Alienware M17x R4 Windows 8 UEFI Fastboot boot time (8 Seconds!!)

Just recorded this after installing Windows 8 on the new SSD drive. In the BIOS I enabled UEFI and Windows 8 Fastboot. You can see that it only takes 8 seconds from the time I press the power button to the time Windows 8's Metro UI loads up. That is very fast.

Specs
Model - Alienware M17x R4
Processor - 3rd Generation Intel® Core™ i7-3610QM 2.3GHz
GPU - 2GB GDDR5 AMD Radeon™ HD 7970M
RAM - 6GB DDR3 at 1600MHz (2DIMMS)
Primary HDD - Samsung 830 256GB SDD
Secondary HDD - 500GB 7,200 RPM SATA 3Gb/s

Note - For those who try to install Windows 8 on UEFI from a DVD note that UEFI only supports FAT32 formatted drives. So if you burned that DVD using UDF it won't show up as a UEFI boot device. The easiest fix is to format a USB drive to FAT32 and copy the contents inside the ISO in to that USB drive. (or you can you one of those windows 7 USB maker programs). End result Amazing...

 

dang that's crazy!! makes my SSD look slow. (SSD takes roughly twice as long to boot for me)

 

WOW... I'm so pumped to receive my R4 in a few days with the OCZ Vertex 4 and Win8

 

If you boot the normal way (legacy BIOS) then yes, it would take twice as much cause the BIOS itself takes about 8 seconds before it transfers the control to the OS. Like i said, if you can live with Enduro (which is quiet ok now with the new Driver update from DELL) the UEFI is the way to go.

:thumbsup:

 

Wow, this is really convincing. We have the same specs but my ssd is 128gb. You think it is worth the jump to Windows 8?

 

well I'm stuck with the legacy bios as I have an m17x r3. Have fun with the faster boot times though.

 

Oh, that's not right! :cry:

 

If you have a R4 you probably qualify for the windows 8 upgrade. And I have had no issues with it so far, all my programs works and games works too. Once you get used to the Metro UI the windows experience is pretty enjoyable. 128GB is enough, if I remember correctly the bare windows installation took less than 20GB, so that would give you plenty of space for other programs. Overall I'm quiet happy about the upgrade

 

Alright, I'll get my Windows 8 soon!

 

The fastboot feature uses the hiberfil.sys to save the driver states. By default the size of this file will equal to the amount of RAM you have. So if you have 6GB's the file will be close to 5GB. But if you use fastboot only and not hibernation you don't need all this space. Use the following command in an elevated command prompt to reduce the hiberfil.sys file size.

powercfg -h -size 50%

Windows will re-size the hiberfil.sys to the minimum required size.

 

Hi,
how did you get the UEFI support enabled? I installed A09 and it reset to RAID. I changed it back to AHCI and tested - Win8 started booting again.
Next when I went to the BIOS BOOT section, I changed the Boot list option to UEFI. but the UEFI list doesn't show anything - I don't get a windows 8 fast boot option and the Secure boot option is disabled. windows 8 still boots fine - but not at the blazing speed. I do have a 256 GB Crucial M4 as my boot device.

 

To enable UEFI boot you will have to reinstall Windows 8 with UEFI enabled in the BIOS. You can't install Windows 8 the usual way (legacy boot) and then switch to UEFI boot later on.

 

Just wondering since you know what your doing, if I can upgrade from windows 7, make sure its in UEFI in the bios, would that allow fast boot to work? or does it have to be a clean install?

 

I read somewhere that this issue is due to my 680M 3D option. Apparently A09 doesn't enable UEFI correctly with this option. Will have to wait for a new update. :'(
Sent from my OMNIA7 using Board Express

 

I think its due to the when UEFI mode boot it uses the integrated HD 4000 graphics, which is not enabled on the 3D option.

 

You can't switch from BIOS to UEFI during the upgrade. UEFI needs a GPT partition to start the boot process. During the clean install the Windows 8 installer will create the necessary partitions required by the UEFI boot. Having said that there is a method to convert the windows 7 installation to UEFI boot mentioned here
https://gitorious.org/tianocore_uefi_duet_builds/pages/Windows_x64_BIOS_to_UEFI
I haven't tried it so I can't comment on it's success.

That's true, currently the 7970M no the 680M has the firmware to support UEFI. By enabling Enduro I can enable UEFI because the system boots from the HD 4000 and switch to 7970M later on.

 

Hopefully they fix UEFI for the 3D models soon.

 

I am tempted to upgrade to Windows 8 and bought a Pro version for £15. Can you confirm your media buttons are working fine for you and did you have any driver problems? How do your game frame rates compare to Windows 7?

I have similar to yours setup, where I use 500GB HDD for storage only and it is MBR disk. If I do Windows 8 fresh install to my SSD using GPT, will my OS be able to see the files in my storage drive, which I intend to leave as it is without wiping?

And the last thing: does your touchpad emulate touchscreen experiance, where if you swipe from the right you get charms bar, from bottom to bring app settings etc?

 

The media buttons work, but I don't get the Alienware OSD, instead I get not so nice looking graphics, probably windows in built. Other than for the visual glitches all media buttons work as they should.
I installed the AMD drivers released from Dell and installed the 12.11 Beta 4 over it. From what i tell frame rates are same as it was on windows 7.(maybe a bit smoother, certainly not worse)
If you plan to boot win8 using UEFI make sure you burn the ISO to the DVD using FAT32, not UDF because UEFI does not handle UDF, so it won't show up as a UEFI boot device. What I did was extract all the files inside the ISO to a FAT32 formatted USB drive. Also make sure you set the sata controller to AHCI, if you try to install it on the RAID mode the setup won't see any of your HDD's and it will ask for drivers.
Don't worry about the Data HDD, it doesn't matter if it's MBR , OS will see it.
I didn't check the touchpad and touchscreen emulations yet, I'll check and confirm soon.

I hope that will help you.

 

Thank you very much for a quick answer. I just got Windows 8 Pro upgrade card delivered and will probably start the installation in the evening or tomorrow.

 

Another thing I don't like about the media buttons besides the pretty plain looking Windows OSD is the Airplane mode. Whenever I push the wireless on/off button it goes into Airplane mode and turns off the Wireless and Bluetooth. I have it set in the BIOS for that button to only turn off the wireless which worked with Windows 7 but seems to be overridden by Windows 8. I have also noticed that my computer automatically boots to the desktop but I think that may be because I did an upgrade from Win 7.

 

I think it automatically boots to the desktop only if you have desktop open when you shutdown.



Cause this happenes to me too, and I did a clean install.

 

Sounds reasonable to me. I like it that way at this point as I am still getting used to the new start screen and am using it more as an add-on as opposed to my actual launching point.
I have this other little glitch where I put a shortcut to the Wi-Fi connection on my desktop so I can disable it separately from the bluetooth (a la airplane mode). The weird part is that I can right click the shortcut and disable the connection but when I right click it after, it still shows Disable as the option and I have to actually go into the network adapters and re-enable it.

 

I bought the US$15 update from windows 7, since I got my m17x r4 after july. But I didn't create a boot dvd, only updated the system. Now I want to format my ssd and reinstall windows 8 to enable uefi but I couldn't create the dvd nor the usb since I can't find any isos.

What do I do to download the installation files again?

 

Why are those with the R3 stuck with legacy boot? Is there no option for UEFI for the R3?

 

I am stuck on windows 7 due to a problem with the bios and installing intel 4000 graphics.

 

On the r4?

 

Yes, for what I gather of dell site and microsoft there is is a problem with the bios and the alienware software that change which video card is active.

At the moment windows 8 install it as a micrososft default controller, and inter driver show me a error that my hardware doesnt support the driver.

 

Does windows 8 works with 680m, or should I install it after from win 7 to 8

 

Works fine with my 680m, I have the non 3d screen, you should be fine with the UEFI, if you have the 3d screen then you cant use UEFI as when it boots it uses the integrated graphics (which is disabled with the 3d screen). You boot into w8 with normal legacy boot (alienhead). Clean install is ok, had issues with latest whql drivers but latest beta drivers are fine.

 

What about the 3D version will it work?

 

3D works with windows 8, you cant use the UEFI boot, you have to use legacy as the drivers for the nvidia card are not compatible with UEFI boot. So yes you can, but it wont boot as fast, will be slower by a few seconds I assume.

 

Yes. I have the 680M with the 3D screen, A05 BIOS. UEFI is turned on, but I can't turn off Legacy mode. Windows 8 takes approx. 1 second more (9 seconds) than the title of this thread to boot up. hopefully a further BIOS upgrade will make this fully UEFI with legacy off and secure boot on as well.

 

Cool 9 seconds is really fast better than hdd loading times, I also wanted to ask how's the 3D on m17x does it lag a bit crosstalk the screen? How's the 680m working with 3D does the frame rates get lower?

 

Good to hear that the loading time is still fast without UEFI, I want to do a fresh install of Windows 8 but am wondering if there will ever be an update to make UEFI work with the 3D screen. Don't really feel like doing another fresh install.

 

fastboot will work regardless of UEFI boot or not. UEFI will cut down a couple of seconds of POST time. until a firmware update is available for AMD and NVIDIA cards, UEFI can only boot from the HD 4000 internal.

 

So for fastboot, can I install from the Win 8 DVD and do all the formatting and everything of my SSD through the install wizard? Do I need to format the drive with exFAT to enable GPT?

 

since you have a 3D screen I guess your only option is to use legacy boot instead of UEFI. I don't know how NVIDIA optimus work. In AMD enduro the system boots with the internal HD4000 and only when High performance apps are loaded does it transfer the control over to the AMD card. So at the boot time it boots off the HD 4000 which is UEFI compliant. You can try enabling UEFI , win 8 fastboot and install windows 8 and see what happens.

Answer to your original question - If you are installing windows 8 via legacy boot , you don't need a flash drive formatted with FAT32 to install. The DVD will work just fine. Only difference is you can't enable Fastboot in BIOS, the during the boot process the system will do the normal BIOS POST process and transfer control to the OS 2-5 seconds later than it would in UEFI fastboot mode. But overall windows 8 will boot just as fast (2-4 seconds).

 

I thought I was bad you guys are going through hours of fiddling to make you computer boot a few seconds quicker I'd wait a few months and do it on my next clean install......by then Windows 8 drivers / issues will be fixed.


BTW it booted on 12 seconds.............how did you count 8?

26 seconds into the video the power button is released...... at 38 seconds Windows 8 is up and running.

 

You have to have Optimus enabled otherwise you can't enable secure boot. Least that was my experience (non-3D).


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Right now I am not able to disable legacy boot (it comes up with some error about MXM and GOP) in the BIOS, so I am guessing that this means no fast boot option at all with install from USB or DVD. I would be fine with installing in legacy mode but I don't want to have to do another clean install if they do come up with a way to make UEFI/fast boot work without the integrated graphics.

 

i got his stuff working in my R4, thankss , btw how can i get to bios with this setting??

 

since I just got my prize from the digitalSSD giveaway earlier, I spent the whole day putting the mSATA SSD in and reinstall everything. Followed the OP's advice and it is amazing now My boot time is somewhere between 8 and 9 seconds and the new Alienware boot up screen looks cool.

 

Would love to get that "Alienware" logo instead of the Windows 8 one.

Anyone know how? Or if its possible?

 

well i'm using tune up utilities which can change your BIOS boot screen so maybe get an Alienware wallpaper and put in there? I'm sure there are many more similar software that provide the same function.

 

Be aware if you burn the disc from the upgrade assistant it wont be UEFI bootable, you need to fix the ISO to get it working.

 

yeah thats why I used one of them tools to make a thumb drive bootable: WinUSB or something so I wont have to burn through a bunch of DVDs

 

If you download the ISO you can fix it directly so you can get away with one disc, it's just something to be aware of.

 

Just curious and off topic, I see that now you're working for Power Notebooks, are you using anything in particular or all of them?

 

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680M video card benchmark result - Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3940XM CPU @ 3.00GHz, MS-16F3 score: P8299 3DMarks

At the moment.... still tweaking.