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

Won't work, different DGFF cards.

Have you tried asking Dell for a quote on a 2070S/2080S upgrade for your R2?

 

Honestly Dell upgrade prices are insane. It was cheaper for me to get the R2 with 2080S, 10900K, better screen (1080p 144Hz), more RAM, bigger NVME SSD (1TB from 256GB) and since the warranty had expired on the R1, I got warranty too. I had an R1 with 9900 (non k), 2060, 1080p 60Hz display but sold that and paid around $1000 CAD on top for the R2. 2080 for R1 was $1000 USD for the upgrade which was more than what I paid for an entirely new laptop itself.

Dell only sold the upgrade in the US and not in Canada. Had to travel across the border to get the 2080 if I got it through them.

 

I typically get notifications from GeForce Experience on updated drivers. I was under the impression that they sorta worked in tandem for updates. I fully understand getting drivers from Dell in terms of optimizations. From past experience with older laptops, after a certain time(usually end of product life), the laptop manufacturers usually stop issuing updates to graphics drivers way before nVidia ends their support.

 

No i haven't, but judging the price for the upgrade kit for the R1 i thought it would be much cheaper to buy it off ebay or third party
i already bought a vapor chamber
https://www.ebay.com/itm/New-ALIENW...e=STRK:MEBIDX:IT&_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649

Also can any post photo of RTX 2070 OR 2080 super cards, i want to know where the mounting points for the heat sinks are (there's literally no photos of them on the web)

 

Here my 2070 Super I hope it will be useful.

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No special eyewear. I'm fine as long as screens are at their minimum setting or don't go over 20% brightness. I don't get eye strain from looking at screens, and that's probably because the brightness is set pretty low.

Just a note, no I am not viewing my screens in a dark room. It's pretty well lit. I do need sunglasses when going outside to see anything more than 4 feet in front of me on a sunny day however.

I don't think those special blue light filtering glasses actually help. I think eye strain is more a function of brightness than anything else.

 

Did Dell throw this new baby tech down the drain?

Worried About LED, OLED Blue Light Eye Damage? Dell Is

 

This was overhyped, as usual with Dell. Many monitors and TVs have blue light reduction mode, plus one can easily do this in software. Windows has built-in night mode which reduces blue light...

 

Nothing to do..... In the end I succumbed to temptation.
I'm preparing some tests to compare the perfirmance difference from 2933 mhz stock memory.
I'm also thinking about a cpu upgrade (now i have 10700k). It will be possible an upgrate to 10850k? To be sure of compatibility would it be better to put a 10900k?
The standard heatsink should be ok?
Tnx

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@etern4l @Spartan@HIDevolution

Is this the same panel (display) 300Hz that we find in the 51M R2?

The reason i ask is because the contrast ratio is much better then 800:1 but the response time is much slower then the 3ms.

@Spartan@HIDevolution display part number: AU Optronics (AUOBE8E) with part number B173HAN

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Good-...ce-RTX-2080-Super-Laptop-Review.490825.0.html

 

That's the panel i have.

 

Thank you. This is the same part number as @Spartan@HIDevolution and the same part number as the M17 R3 300hz 3ms.

I have found contracdicting information about this panel on the M17 R3 and 51M R2. Some websites says it has a contrast ratio of 1000:1, some like dell says: 800:1 and notebookcheck tested 1253. Same part number. Why the difference?
Also Notebookcheck seems to say that it is much slower then 3ms if my understanding of their test is correct. (i am a rookie with these panel that's why i asked @etern4l help on the subject, he would know,)

 

Hi, first post here.
After reading 222 pages I`m convinced of this machine but there still some questions left


I`m going to replace my 17 R4 (7820HK, GF 1080) with an area 51m R2 next week.

A quiet laptop while gaming in 60 fps is more important for me than highest score in benchmarks, so I`m preferring the 10700K with 2080.
Would I get the same heatsink/vapor chamber stuff as the combination 10900K & 2080?

Are there any reviews that compare the a51m r2 10700k with 10900k temperature wise?
Any news regarding black friday deals (germany)?

I`ve repasted my 17 R4 two times. Is it also necessary with the newer models or is the factory "stamp" allright?

 

I wonder if some of you have discovered/knew that Dell have added an hard power cap in the bios. Looks like Dell's engineers follow same paths as they did with the Alienware 18. @Mr. Fox become darn angry once he saw they screwed him.



Alienware Area-51m R2 performance issues

 

Sounds like the same imbecile that screwed everyone that owned an Alienware 18 had the opportunity to molest this one, too.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

 

Today I took out my old rams and.... I noticed an interesting thing.
I've ordered my laptop with 2x16Gb ddr4 2933 ram memory but.... Take a look at the photo.
Do you note anything strange?
Are these ddr4 3200 ram modules or I'm drunk?
Please note that I can't use 3200 profile also on new Hyperx memory.

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Yes, those are the sloppy loose 3200AA (CL22) JEDEC designed for laptops with no memory performance tuning options.

More importantly than that, those are Samsung modules. They are much better than the low-quality Hynix crap that is so common now.

I'd be happy to take those off your hands if you want to sell them. Drop me a PM.

 

I've read that thread and i'm not sure it's the same i think he may have a bad PSU by the look of it that's tripping out once it hits 250W power draw.

I've certainly not seen this issue either when gaming or doing 3d rendering or even stress testing the system.

It could be a Dell trick but i would of thought the issue would be more widespread.

 

I don't know if that's a limit power cap that caused my 51M R1 to have a similar issue but i have noticed many, many times that the 330W power supply got disabled while still connected to the DC in. The solution was disconnect and reconnect and it came back. At that time i had no idea what could trigger this situation.
I will defenitly test this while gaming and if that's true for my R1 and my soon to be delivered R2 then.....bye bye Alienware.

edit: not sure if i understand the issue correctly but i just ran furmark and occt at the same time. 115watts for the CPU (max) and 200 watts for GPU. 510 watss power supply and no drop in power.
Maybe the issue is with the R2 only and the more powerfull CPU. I don't know.

 

I sincerly hope you are right.

 

I'm not sure I understand this issue.... When I stress test my undervolted CPU (10900K) at max draw 4.9mhz x 10 at 1.35v per core at the same time as my GPU (2080S) maxed out at 2050mhz video clock I only see about 200w with the GPU and about 200w with the CPU. This is banging the CPU off the thermal cut off. Obviously this does not include the rest of the machine and fans etc.... but it does not cut off a power supply or limit anywhere else. I'm not sure how you could even get this machine up to 500w with the thermals. Can you elaborate on this issue please?

 

I'm sorry my friend, unfortunately there is no brilliant answer to your question, since Dell doesn't guarantee that any particular panel will be provided. I wouldn't be worried by this too much, I'm very happy with my 144Hz m15 panel (although I would not game on it extensively, just because of the size).

As for the 3ms response time, I would recommend that for any serious FPS gaming you budget for a 24 inch 1ms panel, a 240Hz+ BenQ TN panel would probably be best - these are used by many CSGO pros for good reasons. 1ms IPS monitors are a joke in my experience.

 

Well guys just beat my previous record and now way ahead at number 1 for my config on the charts. The 2070 super and 10700k in this system is insane. Still have more headroom left to keep going. My cpu is at 5.2ghz all core and 2070 super at +180/+800 for this run.

https://www.3dmark.com/fs/24099876

 

Heck ... I have 10700k delidded with liquid metal, Phobya thermal paste and Gelid thermal pads I cannot go above 4.9ghz because the temperatures become unmanageable. Your cpu is excellent!
My score is obviously lower (position 10 or 11)

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Are you hitting thermal cut off during this bench? And are you maintaining 5.3 through the entire test? If so you definitely hit the lottery.

 

Hello Gentlefolk.

I've been lurking here for the past 70 pages or so considering the purchase of a new ALIENWARE AREA-51M r2. This is a most enlightening and useful place thank you..

I have some questions regarding the build I can afford, which is more of a Jaguar than a Tesla Roadster, and is about half way up the price scale of possibilities for an Area 51m r2 here in November 2020 in the UK.

The build follows, the rational of which is gleaned from this site. Could you set me right if I am/or am not understanding the latest advise put out here on your forum informing this build?

I do play games but not FPS (Elite and a bit of Star Citizen), I also design, render video and 3D models.

---------------------------------------------------------->
NEW ALIENWARE AREA-51M
processor: 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i7 10700K (8-Core, 16MB Cache, 3.8GHz to 5.1GHz w/Turbo Boost Max 3.0)
videocard: NVIDIA® GeForce® RTX 2070 SUPER™ 8GB GDDR6
Screen: 17.3" FHD (1920 x 1080) 360Hz 5ms 300-nits 100% sRGB color gamut + Tobii Eyetracking + NVIDIA G-SYNC
memory: 16GB Dual Channel DDR4 XMP at 3200MHz;
harddrive(s): 1TB (2x 512GB PCIe M.2 SSD) RAID 0 [Boot] + 512GB PCIe M.2 SSD [Storage]
color: Lunar Light

Original Price £3,003.99
Black Friday Discount £2,536.40 = ($3367.73) U.S.
----------------------------------------->

There is a lot to follow but I hope it is useful in some way as a summary of the posts I have been reading here - and my apologies in advance for the many dumb questions contained within,.

Processor:
(i) the fastest that can be afforded, though controlling thermals may be an issue.in a laptop.

-is it preferable to buy the non-adjustable non 'k' version or what value will the K version bring in a laptop which runs pretty hot anyway?

Memory:
(i) Buy the least possible of the Dell low quality 3200 XMP ram to unlock the better mainboard?
(ii) Ram clocks can't be altered in the bios but can be in XTC though they prove hard to stick after re-boot?

-What is the current advise for RAM choice for and what clock ratios and speed can I expect?

Hard-drives:
(i) Buy at least three sticks of NV - SSD so as to unlock the internal chassis part for additional SSD's 3 & 4, which is hard to obtain after market.
(ii) Keep your old bits because Dell have suggested if you put more the a TB in each slot they may refuse to service? (is this madness?)
(iii) Raid setup has pros and cons, the bandwidth is limited by sharing the same 4 PCI lanes, though benefits in wear and tear can be seen as each drive in the RAID 0 array is tasking half the load.

-Will the H.D. caddy be included too, or if not is this purchasable?
-What is the best advise in terms of brands and speeds of NV's?

Graphics:
(i) Not much to say here really, buying the best you can.
(ii) waiting 6 months for the RTX 30x/AW R3 to be released would be advisable if you already have an R1 version?

Screen:
(i) There are some issues with the 4K screen in terms of usability and legibility.

-Is there any benefit in this huge refresh rate of 360hz, should/could I just set it to 240hz (which seems to be it's native rate anyway pre-overclock) and then 60hz if I'm not gaming to save battery life?
-does anyone know the stats, quality of colour and usability and the make model of this new 360hz screen yet?
-can it be under clocked easily and usefully to save battery life?
-is under-clocking of a screen only in multiples of the full clock speed, i.e. 30, 60, 120?
-Is NVidia G-Sync purposeful with this power of G-Card & screen, should I just turn it off?

Finish:
(i) The r2 has solved the discoloration issue with the Lunar version with a new external coating.


After The Build:

Cooling:
(i) Run the machine for a while then consider thermal pads and re-pasting when the machine is run in and understood.
(ii) after the lottery of the silicon, set up thermals for longevity of around 85 degrees for the CPU and 75 for the GPU.
(iii) AWCC is the only software for fan control.

Under-voting:
(i) Use TS for this and never AWCC? (but don't tell Dell?)
(ii) figures of between -40mV and -170mV have proved stable.

Bios:
(i) Dell have locked down the bios, either for technical or commercial purposes?
(ii) this includes thermal throttling of the GPU

-Is there a current best BIOS to run in terms of functionality, or should I just update it fully?

Torbil:
(i) This feature is needed to use Windows Hello

-Has anyone found this a useful feature, and for what?
-Is this just best switched off?

Battery:
(i) Set the battery to start charging at 50% and stop at 80% in the bios, because of some rapid degradation issues which have been noted.

Software maintenance & Bloat:
(i) back-up initially so preserve a original clean boot image.
(ii) backup/re-image periodically because both Dell and Win updates have been causing issues
(ii) There is minimal bloat but remove all packages from Dell apart from AWCC and the update service
(iv) http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...it-slider-in-alienware-command-center.833149/

-is there a current Win build that has proved most stable or should I just update to the latest?

Drivers:
(i) Strip out the initial O/S build of all drivers and reinstall the newest only.
(ii) There is a current driver .zip package available on the forum.
(ii) Install drivers one at a time and reboot each time to ensure they install correctly.


-I hope this summary is in some way useful, please advise if i have misunderstood anything,
-What have I missed here as a potential new owner?
-Is this the best current advise?
-Is this budget build representative the current best thinking on this forum?


Many thanks for your efforts here, and for any advise you may be able to offer in advance.


john

 

At 5.2ghz with a -40 voltage offset Im getting about 90C and maintaining 5.2ghz the entire time. For 24/7 use I settle at 5.0ghz and a -110mv voltage offset.

 

Thanks for your proposal Mr. Fox, for a few days I think I'll continue to test the system then I'll decide whether to keep these Hyperx or not; the XMP 2933 profile is giving me problems maybe due to some higher voltages and a bit '' capricious '' bios that creates big problems with the AWCC fan management when I use XMP.
I think I'll try to manually edit the Jedec profile by copying the parameters of the XMP 2933 profile with Taiphoon Burner. Anyone tried this route?

 

Hey guys,
Not exactly sure when this started.. maybe a couple weeks ago, but AWCC used to run fine, but lately the overclock and thermal tabs under fusion are taking forever to load or not loading at all... I tried uninstalling/reinstalling AWCC and it still have the same issue where the thing just spins and loads forever. Is there a way to fix this?

edit:
I figured it out. Apparently the OC controls became disconnected at some point during an update, so I had to redownload the driver for that and manually install it. I do remember AWCC prompting me again and again to uninstall/install new OC control the past couple weeks which was really weird.

 

Thank you for you answer. I have 144 ips on my 51M R1 and i also appreciate very much the color accuracy but Alienware is exchaning my sytem for a new 51M R2 (for the last time since they will void my warranty in May) and i asked for the 300Hz panel based on what i saw from @Spartan@HIDevolution review. He was impressed by the fluidity and i trust his judement. Also most people on this forum like @ratchetnclank and others seems to be impressed not only by the fast response time but also for the quality ot the colors display and i guess contrast ratio had to be good.
Now the only negative i saw from this panel was the contrast ratio on Dell's website: 800:1. I was wondering if this number on Dell's website was a mistake but don't worry, those are numbers and i will make my own mind when i see it. I will be able to compare with my 144hz and i wil know for sure.

Thanks again brother.

 

Some Question’s about RAM options in the AW 51m r2 (the XMP 3200Mhz Version)

Hello, could anyone offer a little advise about this subject?

What is the best non-Dell RAM upgrade option for this XMP motherboard version?
What clock settings and speeds can be best achieved?
Once this XMP 3200Mhz mainboard version is bought, is it still possible to install slower RAM?
Is it in fact better to install slower ram with better timings?
If this is so, which RAM make and model works best with what results?

Aplgys for the dumb questions here,

Many thanks.

 

Do you already have the first 51m?

If you do, what is it lacking that makes an upgrade worthwhile for you? That too is a pretty powerful machine as it stands.

 

Hello Kylera,

No I do not. I currently have a GPU dead 6 year old Asus G series. ;(

I was summing up some of the main comments I'd read on the forum for other people who are considering purchasing an r2.

Along with further questions I'd like clearing up before I purchase one.

One of those comments I had read was. 'It probably isn't worth upgrading if you already have an r1'.

 

So new articles say the 3000 series will release in January for msi and asus laptops only, with dell and the others releasing in April. I wonder if dell will
Make the 3000 series available to upgrade for the 51m R2. I know they would never want to do this for us but maybe, just maybe they will. I’d hate to have to sell my newer R2 and upgrade to the R3 just to get the 3070 or 3080.

 

Abandon all hope. They want you to fork out for a new laptop.

 

Terrible. I’m sick of selling new laptops every year for cheap prices and purchasing the next unit just for an upgrade. This time it will be even more worth it since the 3000 series will trounce the 2000 series we have in the R2

 

Isn't the eGPU port a viable option for that, for use at home anyway?

 

I heard they aren’t working with the 3000 series

 

Well, the more compelling the tech, the higher the chance people will cough up for an upgrade.

 

Funny you should mention that, because it seems Dell thought about that and decided to cut support for 3000 series in the AGA, and actually EOL the product. No replacement is planned. Check out the AGA user's lounge.
One could still use a TB3 eGPU, but that's apparently quite a bit less efficient, especially at FHD.

 

yep, corporate greed at its finest. I’ve screwed over these large corporations plenty of times so I always keep a even playing field with them. My R1 was completely free for me, thanks to Frank Azor. So I don’t feel as bad when I have to upgrade yearly lol

 

Just don't upgrade every year if you are sick of paying for it?

Honestly the year on year difference between specs isn't a worthwhile upgrade unless you have the money to waste in which case do whatever makes you happy.

Also from the leaks so far the mobile parts for 3000 series don't look to be anything special and might only be 2080ti level performance at best.

 

2080ti performance a giant step up from the mobile 2080 super. This is also the worst case scenario for performance.

 

Between 2080 and 2080s it certainly wasn't, the 3080 will be a much more worthwhile upgrade. Dell comes up with these "360Hz display" marketing gimmicks and hefty coupons to push the 2000 series stock for a reason.

 

2080Ti vs 2080 super is about 15% more while gaming when we compare desktop GPU.
Not a giant step in my opinion.
In this review they expect a decent perormance increase over the rtx 2080 super mobile ( the 2080 super mobile varies between 150,160,170,180,190 and 200wats) considering area 51mr2 uses the 200watts version the difference should be less.
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Leake...fast-as-the-desktop-counterpart.496441.0.html
They expect less performance from the 3070 (laptop) compare to the desktop 2080 Ti.

 

I think the 30xx series of GTX will show the limitiation of what our laptops vs what desktops can achieve. Even area 51m and Clevo won't be able to compete with the desktop versions of the cards. Not even sure 3080 will ever make it to our laptops in it's original TGP 320watts.
https://www.notebookcheck.net/The-G...ll-this-mean-for-gaming-laptops.492840.0.html

 

15% improvement between a lap 2080 and desk 2080Ti (the number definitely looks too low) would be about 3x more than the improvement between 2080 and 2080s

Not the greatest analysis IMHO. There've been better ones, where people actually benched the desktop cards with different power limits. This demonstrated the well known effect of diminishing returns on extra power, and laptops should not be far off the sweet spot.

 

15% between 2080S vs 2080TI Desktop. For laptops it's +38% but.....Alienware and Clevo uses the more powerfull laptop version ( TGP 200watts) so i guees it would be less then 38% if we compara a 2080TI desktop and 2080S from alienware or Clevo.
I agree the 2080S is not an improvment over the 2080, but it seems to be running cooler (maybe it's related to the vapor chamber Heatsink), i will soon test and post results.

Ok i just saw the post i think you are refering to It makes sense. Even at 200watts the 3080 would only loose 10-15% in performance wich would make it an enormous improvment over the 2080S laptop.
edit: Now i just saw another post (rumor) that laptop version of 3070 and 3080 should have very low TGP and slower DDR6.....hum.....i don't know anymore.

 

Well, Detective @Normimb , I guess we will see exactly what kind of performance bump we get from this "greatest generational update in history", but my money is on this being an actually significant upgrade, unlike the Super revision. Certainly, we are talking about internal architecture change and fab process improvement, rather than a minor tweak.

Yep, the R2 has better cooling defo temps are lower

 

For sure we will see more than the super "upgrade". If it would be worth upgrading from a R2 to R3 in terms of monetary value though is another matter.