Alienware M17x-R4: What is letting my system down?

Cool, And make sure you select 'clean install' to default any driver settings you may have made

 

If I had to place a bet I'd say that as soon as you plug that 240W PSU in there all will be right with the world. Then it will just be a case of testing if your temperatures are OK - Heaven Benchmark is ideal for this because it just keeps running on a loop & keeps your GPU at a natural gaming type load of 100% GPU utilisation. Hopefully we'll hear the good news in a few days.

 

Side note could a lack of power also prevent USB devices from working?


I have a Blue Yeti Pro that wont work for more than a few seconds recording before cutting out, i beleive that this too could be casued by lack of power (thoughts?)?

 

Maybe, you'll know in 3 days!

 

Thought I'd said this earlier

 

Yeah sorry no response my PSU should arrive today ill post what happens next within 24hours

 

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So yeah it was the PSU, that was holding my GPU back. With Nvidia Inspector how do i safetly overclock my machine?

 

That's great news Assassin. Before you overclock it's best to establish whether your stock temperatures are OK. I see in your Heaven screenshot that your GPU was at 66 degC at one point, but the graph indicates that the GPU was hotter before that point - how hot did it get? You can find out by selecting the drop down box on 'GPU Temperature' within the Sensor Section of GPUz and selecting 'Show Highest Reading'. You want your GPU to be under 90 degC at all times, below 80 degC is good, and below 70 degC is excellent.

Also, could you post a 3DMark11 result rather than a Firestrike Extreme result - I'm not familiar with Firestrike Extreme scores. This is really just to double check that your GPU is working properly at stock frequencies before you overclock.

If your temperatures are OK, then you can start to overclock. Overclocking process is as follows:

1) Determine your max stable overclock of the core at stock voltage. Increase Core Clock by 100Mhz, run 3DMark11 through till end, if no visual artifacts or crashes and if temperatures are ok then increase core clock by a further 50Mhz and repeat process. Keep repeating this process until you see artifacts or crashes, at which point back down to your previous stable overclock & do further more vigorous stress testing. Best way to do this is run a game that pushes the GPU to a constant 100% GPU utilisation (GPU load in GPUz) - eg Tomb Raider, Far Cry 3 are good for this - if the game is stable for 1 hour you've probably found a stable core overclock.

2) Now determine your Max Stable Memory Overclock. Leave your core at your maximum stable overclock for this process. Increase Memory Clock by 200Mhz, and do the same testing procedure as above using 3DMark11 to work out an initial stable max overclock. You can increase the memory clock in bigger chunks in NVidia Inspector, because there's a peculiarity with GDDR5 memory in NVidia Inspector whereby a 200Mhz increase is actually equal to a real 100Mhz increase - it's do with a very technical fact that I don't fully understand with GDDR5 being 'quad-pumped' (4 times faster than DDR3 at any given frequency) - (you'll see evidence of what I'm talking about when you view your memory clock in GPUz, where it displays the REAL memory clock). Anyway, in NVidia Inspector, increase the memory by 200Mhz the first time you test, then in 100Mhz chunks thereafter. Each time you complete the 3DMark11 test view the GPU score, if it's not increasing anymore as you raise the memory clock, then stop your memory overclocking where it is. This is because GDDR5 has memory error correction. As memory overclock increases the rate at which errors occur outpace the rate of error correction, thereby resulting in a lower or not increased GPU score, so overclocking the memory beyond that point is futile & only serving to greater stress your card. Once you've reached your max stable overclock in 3DMark11 then do that 1 hour of gaming like your did for the core clock (make sure you have your core at your max overclock when you do this too). If it's stable, then you've now reached your max overclock for both the core & memory at stock voltage.

We'll save the overvolting to another time, as this means flashing a modified VBIOS & can invalidate your warranty if your card fails & your seller finds out you flashed it.

Good Luck, oh, before you do that can you answer my questions about your max GPU temperature, and your 3DMark11 score? (No point overclocking if it's not performing properly at stock!).

EDIT: Obviously keep an eye on your temperatures throughout this process, keep your GPU below 90 degC at all times!

EDIT #2: Just realised that your core clock is limited to an overclock of +135Mhz on core due to having the stock VBIOS, so you may as well go ahead & just crank up the core to +135Mz for your initial testing rather than the +100Mhz I initially suggested.

 

Any news on how the new GPU is working, or how your overclocking has worked out?

 

Thought i replied to you oops


I overclocked it to the 135mhz temps maxed out at 70 ish

the memory clock is boosted up to 400, probs can go higher haven't tested it yet.


I haven't had too much time off to fully optimise and play with the new GPU but ARMA 3 can play Maximum with no probs, Total War Rome 2 has some probs though, but i believe that to be the CPU.




My Hard Disk Sentinel though keeps tellingme that my second HDD interna is getting to almost about 60 degrees, this HDD sits just above the GPU.


Would it be wise to buy some more thermal pads and make a barrier between the GPU and 2nd HDD?

 

Hey, well that's great news! Temperatures are good. If you're happy with the performance I wouldn't bother going anywhere near flashing a modified VBIOS & overvolting yet, could potentially void your warranty of your card. Perhaps when your warranty has expired it would make sense to flash that modified VBIOS, and then overclock as far you can WITHOUT overvolting, and then if temperatures are still good, you might consider upping it to 1.025V or so, which should get you to 1000Mhz. At stock or overclocked, what's your 3DMark11 GPU score, I'd be curious to see what score you get, but also just to validate that it's working 100%?

That's very hot for an HDD. I don't know the layout of the R4, but with my R3 my two HDD and SSD are only 26 degC (getting up to the low 30's when gaming.). On the R3 my disks are off to the side of the GPU and CPU, so I don't think they absorb much heat from those components. Is that not the same for the R4, or are your HDD's located above the GPU? If they're not above the GPU, then extra heat pads aren't going to help. You can only fit so many pads under the GPU anyway right? If you put too much thickness of pad under the GPU then you'll stress the card by it bending when you screw the card down onto the motherboard right? You could think about getting a cooling pad to help with your HDD temperatures, I use the Zalman NC2000, had it since 2008, I shift my laptop to the front of the cooler so that the front lip overhangs the cooler by 1 inch giving the best temperatures. Although 60 degC doesn't sound right.

EDIT: ah yes, you said your HDD is above your GPU. OK, my points still stand though. Perhaps google other R4 users to see their HDD temperatures. Also might be worth posting in this forum to ask for other R4 users HDD temps for that particular slot you're talking:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...nware-m17x-r3-r4-owners-lounge-thread-61.html