Alienware 17 running hot

I've got a new Alienware 17 and decided to run it through its paces with The Witcher 2, running all settings on the highest it can go, except Ubersampling off.

The laptop performed well, no lag, high fps (50+). But when I viewed the highest temperatures using CPUID HWMonitor I saw that my GPU, an 880M, reached 92 degrees Celsius!

Is this normal? I had a blast playing and didn't notice any adverse effects or even significant heat generation when touching the underside of the laptop.
It's really odd... Any advice?

My specs:

Alienware 17
Intel Core i7-4710MQ Processor
GTX 880m 8 GDDR 5
Intel HD Graphics 4600
16GB DDR3L at 1600MHz
17.3" (439.42 mm) WLED HD+ Anti-Glare Display (1920x 1080)
Windows 8.1

 

Re-paste would be the first suggestion that comes to mind. If you did not upgrade and install the GPU yourself, you never know how good the paste job was done at the factory. Get some good quality thermal paste, like Arctic Cooling MX-4 or Arctic Silver 5. I am sure you will have more suggestions from other forum members

 

Same as mariussx, that's a hideously high temp for any mobile card!

If you was to call dell they would do a couple of tests and send you a new heatsink all padded up and engineer to install it

Good luck.

 

Yeah, that's pretty hot...the highest I've seen mine get is 80 and that was with hours of benchmarking and OC'ing.

 

Agreed mine goes to 80C at most but routinely is below 75C... My CPU on the other hand reaches 90C all the time

 

If you are using Dell's technicians, so you have to follow everything they do. This is what they did on my Alienware. View attachment 112727

 

I recommend you use either IC Diamond 7 or Cool Labs Liquid Ultra. I seen some impressive temps with ICD7 on the AW 17 I own. Highest it rises to during gaming on Watch Dogs is - 72c

 

Good to know it isn't normal. I'd really hate to send the laptop back in or do a repaste job myself (never done that before).

I'll try updating the BIOS and more closely monitoring my fans and temperatures first. Any additional advice is welcome!

 

keep it 2-3 cm up of the desk....i keep it on a cooling pad...leave way on the back of it to take air

 

You probably already know this, but make sure you're not blocking the intake for the fans by gaming on your lap or on a bed or something! And your machine is probably too new to have a build up of dust in the heatsinks, which you could solve by using a can of compressed air to blow out the clogged dust in the heatsink & fans. Re-doing the paste job on the GPU, like others have mentioned, is likely to be the solution given how new your laptop is. I use Arctic Silver 5 and the Spread Method of applying the paste, here's the instructions for the spread method:
http://www.arcticsilver.com/pdf/appmeth/int/ss/intel_app_method_surface_spread_v1.1.pdf
(That talks about application method of a CPU, but it's the same process for a GPU).

 

Thanks for the reply.
Hmmm, updating the BIOS did little and all other sensor applications give the same temperatures. I'll have to send it in I suppose.

What is odd, is that the temperature of the laptop (the underside) remains perfectly cool. Shouldn't that be warm.

 

Did you use Cool labs Liquid ultra yourself? As far as I know it can not be used with the aluminium heatsinks. Even though most heatsinks including AW have the copper plate, which touches the die of CPU/GPU, there is a lot of aluminium in the heatsink. If you used Liquid ultra, did it have any effect on the aluminium part of the heatsink?

 

A lot of guis are using CLU on aw 18...but i didnt see anyone with aw 17...they have the same heatsink? If the ones that used CLU on aw18 didnt had any issues can we use it on aw17...pleasean unser because I've allready ordered CLU for repasting cpu and gpu.

 

Hi
I use liquid ultra on my alienware 17. Liquid Ultra is an awesome good solution for my i7 4930mx. After I applied this, I put on a 0.5 mm cooling pad for VRM on the cooling Block for cpu. Top Results after application.This is what you have to apply if you are going to overclock their CPU;-)

 

If you do not want or dare to apply liquid ultra, I advise you strongly to use Gelid extreme. It is probably the best thermal grease I've used outside of the liquid ultra. :hi2:

 

I order pk-3...it has nice results

 

You should replace thermal paste and thermal pads. I got a set of K4-PRO thermal paste and K5_PRO gummy thermal paste for thermal pad replacement on ebay and solved all my problems with overheating.
You can see these products on this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9v5MDivZfc
and you can find them on ebay here Thermal Paste Set for Apple iMac 27" AMD MXM III Video Board A1312 K5 Pro K4 Pro | eBay
they are also on Amazon

 

Yeah, suffice to say, don't read too much into the bad stories you see in the wild. I recommend watching brother Fox's YouTube video for stripping down the M18x R2. He applied Liquid Ultra with a very small brush. He uses the smalled drop you'll ever see.