Alienware M17X-R2 MAX UPGRADE!

Hey guys
I really want to know what this max upgrade for my Alienware is.
As you can see i have the M17X-R2.
I want to know the best GPU i can have 880m? and max CPU i know it can have the i7 940xm but i want more power then that.
Could i put the i7 3820qm?

Also could i swap the motherboard for a m17x r3 motherboard if i cant get any better cpu then the 940xm?

My specs - i7 740qm ( i think )
AMD 5870m Crossfire
4gb of ram
256gb ssd




Thanks for the help guys

 

Why would you want to DOWNGRADE the motherboard? The m17x r3's board does not support SLI or Crossfire as it has only one MXM slot unlike the r2's dual mxm slot. Even with a better CPU, a fully maxed out m17x r3 is infact, significantly SLOWER than a fully maxed out m17x r2. The 920XM can also be overclocked to around 4ghz and remain stable in the R2 with the right PSU and voltage.

Also, do not for the love of god get the GTX 880m for the r2. It is completely unstable, and will not work. The GTX 780m in SLI will run in it flawlessly. 920XM Is much, much cheaper than the 940XM and offers almost no speed loss at all.

The best card you can get for the M17x r2 is the GTX 780m in SLI or just singled.

 

Ok thanks very much for the info but i can't get any better then the 940xm? i'm asking because i think i'm going to put the 7970m in the pc and when i get more money crossfire them but i don't know if the 920xm has the performance to do so. and if it can keep up with the to cards in crossfire will i need a M18x 330w power brick? And also how could i go about getting the brick custom to fit my m17x r2?.....


Thanks.

 

7970m? Sure!

Those run absolutely sweet in the r2, and are fully compatible. As for the CPU, There is absolutely no point in buying the 940xm over the 920xm as it costs $400 more and you only get a 100mhz advantage which can be negated by the 920xm if you overclock it. The 7970m in crossfire does not need a modded/new power brick. You can still overclock the 920xm with the stock brick and the crossfired 7970's.

Also, the 920xm will not bottleneck the cards. You don't even need to overclock it, but you should if you're lagging behind in games. You cannot get beyond a 920/940xm as the r2 uses the arrandale socket. It does not matter too much because sandy bridge doesn't offer that much of an increase in performance.

 

See my signature, its about the top upgrade for the R2.

I have both 920 and 940. (again u can see different benchmarks in signature)
The 7970M DOES indeed need new powerbrick to be stable over time.
At least if you also want to overclock the CPU to get most of your 7970M's.
If I run my computer with overclocked but not overvolted CPU and stock clock but undervolted GPU's it still peaks over 300W.
If i run BF4 and don't OC my CPU I do not get my 61fps stable.

A modded 240 can give 280, but not sure for how long before it degrades.
Some 240's also does not deliver much more than 240.
I have used both and got problems with the 240 over time and had to go for 330.

The upgrade is easy, but you need to buy a new 330 PSU and kill the 240 you have.
If you klikk my signature again the most difficult way of modding is shown under the PSU.
Or you could look at this for the easy way.

 

The 920/940XM can easily be overclocked and even keep up with newer Haswell processors with a decent overclock. An R3 motherboard won't fit in an R2 chassis, they changed ODMs (R3/R4 are made by Compal, R1/R2 were made by Flextronics). The 330W mod uses the Flextronics/Delta 240W signal chip so the motherboard doesn't reject the AC adapter and allows it to charge properly.

 

Ok thanks man 7970m and i7-920xm it is

 

Is there any way you can do the power mod for me and i just pay you for it

 

First, check out the description made in my post.
Not impossible to do if you follow guide.
In my post there is two different ways.

It is very very important to choose the correct VBIOS cards.
Guess you are going for two?

You need to read this before buying the cards and installing.


If you at first try one card you can wait with the PSU mod and you know you have correct GPU one at a time.

 

Yeah a few traps on this awesome upgrade now

Nice system by the way Trome71, impressive modding.

 

Uh no mate. 780M DOES NOT work in the R2 (see my sigs and you'll see ). This has been confirmed pretty much on NBR and TI already, and 7970Ms (single and Xfire) work beautifully. You;ll have this guy to thank if that's the route you'd take

 

The 780M vbios behaves like later vbios revisions on the 680M which conflict with machines that don't use optimus.

 

I can of course not run that hard in normal use. The GPU's are running stock, and my firestrike bench would be almost 700 lower.
Especially happy about the heatspring mod.
My secondary GPU runs now 6-8 deg colder than the primary one (that has fantastic Gelid extreeme paste), just due to the heatspring.
This off course when running hard on both cards.

The primary was pasted 7-8 months ago about same time as the heatspring was mounted, and might soon need a fix. Think i will go heatspring there too.
When paste was new the difference was about 2-3 deg.

 

Considering the age of the machine, the fact you are making it play with the big boys is pretty impressive.

 

Hi @Trome71
Could you please inform how i do the heat spring mod please
Have the same cpu 920 xm Gtx 675m single in my R2
Would like some info if u could help to cool the cpu
Thanks
St1y