*OFFICIAL* Alienware m15 Owner's Lounge

Well, the devil can be in the details. Even the distribution channel itself can be compromised:

https://www.csoonline.com/article/3...ata-up-for-sale-iso-downloads-backdoored.html

 

Using that as an example, there is no such thing as secure.

 

That would be my conclusion if the article was regarding MacOS. This is more of an example of a smaller distribution run by enthusiasts being more vulnerable.

 

Fair enough.

 

Has anyone been able to fix the fan noise weirdness on the m15 R1? Even at idling and on the silent profile, I can't get my fans to turn off. Not a big deal, but somewhat annoying.

I've got an i5-8300 w/the 1660TI. Undervolted gets me to low 70s on core 1,3 and high 70s/low 80's on 2,4. I may need to repaste, but not sure yet.

 

70s and 80s while doing which stresstest?

The m15 I tested was idling at 40deg with ambient temp 22 or so, and it was pretty much silent

 

For those of you who used gelid gp-extreme pad. How many packs did you need of each size? I just received one pack of 0.5, 1, 1.5 and 2 but they are smaller than I expected so I'm not sure if I will have enough and I don't want to find out while I'm in the middle of replacing them.

 

Prime 95 mostly, for about 15-20 min while testing the undervolts. They went up a few degrees when I ran Furmark as well.

Ambient temperature is 25C or 77 F in my room.

 

I used one whole pack of. 0.5, and a bit of 1. You're good.

 

So, after testing m15 and p1 some more, I have decided to return the m15.

I also tried capping both at -0.145V and 36W PL1 and then running xtu... M15 was struggling at 86deg iirc, while the P1 managed to keep higher freqs and 80-82deg, with a lot less noise (although its fans have an annoying high pitch sound supposedly caused by the antidust mesh).

I am particularly surprised by the fact that, at the same CPU Package Power usage and running the same stresstest, P1 managed to keep higher freqs.

I will post all the detailed graphs and data as I get the time, maybe this weekend or the next one.

 

I've been struggling yon follow your posts TBH. You need to do a very simple repaste on the m15, following which there are no issues and everyone is happy. You can control clicks using ThrottleStop's Speedshift setting.

The ThinkPad P1 seems like an odd contender:

"
Graphics
Up to NVIDIA® Quadro® T2000"

Supports Linux though. It's more of a Dell Precision competitor.

 

Unfortunately I cannot repaste and then return the device if the result is still not satisfactory, so I will never know if that m15 had an exceptionally bad paste/heatsink

I compared both devices on CPU only loads, so GPU configuration should not have a relevant impact (btw, the P1 I have has the P1000).
The CPU is 8750h in both.

If I repaste the P1, that might improve too.

Not being able to repaste, I have to compare them on default Windows install and factory HW.
In those conditions, m15 was:
- worse at powersaving when idle (7W vs <4W) and when browsing the web (though I have not recorded data on that to prove it)
- worse heat dissipation (when both were capped at 36W cpu package power and -0.145V, m15 was running at higher temps and being louder, that was also while using a book to keep the rear part lifted)
- louder fans (though p1 has that annoying high pitch)


I'd say it was a quite fair comparison for those usecases (idle, browsing, high cpu load).

The m15 might be much better than the p1 once it's fully tweaked, repasted, etc... but unfortunately I could not test that and I was not willing to take the risk

 

This is a ridiculously apples-to-oranges comparison. The P1000 is a very weak entry-level GPU with very stable / conservative drivers.

You should have compared notes with @Ionising_Radiation to see how Dell Precision does in comparison.

All that said, if battery life is your #1 consideration, as seems to be the case, the m15 indeed has some room for improvement. I managed to get to a few W CPU power draw (around 2W if memory serves) at some point but now it's worse after a number of BIOS/Windows / driver updates. Someone mentioned clean installing stock Intel / Nvidia drivers fixes the issue. Another data point suggesting some interplay between GPU drivers/class and CPU power draw.

 

I fail to see how it's apple to oranges.
The GPU should not play a role here.

It's off, and not doing any work.

If anything, a beefier GPU should mean the m15 has to do less work to do, since the heatpipe is shared.

Could you elaborate more on why comparison is not fair?

 

I edited my post to elaborate.

 

CPU package power is even 1.5W on idle, but the charge rate is -7 or -8, of which about 2-3W are the screen at low brightness iirc, or maybe less.

Moreover, I did the idle tests on Linux too, where the GPU was (supposedly) competely off.
Same results, 7-8W discharge rate.

Regarding the stress test, if I understand correctly your point for my comparison being 'ridicolously' apples-to-oranges is that the GPU might be, for some reason and even though it's not doing any work at all, producing a lot of heat that would justify the difference in temps, is that right?
If the GPU is turned on during the CPU stresstest and starts drawing 20W for some unknown reason then yes, that might explain the struggle to keep temps in check.
I could not find evidence of that, but I'll be curious to see if others can present more data.

I wish I had a wall power monitor handy while I was testing, that would have shown any big difference in effective power draw which is not shown by hwinfo

 

Yes, I saw 7-8W power draw at the finest hour. The concern is dual: driver/software issues might cause excessive GPU power draw at idle (which of course would be more pronounced on a more powerful GPU), and the suboptimal software might elevate idle CPU load. I will see if I can clean reinstall drivers this weekend.

 

Thanks! I'll be waiting for fresh data then
I am less concerned by the idle power consumption to be honest, I am more disappointed about the CPU load results... It must be that I was expecting the m15 to blow the p1 out of the water, at least in the cooling department...

To be honest, I find it hard to believe that an idle GPU can cause all that difference...but since I don't have the power readings at the plug, indeed we don't know if m15 bugs are causing the idle gpu to draw even 20+W... So all can be

 

Hence the apples to oranges comparison. If you had an RTX 20x0 GPU you would likely be familiar with the fact the MSI Afterburner pushes power draw into that ballpark, all the while the GPU appears "idle" in Hwinfo.

 

Yep

If that is a bug in the m15 software stack, using the same hw will not help. If I had a p1 with 2060, maybe the same would have happened anyway, maybe the p1 (or any other laptop) would have kept the gpu idle and off while m15 for whatever reason turns it on (slightly different driver, bios configs, power profile choices..etc)

I had no time left to experiment, unfortunately, so I guess we will never know if you have news feel free to share it.

I'm really curious to know if the m15 was actually fighting against a much bigger heat source, even if that's caused by bugs

If it turns out that that requires fixes by Dell or nvidia, I'd rather return it anyway

 

Turns out the courier didn't come to pick up the laptop in the end So I still have it here all packed and everything, ready for collection.. I won't be home for a week or so, but I might be able to set it up again and run the test once more in 10 days or so, before the courier comes.

Not sure it's worth the hassle, but... For science!

 

Well, I need to tackle the power draw. It's a minor nuisance but still, and would be surprised if it cannot be addressed. As for the general choice between that m15 and the P1 the only things it has going for it are the double TB3 and Linux support as far as I can see, so unless you absolutely need either of the two at the expense of much more powerful GPU and AGA, you've just painted yourself into a corner with this power draw thing.

 

I haven't really made my mind up yet...I can always order it again. For now, the P1 is more appealing.
- Quieter yet still able to handle full power of the CPU under load (and it's slimmer and 500gr+ lighter)
- lower power consumption on cpu-only loads and idle
- better touchpad feedback, better keyboard, subjectively "better" fhd (but boy I love the 144hz...I could always make a P1 frankenstein )
- the 3 years warranty (which comes in at a ridicolous +381£, for the m15) is an important plus.
- the m15 came with 9.1% battery wear effectively making the battery the same capacity as P1's. According to Alienware technical team that's okay.
- and.. even though the p1 comes with double ssd storage and ram, it's cheaper! (just because of a good offer, ow it would be more expensive).

The only (big) minus is the GPU, but I don't do a lot of gaming on the go, so maybe a Razer Core is enough for my needs.

There's a chance I might give the Precision a spin too... Let's see.

Let me know when you get to gather more data, I'll see if I can take a power reading in about 10d

 

Hi all! I don't know if it was asked before but I want to know what thickness is right for replacement thermal pads.
I was going to buy 0.5mm but then I worried that these can be even too thin.
Which thickness should I buy?
Thanks

 

So, I DDU'd Nvidia and Intel drivers, installed latest, updated firmware on my EVO 970 Plus. CPU power draw around 1.6W, total around 9W. Very happy considering I have two SSDs. Enjoy your P1 mate.

 

Myself and other people I've seen posting here have used 0.5 where Dell used that, and used 1.5 or 1 as the two thicker pads. HTH.

 

Hey did you download the latest drivers from the Intel and Nvidia websites or dell.com? I'm still averaging around 25-30W power draw while doing basic things with just chrome running and am gonna try doing a driver reinstall too, I probably won't go as low as 9W since I have a 4k display but the battery life(2.5-3hrs) right now is really unacceptable for the size of the battery. I was originally planning on doing a complete windows reinstall but never really got around to it cause it would take a long time to setup everything again but I'll atleast give reinstalling drivers a shot and see how it goes

 

Any experience with Liquid Metal on this one? As I'm planning to sell it, I was testing my old AW13R3 from Hidevolution (with Liquid Metal) and it is incredible, I know that the CPU has 2 fewer cores and max turbo on all of them is 3.4Ghz vs 4.0 but running mprime95 and not going over 65C with fans almost silent and no need to elevate the back ... is just too good. I know that I won't get that in the m15 with LM but I need to try I'm planning to use foam to make it more reliable, even if I don't move the laptop every day. Any experience with Liquid Metal on this laptop? I think that UltraMale got one but it was the 8950HK with the 2080 right? I have the 9750 and the RTX 2060.

 

Latest from Nvidia and Intel. That brought it down too 13W, apparently the SSD firmware update was needed too. Disconnect all devices when battery testing, even something like a colling pad can draw a few W, since you probably won't be carrying these, especially your monitor, with you

 

@Ultra Male and @CptXabaras used it with very good results. UM had it done by HID, CX applied himself. OTOH, @Flying Endeavor had a poor experience with LM applied by HID.

 

Can you give me what version of each of the drivers you have, last time I tried downloading straight from the Nvidia website it wouldn't let me install it telling me to download the latest version from the manufacturers website instead, but I think this may have been on my xps and not the m15, don't remember for sure.

 

You cannot install latest from Intel unless you DDU the Dell driver in safe mode. You need the DCH drivers BTW. Don't have the versions handy,, but it's really straightforward stuff.

 

I wouldn't really say poor... It is manageable currently. Quite happy with my M17 tbh. Just needed a decent undervolt.

 

That confirms my readings, I got it to 7W discharge rate on default Dell Windows install.

Your data is a confirmation the m15 just can't get to <1W CPU power usage on idle (P1 draws 0.7W cpu package power, with the same CPU)

Let's be clear, it's not the end of the world just not as efficient as it could be

 

That confirms my readings, I got it to 7W discharge rate on default Dell Windows install.

Your data is a confirmation the m15 just can't get to <1W CPU power usage on idle (P1 draws 0.7W cpu package power, with the same CPU)

Let's be clear, it's not the end of the world just not as efficient as it could be

 

Thanks.So I don't need to decrease the thickness of the original pads?

 

I haven't tried bringing this under 1W because it's a complete waste of time.

1. The gain would be minimal in light of the overall system draw.
2. This issue is completely moot from the point of view of anyone actually using their laptop instead of sitting and watching idle power draw, since any sort of load will raise this anyway.

 

Clearly you don't need to decrease the thickness of the 0.5s. There are also two additional strips which for me were 2mm and I brought this down to 1.5. I recall someone else cutting this to 1mm even.

 

It's not about the number, it's about opportunistic powersaving.

In the few seconds between scrolls, while you're reading an article or doing anything that doesn't require interaction with the system and the system is just sitting there displaying content (assuming no ads are hogging the cpu), the CPU should be able to relax and go to as deep sleep as one sees fit.
Dell decided not to allow that, maybe for reasons related to wakeup latency.
We can do a long run web browsing test if you're keen on getting the actual numbers

 

LOL, it's all about the number. Even if the P1 CPU is more power effliecient by 0.5W on idle only, which I doubt, it would make negligible difference to battery life.

 

0.5W does not mean much in itself. It's just a hint of a possibly suboptimal implementation.
My point is, if you are less power efficient at idle, it is likely that the low load usecase is not optimized either. Of course the opposite could be true too.

That needs to be tested.
Being 0.7W more efficient at idle *might* mean 2-3W average saving in low load for example (note, that's just a semi random guess), and the differences will stack up over time.

I appreciate your passion, but I'm just here to post my experience. Sorry if you find it useless. I hope someone else finds it useful as I did.

If we sync and use the same benchmark, I'll be happy to try it and post results here.

Neither of us knows the truth, so let's try to move this closer to a reproducible and realistic scenario

Please note my initial idea was to buy and keep the m15, I've never been and I'm not willing to be any brand's fanboy.
Let's try to keep sarcasm aside and focus on results that can be useful to the community.

 

Respectfully, the above proposed phenomenon and investigation just doesn't seem to have practical impact. Even if there is a 2W difference, as is unlikely to be the case, nobody with 80Whr+ battery would realistically care.

You just seem to keep looking for an issue where there is none.

BTW What people would typically care about (in absence of serious battery life issues, which is the case) is how well the machines deal with benchmark loads, and on that interesting topic we have heard very little so far from the P1 persepctive.

 

Tag me on a P1 thread, I'll be happy to provide the info you need

Or if you want a benchmark comparison with the m15 I will be happy to provide both here.

Regarding the usefulness of the results, I understand you're not concerned and that's perfectly fine.
I am, other people might be too, we can only speak for ourselves.
More data surely doesn't hurt

Let me know if there's anything you are interested in knowing.

As said, I'll post my hwinfo recordings once I get enough time to write it down in a structured post

 

Don't really need any info about the P1, let's not torture it with graphics benchmarks

 

no, not its strength

 

Hey all, recently upgraded my 15r1 to an m15 and am very impressed with the machine. I 've done the standard tweaking, cracked it open and re-applied paste (Kryonaut), undervolted with throttlestop, etc. I'm looking to improve the RAM (16GB standard DDR4-2666 CAS 19 JEDEC) but the limited BIOS doesn't support XMP and I'd rather not flash SPD (is that possible on DDR4?). Has anyone upgraded their RAM successfully to something with CAS17 or better that's just ready to go? I've been poring over the forums, google, etc. and haven't come across a definitive success yet but maybe it was somewhere in the 300+ pages here and I missed it, apologies in advance if it’s been covered. Thanks!

 

etern4l@ is using hyperx impact, that is 2666 CL15, that seems to be the best you can get out of the box.

Sent from my Pixel 3 using Tapatalk

 

got the same ram Kit as Etern4l. Works perfectly, and they can be found stupidly cheap. got them on Amazon around 125€ for the 32gb kit. Strongly recommend them.

 

Good news for the people that want to buy an m15 r2 and run VM's on it:
https://twitter.com/aw_umar/status/1159567721228591104?s=20

LOL if this ain't a fail i don't know what a fail is either. It's a gaming laptop with max 16Gb memory support. LOL AW has become the new XPS only XPS get's more love than AW....

 

Thanks guys. I had seen those kits while browsing Newegg and Amazon and this gives me the confirmation to go ahead. Picked up a 2x8GB CAS15 kit of the HyperX Impact. Should be here tomorrow so I’ll pop them in and report back. Thanks!