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

Hello,

I just got the gpu/cpu thermal pads from grizzly. I plan to dismantle the machine in the weekend for the replacement operation.

Any tips/suggestions for the process? Any pitfalls or traps?

Thanks


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Its quite straightforward, I followed the Alienware teardown from their YT channel and took my time. I haven't ever done a repaste or gone that far into the internals of a laptop before, so if I can do it pretty much anyone can.

To add, I didn't replace the pads, its something I'll do in due course. I have read that you need to be careful removing the GPU as the connectors can break easily. I think it can cause your GPU to run on less PCIE lanes or something.

@S.K flagged this and will be able to give a more accurate technical response than my poor attempt above.

 

If you don't mind my asking, what did the repaste do for the thermals?

 

It has reduced the average temps by a good 10-15c depending on the game. I still see spikes into the 90s for CPU and high 70s (the new thermal limit) on the GPU.

Sorry I'm new to all this and hadn't captured much pre-test data, but do remember the CPU hitting average mid-80s but now it averages low 70s mostly. Sorry for the vagueness.

 

made a few tests with thermal limits and fan profiles too.

Witcher 3

profle silent, 74°C limit, ~1620Mhz




profile silent, 80°C limit, ~1800Mhz



full speed fan profile

 

Has anyone experienced battery drain with the laptop shutdown? I shut my laptop down everytime I'm finished with it but the last few times I've started it back up it has had significant battery loss.

 

If this was 17", had the new 10 core intel CPU with RTX 8000 at full power with the best cooling available regardless of the thickness and brick size at max power capacity with no throttling, I would consider paying $10k, but it's none of these

 

Alienware Command Center
https://www.dell.com/support/home/u...wt64a&productcode=alienware-17-area51m-laptop

 

Disable the USB port Charging from BIOS

 

Cheers brother, would that cause power drain even with nothing connected?

 

You need to hold down the left shift key to shutdown completely..... Otherwise battery continues to drain!

 

It shouldn't, but try it out and let me know who knows if the laptop is continuously trying to send a charge to the port just in case you know?

Not true, I've never had to do this on any laptop. A regular shutdown is a hybrid shutdown which uses the hiberfile.sys to store some of the system apps/DLLs/Driver so when you start your laptop the next time it starts a bit faster but it is still a complete shutdown that should drain 0 power when the machine turns off. Only standby/sleep drains power slowly.

Holding down the shift key simply means the system will not use the Fast Startup the next time it boots.

 

Seriously? Since when was that a thing? I've never done that on any laptop...ever. Genuine question here? I also disabled 'fast startup' but no longer see that as an option within the power options.

Note sure anyone has seen the below, ADATA memory with the Samsung die should work with 1.8.1 and provide fast speeds out the box.... apparently.

 

I have never ever heard of such a step being necessary to shutdown a laptop - this is something new to me as well, I'd like to know when this became necessary because I have never seen anything to indicate this.

 

How to tell which memory that use Samsung die?

These two are the only available in my local market, no info on die AFAIK.

Adata Premier SO-DIMM DDR4 2666MHz 16GB (AD4S2666316G19-S)
Adata Premier SO-DIMM DDR4 2666MHz 16GB (AD4S2666316G19-R)

 

I mean its nice we get a tweet out on this question, as I would like to upgrade to 64 GB but I need to know which exact memory.... if it works at 2666 I will be happy, but we need to know which....

EDIT: Checking this on Amazon, I also see a 16GB unit with a -D....

 

I had a quick look as well but couldn't work out which ones had what dies etc.

I'd look more into this don't take my post as 100% fact. I don't want you buying this memory based on my post haha

 

Anyone know which cable controls the LED color for the back of the machine? In particular the tron light, LCD lid light and possibly power button light?

My colors are slightly off on those LED's. It's not the tron cable itself, I tried adjust that one, and even replacing the tron cover with a new one and it gives the same effect.

It's probably a pinched cable somewhere causing a bad signal, just can't think which one it would be.

 

What do you mean by off?
Could they just be dimmed?

According to the ney AWCC app they fixed some things around RGB themes, and previously brightness control was not saving. The 'fix' could have activated a previous unsaved dimmer setting maybe? (Only guessing if you just updated)

https://www.dell.com/support/home/u...wt64a&productcode=alienware-17-area51m-laptop

 

Guys, I been searching the threads and can not find an answer. What would you recommend for my core voltage running 4.7 ghz on all cores?

 

When are they coming out with these bios?

 

If I set the lights to certain blue hues the color does not match the keyboard. I can select all zones and set them to the tealy blue color that comes stock but the back ring and alien head are a much lighter version of that color, almost a different color even.

This was there before the new CC update, and it has persisted after unfortunately. This same issue happened on my 17R4 for the Alienware logo under the LCD and the back alien head logo on the screen. In that instance I am almost 100% sure it's just a bad cable, I just didn't feel like taking the screen apart to change it.

If I set the colors to red, for example, then I don't have this issue. It only seems to be certain shades.

It's mostly just my OCD at this point, it does not affect performance or anything like that. Was just curious if anyone knew of a cable, like the one on the 17R4, that might control this.

 

Currently running 4.7 on all cores at 1.075 core voltage with 0.040 undervolt. Stressed test passed with max temp at 85C. Any thoughts or recommendations?

 

Soo here's something I'm trying to figure out, in the awcc I have my 2080 set to a max temp of 80c then I use msi afterburner to set my oc but the gpu always goes above 80 no matter what temp I have it set to max, something im not doing right?

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Ok this drove me crazy for a few days also, the AWCC software leaves a Lot to be desired, you have to actually click ON the TRON and Alienhead individually and set the color for each, it is completely different then how you do the other lights.

Also click on save theme after each change bottom left.

I finally got all my lights the same this way.



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I *think* all that thermal slider does is adjust how the fan profile is applied ?

It does not always seem to correspond to the “thermal” GPU step down temp.

I have seen this behavior as well, but honestly with some of the different behavior we hear from others hear I am starting to wonder if having the KS is affecting things, I believe you also run a KS still ?

And you and I have different results when we try to make things work as they should out of the box than others.

I have settled on under volting the GPU for now on 1.7.3 at .962mv in Afterburner NO overclock in AWCC and set for 76c

Any OC at all or even stock 0 0 on any BIOS other than 1.5.0 results in hard throttle for me down to 300mhz and slideshow time in game after 5 minutes.

Others here don’t experience that they say.




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Hello! I recently purchased an Area 51M that is performing at 3DMark approximately 600% worse than similar models. The equipment's BIOS is 1.8.1 that came pre-installed at the factory or was installed by Alienware Update on first use. I cannot find this BIOS version on the DELL website or anywhere else on the Internet. Has anyone had a similar problem?

 

Yeah its like basic GUI design was thrown out recently, I have seen a lot of really bad GUI's that are just not intuitive.

What system specs do you have, but at 600% that might be a power issue, like you are running only on one brick... does HWInfo show everything running at correct speeds, etc?

 

Unfortunately this isn't it. It's almost like those back lights are just not as bright as the front keyboard ones, so they look like a softer different color?

I don't know, it's not that big of a deal, I don't see them much anyways haha.

Going to need more info to even begin to troubleshoot that....

Specs? Temps?

 

What kind of stress tests are you using?

 

That is weird, I know you can separately DIM the back from the rest but it’s not easy and frankly it was so counter intuitive and I stumbled onto it that I can’t remember how to reproduce it.

I settled for everything darkest blue and dim, that software is really irritating.


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Hi everyone, after searching and reading through this thread (over a hundred pages) I still can't find a solution to my issue. I have tried good old google as well. Here's my problem: I have a very efficient curve set up in MSI Afterburner, and a decent undervolt with XTU. My issue is, I have to apply both regularly as AWCC keeps overriding them. The one that pisses me off the most is the AB profile override. I have tried every suggestion, I even have AB load with launch parameters (-Profile1) with task scheduler, and it does, however, as soon as I run a game, and AWCC switches the fan and power profiles, even with OC tuned off, it still overrides my undervolt and curve. I currently have the profile hotkeyed, so when I launch a game, I simply key in my shortcut an my profiles are applied, but I want to automate this. I want to stop AWCC from messing with my CPU and GPU profiles. Short of uninstalling AWCC (which is not an option, as I want fan control) is there a way to restrict AWCC's access to the CPU and GPU? Can I uninstall, or even break just the OC portion of AWCC and keep the RGB, Fan and Power functionality, or am I SOT?

Here's a list of things I've tried:
- Set a delay to AB launching - does not help, since launching AWCC always overrides it.
- Follow the OC and undervolt guide on this forum - again, everything works until AWCC has to do anything, which overrides it
- Cursing out Dell and Alienware support for having broken software on the phone.

Thank you for taking the time to read this long rant/question/plead for help. May your temps stay low and your framerates high.

 

Not sure why it messes with yours that bad. Mine never interrupts, but I manually change fan and power settings in AWCC while AB curve and TS have my OC and UV loaded at login. I dont let AWCC have any automated control over my system.

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Hmm same as the above for me. ThrottleStop and Afterburner control CPU and GPU and AWCC only changes fans and power profile automatically, but doesn’t override anything on CPU or GPU voltage nor clocks.

 

For me anyway as long as I follow this order it works, 1. Boot up and wait for AWCC to load ( this is adding insult to injury there is no reason it should take AWCC so long to load)

Make sure my NO Overclock settings are still in place, CLOSE AWCC.

2. Launch Afterburner and apply my saved UNDERVOLT, exit Afterburner.

Then DO NOT touch AWCC again - if I do I need to run Afterburner again.

That works until next reboot, I even reset Afterburner after resume from sleep/hibernate as I don’t trust it, or I’ll usually not sleep and just shut down restart.






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This is the behavior I want. Are you using the "no overclock" peofile in AWCC or the 78C, 0,0 from the undervolt guide for the GPU? Do you have AWCC change cooling profile automatically on game launch?

Thanks in advance.

 

Anyone know what the AWCC update that rolled out today is for?

 

@Papusan @maoshen1234

I want to try this the next days. A few Questions:

1. Why do i need to edit Part Number, Serial Number and manufacturer?
2. my ram has B-Dies, so i dont need to chance the stepping, right?
3. You Profile is 2933mhz CL21. My Dim is testet with 3800 CL18. Can i edit your profile to 2933mhz cl18 or will this not boot?

 

Use the 'no overclock' profile, this used to happen with me when it was set to anything other than no overclock. If you want to set a different temp limit you can use Asus GPU Tweak II.

 

I expect he replicated fully Dell’s so called validated ram. Hence he got it to work in his notebook. I don’t know what shenanigans Dell has put into their firmware.
“Some of Dell’s models had even 2926Mhz ram support. I think Dell reduced this to 2666MHz in later firmware for those models. Aka they downgraded ram speed support without shame”

I would try the guide first to be sure it works. You can of course do the opposite and try several things.




Edit. Look at this beauty https://www.dell.com/downloads/ap/services/dell-certified-memory-white-paper.pdf

 

"Value vs price" made me laugh out loud...

 

Is it any wonder I tell people to not trust Umar Khan?

 

This story of ram + 2400MHz support is worthy of the best soap operas ... Guys I installed the vbios 200w with disappointing results, I would like to go back to the original vbios 190w, is it dangerous to use nvflash64? Any recommendations before using it? Thanks in advance

 

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He's trustable, i've been talking with him about Area-51M lately, he seems very mad about GPU temp limit. This will be fixed to ~83, and BIOS 1.9.0 will release in march with XMP.

 

He really is on our side with all of this, he is trying to get things changed for us.

 

He tried last year. I mean it was March month for ram and end of April for the GPU gimping. Nice they show up now and say they will clean up when the refreshed models soon is out. Was the stopgap Azor himself?

Just a reminder. After 1 year the obligatory warranty is out. The time is now. Means if yo don’t have any more warranty... Dell won’t have to fix damaged machines for own costs anymore.

 

Best news I’ve heard yet, I really hope it happens it would make WORLDS of difference to everyone that owns an Area51m.


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That would be awesome if its true.... given that an R2 is some time out.... and I imagine those 2080 kits aren't exactly flying off the shelf since word is out on the throttling problem.

I will remain cautiously optimistic...

 

And one thing we all know we can count on is that Dell takes that kind of cost / benefit ratio into the equation without a doubt.

 

Try this man!

I don’t have anything set in the fusion tab at all in AWCC. Yes, AWCC changes to the cooling auto-profile for my games when I launch them.