*OFFICIAL* Alienware Area-51M R2 Owner's Lounge

Hello,
I recommend you also disconnect tobii eye tracker cable inside the laptop and test your trackpad after see if it helps (it is very easy to acces that cable, near the wi-fi card) . Also i recommend you desatived the tobii services.«Tobii runtime services».
I had trackpad issue with my R1 when i first got it and it is what it did to solve the problem.

 

Hello Marvin, i can also confirm that i had a lot of iupsaclling ssues with 4k oled panel i had on my previous m15R2. Some programs would open to small and i was never able to find and easy solution to fix it other then running the laptop a 1440p or lower resolution like 2 or 3k but not 4k.

 

I'm good thanks, counting down the days to Cyberpunk 2077 and the next HZD patch .

I've not had any scaling issues like mentioned above and I use quite a variety of different software, however i do set it at 150% rather than the default 200/250?, as I prefer smaller windows and task bar etc.

However if your routinely playing anything above 60 FPS and relying upon a faster response time in a competitive PvP game you almost certainly need the FHD screen at 144 or 300Hz.

 

Thank you all for replying.

That is what I suspected; more ammo talking to Dell Support.

A simple test for the two finger scrolling is, (1) Enable Tobii - it doesn't matter what features you have enabled or not, (2) Open Windows Explorer in a folder that has many items (C:\Windows), and (3) try two-finger scrolling; for me scrolling doesn't really occur: the last file in the view gets highlighted and it just jumps from being the last item in the view to the 3rd from bottom.

Here is a video of the problem:

Pinch and rotate drive me mad too! I have them off too.

That is the only feature I like with Tobii but that is not the erratic movement I was referring to. I made this video to show you:

Just disabling it in the Tobii Experience solves the problem; I didn't need to go through such extreme measures but thanks for your input.

 

I had this problem from an Area-51m R2 laptop I bought via HIDevolution. The constant disk sounds + mouse move sound was super annoying (especially at night when it was quiet), but I also discovered that the Unigine Heaven benchmark really amped my coil whine noise up to 11. I might have just lived with it until I discovered that the Heaven benchmark and some other games push it from irritating to unacceptable. My laptop is currently back with HID awaiting a replacement GPU from Dell.

I tried undervolting the GPU - which made is slightly better - but it seemed to be a bit more complex than just a direct power -> noise relationship. It may be worth downloading the Heaven benchmark to see how that goes, as it's definitely unacceptable for a laptop with this price to have these issues. I checked Dell's website and it seems like a few other people have complained - hopefully it's not a common fault.

 

I noticed no one talked about the 2933MHz RAM sticks except:

My first R2 was configured with the 3200MHz RAM which came with the Kingston XCCT36-MIE.
My second R2 was configured with the 2933MHz RAM which came with Samsung M471A1K43DB1-CWE. These sticks support JEDEC:

• DDR4-3200 CL22-22-22 @1.2V
• DDR4-2933 CL21-21-21 @1.2V
• DDR4-2666 CL19-19-19 @1.2V
• and some others

I wonder why they run at 2933MHz though.

I also managed to swap the RAM sticks with 64GBs of the Kingston HyperX 2933 CL17 (KHX2933C17S4/32G) which appears to have had a measurable impact on the CPU score in Time Spy.
With OC Off, O1, and O2, the CPU score increased by 7.35%, 8.06%, and 8.73% respectively. Not sure how much of that is due to RAM increase and how much is due to the better CAS latency.

 

Nice score improvement, it is entirely due to latency. Thanks for another data point supporting the obvious: Dell saves pennies supplying absolutely reprehensible RAM in their enthusiast systems, priced ever more exorbitantly. Perhaps less obviously, can't go wrong with HyperX in AW laptops.

 

You know what makes no sense? HyperX's 8GB stick (HX429S17IB2/8) and the Samsung 8GB stick (M471A1K43DB1-CWE) cost the same; in the ballpark of $30 in wholesale; at most $2 per stick difference.

• It cannot be for financial reasons as the prices for the two types of RAM are practically the same. Even if we assume there is $5 difference, $10 for two sticks, and Dell projects that they will sell 50,000 devices, it would cost them $500,000 in their margin. But on the other hand, they give 17% discounts and alike, which is about $600 per device. During all the promotions that they run around the world, if only 850 machines are sold, they loose $510,000 on their margin.
• It cannot be contractual since Dell already ships the other comparably lousy Kingston RAM; they already have a relationship with Kingston.
• It cannot be stock-based as the manufacture dates on these RAMs point to mid-may and Dell builds tens of thousands of office-laptops annually to dump the crappy RAMs on.
  
• It cannot be incompetence because these decisions are not made by one or two people. There would be tens if not more involved and I refuse to believe that they don't have at least one competent person on their team who turned to others and said we can gain 8% performance (exaggerated) using this equally priced RAM.
• QA impositions cannot be a factor since they check what they are told to check. However, miscommunication can play a role but not year after year, device after device!
  
• Corruption?

Did I miss anything?

 

The only thing I would think of is compatibility/stability.

 

I'm not sure how precise your pricing info can be, considering you are presumably not privy to the particular deals they have. I'm sure @Papusan will be more than happy to point you numerous examples of Dell shaving off pennies on inferior hardware. To me this is one of the many indicators of the corporate culture there, in addition to their communications (including misleading marketing), the relentless push for thinner and lighter regardless of other considerations, not to mention my favourite: soldered RAM in an enthusiast/gaming laptop.

I very much doubt it. HyperX Impact is universally recognised as rock solid and broadly compatible memory. Case in point: it even works fine with Alienware Area 51M!!!!

 

Its for none of those reason. It's for supply chain reasons it's always supply chain, samsung or whoever will guarantee x amount of sticks for x months at x cost. Which will be shared across a number of models.

 

Of course supply chain. However, working for a company equal in size and volume to Dell's, we spec out what we want and vendors bid for it. Vendors even change their production focus based on our requirements; we don't bend to what they can provide specifically because we want to have the best offering for our customers. If supply chain is really the reason, it boils down to Dell's lack of desire to put forward the best they can.

 

A question about RAM for R2. Does any 3200 MHz ram work on this laptop or has to be a specific one that dell uses? I was wondering if I can use HyperX 3200 MHz ram on this machine.

 

Order it from Dell if you want it to just work out of the box. You can try aftermarket ram although be prepared to have to try multiple brands before finding something that works. So far I think Crucial Ballistix DDR4-3200 CL16 was confirmed not stable. HyperX DDR4-2933 CL17 works, not sure about their DDR4-3200 CL20.

 

The only reason I did could not get RAM directly from Dell is because I got an amazing deal from Dell for this laptop and there was no ram selection available during purchase. Also I do not want to pay dell inflated prices for their ram after purchase. Have been a longtime fan of HyperX memory.

 

I'd get the 3200 or 2933 HyperX, whichever is cheaper. Worst case scenario the 3200 will fall back to 2933 CL17. Or you can get the more expensive slow value RAM from Dell, and reward their reprehensible business practice.

 

	HyperX DDR4-3200 KHX3200C20S4/16GX	HyperX DDR4-2933 KHX2933C17S4/16G	Stock DDR4-2933 (originally 3200) M471A1K43DB1-CWE
Profiles	• JEDEC/PnP: DDR4-3200 CL20-22-22 @1.2V • XMP Profile #1: DDR4-3200 CL20-22-22 @1.2V • XMP Profile #2: DDR4-2933 CL17-19-19 @1.2V	• JEDEC/PnP: DDR4-2933 CL17-19-19 @1.2V • XMP Profile #1: DDR4-2933 CL17-19-19 @1.2V • XMP Profile #2: DDR4-2666 CL16-18-18 @1.2V	• JEDEC/PnP: DDR4-2933 CL21-21-21 @1.2V
Latency	30ns	35ns	42ns
Read speed	17.4 GB/s	17.0 GB/s	16.0 GB/s
Write speed	14.3 GB/s	13.7 GB/s	8.6 GB/s
PassMark	3355	3231	2600
Cost	$84.99	$78.99

Don't have stats for stock 3200Mhz XCCT36-MIE.

The 2933MHz costs 7% less, and has 2.3% slower reads and 4.2% slower writes; I am running this.
Someone had already tried the 2933MHz ones and I figured I would play it safe; they had 30% off which made the choice for me.
Also, something like this scared me: https://www.dell.com/community/Alie...M-to-be-able-to-clock-to-2933MHz/td-p/7580405

Dell's DDR4-3200 SNPWTHG4C/16G will cost $187.99

https://www.memorybenchmark.net/ram.php?id=12056
https://www.memorybenchmark.net/ram.php?id=12965
https://www.memorybenchmark.net/ram.php?id=14589
https://www.kingston.com/dataSheets/HX432S20IB_16.pdf
https://www.kingston.com/dataSheets/HX429S17IB_16.pdf

PS, not sure what all that whitespace above is for!

 

Here in Canada, the prices for 16GB modules are:
HyperX 2933MHz: $135
HyperX 3200MHz: $119.99

I am not even kidding. 3200MHz is cheaper here. Oddly its cheaper to just get two single sticks rather than a combo as the price is much higher if I go for a combo.

 

I think those are Amazon.ca prices; they probably have a deal on the 3200MHz right now.
3200MHz: https://ca.camelcamelcamel.com/product/B07BGL6493
2933MHz: https://ca.camelcamelcamel.com/product/B07BGLZL9X

I bought mine directly from HyperX: https://www.hyperxgaming.com/united...eed=3200MHz&Module Capacity=32GB&Kit=Kit of 2
Scroll all the way down and see if it gives you an option to buy from them because the prices are better than Amazon's.

 

I've noticed the 3200 being cheaper on Amazon UK at one point too. Must be a demand / surge pricing phenomenon.

 

sorry maybe it's a question that has already been answered I'm about to take the 10900k, rtx 2080 and 17 inch 4k model, but if I have to go out only to work and not play can I bring only a power supply? and are they identical? i have problems working only with the cpu? and in any case this laptop can manage the gpu inside the cpu?
thank you

 

You can use one psu, it just limits the power to the cpu and gpu So it will run in gimp mode basically.

 

ok thanks .. according to you to work in editing video graphics etc. which processor is better to insert? Its ok the 10900k it gets too hot?

 

Which NLE do you use?

 

what is NLE?

 

https://www.vegascreativesoftware.com/us/video-editing/non-linear-editing-nle/

Non Linear Editing, as in modern computer based audio or video editing via a dedicated workstation. If doing any editing do you use specific software for a specific role? This would enable some of the gurus on here to better advise on the impact of any difference in CPU, likely as different programs will utilise the CPU and GPU (if at all even in some cases) to varying degrees.

 

I had a few questions about the Area 51m R2:
1. What is the model number for the Area 51m R2 M.2 Heatsink? If aftermarket heatsinks are compatible, can someone suggest which ones?
2. Is there any reduction in PCIe lanes to M.2 SSDs or reduced speeds if I have 2 installed in the system. I have an extra 1TB NVMe 1TB SSD and a 1TB is coming with my new laptop as well.

 

I do not know what the part number for the heatsink is, but it can differ depending on what GPU you selected, and if you order with the K series CPU you get a heatsink with a vapor chamber on the CPU side.

For the SSD, each gets its own 4x PCIe 3.0, but all are connected via the PCH and share the DMI link bandwidth between the CPU. It should not be an issue unless you are trying to read or write to both SSD's at the same time.

 

Sorry my bad. I was checking in on the heatsink for the M.2 SSDs. I am getting the model with RTX 2080 Super and 10900k. So I am getting the best heatsink they have for now for those components.

 

All I can add is that I only got supplied a heat sink for the 1 NVME drive that I ordered the system with (no additional one fitted in a spare port), which is very basic and no more than a standard plate. The additional Samsung evo drive i ordered separately i attached the following heatsink to, due to its low profile and through testing found it helped by roughly 5-7°. It comes as a pair and has its own thermal pads, though purchasing better quality pads and removing the drive outer sticker (so to optimise heat conduction between the drive and pad - marginal i know) no doubt would make further gains.

Of course not the best out there, however cheap, a quick win, compatible to the available space and id say better than stock.

I'd probably should also replace the stock heatsink, however its firmly placed and I don't want to risk damage unnecessarily and of course keep things simple should it go in for repair. Regardless the gains here are minimal.

I'll be more interested if the Graphics Amp can take a 3080 effectively without too much bottleneck, no doubt a brave soul on the official forum for that will try shortly.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07K9MF25F/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_awdb_imm_t1_hl8xFbZVR4ZCD

 

be careful .. I had it and the rubber bands came off with the heat

 

Hello,
I'm trying to play with the audio settings in the ACC but nothing change.
Do you hear any change when playing with the equalizer or audio effects? Am i deaf?

For info, i just reinstalled the audio driver and Realtek console but with no luck.

 

Uninstalling the Realtek Audio Console gave me back the real Alienware Effects back!

 

Thanks, that worked

 

For those of you who have a Western Digital SSD, W estern Digital SSD Dashboard v3.0.2.37 released . Can see drives even in RAID mode and can update firmware and enhance performance:





It's sad that Samsung Magician even in this day and age where many laptops are sold in a RAID setup still cannot even detect the SSD if it's in RAID.

 

@Superbibi56 , @Spartan@HIDevolution
Guys next time you face this issue, no need to reinstall realtek audio driver (sometimes it doesnt fix the issue)
You just need to enable audio enhancement in windows 10.

 

That was already enabled for me by default but it seems the Realtek Audio Console kinda takes over the AWCC enhancements to uninstalling it helps make the effects from AWCC work

 

Replace them with viton orings with the same diameter and section, viton is stable at temps in the -26°C to +205°/230°C (-15°F to +400°/440°F) range, wont break again due to heat, or vibration in fact, and for that size they will cost something like 1$ each, just dont buy from eBay because you will get buna-N(rated to 85ºC if that) sold as viton.

 

Maybe it's a different issue with this software: audio realtek console.
Personally i never installed this software on my system but i have experience the same issue many times (no audio effects in awcc) for many different alienware system. (R3,R4, M15R2,51m). I am very confident that this sofware, might just disable audio sound enhancement in windows wich should be the source of the problem. Next time it happens it would be interesting to just verify if this is sill activated.

 

hi guys, on this z490 chipset is there a real advantage to create a raid 0 of m2?
is there a tight limit on the z490 chipset?
would it be useful to use the new M2 pciexpress 4-0 or not useful? I was thinking of the new m2 rocket sabrents ..
(for area 51m r2)

 

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/201834/intel-z490-chipset.html

Its still limited to a 4 lane interface between the CPU and the chipset, so RAID0 will end up just being bottlenecked by the chipset interface with the CPU, and you get worse 4k random speeds, just go for a fast single NVMe.

 

tks Senso..
can you recommend a new model? and example the sabrent?
or don't need the new x4?

 

Given that the Z490 chipset is still "only" PCIe 3.0, a PCI4.0 based NVMe SSD is a waste for now, because your system wont be able to make full usage of it(but it should still be faster since in theory a PCIe 4.0 drive should be able to saturate the PCIe3.0 interface, but if you want you can then use that disk in a new laptop.

For now PCIe4.0 NVMe controllers are more or less just regular PCIe3.0 controllers with the new interface bolted in, as in, better drives will be launched in the future(like the announced new Samsung 980).

 

They say no real advantage. I personally tell the snappiness in windows and the programs i use running in RAID 0. I like having one big volume and one drive letter personally instead of multiple letters. Plus the drives tend to run a tad cooler as it is balancing the workload between the 2. I don't care about redundancy that people always complain you loose with raid 0. One i have had a nvme drive die on me yet and ive been using them for years. I also have multiple and redundant backups all the time of important stuff so doesn't matter.

 

. Then when you couple it with this, there is nothing to fear:

The best and fastest way to backup your data!

And

Macrium Reflect Usage Guide:




Here is how to create a bootable Flash Drive and partition it to have a single USB Stick containing both the Macrium Reflect Rescue Disk and a Backup Image partition in that rescue disk itself. So if you have a large/fast USB Flash Drive, you can use it to both boot into the Macrium Reflect program without installing and use its second partition to create a backup image of your computer



What I usually do when I buy a new computer, the moment I turn it on and before even getting into the Windows setup wizard I boot straight away to the Macrium Reflect Rescue Disk, create a full backup of the local disk including all its partitions. That way I always have a backup of the untouched factory image should I ever need it in case I changed my SSD later or had an issue that prevents me to use the local restore option

 

Hello dear friends, My new r2 team arrived and I am seeing this, is it normal?

https://ibb.co/y5zfqhJ

 

They forgot to adjust the heatsink on the cpu and gpu


The temperatures work normal

 

Can anyone share the vbios of the 2070 Super of Alienware Area-51m R2 please?

 

Does anyone know what exactly do I need to add a second NVME SSD?

1. I know we need a SSD Bracket: 3N3W3
2. Thermal Pad: https://www.amazon.ca/Packs-GLOTREN...jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==

Dell is trying to sell me something called Thermal Grease for $2.99 and Thermal Shelf for $64.99. What the heck is a thermal shelf?

Also is there any disadvantage in running the 2 NVMEs on this laptop. Not in RAID 0. Just 2 separate drives.

 

Circuit, how much is Dell asking for the ssd bracket: 3N3W3? Thanks