M14x R2 temperature and cooling thread

Agreed. I noticed this when trying to quiet the dang fan using hwinfo - I can keep the fans down, but the nvidia will throttle down even though the CPU is fine etc..

 

Just curious, since this is a thread about temps, would it be alright to use this computer on glass surfaces like a glass top desk? Or does it get too warm/do funny things?

 

I just got my r2... without a cooling pad im getting 45-50ish cpu idle temps and 78-80 max after playing max pain on high settings for an hr or so.. this is normal right?

I didnt measure the gpu temp unfortunatly.... however after an hr i died and before it restarted me at a checkpoint it gave me a "Max payne has encountered an error and will close" error... this isnt heat related is it?

 

Matt, cant say for sure that your crash was heat related, as heat could be one of several possible reasons including application instability (which is more likely considering you have new machine and the game was recently released) If your temperature assessment is accurate, we can rule out CPU overheating as a result of the crash due to reasons stated in my original reply to khumprp above.

GPU overheating also seems unlikely at this point because several people including me have rigorously stress tested the GT650, and even under a moderately high overclock (135core and 200memory) the card never goes above 65c without throttling down. I would very highly recommend getting a notebook cooler though, if you want lower overall temperatures and longer overall life of your hardware components which you paid handsomely for. If you must use the laptop without a cooler, I would recommend turning off Turbo boost through the bios as you wont really notice the loss of processing power in most games.

Bottomline, for a new machine, you dont have anything to worry about at the moment, the crash is most likely caused by poor optimization/bugs, but get a notebook cooler if you can and use the laptop on a hard surface.

 

Thanks for the quick reply! Thats a load off my mind

 

Could someone explain the throttling for the 650m? How bad is it? How much does it effect gaming? Ectera.

 

damn that is a shame. I was hoping to use hwinfo when my r2 arrives, it worked great on my r1. What did you set the fans to?

 

So I finally gathered the nerve to open up my R2 and repasted the CPU and GPU with IC Diamond. The picture shows CPU temperatures after playing dawn of war 2 on ultra settings for about two hours, with 135/200 OC on the GPU. Honestly I expected to see a difference in temps but I never thought it would be so dramatic with the u2 laptop cooler and new thermal paste the cpu idles in the low 20s with turbo mode on and maximum temperatures dont exceed 69C! Needless to say, I am extremely pleased with the results! Based on the outcome I'd definitely recommend a CPU/GPU repaste to every M14xR2 owner



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Edit: FYI I like to have ambient room temperatures between 16-20C (59-68F)

 

Nice one, although I notice the cpu doesnt get a full work out with only 21w maximum recorded. Can you fire up BF3 and see what temps you get as that really works your system. And have you disabled turbo boost?

Did you notice any difference in fan noise?

 

Yeah turbo boost was on during the entire session. I dont have bf3 but ill try out skyrim as it was one of the games that gave me higher temperatures before repasting

The fan noise from the system was almost nonexistent because temperatures never got high enough for the fan to increase RPM

 

We Shouldn't have to resort to opening brand new boxes in order to get the fan to turn down..

 

Ignorant question here.... You can easily replace this?

Further, if someone has some nice screenshots of thermal repasting or directions, that'd be great.

Necromage - Rep+ for your multiple excellent responses.

 

Unfortunately the GPU comes soldered on the motherboard on the M14x so there is no way to replace it at this time, however the cpu is replaceable. I dont have much experience with laptop assembly so I just loaded up this video guide on my ipad and followed all instructions step by step. The clip shows how to completely disassemble an R2 laptop but it was a little tricky (at least for me) to put the thing back together as the instructor just advises to 'reverse the tear-down process'

So from experience, just make sure that you keep a separate place for every set of screws before you start taking the system apart, it will save a lot of time and cause less frustration when you put it back together.

 

After running prime 95 for a few minutes max cpu temp was between 80-85... is that normal without laptop cooler?

 

That's awesome lol

 

My brief stress testing has revealed that the r2 has indeed overcome the heat issues. I ran the exact same VJ project in both (two particle generators w/ a chain of effects on top). The r1 CPU starts to hit mid-90s after 20 minutes, with a high of 98c. The fans are blasting at this temp. The r2, however, stays around 63c and tops out at 66c! The fans aren't nearly as audible. That is a huge difference IMO. No GPU temps to report, but I'm honestly not worried. All I wanted to know what that the core temps have gone waaaaay down (and they have). Will do gpu temps soon.

 

Well after playing diablo for 2 hours on maxed settings... my cpu averaged 65ish and never went above 70... the gpu average 55-57 and never topped 60. Good enough for me

 

can you tell me...u play it with turbo boost on or off ? ty

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On... i believe. I have stock settings, i havnt changed anything lol. How can i check?

 

you'll need to enter the bios by pressing the F2 key when prompted during startup. Once there navigate to the advanced tab and you should see the option indicating turbo boost status.

 

I'm going to try the re-set of the heatsink, my Arctic Silver kit with cleaning & conditioning solution is on the way. A BIOS FIX IS STILL IN NEED. But until then, I hope to get lower temps all around. I'll take some pics and post them.

Fan on this thing is ridiculous....

Thanks necromage9 for being the pioneer and sharing your experience.

 

No problem! discussing the system on this thread greatly helped me expand my knowledge in the matter as well!

 

I noticed around 2000-2500 rpm , the fan spin without noise , but around 2500++ above fan noise started but the cooling need to runs up to 2500++ to get the gpu cold down , when gpu around 50c+ the fan will spin up to 2500++ to keep the gpu cold down , I think the fan design is the main problem , just wondering if there is any fan mod , if the fan could spin up to 3k rpm without noise.

I think all of us have this problem

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I have a m14x r2 with 3210m on the way. I will see if they new IB dual cores fare any better and let you guys know

 

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WOW that sounds extremely loud for only 3000kish RPM. I think my R1 is as loud as your R2 at 5600 RPM. Maybe its only the sound of the vid but that sounds extremely annyoing. Im waiting for my R2 now and see if the problems of the R1 are solved or not.

@ninja2000 Ofc the Dual Core Ivy will be less hot and loud as the Quad Cores but at less Performance. For 90% of the games it wont be much difference. I think the perfect CPU for the M14x would be the i7-3667u with 17 TDP. It has still alot of Performance (2.0-3.2 Mhz) specially for games more than enough. And it should run very cool with the extreme low TDP so it will maybe perform better in longer game sessions than the 45 TDP Quads or 35 TDP Duals cause it can hold its max clockspeed without throttling at any point.

And dont forget the fans - i bet it runs with max 2600 RPM since the temps would be around 60 Celsius after hours of gaming.
The battery life would also be highly extended. Id say 6 hours surfing and maybe 2 hours gaming with the dedicated card.

 

Hi All

Not sure if these numbers mean that much, but here's a cap of my m14x r2 temps after running Unigine Heaven for 25min. Tesselation, 16xAnistropy, 8xAA, Vsync, and I was getting 16-30 fps overall during the demo.

BTW I have the 3610, 8GB 1600 HyperX, 2GB gt650m

Previously, my r2 had bested my r1 by 30c when running a VJ stress test. With the Unigine test, the gap drops to 23c or so. Still quite a difference. The CPU and GPU temps seem to hover around 65c and 62c, respectively :]



BTW I should add that the r2 has the RAM cover removed ;] Unfair?

 

Does anyone know if Dell is working on a bios fix for the fan issue? because i might hold off on buying one until it's fixed.

 

What fan issue???

 

Yeah, the r1 temp issues are bad enough that I'm surprised there wasn't a mass revolt. It didn't take me long to notice it hovering around 95-98c core temps when I was VJing or rendering video. Then I started to learn more about hi-end lappys and realized how short-sighted manufacturers can be. Surely they stress tested the r1, so they knew it ran in the 90s. BUT they don't offer better thermal paste like resellers do. On top of that, users have posted images of how the stock paste/pad is sloppily applied. So they basically did nothing to help heat on that front. I figured I'd redo the paste myself, then I saw the teardown process... Alienware M14x R1 R2 disassembly for GPU + CPU teardown / review HIDevolution.com - YouTube

They don't even want me to remove a stripped screw, so I can't imagine they want the average user all up in the innards. Any number of small tabs could break, screws could strip, etc.. Can't wait to try it on the r2...

 

I'm wondering the same thing... i havnt had any real issue with the fan on my r2 lol. When i play diablo, and the cpu heats up... the fan turns up to cool it down. I dont have a cpu cooler so not only do i expect it to behave this way, i'm greatful.

If someone could clarify this "Issue" id appreciate it.

 

BTW how common is manual fan control on notebooks? The r2 still doesn't allow the user to control the RPM, right?

 

Its even worse. You cant even change fan control in an unlocked BIOS where you can see and change the Thermal settings and limits.

The Dell EC is absolutely locked to any kind of manipulation and if you try it with HWINFO it bugs and freezes your whole system. Ofc there are workarounds but they are very complicated and not easy to use for every day.

So Dell dont want you to change the settings and not even a good coder can help you with that.

 

The m11x and m14x have always been buggy with hwinfo. That said, I found I could open hwinfo set my fan speed manually then close it with no problems. It would only get buggy if open whilst trying to game or use msi afterburner.

I am hoping I can do the same with the r2.

Have you guys who are complaining about the m14x r2 fan noise ever used an m14x r1? as that had a very annoying fan profile from a01-a04 bios but then massively improved in a05 onwards bios. I am hoping this will be the same

 

Hey there !

So I'm gonna buy a brand new Alienware M14x-r2, but I wonder something.

I'd like to know if I take an i5 instead of an i7, would the computer be hotter when playing games ? Moreover, do you think the battery life would be much better with an i5 ? I mean, like over 1 hour more at least ?

Thanks for your answers and sorry for my bad english...

 

A bit lower temps - about 5-10 C while gaming. About 10-20 Minutes more battery life while web surfing or using a programm without the gt650m.

Dont forget its a Dual Core CPU with a bit lower clockspeed and only very few better TDP. The biggest plus of the i5 is only the price and maybe a bit less temps. If you really want more battery life and way less temps wait for the ulv i7 sandy bridge CPU´s that are coming this month. They performan better than the i5 and have only 17 TDP!! Means they are a huge increase for the M14x ... if Dell would ever put them into this system even it crys for them.

 

Ok, thanks for your answer !
The price for me is quite important, I'm a student !
If I buy an Alienware, it will be on a special website done for students (which only contains Dell and Alienware computers with included 3 year warranty). I'll ask them if they'll get these new ulv CPU's !

And another question : 1go or 2go for the gt650m, is there really a huge difference ? (I just wanna play Diablo 3 on it, I guess 1go is quite enough, isn't it ?)

 

Sorry i was a bit tired yesterday.. i wanted to say Ivy Bridge ULV´s not Sandy Bridge of course. Specially the i7-3667u which will be the best of them all and used for every new Ultrabook, Macbook etc. thats coming out soon. Im also waiting to get one into my hands and upgrade my M14x with this CPU and sell my i7-3610qm for it.

The 2GB GT650M is important if you use external monitors / beamers with your M14x. If you are only going to use your laptop on its own the 1GB is more than enough.

Hope that helps

 

Haha ok, no problem !

Yeah it looks quite interesting, but I think it'l be too expensive for me. Moreover, it's not sure that this will come soon in the M14x !
(For information, the M14x I wanna buy has an i5, 500gb HDD, 6gb ram, 1gb GT650m, color red D) and 3 years warranty, for an amount of 1250€.
And I don't know if I should take a 3 years warranty for the break of the laptop, or a 1 year extension of the basic warranty (4 years in the end).

Are the Alienware laptop reliable during many years, or have they often problems after 2 or 3 years ?

Ok so it's sure I'll take an 1gb GT650m thanks a lot !

Moreover, I've seen an interesting offer of a man of a forum, here's the link : (french forum)
http://portables4gamers.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=22575
If the 3 years-warranty extension is always available for 165€ in Dell, I think I'll take this laptop

But what is the battery-life of a M15X ? (With a 6-cells battery)

 

My M15X died after 40 minutes of gaming. Also while surfing the web the time wasnt great. I remember about 1hour30minutes without plugged in. The M15X has only the dedicated GPU and no optimus solution thats why it is not really for portable use without cable ... But the chassis is great and relative heavy. Its chassis is brushed aluminium - i would always prefer this material over the rubber finish of the M14X.
The GTX260m is a very nice card for an older system ofc. And the M15X has no temp or noise issue at all since it has 2 big fans that cool the GPU and the CPU each at low RPM. Temps on mine with similar config as in your link were about 67 C after 2 hours gaming.

 

Omg, life battery on m15x sucks !

Now I don't know what to do...!

Do you know if Dell still does the 3-years warranty extension for only 165€ ? (Normally for almost 400€...)

 

Hm dunno i paid 200 for 2 years extension.

 

Ok, finally I decided to let the laptop to another guy !
Now Ive seen a M17x r3 for 1450€ with gtx580m, bluray reader...
And Ive read that the battery life of the m17x r3 is looks really good ! Almost 4 hours without gaming of course... Its battery life looks like the m14x r2 no ? ~4 hours

 

What does everyone think about these temps?

This is after about an hour of S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl with the Complete Mod (2012). Oh, I have the Cooler Master Notepal U2 running.

 

Looks about right to me

 

Too high for my taste but still way better than R1 temps. I would prefer temps at max 70 C for such a small Notebook. Without the coolpad your temps would be mid 80 C i guess. But as long as the warranty lasts i wouldnt care for temps like that.

 

That's hotter than other previous posts, but it seems normal in my opinion, knowing that there's only one fan in the laptop !

 

They look normal to me, but take note atmosphere temps also when doing these checks. For instance I'm Aussie and since we're in the middle of winter when I get my M14x temps will be a bit cooler then yours, the air your laptop is sucking in matters; dont forget, the U2 pumps more air into your laptop, it doesn't cool the air, summer will be dangerous for me and I'll probably have to move my T.V. and laptop out infront of the aircon cause we get 40 Celsius days.

Anyway, whats the weather like there? Room temp I mean, if it's quite warm, I'd expect 70 degrees temps in my laptop at 30 degrees room temp. I would prefer 50-60 at full load for me.

 

So are these temps similar to yours? Should I be worried?

I feel they are a little high too. I'm going to try it without the cooler and see what happens.

That's what I was thinking and why I posted as the temps seem to be a bit higher than other posters' temps.

Good point. The temps here yesterday (Northern California) were in the mid 70s, not too hot. It's going to be much cooler over the next few days. I guess I'll just have to keep playing more Stalker to do more tests

 

Personally, I wouldn't be worried about this temps, moreover I think ur warranty is always available knowing that the r2 has only about 1 or 2 months.

And for the battery life, how long does your m14x ?

 

Cool, thanks. I haven't been using the battery much yet; I've just had it plugged in since I got it. But from a quick check, it has about 4.5 hours, but I'm sure I could get more if I turned down the screen brightness and turned off Alien Effects.