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

If the latest bios doesn't cripple performance then i see no real advantage for you to downgrade. As i said before make sure to create a 78C profil in AWCC and the 200W Vbios (if you have a good paste, cooling) or the 180Vbios is you have stock paste (not so good cooling). If then you are not satisfied with performance (wich i doubt) then maybe you can take the risk of downgrading bios (but never 1.3.2)

 

I was scared since @MogRules reported soft brick of his laptop, the downgrade is sucessful from 1.13.0 ---> 1.5.0

 

Oh....i just learned a new word .....soft brick? Does it means it looks brooken but in reality it's not? Interesting.

So i think your a refering to this post: Force downgrade Alienware Area-51m Bios (or any alienware) to locked lower versions

and then this one he explains what he thinks has happened and how to prevent problems: Force downgrade Alienware Area-51m Bios (or any alienware) to locked lower versions

The know issue with downgrading to 1.3.2 is that it will break your laptop (for real) as compare to 1.13 where @MogRules almost had a heart attack thinking (fortunatly for him, not) he had broke his laptop.

I understand your dilemma now. Unfortunatly i heard of no-one downgrading from 1.13 successfully, Well that's not completely true since @mogurules finally succeded going from 1.13 to 1.12 to 1.7.3 (from there you can sucessfully downgrade to 1.5.0 if you really want). That was a scary event and i am not sure it's worth the risk in your case.

It's your decision now but you should really test 1.13 with all the tweak i link you too before and benchmark it after, see if this bios really cripples performance (that would fit dell's patern unfortunatly). But if i was to attempt this bios downgrade i would do 1.13 to 1.12 first. And then anything equalt and above 1.5.0 base on @MogRules experience.

 

I downgraded just fine from 1.13.0 to 1.5.0 just fine , no brick what’s so ever.

 

Great news! Happy for you.

 

Is there such thing as GSYNC RTX2070 and NON-GSYNC RTX2070 for A51M?

Point being, im dealing with Area51m that originally came from dell as i9-9900k and rtx2060 60hz mon GSYNC panel/no tobii eye tracking setup. Rtx2060 being as bone stock as it gets it works before and after the attempted upgrade. Im on system bios 1.7.3, unsure what vbios rtx2070 is/was on.

What happens exactly is at the start with 2070 in place all lights come on but not LCD. It cycles trough colors on the keyboard for like 10 seconds, turns off by itself, seem like reboot readjusting CMOS settings etc, turns back on by itself 2-3 seconds later fans spin stops lights go dark, restarts, repeats endlessly. Infinite bootloop like this

I was thinking, either rtx2070 is simply dead, or system bios too old/incompatible with 2070vbios , or, perhaps card is GSYNC and since my system isnt GSYNC capable.... Maybe thats what happening? Any ideas?

Oh and yes, I did try and reset/clear CMOS settings, pulle , laptop battery, RTc battery, shorted RTC coin battery terminals held together with power switch pressed down for 30+ seconds, didn't help.

 

Have you ever tried to plug in an external monitor?

 

No. But, I tried unplugging EDP connector from the card and trying it to stsrt and it was a no go, nothing changed, its likencard refused to initialize and almost shorts the laptop power circuit so laptop nust reboot every 3 seconds endlessly

 

Dumb as this suggestion might be, do you have SecureBoot on or off in the BIOS settings?

 

I had tried with both options, neither has done any impact unfortunately.

 

I think Gsync is only a screen & driver thing, not video chip implemented but I could be wrong things change every time I'm not looking.


You might want to take a close look at the LCD ribbon cable ? maybe carefully reseat it that sounds a lot like what some people have reported after having the laptop apart, and if the LCD connector look ok, I know it's a pain but if I were in your shoes I would put the 2060 back in just to prove its the 2070 or not?

 

Just for reference..... Melbourne domestic airport.... not even remove from backpack at security.... no issues.
Brisbane airport... remove from cover into dirty tray..... scanned and then detected issue in red box????? Rescanned and then drug/bomb swab.....wtf???? Then cleared.....

Will check how dirty the white got as a result.
Now not used or charged from Nov 30th 2020..... will also reveal the battery level(80%) before left.... on setup home
Edit: So NOOB mistake hooked up to USB C monitor that was off on trying to start on battery power... first start and did not start. Connected Power to lappie and showing 79% battery. Shutdown and monitor unhooked, on battery.... started no issues. When I original shutdown pressed and held left shift to ensure all power drain off.

 

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I recently installed this vapor chamber heatsink assembly in an Area 51M R1 9900k / RTX 2080 and it worked shockingly well.
Previously my idle temps were low 50 C range and this brought my idle temps down to low 30 C range. (my cpu doesn't idle that quietly and I gain -5 C if I shut down some background processes)

I used liquid metal between the IHS and the vapor chamber and changed out the thermal pads when I did it. It is a tight fit but I eventually got it installed.

With a modest undervolt (~1.32v 5GHz) you can sustain all cores at 5GHz but you will be in the low to mid 90 C.

Later I installed a waterblock on the cold side of the vapor chamber that runs 10 C water through it and with that idle temps are 20 C and all core 5GHz is low 70 C range. The cpu can sustain 200W indefinitely with small overclock but anything more than 210W and I'll be at 100 C. I would call that pretty remarkable for a laptop.

The fans on this assembly are also better. They are quieter, faster to respond and push more air.

I would definitely recommend this as the cheapest and easiest long run fix for the heat issues.

This is the ebay product title: Vapor Chamber for ALIENWARE Area-51m 51M R1 ALW51M Fan With Heatsink 0FY4CJ
This is the seller: cicichen594
This is the price I paid:US $268.00

I received it from Hong Kong in about 10 days.
You can see the feedback I left for him was pretty positive to say the least: Tx# 264882164884

 

Ive looked trough that, it was nothing to see/find/fix etc, connection on lcd cable was 100% perfect. And yes, I swapped 2060 back number of times to verify, and 2060 works every time while 2070 does not. Seems like bad 2070 to me. Anyone has 2070 vBIOS dumps for it? Or perhaps PCB schematics?

Thanks

 

the rtx 2070 is new? can be uninstalled the rtx2060 driver and put the rtx2070 back and restart

 

Dell are you reading Rockland post I WANT MY PROMISED UPGRADEABLE Area 51m from current max spec to this solution!!!!!

 

Is this meant to be sarcastic?

 

Hey folks - I suddenly noticed the other day my fans were spinning harder than usual. No heating issues etc. but what I noticed was my AWCC was not loading, just coming up then the spinning windows doodle going around and around. I reinstalled AWCC, but while everything appears to work, the temp profile isn't being applied it seems UNLESS I click on it once. After that until reboot, it works fine until I shutdown. Anyone seen this issue by chance?

 

I had a similar issue. When i use custom thermal profile, fans were not kicking and the laptop was overheating. When i switched back one of the default profiles, it was working. Then i have found out the problem is related with Alienware OC Controls. I have uninstall and installed Alienware Command Center and OC Controls based on a guide which can be found in this forum. Now it works properly except that annoying pop up tells me to upgrade oc controls and sound profile add ons even though they are up to date. You can try this and try to revert previous versions of OC Controls or Command Center.

 

Thanks for the tip - I seem to recall that now that you mention it!

 

Random question--Any of you guys mine on your 51m and have a 2080? Been doing it for over a month and curious to see what hashrates people have been able to get out of it. I haven't overclocked the memory as we all know how sensitive these guys are to heat lol. Just running stock clocks and currently get about 38-43 MH/s at about $4-$4.30ish a day. Everything stays super cool with fans at max speeds, but unfortunately don't have a way to check the gpu memory junction temps like I can on my 3090 desktop PC.

 

I mine eth with my 51m non-stop 24/7 from April 2019 except the times I am using it for productive work. I have created a profile on the msi afterburner with the gpu underclocked /undervolted and the memory at +850mhz. I get 43-44mh/s and temps around 60-62c. Gpu and cpu are with liquid metal.

 

Hi guys! I have an area 51m r1 i7-9700k and rtx 2070...whats is the best bios version to install? The current is 1.12...is this one good enough or do i need to downgrade?

 

And can anyone please tell me the best settings to overclock and undervolt this version in msi afterburn and throttlestop? ( i dont know if its possible in 1.12 bios..)

 

You should try and find your own settings. There are lots of messages related to your question and those can give you a good start.

 

There are many great threads in this forum about those things but you will need to search, I can save you a bit of time though and let you know that unless your very experienced and into benchmarks there is not a lot to be gained by overclocking an A51m, the heat exchange is simply not up to the task, in fact some people UNDERVOLT the GPU and get more stable performance but that involves creating a curve for your GPU in Afterburner.

Undervolting the CPU to reduce heat? the i9-9900 runs hot I see most seem to be ok at -100mv to -130mv offset but you have to try it on yours and stress test it, silicon lottery.

Best bet IMO is to work towards making your A51m STABLE in extended gaming / whatever sessions that ramp up the heat for extended periods of time.

And whatever you do don't upgrade your A51m BIOS past 1.5.0 or maybe 1.7.3 if you have Chi Mei panel and want Gsync.

 

Tks!

 

And wich one is the best bios version? .5 or .7.3? Is safe make a downgrade?

 

Reasonably safe but there is always a chance of problems especially if you are inexperienced in doing it, since you are on an early BIOS already 1.2 I think you said ? no need to change it, I believe several people here have said they run 1.2 or 1.3 with good results.

 

Im on 1.12.0 bios, not the 1.2...so i would like to know if this version (1.12) is good or the 1.5/1.7.3 is better?

 

I thought any bios past 1.5 throttles the gpu at a lower celcius number. Does 1.7.3 have the same gpu temperature max as the 1.5?
I would love to use the g-sync in my laptop screen but having the gpu throttle because of the thermal limit is a big no-no for me.

 

I believe someone here mentioned they were able to unlock the thermal slider on 1.12 and didn't see much difference between 1.12 and 1.5.0 but YMMV each system will be a little different.

From what I have read here 1.2 seems to be fine, if its working for you there is no real reason to change it IMO.

 

Others will correct me if I am wrong, but I think I remember seeing people say they were able to unlock their thermal slider all the way up to version 1.12 or 1.13, however there is still the issue of other thermal management in the machine which may or may not cause stuttering as you approach 76c - 80c varies a bit by machine and what you are running at the time, your ambient air temp in the room etc.
Myself I have been back and forth several times and decided Gsync isn't worth it for me, I get the most stable and stutter free performance on the games I play running BIOS 1.5.0 with thermal slider set at 78c.

 

All you have to do to unlock the slider again is replace the "profiles.zip" folder to a copy that is older than when they locked the slider. I use a copy of the profiles.zip from June 1st 2020. Just copy and paste it in the OCCcontrolService folder to overwrite the folder and then set it to read only. Then just restart the laptop and the slider is unlocked again. you have to do it again every time overclock controls updates every couple months though.

The guides they had on this thread had a lot more steps to unlocking the slider, but I have never had to do anything other than replace the folder and restart to unlock it. super easy.

The newest bios has been the most stable and the smoothest gameplay for me. I set the thermal slider at 77.

 

That's encouraging to hear, maybe I will give it a shot again if I get bored and see if it works here as well.

 

So wait the thermal throttling happening before 80c is not a bios lock but a software one from Alienware command center? That does not make sense because the throttling happens even without the software being installed (most the time that I format my laptop I don't even install it).

Can you please point the guide that has the latest version of the bios working with 80c thermal max on the gpu? I am curious on the exact steps.

Thank you.

 

Use a couple of hours in this thread
Force downgrade Alienware Area-51m Bios (or any alienware) to locked lower versions

 

Only 2380 pages to go through

 

It's both Bios limited AND software limited, but at different temperatures. You can bypass the command center lock, but not the bios limit.

The Bios throttles it hard at 79ish degrees and drops the GPU to 300mhz. Dells fix instead of raising the bios limit was to lock it in command center to 75 deg to avoid the hard throttle. if you set it to 77 or 78 deg it never hits the Bios throttle ever and you won't have any throttling that you will notice or FPS drops. one of the benchmarkers on this thread tested the newer bios with it set to 78 degrees vs. 1.5 bios unlocked and there was basically no performance difference in games.

 

So I'm getting messages about updating Windows 10 Pro to latest..... is there any issues with doing this?

mmmm. How do you say at 78 degrees?

 

Macrium Reflect Rescue Media ISO v7.3.5758 (with RAID support and cloning to dissimilar hardware supported).

Spoiler: Changelog

Bug fixes and Improvements v7.3.5758 - 22nd March 2021

• Server Plus - Exchange Mailbox Restore
  • When filtering by message type, the Mailbox Restore wizard would not always display the correct description for the filter being applied. This has been resolved.
  • When applying a default message filter, all messages would be filtered out. This has been resolved.
• Rescue Media Builder
  RMBuilder could fail to retain its configuration state after build failure. This has now been resolved.
• Backup Definitions View
  The 'Type' column wasn't populated with the definition type. This has now been resolved.
• File and Folder Restore
  The time taken to restore has now been added to the end of the restore log.

Use RUFUS to make a bootable USB Flash Disk from it







Note: I don't install Macrium Reflect, I only boot from the USB Flash Disk to create or restore images. That way I have none of its bloated services running in the background.

Be smart...be like Spartan..

 

My reaction to that message was no thanks. In my experience there have been constantly issues with updating windows, so if it is working why mess with it?

For my system it's disabled as well as all "feature" updates any supposed security update install gets delayed here for 3-6 months until they fix whatever they broke with that patch, I am not interested in any of the supposed "new features" I find all of them pointless and useless, I don't know what those people are smoking but it's not helping.

In my opinion both M$T and Apple are both doing a great job of introducing more and more people to Linux.

 

hi guys, im getting Display driver nvlddmkm stopped responding randomly (not in gaming)
i tried to lower the gpu and memory speed to see if it helps
but they just getting less but still happens(both 150mhz lower than default and 0.1 volt lower)
now I wonder if I upgrade the vbios to the 200w bios will help?
I'm still on the original 190w RTX2800 vbios
and the temperature were just fine, even in gaming it never reaches over 84degrees on very demanding games, most games lower than 70 degrees
and I already followed the paste and thermal pad guide to add/replace all the stuff
motherboard is v1.5
it doesn't seem to be a driver issue cause I already tried a lots of old or new drivers and they are the same

 

"nvlddmkm stopped responding" is most likely your GPU settings are not stable.
I don't believe changing Video Bios will correct that issue.

 

This is not entirely correct. It is part of the BIOS ROM, but most importantly of the EC (Embedded Controller) part of the BIOS. And as such it can be Disabled and Bypassed!!!
I think a few people showed it before, including myself: simply have HWINFO64 running, disable the EC and manually control the fans. If you disable "Alienware EC" support I think it's called, the "hard-lock" at 78-79C will not happen!
Obviously, lower temps are better and I wouldn't use the GPU constantaly at 80 Celsius, but it is up to you

 

I usually get this error when gamning and my MSI overclock is unstable.
Try to restore you overclock to default and then close MSI (if you are using it) or set overclock GPU to stock in AWCC.
If it doesn't solved the problem then reinstall video driver using DDU uninstaller. Reinstall before rebooting.

 

the thing is,I didn't even overclock, I even tuned lower than default and this is still happening , I already did the DDU uninstall part before with other version of drivers and its still happening, not very frequently but maybe once every few days.

 

The same applies for instability if you undervolt too far... it could be the same. Try default clocks and voltages and see if it still happens. Make that your baseline and only after you have proven stability, start undervolting step by step and test each time.

I know you went -.1 V but this might be too far for your 2080. Maybe you got an undervolting lemon in the silicon lottery...

 

Hi there ... I've had an Alienware R4 17 for about 4.5 years now and other than running hot, it's been a flawless machine. But the 6700HQ/GTX 1070 combo is starting to balk at some of the newer titles and so I'm considering purchasing a 10700K/RTX2070 Super Area 51m off of the Dell website. My question is this: has Alienware improved the cooling at all on the latest iterations of the 10700K based Area 51 machines? Also, if overheating becomes an issue, will Dell come out and assist with a repaste?

Thanks in advance,
s1rrah

 

IMO from what I have seen and read the simple answer is not really and no.

If you are set on getting that particular machine best bet IMO would be buying from a 3rd party rebuilder who will re paste it with better quality paste and build it more to your needs, but the box can only move so much air.