Alienware m17x R2 Upgrade - Challenge!

Hey all,

I work in media (graphic designer/motion artist) and have had my Alienware m17x now for a couple of years (Intel i7 620(I think) processor, 6gb of ram, 256GB (2 drives, it's quite low on storage as in a raid config for speed), 5870 ati card.

Anyway - it is now time to do a serious upgrade, I have considered a BOXX desktop but seems a waste to not get a few more years out my Alienware!

My question is if you had a budget of £1500 GBP or thereabouts what would you get to upgrade it? You can go higher if you like, as I say as long as it's cheaper than a new system I will consider it. I need a scratch disk and a system disk as I do a lot of work involving that configuration (or does it not matter with SSD?

Thanks for all the help in advance, and also please state if it's hard to do the upgrades you mention (I have no idea how hard a CPU replacement is for example)

 

You have one single GPU today?

What sceen you have on this one? (not all screens would make it worth the upgrade)

You want to go baddest or least work?

What PSU do you have?

1500GBP should go all the way for what you need.
This is the edition of max performance, but work from your part:

2*7970M GPU (2* apx 300 £)
1*920XM CPU (less than 300£ )
1*330W PSU (100£ but you might need a 240 as well to get the chip for mod)
8 GB RAM (less than 100£)
any SSD disk. (whatevver you want to put in it)


There are guides on how to do pretty much all of this.
Question is how much knowledge you have in electronics.
Going for my solution you have to be able to solder too.

 

Flip side, selling the R2 you could potentially buy an R4 or even an R5 (I don't know exactly the prices in Dell UK, you could look at Outlet). You need quite a bit of money to drop into an R2 to make it top spec, not to mention you pretty much have to overclock the i7 Extreme chip to get maximum performance.

 

Hey thanks for the reply - I will look into this stuff. Currently it has the RGBLED 1920x1200 screen which at the time was the best, I quite like its "vibrant" colour for design work even though it is completely and totally innaccurate as a colour grading system! haha. PSU I am not sure, all I know is it was stock at the time and it was when the R2 was not long released.

I definitely want to go "baddest" but as the guy below you says perhaps I should look at selling and upgrading to a newer model. Just sad to see my r2 go, so much history!

 

I would recommend you to sell it and get one of the newest ones, that will stay in your budget and will keep you updated with the components.

 

Well this depends on what you wanna do.
Sceenwise, your at the best.
Your PSU, it says if its 240W or lower on it.

Performance wise, the R2 with top spec outperforms every other M17 built to date since it is the only one that can do crossfire.
CPU quite a bit slower, GPU WAY faster. (close to double GPU speed) In GPU it can only be outdone by M18's with crossfire and faster cards. (2 or 3 different choices, but at WAY steeper price)

For you, if you dont feel for tinkering to much and just use it, id sell and go for another M17.

If you want to play BF4 @ 60fps ultra settings, you go ahead and upgrade your R2.
Warning, it becomes an addiction tampering, pampering and tinkering with it, and there are others in here with same interests that is happy to share their knowledge.
Tinkering would also mean overclocking your CPU, this is not rocket science, but still needs to be thought.
Learning this and how your R2 operates = nice experience you will not regret.

Price?
As i told you 12-1300 £ in upgrade cost. but you really do it on own risk and guarantee is gone.

Your alien could be sold for apx 400£. (since you have single GPU most likely.)

This added to your 12-1300 cost for the R2 makes you able to buy a quite upgraded R5 used.
Just above 2000£ makes you get a good upgraded R5 4900MQ and AMD R9 M290X, new with a SSD disk and 16 GB RAM. Needing perhaps a bit extra for extended warranty that you probably would want.