M14x R2 Noisy

Fan is way too loud and constantly on. Anyone have any tricks or tweaks to adjust this?

-H

 

Did you force the Nvidia GPU to be used everytime under nvidia control panel? If so just switch to always use Intel4000 and whitelist your games

Try also this: set your energy profile to high performance and switch back to balanced mode

Whats your temps ingame and idle?

 

it's choosing the right GPU's. It's just the fan is so loud and it doesn't kick down very much. Maybe I"ll turn off turbo boost and see what happens..

 

It guess it is not because of anything, I think it is because of the BIOS setting that come default with the laptop, it just like the R1, back when it first release, the fan is on and loud like 95% of the time, then until Dell release the A05 BIOS update that fix/lower the fan speed. However you can also it do manually by installing a modded/unlocked BIOS, just like the numerous unlocked BIOS release by the guys at Tech|Inferno.

BUT be aware, by installing a 3rd party BIOS, the warranty may not be cover should anything wrong happen.

 

I've noticed the fan is quite loud as well. I'll try some of the above suggestions and see if that helps. How do you turn off the turbo boost. I thought that was not an option with the new 3rd gen ivy bridge chip.

 

Check this out, if the issue continues to be the same please send us an e-mail to [email protected] including your service tag and phone number and we will take care of you, after the resolution please post it here so that the community is aware of the fix.

 

I just assumed that is how active cooling works. My R2 is 3 weeks old. It has an SSD in it. And, it sits on a usb cooling pad. I started up a virus scan and boom, fan sounds like full throttle. I had just turned on the comp. During games the fan is full speed it sounds, but I just assumed the GPU needed the cooling.

I don't know much about computers and cooling, but it seems like the fan is very quick to go full throttle when I feel a consistent medium speed would suffice.

 

It shouldn't be this loud.. Thanks L_Porras, but It's clean as a whistle, and I have the latest A03 Bios..

Will follow the issue and see if an A04 or anything later that comes out will fix it.

 

Would you say it sounds a bit like a small vacuum cleaner? I have the same problem and it really makes me not want to use the machine at all...

 

ya the fan def has a distinct sound to it. different then the R!

 

It`s definetely different from the sound of the R1.
The fan of the R2 has a "higher frequency".

 

Well, I sincerely hope a BIOS update fixes that soon.

I can't seem to change the fan's behavior in speedfan. Might any other programs work? My fan is flipping out and going full blast when the gPu is only 60c

 

It's blowing out cold air.. Like the cpu isn't even hot, I'm running some MS Word or something light, and the fan is running at full...

PLEASE FIX BIOS. Thanks!

 

If you are just surfing the web or using word, try setting the power setting to power saver. That does the trick for me. My fans do not run unless I put it onto high performance when playing games.

 

Have you tried manually controlling fans in hwinfo? I have used it for all previous alienwares. I dont have an r2 to test for you though, sorry

 

Actually, was planning on coming in this morning to share my findings. Last night I tried hwinfo and set a whole new fan profile, and it works quite well!

My fan is off completely when the GPU is below 45c, and only hits 3000rpm at 65c.

Is anyone familiar with the safe operating temps of the 650m?

 

Excellent tip, but did you mean CPU instead of GPU?

I can't see a GPU option. Which CPU metric did you choose and your ranges? Screenshot would be nice.

 

I closed HWinfo, opened Diablo so the GPU was in use, THEN opened HWinfo. It then detected the GPU and let me choose it.

It's kinda a hard choice between GPU and CPU, since there may be some point at which the GPU is not being used, but the CPU is in heavy use...Honestly, Dell just needs to get their s___ in order and release a BIOS that fixes this.

 

2nd Pair of eyes please? This is keeping it silent for the most part, haven't given it any huge load except OCCTPT on cpu. Turbo Mode ON

Pleasure to use at this level.

 

Seriously - FIX THE BIOS - the fans are running ridiculously high... I use the program but it throttles down my hardware when it gets too warm, and it doesn't keep the fan setting on reboot.. I always have to re-open the app....

YES YOU DELL FIX THE BIOS

Otherwise loving this machine for Starcraft 3 & Alan Wake atm

 

Same , here its getting annoyed recently...please fix the bios.

 

starcraft 3 lol.. when did that come out

 

I'm in the uber exclusive beta!

 

Spoiler

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Back to topic , Macbook Pro 2012 just released & it came with gt650m and their fans is really quiet , like no sound at all...but why our m14x with 650m...

Our machine is brand new , I don't think is dust related.

An out of date BIOS - latest bios A03 , having this fan issue too , we need a bios fix , if possible fan speed control unlock too.

 

Greetings -

Update - I've done a repaste. It appears temps are much lower. I'm running about 37c. I can't remember what I was doing on my page 2 pic, but those are in the 40's. It's much quieter. I think I got net 5-7c off the cpu in every case.

I used Arctic Silver 5 and the ArcticClean kit. dis-assembly wasn't bad, and only 2 screws don't go back in where I thought they did so that's not bad Box is still solid as a rock. I also removed the memory cover in hopes I get better cooling on the RAM not that it matters much.

Still waiting for a good bios update though.

Pics forthcoming -



OEM Paste before swap and before I cleaned it all off CPU & Sink - Please comment if you think it looks good or bad.

 

So is it still loud or has Dell fix this annoyingly instantly full blast fan noise.

 

Wow my one is idle!!! at 53C and after a few seconds of load it is really loud but doesnt go over 65

repaste is an option but i dont want to break my warranty

regards

Wulfher

 

The thing that annoys me is that the fan seems to kick on when I'm doing nothing but playing an mp3 off the main hdd. So if you're trying to us the internal speakers for the sound, they are actually degraded by the fan noise. It seems like AW never really cared about tuning this stuff to work correctly. Can we manually control the fan yet in our r2s? And that paste looks like bullcrap to me. AW has been dancing around the sloppy paste issue forever now. It's one of the dumbest decisions I've ever seen in a high-end laptop. Take a computer like the m14x r1. They know it runs hot. But then they use sloppy/inferior paste. Which means they are knowingly adding 7-10c to the load core temps. It's soooo duuumb.

 

When you think about it, the paste decision has probably cost them so much time and money that it's idiotic. I have seen users complaining of temp and performance issues since I began researching the brand a year ago.

 

My temporary fix until Dell/Alienware sort out the BIOS/CPU heat issues so that fans don't take off!

For my M14x R2 the main problem generating 90% of the heat is the ivy processors creating to much heat when in turbo mode. I created a new power profile from the balanced profile and tweaked the maximum processor between 60-80% depending if you want complete silence or barely noticeable fans even whilst playing games with the GPU. The other power options which didn't make that much difference was the GPU settings and cooling settings.

 

Apple put some effort and costs into creating a custom fan that is very quiet for their notebooks. If you can catch one try if it fits into your M14x . While Dell just uses standard low budget fans which are also in cheap laptops like acer and co.

The only way to keep our fans quiet if we cant get a seperate Apple fan is to lower temps so it doesnt kick in that extreme.

 

I did notice that the fan design changed between the r1 and r2. The r2 has a more open fan with three "spokes", while the r1 was different...

 

I'm planning to try mac mini's fan not sure if that's possible.

 

I'm still curious, with the latest bios as of 12/11/2012 A09, is there still a problem with the fans being too loud or any heating issues?

 

You might do a little research with A09 before you try and upgrade. I've been reading up on it and there are possible issues with it with some users machines and it causing their nvidia card to be undetectable. There is an open thread on the dell forums about it, dell hasn't come up with an answer just yet.

Here

 

Well if you were to buy a new m14x r2 wouldn't it come with A09 BIOS? There shouldn't be a problem if it comes from the factory with A09 BIOS right? I sure don't understant why Dell doesn't stress test their systems to make sure they are working properly.

 

Mine just arrived yesterday and it came with A09. So far so good. I've had a couple bsods and I've tracked both of them back to paragon backup and restore and their drivers. So far the nvidia card is working good with SWTOR and Guild Wars 2.

Also Holy crap, the fan is loud when it kicks in at full blast lol.

 

Well I got my M14 R2 back in August, I have just checked the bios which is A04 and I have no issue with the fans.

On POST the fan is quite, in the OS surfing the web the fans are quite in games the fans spin up

The fans them self's sound like a small server when there on full power but it is to be expect as it is a performance machine and they only do it under heavy load like gaming (virus scanning just about spins them up every now and then). I also have a cooling pad to improve performance under heavy game play.

So basically fans only come on under heavy load otherwise there silent, even on POST there quite.

====edit====

I should also add I don't use my M14 R2 as a laptop, I use it as a base unit so it just sits on a table hooked up to keyboard & 40" screen so body heat does not effect performance/tempreture

 

Exactly my thoughts as well. I have this machine sitting right next to my M15x (the wife's new machine now haha) and it's great. I couldn't be happier with the performance and so far the fan noise hasn't bothered me a bit and I've spent a great deal of time in SWTOR and Hitman.