A few technical questions about my M17x.

Alright first off I love this thing, it's great. But I have a few problems that aren't so much the computer itself but what's built around it so to speak. First thing to get out of the way is, sometimes the laptop doesn't recognize the factory shipped AC Adapter as an official Dell AC adapter, is there an update that fixes this?

That also leads me to my next issue, I've been trying to access Alienware's "My Hive" to get some support but it requires an account number that was supposed to be located on an ID card in the binder I got, and that ID card wasn't there. I've tried using the Service Tag and that didn't work, in fact I went to dell's driver area and typed in my service tag and it's not recognized by the system apparently. I'm not asking for solutions to all of my problems, though those would be great trust me. To be honest I'd just be happy to know why my computer technically doesn't exist to Dell.

 

So, first off - not sure which system you have - R1 or R2 (R1 is with the core2duo and R2 has the i-series).

There is a known issue with BIOS A04 for the 17xR1 where the power adapter is not recognized. They are aware of the issue and at last update in the thread, a fix is in the works.

For the MyHive issue, see this page:
Alienware: Client Services Support Area

text in red

 

Thank you, should have mentioned it's an M17x R2, I actually have a more serious issue now that just started to happen. So earlier when I was checking for the service tag number I closed the laptop, it went into sleep mode, I checked the tag, and opened the laptop back up and the screen was blank. I hard rebooted because there was nothing else I could do, no keys were doing anything and I could only see my mouse, and then continued, it started up normally. So I went about my business, closed the laptop, opened it up again and encountered the problem again. This time when I hard rebooted, the systems welcome screen didn't display, it made the noise that it had opened but the display was blank. I've switched to an external display and it shows nothing either, it only allows me to see the display if I enter safe mode, which I'm in right now. Any solution to this problem?

EDIT: That problem is resolved, thanks to this website. Turns out the problem were the drivers for the mobile HD5870's in my laptop, saw this was a kind of common issue when I searched on here and found the solution, now it starts up fine. This is my new favorite site. Still wish I knew my account number so I could access "My Hive" at Alienware though. Or better yet I wish my service tag was recognized by Dell's system

 

Again, you can't access the 'My Hive'. Even if you could, it would not contain any relevant info for the M17xR2. It is for legacy Alienware systems.

So for your system, bookmark these links:

Main Support Site

Drivers and Downloads for the M17xR2

(Note: When first downloading a driver/update from the above link, you may be prompted to select to use either the Dell Download Manager or via web (http), select web - http. There are issues with the Dell Download Manager)

Manuals and other Docs for the M17xR2

 

Thank you again, when I took a second glance at "My Hive" I saw the prior to 2009. My apologies. Now in terms of my Service Tag, I've read it might take awhile for that to be recognized/activated. Should I just wait and see or call customer support about it?

 

It depends - if this was a transfer from another owner or a retail purchase from a store (best buy, etc.), then your actual ownership info may still need to transfer.

The service tag is still valid for accessing the support site - the two cases I outlined above do not apply to driver downloads

You should be ok.

 

This baby's brand new, just a few weeks old and bought directly from Dell. Whenever I enter the service tag it says it's unrecognized. The invoice says it's the correct Service Tag so my only guess is that it's not activated yet I'll give support a call soon if it continues to not be recognized.