[Guide] Installing AMD Radeon Mobility 6970 / 6990 in your M17x R2 (Single GPU and CrossfireX)

Whatch out with the quantity of thermal paste that you apply. A really small qty has to be used to achieve good results. My 6970's are flashed as desktop 6850 @ 775/1000 1.035V, it is rare for me to pass the 70 °C mark... and only in very demanding games, Usually it range from 65 to 68 degrees on the thermal diode and 2 to 3 degrees more on the shaders. Also, try to set a more aggressive fan scheme with the help of HWinfo, it works really well

 

So, more bad news here. The old 5870's no longer work either. The laptop has been occasionally starting up blinking the "bad motherboard" light combo, or bad video card, but neither with any repeatable success, and I even got a beep code that isn't in any of the Alienware documentation 1 time.

The box was BEAT to HELL and BACK by Fedex and has a hole in one side and 3 corners with drop damage. I opened a claim with Fedex but was told today on the phone that the laptop was shipped back from Eurocom with 0 added declared value (WAY TO GO GUYS), so Fedex is off the hook for only $100 if I pursue it. I have contacted Eurcom, but I'll have to wait til tomorrow to hear back at this point. I don't know what to do but I am steaming at this point. I am so mad, I could literally punch the wall -- so mad I'm having trouble spelling as I type this. I think I've learned from this that moving forward when I need a new laptop, I buy a new one instead of messing with upgrading the one I have. This has dragged on for over 4 months and I have had to cancel a trip this week and another next week as a result for work because my laptop is hosed.

 

Dam bro so sorry to hear, yeah be care full with those shipping companies, and eurocomm is an for not insuring it :/

On the other hand last where I left off, my clevo 6990 is in a better place now, saved up some cash now Baught a new 6990m this time going to try the dell card, just going to have to set up fans manually, but I actually Dont mind, its not like its hard or anything. But I have one question, can I just use the 10 bios, and flash the vbios to the clevo vbios, or is there any alternative or hints maybe someone can throw at me ? Please and thank you.

 

Oh man, that seriously sucks. Eurocom should be on the hook for the damage, if they are shipping it un-insured. That's just absolutely ridiculous.

 

i know how you feel. Its always a risk to upgrade current machines but if all work properly then you feel better than you would if you bought a new machine.

 

I have a m17x r2 with 2x ati 5870, is it at all possible to upgrade to single gtx680m or sli? (sli depend on power of card wich i couldnot find)

 

Afaik single 680m it is doable, it has been done and it works. For SLI i'm not so sure, dual 580m was a no go, the cards wont work in SLI.

 

There's no point in the dual/SLI 680m's anyway. Even if you got it to work, you'd have to undervolt each card since the max budget for two cards in the R2 is 150W. Two 680ms at full speed will draw 200W. You won't be able to run them at full power UNLESS you take two 220W power bricks and macgyver them together into a 330W power supply. I know users around the forum have been attempting that, don't know if any of them have succeeded yet...

 

Have a look here.

 

Woo hoo, I didn't think anyone had a firm design on it yet. Crude and cumbersome...I LIKE IT!

 

or you could give up your brightness controls and do the simple m18x 330w psu mod.

 

True. I'm surprised there's not a way to crack open the m18x's PSU and take whatever chip that sends the ID signal from the PSU to the notebook out of an m17x PSU and put it into the m18x's PSU. I don't imagine it to be anymore difficult than removing and re soldering a BIOS chip...but that's just me.

 

Unfortunately for us, it isnt that easy... Wish it was. See Whap-A-Chow's post here.

 

I've opened both slim 240 and 330 psu they are totally different in guts lol. but i can see it possible with the non slim 240.

 

What about the Slim PSU's ID chip. Could it be more similar to the m18x's PSU ID chip than the 240W's chip?

 

Everything on the slim 240 is extremly small compare to the non slim psu's so yes they are really different.

 

I know there has been quite a bit of discussion about this throughout this thread...of course now that it's 497 pages...I can believe it's hard to find. I know a lot of us have been holding out hope for a long time for an "easy" way to make the m18x PSU compatible with the R2. A few folks in this thread have already done the dual PSU trick with various methods, but it's always a bit Frankenstein unfortunately.

 

Greywolf, I agree. I looked at the inside of the new 330 vs my old 220. Not even close, as you probably guessed, I am awaiting a refund from Eurocom and have already purchased and received a new M18XR2. My M17XR2 is nothing better than a paperweight at this point. The motherboard is totally fried, and I am hoping to resurrect it at some point but I fear the old cards I've tried to test with are fried at this point.

 

Hey man,

Sorry to hear about all the troubles you had with your M17XR2...that all really really sucked for you. Congrats on the new beast however! I'm hoping to squeeze another year out of mine and then will look to see about upgrading that way myself. Maybe the M18XR3 or R4 will be out at that time.

 

Exactly the way I'm headed. I don't like the way the m17x line is going. I am hoping the m18x R3 or R4 will some in silver or blue (I can only hope). I do plan to keep my m17x R2 around for another year or so, though.

 

Part of me is wondering about what I did wrong when I tried to Crossfire the two 6970Ms that I had. >_>

It's odd really. I used throttlestop to lower the TDP of the CPU while undervolting and underclocking the GPUs and STILL it peaked pase 240w.

 

Having some problems with my 6970's in X-fire

Been noticing some performance drops of late and thought i'd look into it, it would appear that although I have X-fire enabled and showing in GPU-Z and ATI's catalyst all games and benchmarks are not using the second card? They both show as working but the GPU load on the slave caed is always 0 (very occaisionally flicks to 5%) so i'm only running on 1 card.

I've tried swapping the cards round but this does not change anything..... any ideas guys?

 

what driver are you using? Thus be sure the crossfire cable is nicely connected on both gpus.

I had such a problem recently (second gpu was used though) watching unexplained lags in games and graphics were somehow distored on specific height of the screen on orizontal direction. I couldnt fix it by uninstalling-reinstalling different drivers. Only a fresh format and reinstallation of everything solved this. I am lucky about this because it seemed to me like hardware issue in the beginning. Hope it wont appear again.

 

So the mx17r2 is crossfire ready, but the mx17r3 isnt?

 

Correct. The R2s are capable of dual GPUs, but they released the m18xs at the same time as the m17x R3, and hence moved the dual GPU functionality to the m18x line.

 

yes and more weight too!

 

Yah! If the m17x line continues the way it is, my next notebook upgrade will be to the m18x.

 

Hey guys!!, so I installed my new dell 6990M, runs great and all, until Im playing the ultimate spider man, and I use HWinfo32 for my fan controls, so while im gaming all of a sudden and out of no where my whole m17x turns off... I reboot it and then tried it again, I hit 87c and my alienware powered off again. It keeps powering off =/ I am using drivers 11.10 and my dell 6990m is flashed with the clevo vbios, any suggestions? ideas? what should i do, did anyone ever have this problem?

 

Did you apply new thermal paste and everything? Sounds like your laptop is getting to hot and shutting down.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S2 running Resurrection Remix

 

Do the fans ramp up? You might need to use hwinfo64 to control your fans.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S2 running Resurrection Remix

 

My fans spin just fine, no problem with them, all the way cranked up.

So after a whole day of research, including tea breaks... I have found this, for people who might get the problem im getting, a shutdown at 87c Dell6990M using HWinfo32..

UPDATE:
Users of models using Compal EC (M11x / M14x / M17x-R3/R4 / M18x-R1/R2) have 2 choices for fan monitoring/control available (when using build 1451 or later) depending on the value of "LPC & EC Support" (or "EC Support" in later HWiNFO versions) setting:

1. "LPC & EC Support" (or "EC Support") Enabled (default) -> direct Compal EC access.
Pros: More precise fan control (fan speed setting limited only by EC/fan min/max limits)
Cons: On some machines this can cause lockups or shutdown problems (on some machines it doesn't cause any issues)

2. "LPC & EC Support" (or "EC Support") Disabled and "SW SMI" Enabled -> a new DELL SMI Method used
Pros: I expect this method should run stable on all machines.
Cons: Allows only 3 fan speed levels - 0, low, high. Exact values are determined by EC (should be displayed).
Important note: On all models with DELL/Compal EC it doesn't seem to be possible to control fans independently, only all at once (firmware limitation). So on machines with more than 1 fan, if you setup a control for more than 1 fan, it may cause a conflict, because each fan control setting overrides all fans in system (i.e. CPU fan speed setting overrides GPU fan speed and vice versa). Thus I advise to set-up fan control for a single fan only !

 

Hey True_Talk

Interesting find...so have you been able to resolve your shutdown issues?

 

Hello greywolf.. nooo I haven't, no matter what I do, if I hit 87c auto shutdown I'm ready to buy another 6990 to crossfire, but this shut down thing is holding me back..

 

So, i realized I had my m15x R2 laying around, and did a bit of research, and decided to put that Dell 6990M in the m15x... Rethermal pasted it up, put 5mm pads on, Started it up, works like a charm, and does not shut down at 87c like my m17x r2 did...

now come to realize, only 2 differences between my m17xr2 and m15x r2 are, 1: 150PSU that the m15x has, 2: i7 q740 where my m17x has i7 920xm, and also i got 8gb ram in the m17x where the m15x has 4gb...

So guys why do you think my m17x would shut down at 87c where my m15x with the same exact card swapped, does stress test all the way to 95c..??

I started pondering, and thought to myself, It has to be a PSU problem? thats what I think, guys please let me know what do you think it is.

 

I also was looking up some 7970m cards on mxm upgrade. But I have one question, you can not use a external monitor with a 7970? Because I love gaming on my 55". And it says that it Dont do a/v through HDMI... but does it work through VGA? Someone confirm this please.

 

I believe if you use a Dell Card you get audio with HDMI, have to use manual fan control. Clevo cards have auto fan control, but no audio over HDMI. Both should output video over HDMI. If you order from Eurocom or upgradeyourlaptop, you would need to specify which one you wanted for your M17x R2.

 

I've had this shut down problem its not psu its the card. You need to put thermal pads on specific locations on BOTH sides of card. If you dig around here you should be able to find some pics.

nvm found....it this is what stopped my shut downs i placed thermal pads on red outlined parts you see on pic. If these dont work for you then could be a bad psu but i doubt t.

 

Good find Stealth,

I personally never had that problem, but I do recall a few people did. I do know of at least one other person who was running 6990's in crossfire (not single), who would trip the power supply when certain games got demanding. A new power supply did the trick for him. If you haven't it would be good to get a Kill-a-watt and see if it's the wattage or the temp that is causing the shutdown. 87 shouldn't shut it down, but stranger things have happened.

If it's wattage, a few things to consider (sorry if I'm repeating some steps you may have already tried).

Make sure you aren't doing any over-clocking in the bios (mine works fine this way, but some folks have had trouble, plus I'm running 6970's)

If you are under_volting the card, you may want to set it to defaults to see if that helps...if you aren't you might try that to see if it helps.

It sounds to me like you are tripping on voltage not heat, but since they can both react the same way, I'd definitely do what Stealth is recommending as well. Typically a single 6990 shouldn't be tripping (I wouldn't suspect it to be), but who knows...with a Kill-a-watt you'd no for sure, otherwise we are just guessing.

Also, does it only happen on that one game? It might be something else entirely...I know Guildwars 2 did this to me until I upgraded to the latest AMD driver and they patched the system...ever since then I haven't had an issue.

So something else to consider.

Good luck to you!

 

Undevolting the cards a little bit using atiflash can also prevent shutdown. Both related to temps though

 

Thanks so much guys.

And im thinking about just leaving this card in the m15x since it likes it so much without any problems,

and to answer your question greywolf, it wasnt just that specific game, it was anything that was capable of getting my 6990m to 87c.

thanks for answering DR650SE, so you think I should get my 7970m from eurocom? sounds like a good deal from them. Also looks legit from MXM Upgrade.

maybe we should see who bought their cards from where

Guys can you please give me some feedbacks from, mxm-upgrade, eurocom, and upgradeyourlaptop. Thanks so much again guys =]

 

Hey True_Talk_Snake

Upgradeyourlaptop and Eurocom are the same (upgradeyourlaptop is simply their e-bay store). I bought both my cards (6970s) and crossfire cables from them. A lot of people here have purchased their 6970/6990/7970's from them with quite a bit of success.

However some folks have had difficulties as well, so just like anything your experience may vary.

One thing about Eurocom is that they at least say they support the cards in the m17x-r2, and won't give you the run around when it comes to supportability. Again, I had great experience with them, and some folks had some trouble.

I've been runnning my 6970's now for almost a year with no problems what-so-ever (knock on wood)...so have been really happy with my Eurocom cards (can't say the same about my clevo cards, but that was a LOT of pages ago).

 

ok Ill probably go with those guys. =] so excited, But you dont know much about mxm upgrade? check this out bro.

Untitled Document

let me know what you think

 

Hey man,

Sorry, I personally have never ordered from them..although I think quite a few folks have. Always been the more expensive option between the two for me, but I know I've heard them recommended before. Just can't vouch for them myself.

Good luck with your decision, a single 7970m should be a nice boost in performance.

 

Thanks Wolf =] idk if its the m17x or the m15x but when im gaming full maxed out on my m15x 6990m, my temperature never goes over 70c... lol the coolest system I have ever had, idk if its my pads or paste. I can maybe overclock ????

 

In this guide on the first page it is written :

" Unfortunately, these cards/VBIOSses do NOT support audio over HDMI/DisplayPort (but hopefully this could be fixed with a VBIOS update/mod). "

So, does anybody knows hot to enable audio over HDMI on Clevo 6990M cards ?

 

I have a i7 720 with the dual ati 5870. So it uses lower power then the 920. Can the system support the dual 6970 or 7970

 

Hi Atol,

Dual 6970's or 6990's should run just fine in your system. I'm running a 920X and have dual 6970's (with a slight overclock on the cards and the CPU) and everything is running great (and has been for almost a year now).

So no worries at all, shouldn't be an issue.

Vwrafi, no HDMI audio is available with the clevo/eurocom cards...believe it only works with Dell cards (but then you lose automatic fan control).

 

OK, It seems that the person who sold me the 6990M just cheated me. He sold 6970M ES instead of 6990M. Anyway, can anybody post the latest Dell vBios for single 6970M ? Mine is from December 2010 so quite old and I can not find any newest vBios for single card.

 

Just making sure. Your talking about the old headset ports. On the right hand side on the back? All my audio come from usb Wireless headset or speakers from the computer.