*OFFICIAL* Alienware Area-51M R1 Owner's Lounge

Thnx a lot.. will go for replacement

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I am big time confused this is issue is not there when i am playing farcry 5..bf3..doom..xplanes 11..metro 2033 redux..metro last light redux..ghost recon wildlands.. but its there when i am on bf5 and metro... what u think may it be?

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You should thank them for their service.
Generally Samsung EVO series are incompatible with AW configs, only SM/PM series work w/o issues even though they are same as evo or pro with retail firmware. There's alternatives though ADATA SX8200, WD Black etc... You can go for 960/970 pro as well.

 

Really? I was thinking of replacing the 1TB SSHD with a 2TB 860 EVO/ QVO. I thought a few people here were running 860 EVO without a problem? Hmmm.

 

I have a 1TB 970 Pro in the White A51M and a 1TB 970 EVO Plus in the Black A51M... both work perfectly...

I've used only Samsung m.2's in all my AW laptops from new to old gen... Either PM, SM 800 series or 900 series SSD...

Don't always believe what you hear.

 

240 Hz screen for Alienware Area-51m not coming until next year but there are plenty of other options

Yeah, the way it goes when the designers prefer design over functionality...


Beyond that considerable selection, there’s even a choice over at Dell for die-hard Alienware fans who desperately want a laptop from this particular brand that can manage 240 Hz. The Alienware m15 thin and light gaming laptop comes in a wide choice of SKUs with different panel options, which include both OLED and 240 Hz screens.

 

They are somewhat right.. i have samsung 860 evo 2tb.. all works fine..except in seld test or esa diagnostics.. it returns an error "drive xyz s/n numberxxxxx could not be tested as command was rejected "
Except this it works fine

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I don't understand why you'd want more than 144hz... I'm a bit of a noob with refresh rate because I've only ever had 60hz until this machine- but won't you only enjoy 240hz properly if you have FPS range in the 200 area?

 

Try 960/970 EVO some don't play well with AW BIOS but works wonderfully in their desktops and laptops. Some set of FW versions caused Watchdog timer,IRQ_NOT_EQUAL issues etc.. People just returned EVO for a Pro.

 

People want more options than 144hz@1080p or 60hz@4K panel. Some of the new 240hz screens is mentioned to be damn good.

A smart move force people to upgrade the whole machine...

 

As nice as 240hz sounds for bragging rights, most games even at FHD resolution cannot reach 240FPS so I am with you on this. What' the point?

 

Check if you're using RAID?

 

I agree, it is pointless unless you only play fortnite or overwatch, which I guess many do. But if you are playing the latest games, even at 1080P on max settings, you won’t even make it to 144. If you like dragging white windows across your black desktop, 240 will be better for you as well lol


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I have 1x970 Pro 1TB as my SSD1 and 1x960 Pro 2TB as my SSD2. I have a Samsung 860 Evo 4TB as my Sata drive. So far no problems. AFAIK, the SATA protocol is set and the motherboard doesn't know what's behind that connector as long as it is compatible with the protocol. The basic data read/write functionalities are what matter the most to many people. Doesn't really matter if one is testing a drive and it doesn't "pass". Big deal as long as it does what it is supposed to do.

 

That and the 240hz panels are TN panels. The 144 is IPS so in reality it’s a better choice for context creators, photographers and gamers even. I’ll take a 144hz IPS over. 240 TN panel any day of the week.

 

2.5" works, its those m.2 2280 and some FW issue that causes issues and at the same time it works on other laptops/desktops.

 

Maybe there is something we don't know. The SSD works just fine for me too. @Vasudev, can you give us more information about why it's incompatible with AW?

 

I agree. I've been using a 860 Evo 2.5" on my M17xR3 since 2012, haven't had a single issue over the years.

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I own the 960 and 970 Evo as well... They all woke perfectly fine. Zero issues.

There are no issues. We should nip this at the bud before it spreads lol.

I own a wide range of ssd's... All Samsung work perfectly fine. There are no issues. None.

 

Just watch someone over at Reddit now claiming that *all* Samsungs SSDs won't work properly with a Area 51m. Another, 2060 side vent debacle coming up.

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2.5" drives aren't affected even 830/850/850 works fine! No issues aside from some samsung magician versions.

I did see a few 960/970 evo fail mysteriously with watchdog or timer issues and even Samsung NVMe drivers. It was long back, I don't even remember their names. Maybe it was a bad batch. Or something else.
People usually choose Pro, so most issues are non-existent.

 

All I have in my laptop are Samsung SSDs.

2x 2TB Samsung 960 PRO [RAID 0] + 4TB Samsung 860 EVO + 2TB Samsung Portable SSD T5

 

I don't know exact reason, some say reverting to old BIOS fixed it or upgrading to latest BIOS and SSD firmware through USB fixed partially, some even returned the drives and got replacements that had no issues like previous drives. Some of them switched to WD Black altogether just because their spec sheets and test says the drive was tested on Alienwares.

 

Then don't spread FUD without solid proof and facts!

 

Let me check that, I should've bookmarked them. Let me phrase a correct query on Google or Bing, I might stumble into correct answers.

 

Let me help you, bruh Dell pushed out bios update 1.3.0 (Improved the compatibility of storage devices).

 

So they quietly washed their hands off the mess they created?

 

Ahem, they're still doing this with the 51M's going up in smoke but this time within the hardware as someone pointed out a few pages before - they're quietly soldering beefier VRM chips on the PCB.

I'm still waiting for an official statement that the 51M is now safe to order but that will probably never come.

 

I didn't have any issues with my PM981 (970 Evo) and my laptop shipped with 1.2.0.

 

PM and SM series along with few Toshiba, SK Hynix, Lite-on are listed as compatible parts in their spec sheet.
I haven't check the FW version for PM and 970 evo! Are they same or do they differ?

 

Same here : I have 2 M2 970 EVO and a 860 EVO (2.5") and they all work flawlessly. They are WAY cooler than in the 17R4 BTW.

 

They likely have different firmware revisions, but not sure why one would work and not the other. I take spec sheets with a grain of sand because they aren't going to test every component. That's the beauty of standards, I haven't ever had an issue running a NVMe SSD in any of my laptops (that support NVMe that is). When I started with computers 20 years ago, things were much much much more difficult when it came to compatibility...

 

Remember the days when we had to ensure that one hardware device was not using the same IRQ port which is used by another?

 

This ssd is classified as OEM drives. All of those variants will have fully support from all notebook ODM. Special created for this use. Many offer support for more ssd’s with coming bios updates. This is quite normal procedure.

 

I will disagree with some and say that the thin border on the 51m does help to "sell" the device. the 15m gets some grief for not having narrow enough borders just to give you an idea of how much narrow bezels are preferred. The XPS 15 went so far as to mount the camera on the bottom just to keep those thin bezels. And that model sold like hotcakes even though the bottom camera placement was horrible (imo). So it will take vendors a bit of time to catch up with thin panels on 17.3" models. It really is the "way of the future" if you think about it. 15.6" panels that went thin became replacements for ultrabooks at 13.3 and 14. What you will see now is that thin 17.3 will be preferable to 15.6 with normal bezels. My $0.02 is that the 51m went thicker for better cooling and thin bezels to keep the frame from visually appearing too huge. I really think if you didn't have those things it wouldn't be hitting all the same bells with customers. As it is, people are searching for larger bags to fit it into. If you added another inch (.5 on each side) to the width I don't think it would be nice a machine. Others will disagree. I heavily suspect that once panel vendors start making more models of "thin" 17.3 panels you will see it adopted by a lot more notebooks out there.

My true remorse is that Samsung display didn't give us a 17.3" OLED panel to go with the 15.6, 14 and 13.3 they introduced this year. If the 51m had come even with a 60 OLED with the natural low response times and super quality of a OLED picture, I suspect we'd have had a nearly perfect machine. Mind you 120 would be pretty easy in an OLED panel as well, but what most people are after with high refresh is a very, very low pixel response time (visually seen as smear). Some of that is cured with faster FPS, but 75% of it is simply that in making a fast LCD panel they are decreasing the pixel response times to attain that refresh rate and thus you get a high Hz panel as a result. Most people who look at OLED@60 are going to see a better picture than LCD@120. Now OLED@120 is going to be pretty much nirvana, so there is a value in 120, don't get me wrong. But fast response times, naturally high quality HDR, and wide color palette make OLED really fantastic on a laptop. You might lose battery efficiency (remains to be seen if that's improved), but who'd care on something like the 51m?

Lastly no one has seemingly noticed that Samsung drives consume a lot of power compared to other SSD's. Their speed is legendary for sure. But in a notebook factor some of the power consumption builds heat and some of it may be more than what some connections intended for a M2 drive to consume. Just bear that in mind because it may "work" but the power consumption and heat will be a price to pay. Drives using the https://www.anandtech.com/show/13131/the-silicon-motion-sm2262en-ssd-controller-preview Silicon motion controller use 1/100th of the power and generate very nearly the same speeds (practically no difference in the real world). They therefore generate less heat as well. I won't argue with the huge popularity of Samsung drives. I have a few myself. Just in tight locations where heat is going to impact the lifespan of the drive I tend to favor lower power consuming drives these days because in my real world comparing I could see little to no difference in every day usage. Just a thought to consider.

 

They don't have to support the individual drive, they have to support the protocol. I've owned many many many laptops and never had any issues running "non-OEM" drives. I just happened to have a spare PM981 that I ran in the 51M along with a SX8200...

 

The Area-51 should be receiving a 4K 120Hz display later this year. That should provide another option. Honestly I'll probably have to find a way to source the display assembly. That display will be amazing (hoping).

Unfortunately I'm assuming even the latest windows insider build still has DPI issues? @Ultra Male


As for the Samsung SSDs, I use strictly Samsung and never had issues...

AW13 R3, AW 17 R4, AW 17 R5, AW m15, AW Area-51m.

 

4k 120Hz is only possible if they a) cut down the quality a lot to save bandwith b) HDMI 2.1 comes out

 

1) Tagging me doesn't work as I've disabled tag notifications due to people abusing it. To draw my attention to something, you can quote me in any post that I've made. But I did see this one accidentally so I'll answer.

2) No, the DPI Scaling issues are the same. I don't know if you remember but @custom90gt does, I've owned a Dell XPS 15 9570 last 3 weeks and loved it and loved the clarity of its 4K glossy screen but I returned it to get the Alienware Area-51m but here's the thing, many programs did scale well but the ones that didn't were awful, stuff like VLC Media Player didn't scale well, the buttons were all small until I manually set the DPI scaling in the EXE of the app Properties to System (Enhanced). Dude even Windows' own Windows Media Player doesn't scale well, the buttons are all small like they didn't scale. Pathetic really. So no sir, not getting a 4K screen again unless I was buying a MacBook since those scale perfectly.

 

I'm going to bet by Christmas and the next CES you will hear everyone under the sun talking HDMI 2.1. Receiver vendors are already trying to sort out what models can handle eARC with just a firmware update. eARC is a big shift, possibly alleviating many of the issues people have with driving multi channel sound over HDMI 2.0a/b. But more than that you will start to see monitor vendors (think AW's 55" OLED which is already set to carry 2.1) start to tout the abilities of a single HDMI cable to carry both sound to multi channel systems as well as 120+ signals to gaming monitors. HDMI 2.1 would allow the 5120x2160 resolution to actually operate at high speed and high resolution and color depth over an HDMI connection for example. Right now that can only be done with DP 1.4.

And for those people here with 51m's in hand, please note that you are likely to be lucky enough to upgrade when this comes out as HDMI is attached directly to the RTX board in the 51m. I'd suspect that if they do an "upgrade" card end of this year or early next, you'd see HDMI 2.1 on the feature list. That would toe in well with offering you the 55" OLED monitor to enjoy it with.

 

Always will be an upgrade..this is the market!

 

Ultramale while each person's affinity for high resolution screens varies, and there certainly is no good spending money on a feature you don't really want, I do happen to have several very high DPI screens and have them alongside monitors of lower 110 area DPI. The quality of small text (if you work in a lot of spreadsheets, powerpoints and such) on a high DPI screen is really night and day. Some of us work the business world by day and game by night. And there is a huge use to high DPI screens in many cases. So I don't want to invalidate your thoughts, only share that they are extremely nice for certain things and the scaling is getting better with every program that builds with high DPI in mind. Oracle Cloud deals with high resolution screens pretty well now as a business example. Older Oracle didn't do as well. I think Media player was ignored because they moved to Groove. I also use VLC so I'm not saying Groove is "the way" I just think that media player lost attention due to a shift in business direction rather than being a good example of scaling being ignored. Many programs need scaling attention, to be sure.

But the 4K OLED panel coming for 15.6 machines from Dell, HP and Lenovo is going to really be quite good if you can live with the scaling. Whether you can live with it is really up to what programs you are using day to day. 2 years ago scaling impacted 50% of the programs in normal use. Today I think it's less than 25%. But users choices will vary of course as you say.

 

MADE A SMALL VIDEO FOR SHOWING PERFORMANCE IN GAMES...

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The new 240hz panels by sharp (in the new Asus and Razer laptops) ARE NOT TN. The 17in in the AW51m will also not be a TN. Welcome to the future.

 

you've got it all figured out d00d

 

240Hz on Razer Blade 15 is ips (Confirmed by Min himself), other laptops that use this 240Hz would be also ips i believe.

 

Ok guys, I have a couple of questions (as per usual heh): So I'm still fighting the battle of thermals. When I set video options in a game to max (games such as Arma 3, Warhammer Total War, No Man's Sky, Elex) I will, after about 15 minute of play, often be in the high 80s low 90s on the CPU, and high 70s to mid 80s on the GPU (with occasional spike much higher on both). I have repasted with grizzly Kryonaut using the spread method and now the X method. My idle temps are typically 35c CPU and 30c GPU (much lower than before using Kryonaut and X method). However, my high temps while gaming a relatively short time are concerning me.

I have the 9900k and RTX 2080
Ambient temps are about 73F in the room I'm in

Things I have yet to do: Undervolting CPU and GPU and using new thermal pads (the ones that came with this thing are falling apart on the CPU side). So, my questions:

1. What thermal pads do you guys recommend on this thing? Sizes and thickness as well please.
2. Does anyone know of a really good guide for undervolting CPU and RTX 2080? I've been told that Intel MSU is great for undervolting the CPU, and that I should start with a -100 offset and work down from there. That much I can do but I would still like a guide just in case. And I'm at a loss for which program/method I should use for undervolting GPU (I've actually never undervolted before).

Any help is, as always, much appreciated!

P.S. Am I rather screwed on gaming on Ultra settings with those temps currently?

 

I’m on mobile, so can’t go linking... but just wanted to reassure a fellow 51m owner - you desperately need to undervolt; but once you do your temps will drop a bunch. A -100mv UV is almost a guaranteed drop of 7+ C.

 

How is dlss enable on fhd?

 

Haha, well, I can assure you that your reassurance is appreciated. I've got experience with quite a bit, but undervolting is an area I'm admittedly inexperienced. Glad to hear again that my worries are not unfounded. I know that you are on mobile, but if you get a chance later to link to something you know is good, I would truly appreciate it. Especially when it comes to that GPU- That things temps frighten me, and this is the second GPU from Dell o_0, so I'm a little extra paranoid.