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

If I were you, I'd wait it out a little bit more until prices go down a little bit further and buy the 2080 setup directly. As for the CPU, 9900K is quite a bit more powerful than the 9700K, has more cache and will future proof your setup for quite a long time. These things are not bought every day so I'd suggest buy what's top of the line so that you are good to go for many more years to come. Buying the lower spec version will make you frequently upgrade as time goes on and you might end up spending more money overtime if you go that route. Since you are buying directly from Dell, I have noticed it numerous times that Dell sends mixed batches of hardware in their machines (I got a bunch of these laptops serviced and most of the times, parts that arrived for replacement were actually older than the ones installed in the laptop, with under-spec mosfets and lower grade components that were actually upgraded in second batch). Due to this reason alone, I'll suggest that you buy from HIDevolution and specify to them that you want an upgraded GPU + Motherboard. Telling Dell to do one thing is next to impossible because it's a big corporation and there are way too many idiots in support / sales chain who simply and blatantly ignore your requests and send over whatever they have available. With HIDevolution, you will pay a little more but they'll make sure you get what you paid for at least. My experience with them has been good except for the thermal upgrades but you can opt out of any upgrades if you want. Once you get your machine, transfer your warranty from the name of HIDevolution to your own name. Then communicate the details of your case to Alienware Tech twitter support and they'll expedite your warranty transfer in your name and it'll be done in max 2 days or so. So at the end you'll have your laptop in your name and the parts will be of your choice and in some cases, even cherry picked from a large lot of parts. You won't get this from Dell and your machine might end up potentially getting a lot of unnecessary "services" when you can avoid that. That'll all be for free, sure, but the time and frustration is also a cost imo. Good luck with the purchase.

 

The AGA only works on the internal display if its being driven by the Intel GPU.

 

Good to know. first time i heard of such limitation. Meaning any alienware models with G-Sync will not run on internal display. thanks for the info

 

Now I can relate to that in more ways than you realise, I completely understand your feelings and your reasons. Why waste money on something when you can use it on something more important, isn't it?

2060 is a good card but what I don't like about it is that in some scenarios, it actually slower than a last generation 1070, which for me is a big bummer. RTX won't work on a 2060 anyway so it's a huge waste and hardly a new generation card.

Since you'll be using the AGA most of the time, I can understand your point of view as well. But, in terms of upgradability, its easier and cheaper to upgrade the processor in the future than the DGFF Dell cards. Who knows what the pricing might be.

And in terms of warranty, you're right. Put the money for some extra warranty, you might end up with some upgraded hardware in the future, this machine is notorious for dying without any warning. Good luck.

Sent from a Galaxy S9+

 

Hopefully someone can help me out. I haven't been able to use Tobii in about 2 months.

I've tried just about everything besides a clean install to fix it. I uninstalled the Tobii software and drivers multiple times using Revo uninstaller, tried older and newer versions, basically gave up and disabled it.

I'd like to get it working again though.

When I run the troubleshooter it says (error 0x101) One or more eye tracking components is missing.

I've downloaded all of the Tobii related stuff that dell lists on their driver page to no avail. Anyone have this issue and able to help me out?

 

Can I ask why you have a AGA with a Radeon VII when you already have a 2080 in the laptop? And also does connecting the Radeon VII disconnect the 2080 when connected via AGA?

Oddly I’d forgotten about tobii until I did a bios downgrade to 1.5 and suddenly the app appeared as I started windows. What bios version are you on and which version of windows? The app coming back might have been a windows upgrade rather than the bios downgrade. I’m not sure. All I know is that app appeared after either one had happened.

 

Im on 1.5.0 and latest 1903. I know I was on 1.5.0 when it was last working. Can't recall what windows version I was on though.

 

I warned everyone a long time ago to stay away from 1903 for now. I said that for good reasons. You should revert back to 1809 if you want to avoid unnecessary frustrations.

 

Alienware Area-51m Drivers 07-Aug-19

Remember to unblock the ZIP file before extracting it by right clicking on the ZIP file, select "Properties" then find the unblock button in the bottom right, check it, then hit apply.

New Intel UHD Graphics Driver
New Intel Rapid Storage Technology Driver
New WLAN and Bluetooth Drivers

 

https://www.corsair.com/us/en/Categ...™-Gen-4-PCIe-NVMe-M-2-SSD/p/CSSD-F2000GBMP600
Will this fit on A51m? heatsink looks huge on photos

 

Shameless plug: the DGFF on the Precision 7X30 can be upgraded to those coming with the Precision 7X40.

I upgraded mine from the Quadro P3200 to the Quadro RTX 3000.

 

Nope, but I made an SSD heatsink post and plan on trying various sinks.
I will post in there.

 

I don't think that gen4 SSD will perform very well in a gen 3 slot. Just a hunch no proof yet.

 

I could not find this ssd heatsink post.

 

Many should. Depends on if the brand offer proper backwards compatibility. Read reviews before purchase.

 

What's the best way to step back to 1809 from 1903? just got my unit and 1903 is the new base image.

 

format c:

lol jk you'll need to do a clean install.

Always do. I did read that the corsair mp600 is backwards compatible. They suggested it will not perform near current high end NVME gen 3 drives though. I will have a couple in the next few days and might try it. Don't know if I feel like disabling my 51m just for testing right now..

 

@Papusan if there is anybody being paid to shill a product by Alienware, I think it's pretty obvious who it would be on this thread...

What he's saying is, hide all the failure ones, and only show "positives"

 

Nice. What TimeSpy score does your RTX 3000 achieve?

 

area51m-aftermarket-ssd-heatsinks-that-fit.829804

 

In case anyone missed it. New AW headphones that match the design of the 51m. The higher end AW510h comes in dark side of the moon or lunar white type colors to match. The cheaper aw310h only dark.

https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/accessories/apd/520-aaqc

 

I wonder if the Lunar White headphones will become yellow as well. Probably best go with the dark side of moon.

 

Shower more often. Get up from the computer desk and wash yo nasty butt's..

 

Those are surprisingly cheap. I was expecting them to be quite expensive based on their original headset.

 

you’d be surprised I would class myself as a gamer once or twice in a month, I’m usually out with the lads playing tennis or football (soccer in your country lol). Gaming should never be your only go to thing for relaxation

I’m like @Mr. Fox I only really play games for the benchmarks and to push hardware. Once I know how it performs I sell the machine and make profit. It’s as easy as that.

 

Couldn't get the TimeSpy score to show publicly (link here), but here's a screenshot:

 

looks really promising for Area-51m. GPU upgrade might actually be a reality.

 

Doesn't look like it will work though because the quadro cards have 3 connection pins for the pcie link to the MB, the 51m only has 2.

Maybe I'm missing something though?

Edit: error

 

Your version of windows is to old, after you update to the latest, uninstall tobii and let windows download auto, will work 100%.

 

I'm on the latest 1903 update.

Just uninstall it and let windows update download it?

Edit: Just tried it and it still isn't working. It's also saying components missing but I've installed every Tobii driver on Dells website.

Edit 2: Just installed it and everything related to Tobii. Removed all remnants in the registry as well as hidden folders. Restarted and let windows download what it needed, then installed the driver package from dell, then Tobii Experience app.

Still not working.. I wonder if my Tobii is just broken. When I try to look through the camera on my phone to see the IR lights, they aren't visible.

 

Not a waste at all. G-Sync will help too with lower framerates so I say go for both.

It did work like that on the older models ( I am assuming due to Optimus/iGPU wired to internal display)

On Area-51m, if I game on internal display, my Radeon VII doesn't seem to be utilized.

Radeon VII is for a hackintosh project. It's fully supported in macOS, 2080 is not supported at all.

On older laptops, the dGPU disconnects and AGA GPU turns on.

On Area-51m the dGPU stays on so all 3 GPUs are on at the same time (iGPU, 2080, VII)

 

Hey I haven't posted in ages. My area 51 works excellent. Would it be worth it to upgrade to a 9900k or 9900kf for gaming as well as a portable workstation or should I not play with fire (Possibly literally) here?

 

For gaming it would not make a difference. I don't know about workloads but i don't expect that it would be a huge upgrade.

 

Thanks. Have you applied any undervolting to the CPU and GPU? Does MSI Afterburner work with Quadro cards? What max CPU/GPU wattage and temps did you see during the test?

 

https://twitter.com/EddyGoyanes/status/1159290974973112320

seems they don't have a plan to Memory.

 

The CPU was undervolted with an offset of -0.136 V, as was the cache.

Unfortunately not. Memory and core clocks, and voltages, are 100% locked down.

The Xeon E-2176M CPU attained a power draw of 90 W (the PL1 limit), and the GPU attained its specified power draw of 80 W.

 

Thanks. Very interesting to see that the 45W TDP Xeon still reached 90W while undervolted. You haven't mentioned the temps, which would have shed some light on what was going on.

The GPU is a bit underwhelming TBH. Performance is on par if not below stock 2060, possibly related to the 80W TDP as opposed to 90W (occasionally boosting to 100W) in AW m15 R1. On top of that, just 6GB of VRAM if I remember correctly, which is surprisingly low in a pro machine.

I guess they had to sacrifice graphics and cooling to accommodate all that storage and RAM estate.

 

I, for one, am not surprised in the slightest by this. Their main focus for the past months have been "fix" the burning issue, not to make the system even more hotter. They achieved this by throttling the GPU and *most* of the users out there will never notice this as it doesn't seem to effect the "performance of the games" like its said on his reply to your tweet. Only, informed users will know what the hell is going on with their system.

I will go as far as to say this, the Area 51M debacle cost Azor his job at Alienware, but due to his legacy, it was done in a more bureaucratic manner. There will never be a R2 version of this system as "business wise" it doesn't make sense at all. Most of us are protected by a long warranty back up, but I truly feel sorry for people who has only 1 year warranty with this system.

Sent from a Galaxy S9+

 

Well I joined the club yesterday. Made my purchase of the black model with the 9900k and 2080 with 32 gigs of ram. Now the waiting begins. I'm rather excited!!!

 

I bet they will still do I R2 and correct many things on this.
I think that because this is different than the 18 from the past. They cannot stuff this performance in their thin and light and will need a non MaxQ system.
Frank was planning this departure long before this system. He's been with the company a long long while. All of the other founders have moved on to other things etc.
He had a long run, he ran a successful transition to corp Dell and it was his time to move on to new endeavors. Simple as that.
Their numbers would not call the A51m a debacle. While the failure rates are higher than normal they are still lower than you might think. Because of the tech industry, it doesn't matter as much as you would think.
They will be on to the next refresh faster than they could implement a physical hardware fix. This is not their fault but more of a Moor's law-related thing. Tech just moves too fast for a large scale fix to make sense.
If there truly is a defect and your personal system keeps failing, there will be a record of this. (I suggest documenting every repair and exchange). If they fix the issues on the R2 and you have the proper records, it would not be difficult to plead your case to get an R2 as a system exchange.
Especially because the R2 would essentially be an Intel refresh plus presumably a fix to these issues. I personally have this mindset when it comes to my system.
So the warranty truely is proper protection. It is not unheard of for Dell to do this. So, really the only issue is dealing with the headache along the way. Your purchase is well protected from a warranty standpoint.

 

This is the biggest reason i won't give my money to AW anymore. They'll lie to you, just to get your money. It was all marketing just to get your money which worked. Again...

 

Agh, I keep mixing benchmarks. It hits 90 W in Cinebench R15/R20, but only about 65 W or so in Time Spy. The temperature is rather elevated because the GPU is running, too, but there is no throttling, and all 6 cores run at 4.1 GHz.

Well, that's the specs of the Quadro RTX 3000. It was supposed to come with 2304 cores, but it's only got 1920 (which I am following up on with Dell). The power limit is a problem, but there is definitely wiggle room as the GPU barely reaches 65 °C under heavy loads.

 

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The 144Hz w/ g-sync is certainly not wasted on the 2060 as I can confirm being a proud owner of the 9700k - 2060 config.. You will also NOT be limited in the games you choose to play either. You may want to choose High settings vs Ultra sometimes in order to get better thermals. Also every so often I might cap the FPS If it gets me from 80+C CPU temps down to 55-60C, but it is by no means necessary. You will also be amazed at the low GPU temps in any situation. Mine rarely gets above 70C, and is usually in the upper fifties or low sixties.

 

New Area51m mousmat

https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/ali...581?ref=p13n_ena_pdp_vv&c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs

and a hexagon mat

https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/new...587?ref=p13n_ena_pdp_vv&c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs

and whatever the hell this is:

https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/ali...580?ref=p13n_ena_pdp_vv&c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs

 

As much as I'd like that to be true, my personal hunch is that when AMD approached the Aliens (or vice versa) to exclusively install ThreadRipper into A51 (for the remainder of 2017), FAzor & AMD management had a romance of sorts: 'come onboard someday, we'd love to have you', or, he seduced them

As an aside, the fact he never authorized a Bios update for TRip1 buyers to upgrade to TRip2 chips during the 'I'll go work for AMD someday!' period in his life, is, bizarre, given that potentially a few thousand TRip2 chips are unsold & will remain unsold on store shelves because of him, & TRip3 chips soon unsold as well. There a man who could snap his fingers & AMD rakes in the $, but didn't


As for memory speeds, I did think - based on this January Reddit AMA - that 2666 (or higher) would be a no-brainer. Often, the desktops launch w/base memory speed then higher configs hit the sales menu. Odd that Goyanes says 2400 is 'aKtUalY bY DeSIgN' like a self-imposed ceiling. The Aliens are like NASA: never a straight answer

 

I don’t think threadripper was really a thought as it isn’t a great gaming cpu and this machine is really about gaming. It’s to quirky having to reboot into “game mode” etc.

 

THANK YOU!

I was hoping a 9700k/2060 owner could give me feedback.

So now...It just a wait for a sale, or until I have to pull the trigger because my credits are expiring. By the point maybe the 2070 is feasible.

For the record, my son has a M15(R1) 100c+ heat is the norm after a gaming session. I surreptitiously dropped the voltage a bit, and purchased a multi fan pad... I really do not want to have to replace it!!

 

to be fair, they never marketed the memory to be more than 2400MHz, though i'm also disappointed why this can't be done on a modern platform.

 

Yeah I dont understand why they haven't put this in yet.

Is it really that hard for the software engineers to implement this into a BIOS update?

I wish they would at least allow custom BIOS mods so the talented people in this community could create firmware that supports 2666 and more. Hell, I'd pay for it.

 

I noticed your are using premium hyperX memory. Since there is no BIOS control over memory, do you get better CAS latency and timing with the HyperX memory or it's just the same as any regular 2666MHz memory?