*OFFICIAL* Alienware X Series Owners Lounge and Discussion

I agree constructive feedback is good. Read back through my posts and that is exactly what I’ve been saying throughout. The sarcastic negativity however doesn’t add anything to the conversation.

If you insinuate that I fall into the trap of taking feedback personally then you obviously haven’t been reading my posts properly. Like I said previously I’ve had a bad experience so far with the X17 with 2 laptops received that have been damaged and came with other issues that I sent back. If anything I should be joining in with you making sarcastic, negative remarks. However this doesn’t add anything to the conversation which is why I haven’t.

End of the day you think you’re right and I think I’m right. The moderators have obviously had enough due to them deleting various comments from both of us, as I’m sure the rest of the people on this thread have had enough as well and would rather talk about the laptop.

 

What frequency should we run to get into Gear 1 mode?
I don’t understand why x16 modules should be faster than x8 ones (with same frequency and timings I mean).

 

x8 modules are faster, x16 should be avoided in any case and are significantly slower. Gear1 could be only activated in the bios, but this option does not exist in the X17 bios. So we are stuck with gear 2 mode.

 

So I guess we can only wait for an hypothetical BIOS update from Dell.

 

Great info, thanks for the reassurance on the X17.

 

Well this is concerning. My temps were at 23C ambient. Here is an updated video getting draw from the wall too.

You think LM will help with this issue?

Any change that the load I am putting on it is unusually high. Wow is definitely CPU intense and might be causing higher temps. Let me test with another game.

 

This isn't remotely correct. I don't need to stick my hand in a fire to know that isn't a good idea just like I don't need to drive a Pontiac Aztec to know it isn't a good car. You've stated, ad nauseam, your extreme knowledge of the PC segment as a foundation for how qualified you are in assessing the quality of this product. That alone contradicts your statement here.

Sure, you own it, which might also be a source of bias.

@etern4l has been a forum member far longer than you . He's contributed countless hours to helping folks make purchase decisions, troubleshoot problems with multiple brands of laptops, and has well established themselves as a reputable source of information when it comes to the technology present in the market then and now. The points they made are valid criticisms. Here's why:

The X17 is, at best, a mixed bag. Looking at this thread and the performance reported, it is probably one of the better laptops Dell have put together. It doesn't suffer as badly thermally over past offerings but, and this is the big but, the cost to performance ratio is poor. You can get a superior laptop for less, period. Upgradeability is better, again compared to past Dell offerings, but is more a return to what we already had with older Alienware laptops. The cheapest X17 runs $2250 (approx). I can get an Asus G17 that weighs nearly a pound less with a Ryzen 9 and a 3070 for $200 less, that will walk circles around the lower-priced X17 and likely far higher-priced configurations as well.

Ultimately, if the X17 or X15 makes you happy, great. However, criticism for this laptop is deserved. Dell has had opportunities come and go to make great kit, and I'm not talking about socketed everything or big chonky DTRs. The X17 could have been better but Dell knows its buyers better than they know themselves. The staged rollout of the higher-priced models first is evidence of this. They know the whales out there that won't wait to see if a better value configuration is in the pipeline; they'll buy whatever is perceived as the "best" to be first at the show with the shiny new thing. In the end, the decision to launch the X17, even with the issues brought up here, is validated on the business side because it appears to be selling well. It sends a signal to Dell that this laptop and products like it, are good decisions. This means Dell doesn't improve the product stack and continues to offer more laptops like this.

 

That wasn't my intent nor is that true either. You understand exactly the point I've made and likewise, you've made your position known as well. I don't know how old you are, or what sort of history you have with mobile electronics. For the older hats around, I remember when Alienware was a standalone company before the Dell buyout. I do appreciate thinner and lighter laptops that are powerful and capable. Who doesn't, right?

However, Dell has moved Alienware in a direction that has left many of the older adopters frustrated. I can't speak for others, but I tend to express that frustration with my wallet. Occasionally, I'll chime in when I think it might matter. You've called @etern4l a troll more than once and I know that isn't the case here. I felt that needed to be addressed.

 

That’s fair enough. I’ve said that @etern4l IMO seemed like troll once because of all the negative/sarcastic comments being made throughout the thread. This was just my opinion based on the responses they have made throughout this thread which is why it seemed that way. Either way it makes no difference as everyone has different opinions, I was just voicing mine.

Yeah I understand why older users would be frustrated with the way Dell is taking Alienware and why older users are upset about it.

 

Just to make sure I understood this: 11th gen can run imc in gear 1 at 3200, it's just that the x17 doesn't? Why not?

 

Bruh, Why you gotta hate on my car lol.

 

Can we get back the RAM conversation? I would like to know if there is something we can do to improve the latency besides waiting until Dell release a new BIOS. Is any kind of kit that would increase performance in a tangible way?
Here in Spain I'm waiting Amazon to get stock of this kit: F4-3200C18D-32GRS. As long as I can test it, I'll post some results.

 

Should we expect much improvement with after market ram? I have this sitting on my desk. Only planned on using it if I kept the 7i with 3200 ram. My x17 has the 3466 and didnt plan to use it in it as I though speed was better than timing for these chips. Correct me if I am wrong. Would this faster timing ram be better?

Crucial Ballistix 3200 MHz DDR4 DRAM Laptop Gaming Memory Kit 32GB (16GBx2) CL16 BL2K16G32C16S4B.

 

Some users (me included) bought that kit and had problems, as soon as we enabled XMP in BIOS, started to get BSODs in Windows.

 

That particular Crucial ram gave BSODs for a couple users on here with the X17. The only aftermarket ram that seem to be worth getting is the following:

Kingston FURY Laptop Memory DDR4 3200MHz 16GB (2 x 16GB) Kingston FURY Impact CL20 1.2V SODIMM KF432S20IB1K2/32 at Amazon.com

Amazon.com: Kingston Technology HyperX Impact 32GB 3200MHz DDR4 CL20 SODIMM (Kit of 2) Memory HX432S20IBK2/32 : Everything Else

Someone else can comment on how much of an improvement they get from switching from the 3466 to the above 3200 ram, although if I remember correctly the difference was minor?

 

Great info, thanks!!! This helps me a ton. Actually had the HX432S20IBK2 in my cart but went with the crucial as I knew them better. Will wait to hear on those that compared.

 

Liquid metal may help. It's possible that you particular benchmark is stressing the CPU more, which tends to increase the overall temperature more than workloads that stress the GPU more. You can check the CPU/GPU temps as a sanity check. Also you might as well cap the FPS to 120 since any excess frames aren't really beneficial with the refresh rate limited to 120Hz on the internal monitor. Any excess frames that need to be processed only adds to the heat on the CPU because it needs to use more power to process them.

The other thing that can help is to make sure the room you're using it in has good ventilation and circulating air.

 

I spoke to a technician at HIDevolution and asked them about the SSD situation. They say that a 4TB ssd will squeeze in there which is why they offer it but they think an 8TB will be too tight to fit.

Slightly confused though as I thought all 4TB and 8TB sabrent ssd’s were double sided. When I mentioned it to him he seemed to think that the 4TB was single sided.

Anyone heard of single sided 4TB ssd’s? And if the 4TB is double sided wouldn’t it be the same thickness as the 8TB? Ended up being more confused after the phone call than before it lol.

 

The vid is about the desktop 11th gen. Gear 2 mode was obviously introduced to run mem at very high frequencies. Why gear 2 mode is even an option for the mobile 11th gen platform is beyond me, makes no sense. Would be interesting to know if the GE76 also runs in gear 2. I have little hope AW will give us the bios option for gear 1 mode.

Again: Do not buy any aftermarket ram for the X17, you won´t get any performance benefit, possibly make performance even worse. X17 does not benefit from tighter timings as it runs in gear 2 CR2 mode which "castrates" the imc. I speculate AW chose this imc configuration to run Kingston value ram at 3466 MHz to look good on paper. This kind of ram kit probably won´t tolerate gear 1, while higher end modules may do. However, we will probably never find out. Furthermore, maybe ram speed is of lesser importance on the 11th gen intel mobile architecture.

 

Why would RAM speed be of lesser importance on the 11th gen intel mobile architecture? If anything, it seems of higher importance given the terrible 4K SKU Optimus graphics scores.

 

I forgot that @Papusan already posted results of the GE76 which runs its 3200 ram in gear 1 and CR1. Latency is 63ns in AIDA. So a Cinebench comparison would be interesting. However, CPU cooling on the GE76 is a joke and I think the TDP is lower than on the X17. I speculated that maybe the 11th gen does profit more from frequency than latency. However, gear 2 means the imc runs at half the frequency. I wish AW had just used 3200 ram in gear 1.

 

Cinebench is most likely an almost pure CPU benchmark. The raytraced scene is fairly simple, I don't see too many textures. Could confirm this by checking how much memory (working set) gets allocated by the process.

 

I would trade 3200MHz (in gear 1) with decent timings any day over Dells great idea to offer 3466 ram sticks with awful timings as "bragging factor" to charge you even more. Don't forget how Dell have screwed up for the users with ram sticks that don't perform or even can't run Intel's specs in the last two gens laptops who had ram slots.

Newer CBR benchmarks benefits with faster sticks. But not so much if they run at disgusting timings.

 

So from what I have read, Dell has locked the bios to only run in Gear 2 which gives higher speed but kills the latency and if you get a stick of low latency ram you will either get high latency still or unstable system (or both)?

Does that mean if Dell decides to release a bios update to allow it to run in Gear 1 then we can take advantage of low latency ram at a lower speed?

Does Slower Memory with lower latency out perform Faster Memory with high latency? (Why can't we have both?)

Sorry I am not familiar with RAM stuff like this if I am asking stupid questions.

 

I have come across this on the Chinese forum earlier that included the instructions to enable dGPU switch in bios, in the same post this person was able to run his ram to 4000mhz in gear 2 without enabling XMP.

Later on he also posted up instructions to allow your memory to run in Gear 1, through editing with RU.EFI

 

Maybe you ought to not trust the Chinese. It's a photoshopped result. AIDA does not recognize the blocks for the memory bus and memory type on the X17 and all you have to do is look at his version of AIDA. The Chinese posting is the 1st version to recognize the X17. Here is the newest BETA version that still doesn't recognize those blocks. Another way to see is that the Chinese posting says quad channel memory which the laptop doesn't recognize. And another reason why people who don't have the X17 and make nasty comments have no voice. To much bad information floating around. And the car analogy was stupid.

 

I don't understand why he would lie about it, in the same thread he has provided useful and working information to enable dGPU, as proven by @pitha1337

Perhaps my formatting is crap and introduced misunderstandings, let me edit my posts above for easier readings.

Also what car analogy?

 

Yea, this test was hammering the cpu hard as WOW is my main game and its known for that. And i had the resolution cranked to 5,120 x 2,880, well above what I would run. Will play mostly at 2k and lock the fps to the monitor. But future testing and doing extremes. Thanks for your thoughts again.

 

Also, if anyone cares, Legion 7i with the 11980hk has its ram in Gear 2 as well. No options in the bios that I saw that reference gears.

 

They also put a disclaimer in their blog that Aida64 isn't reading some properties correctly, which isn't surprising since they're editing the UEFI variables in the bios. There's no reason for people to jump to conclusions and accuse someone of photoshopping results.

 

My X17(4K) with the 64GB Kit from Dell are Kingston Dual Rank 3466 sticks. It's the only kit that comes stock being 2R. The timings are the same as the stock 32GB AData Kit @ CL22.. you can check out the full details in the link.

I've tested my 64GB Ballistix CL16 RAM as well in the X17 and with XMP ON it runs it at 3200MHz with better timings.


Stock ADATA @ 3466MHz 64GB Kit: = Calculated Nanoseconds: ~12.6947489

My Ballistix @ 3200MHz 64GB Kit: = Calculated Nanoseconds: ~10.0000000

 

I don't know how to read this but this is from the post about setting the X17 into Gear 1

He says in the comments that his latency is 70 in Gear1 and 90 in Gear 2

Source

@iunlock I noticed that in your signature that you have an X17 r1 with 4K 120hz panel and Advanced Optimus enabled, how did you go about doing that?

 

Interesting...

Here's the same Ballistix 64GB Kit in my AW R6 (11800H/3080) laptop.


CR of 1T...

 

Sorry to bother, @iunlock I noticed that in your signature that you have an X17 r1 with 4K 120hz panel and Advanced Optimus enabled, how did you go about doing that?

 

Interesting.

How did you make work the Ballistix? As soon as I enabled XMP, I had constantly BSODs and even the BIOS Ram checks failed. And some users from here have had problems with that Kit.

 

Hang tight.

I've had many people test the 32GB Ballistix kit and it seems like the 64GB kit is the only one that works (oddly) with the X17 without any issues.

If you want to use the Ballistix, the only confirmed working kit is the 64GB.

 

That blows my mind tbh, so confused now because I cannot see why the 32Gb kit failed that hard then. Could you make the Aida latency test and some test in 3dmark/games to see if there is any advantage in performance compared with the stock ram? We are talking now about 350€ of investment, pretty sure it does not worth in the majority of cases. Thank you for the info.

 

From what I read Gear 2 would only be needed above 3200, but Dell enabled it for 3200 too in the x17 (but not the thicker m15 R6!). Hint, hint..

How did you calculate these nanoseconds just based on CL?

Post of the day. So the same RAM runs faster in the m15 R6 than in the x17! Why? Could this be due to the mobile phone technology used? What do AIDA timings look like on the m15 R6 with the Ballistix?

 

So what would you recommend?

 

Well, you do get twice the amount of RAM, and to be fair €350 is right about what Dell charges for the 32GB 3466 gimmick.

 

I'm not saying is a bad price for 64Gb kit, but I would not take advantage of such amount of RAM in my daily usage. Heck, I'm sure I won't populate the 32Gb kit xD. I'm looking for a performonance incresase (if any).

 

Open more Chrome tabs and get your money's worth

 

7i doesn´t even support XMP. The only good thing about it imho is it´s vapor chamber cooling solution. In the end all 11th gen RTX 3000 series notebooks have performance compromises, exept you opt for chunky plastic DTR Clevos - which I even might have done if they would run the 3080 RTX at 200+ TDP.

It´s in CR 1 because the 10th gen does not have a gear 2 mode in the first place.

Link please. -- Nevermind, found it.

 

First of all, not clear my suspicions about CB are correct in the first place, haven't had a chance to check the memory utilisation. Bro @Papusan claims memory latency affects it.

The way I see it, a memory bemchmark like AIDA provides the upper bound on practical performance improvements. Sequential read write is particulsrly relevant if the application needs to read and write large contiguous areas of memory: Optimus, 3D games with large assets, video editing, filesystem caching by the OS, to name a few.
Latency would be particularly relevant in applications which use a sizeable amount of RAM in more random fashion: databases, open world games, simulations, science, even browsing with large amount of tabs etc.
Basically any process that loads the CPU and uses a lot of RAM (much more than the L3 cache size) has the potential to realise significant improvements from faster DRAM. The reason being that cache misses are extremely costly, and RAM latency completely dominates computation times if those occur frequently.

In addition to checking CB23 (particularly if it uses a lot of RAM), I would recommend running Sandra if possible, because of the alternative latency benchmark and the "transactions per second" benchmark, as well as benching the applications you see loading the CPU while using a lot of RAM.

 

We're all in the same boat scratching our heads.

Here's my Time Spy:


As for AIDA, for some reason the versions that I've tried didn't populate the fields properly. Can you link me to the AIDA that works for sure with the X17? Thanks

Yup just a quick calc...But for sure I'll test it thoroughly when I can get a working AIDA that will actually populate all the fields in the app.

Yea that's true and same applies the storage...especially for like the 4TB SSD option...with the discounts applied it's cheaper than to buy the Samsung 980 PRO (which essentially the X17's come with in the 2TBx2 Config)

My R6 is 11th Gen Intel 11800H.

 

Wait, m15 R6 is 11th gen... 11800H. That's the AW laptop I would consider if I had to.replace my m15 now.

 

@iunlock you must download Aida64 beta: https://www.aida64.com/downloads/latesta64xebeta

 

More RAM will increase your filesystem/OS performance too, as any unused RAM can be used by the OS for filesystem caching. RAM is still 10-100x faster than PCIe4 SSD.

 

Have you overclocked the CPU? I'm using G.Skill CL18 3200Mhz RAM and gettings "only" 11700 CPU score in "stock".

 

Ups, didn´t know that. So AW went with the X series in gear 2 CR2 to make it look good on paper (3466 MHz ram ) and perform worse in real life. We need to edit htis bios. I wish the site was in native English. I am a bit hesitant with this Chinese how to. I wait for you bro iunlock to make the first jump in the cold water.