Alienware M17x R3 460M to 780M - Questions/Concerns

Oh man...So i wont be able to get this card to work? How did that one person you mentioned manage to get it to work? Is there anything at all that i can do to get this to work? Im on my knees begging for this to work if it doesnt im screwed

 

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. I don't think you will get it to work . I can't think of a single thing other than a bad connection - you did reseat and clean the edge connector? There is still a little hope if not.

The downside of having the 120hz model is there is no intel to boot from.

I'm sure the guy had a 60hz panel and the problem was not being able to get the card to switch; it was an R4. Others have just not worked ever, even when windows sees it and the driver installs. Can you not return it?

Never seen a 3D try a 770m so there is hope but I would have said there would be problems.

You do get to use a 680m or 780m easier as you do not have to disable the iGPU, but not much comfort right now .

 

Unfortunately I can't return it so i dont know what im going to do if i dont get it to work... Well I guess ill have to try and play around with it some more and see what i can do. Thanks a lot for taking the time to reply to me, I really appreciate it regardless! One last question...There's no way i can unlock the integrated video without modded bios right?

 

With a modded bios you can do it but it will 'brick' and not start at all. The intel GPU is part of the CPU but it cannot boot with a 120hz panel so it has to be disabled.

Good luck with trying stuff but if it messes up badly you should be able to recover it by removing the coin dell battery.

Let me know how it goes...

 

I see... Alright I'll post what happens after. In case I do get another card, do you think ill be able to get through without the intel gpu using the 680m or 780m and get past the loading screen at least to install modded drivers? Since the 580m is really unreliable I would like to go for one of those two instead.

 

Yes you can. Because those cards were used with 3D models. Only, the 3D options are missing from the driver .

It's a bonus of the 120hz model because on all other models you have to disable the iGPU (no optimus now) for the NV card to work (if it was not sold with the model).

I know from my own bitter experiences of the 580m and it's rebadge, the 675m. Soo hard to work with! You can get lucky, there must be a ton of people that they work fine for. From the failure rates I am seeing currently it's members that never OC them that are now just dying of old age.

The 680m is the most solid, it's been around a while and is still a star performer with a little work

All you will need is modified drivers that are easy to get whenever you want to try a new driver. Mine runs so cool I have never been happier with a GPU. Never see above 67c , so I always recommend it even for the latest titles ATM.

 

Alright sounds good then! Getting 3D to work is not a concern at all. When i first got my laptop i only used it for an hour then left the 3D glasses in my drawer and havent touched it ever since. I just want the nice & smooth 120Hz to work that's all! I'll try and get the 680M and finally start gaming again :thumbsup: Thanks again for the help! Im sorry if you had to repeat anything that you have covered in other posts... Its just there's too much to read with the so little time i have atm.

 

No problem at all! It is a mess of information simply due to all the different variants out there. And you really need to ask about your own model and circumstances for the best chance of success

Good luck with the 680m hunt. Are you familiar with the heatsink/pads/x-bracket stuff?

 

Yup and thanks! I'll ask the seller if it works exactly for the model I have. Yup thats all covered, I have the right heatsink, a bunch of spare good quality thermal pads, and x-bracket is not a problem to install for me. All i need is a compatible working card and i'm set!:thumbsup:

 

So after following all of this from the start, I thought i would make an account and jump in with a quick question... I have the stock gtx 660m in my rig (early 2012 m17x r4) and I am looking to upgrade it. Now I could easily find the time to tackle a project like the gtx 780m on the weekends and such, but after reading all of these posts and viewing some others on different review sites, what would be the best "bang for my buck"? It seems the gtx 680m would be a nice upgrade and available even through dell, but with the 800 mobile series and more on the way, I feel like that would just be outdated soon and some what pointless, can anyone recommend what would be my best option? Money isn't really an issue, but $1000 seems so OP for the 780, and i'm sure the 800's would be double that, where as the 680 seems to be around 500/600... any help would be much obliged!

 

Hi, the 680m is an awesome card. IMO, the best NV have out there ATM. The 780m's are running too hot and the 880m are a clusterf*** of problems.



The 680m is plug and play in the R4 so it's a no-brainer. No bios mods, no driver mods and it runs way cool. Under 70c overclocked (+200mhz), and can easily get 780m performance (without the ridiculous 80c+ temps!).

I believe the 9xx cards are going to be PCie 3.0 so you're not going to get the full bandwidth without a new machine (unconfirmed, feel free to correct people!)

Good luck.

 

Game Ready
Best gaming experience for Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, The Evil Within, F1 2014, and Alien: Isolation


M17xR3 - Windows 8/7 GTX 780M installation

[Guide] Modding Nvidia OEM INF Files

GeForce 344.11 WHQL

Modded nvdmi.inf v344.11

 

+rep for all the links brah

 

Desktop solution then ...So is mine AW...:hi2:

 

Thanks a lot!

 

hello... i have a problem here.....

i put my gtx 780m in my alienware m17x r3 i go to unlocked bios and i disable high def. sound.....

in second advanced i dont see "disable IGP" but i set peg display... f10 and reboot....

now i cant find my geforce in device manager or anywhere.... i see only intel 3000... i try gpu-z but nothing...only intel....

i go to install the drivers and then appears this: nvidia installer cannot continue..this graphics driver could not find compatible graphics hardware....

sorry for my english...pleaseeee help meee!

 

Hi, are you following the instructions outlined efficiently by j95 in Post #92 here?:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...60m-to-780m-questions-concerns.722670/page-10

Make sure you're using the "A12 Unlocked BIOS with SATA Tweak", and you should have all the necessary options in the BIOS where you can disable the IG D. Note that's a "D": IG D. Note that without any NVidia Drivers installed for you 780M it will appear in Device Manager as Generic Video Adapter, think that's what it will be called (something along those lines!), and then once NVidia Drivers are installed it will be labelled 780M in Device Manager.

 

yes i go with instructions from j95.....i have this unlocked bios version.....and right now i set bios to default and go again to disable this things.....now i can see my gtx in gpu-z......i go to try it again with drivers...

thank's for your quick response !

 

Ok, cool, sounds like it might be fixed now. Should be fine if you can install NVidia Drivers ok, and also see GTX 780M in Device Manager & GPUz. If done correctly you won't be able to see Intel 3000 in the Device Manager - because you would have disabled that in the BIOS by following j95's instructions.

 

ok!!!! i install drivers and i'am playing cs now!!!! i have sound too!! i'm so excited )) thank's robbo for your response!!!!

something was wrong with my bios settings....i choose to default settings and start all over again.... and my gtx installed perfectly!!!

sorry for my english...

 

Good good, you're welcome! Enjoy!

 

Hello all . First let me say thank you this forum has helped me so much over the years with my p7805u and now my AW. Thank you .

Now I have a m17xr3 just installed 780m followed all previous instructions . Got card up and running but cannot reenable IDT.

Tried all the tech inferno steps. I can boot enabled but as soon as I click speaker icon in tray I crash with solid blue screen. Using 353.60 driver from eurocom. Using latest Dell IDT driver. Only thing I have yet to try is to set enable power management time to 30 seconds in IDT . Is this a must ? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Using 780m with dell vbios . M17xr3 240w adapter.A12 unlocked bios. Thanks again

 

You possibily messed up the sequence. Read instructions carefully and do it one more time

 

Thanks for the reply. I did it all over again .Uninstalled NVidia using ddu . Uninstalled idt in device manager .Uninstalled idt in programs , removed 780m. rebooted with everything enabled . Installed idt latest driver from dell . Rebooted made sure it worked and made sure the power management box was checked. Rebooted into bios disabled igd , high definition audio , set to peg . Hit f10 and shutdown . Installed 780m booted into windows and installed 353.60 modded driver from eurocom. Rebooted and made sure it worked.

Rebooted into bios , enabled high definition audio and f10 .Booted into windows and everything seemed to work volume up and down on keyboard , equalizer in idt control panel etc.....Until I clicked speaker icon in tray then bammmm crashed with pink screen. As long as I don't click on the icon it doesn't crash . Any ideas ? Id like to get this fixed as I'm sure it will crash again . Maybe try different NVidia drivers ? Do I have to disable idt to install new video drivers? Thanks in advance.

 

How about trying some different sound drivers maybe? If you can't get sound to work properly as a last resort you could buy a USB sound card - you could get a high quality one (better than onboard sound) or a cheap one that might just be as good as onboard. (USB sound card only useful if you want sound through headphones or external speakers.)

 

Thanks robbo for the reply . I guess I could try the last idt drivers from dell .Not sure where else to get idt drivers from that would work. Also would I have to uninstall 780m again to install idt drivers again or do it in safe mode ? Thanks again . Sound is working fine other wise . As long as I don't click the icon. I just hid the icon for now . lol

 

Haha, yeah...hiding the icon to prevent the problem...if it works it works! If you need to make changes to the volume or sound configuration there are other ways of doing that through the OS as well as media buttons, so you don't really ever need to click on the speaker icon - so you might not really have an issue with those workarounds. For the latest version of the IDT sound drivers you could try the IDT driver that it is linked in the first post of the following thread by j95:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...er-v-6-10-0-6421-maxx-audio-3-quality.718224/
I used that sound driver on Windows 7 if I remember correctly, so it's not just compatible with Windows 8 which the thread suggests. That sound driver doesn't appear on the Dell M17xR3 download pages, it was on one of their download pages for a different later model of Alienware laptop, but it is backwards compatible with the M17xR3.

 

Again you messed up sequence - as I remember you should reenable (bios) IDT after mount 780m, then install idt driver first, after that graphic drivers.

 

Hi guys.

Everything is working on this, the only issue is that the card randomly underclocks itself from 2500mhz to 800mhz. In Diablo, this causes the whole game to freeze.

I'm thinking it's the power brick, but I'm not sure

 

hello again.... i have the gtx 780m in my alienware m17 r3 without problems from 20 may 2015....

but i have a problem now.....when i play a game my laptop restarts :/

i run whocrashed and i have only one dmp file....

Crash Dump Analysis --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Crash dump directory: C:\Windows\Minidump Crash dumps are enabled on your computer. On Tue 26/4/2016 5:50:11 μμ GMT your computer crashed crash dump file: C:\Windows\Minidump\042616-22885-01.dmp
This was probably caused by the following module: nvlddmkm.sys (nvlddmkm+0x7A3F38) Bugcheck code: 0x116 (0xFFFFFA800BF524E0, 0xFFFFF8800608CF38, 0xFFFFFFFFC000009A, 0x4) Error: VIDEO_TDR_ERROR file path: C:\Windows\system32\drivers\nvlddmkm.sys product: NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 347.52 company: NVIDIA Corporation description: NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 347.52 Bug check description: This indicates that an attempt to reset the display driver and recover from a timeout failed. A third party driver was identified as the probable root cause of this system error. It is suggested you look for an update for the following driver: nvlddmkm.sys (NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver, Version 347.52 , NVIDIA Corporation). Google query: NVIDIA Corporation VIDEO_TDR_ERROR

any suggestions?

and sorry for my bad english.

 

Looks like a crash somehow related to the GPU. I'm thinking it could be one of the following:
1) Driver needs to be reinstalled: use DDU ( http://www.guru3d.com/files-details/display-driver-uninstaller-download.html) to remove all traces of NVidia driver & then install the latest NVidia driver from their website.
2) Perhaps the GPU is getting too hot: check temperatures using GPUz while gaming. Could be part of the card (without thermal sensor) is getting too hot & causing crashing. Repaste GPU / check padding of other components on GPU / remove dust from heatsink and fan using can of compressed air.
3) Perhaps the GPU is in the process of dying & is becoming unreliable. Could maybe test this theory by underclocking GPU with NVidia Inspector & then seeing if it's stable in games.

That's everything I can think of, and those are the things I would check. The order in which I would approach this is #2, then #1, then #3.

EDIT: and one additional step, you could try reseating the GPU in the PCIe slot - just to ensure good connections - maybe clean the pins of the GPU and use can of compressed air to blow out any dust from PCIe slot.