End of an era

Might be good to post the last best working specs on the M17 R4/R5.

Thinking it would be 1080/1070M and last X rev CPU.
2133mhz RAM
whatever SSD

 

Did the 1080 not work because of the power delivery limit on the R4? The 1070 is limited to 120W on the R4 at least, unless there some kind of board mod I am not aware of.

Sent fra min SM-G970F via Tapatalk

 

I'm sure Alienware 17 and M17x R4 can take RTX 5000 just like M18x R2 can....it just needs modification of heatsink and MXM slot.

 

CPU: 4930MX (4980HQ/5950HQ if mods ever pan out, 4940MX is best at stock no OC but is worse for OC)
RAM: 32GB 2133mhz+ DDR3L SODIMM (64GB if 5950HQ were to work, which it doesn't)
GPU: GTX 1070 MXM power modded up (RTX 5000 MQ MXM should work, haven't seen any results)
Storage: Complicated, lets just say without modding, 3x8TB SSDs in the 2.5 bays/ODD or 3x5TB HDDs, and a 2TB MSATA or 4TB M.2 Sata with a PCB adapter
Screen: 1080P 120HZ, don't know if higher internal resolutions are supported. Maximum for external displays is one 4K 30 off the HDMI, and one 4K 60 (maybe more with MST adapters) off the mDP port, or any derivitive of those resolutions (1080P 120HZ over HDMI ~ 4K 30 bandwith wise)
I think thats all.

 

2133mhz is the limit thus far on ram.

Ranger can't deliver anymore than 115w in the gpu slot. So power modding a 1070 is a waste of time.

Higher internal resolutions thus far do not work.

 

Hold on, what's that with 5950HQ? Is someone working on putting a desktop processor into the AW17R1?

 

Considering the fact that the R1 wont post with 4980hq, I dont think the 5950hq has much chance to post either. This was Crystalwell microcode injected in my BIOS. That all being said would love to see it happen though...

 

Absolutely. This would be an incredible feat for the 17. Possibly a couple more years to go whe (if?) The RTX ever drops to a reasonable price then it would stil be kicking

 

The quad core CPU with its Swiss cheese patches will be a severe bottleneck as most AA and AAA games already use 6 to 8 cores.
Specially by the fact that AMD will now push 6 and 8 cores cheaply into the laptop market I see no reason to keep using quad core laptops as main systems.
It was nice as long as it lasted though, here is to a hope for future mainstream upgradable laptops.

Sent fra min SM-G970F via Tapatalk

 

They're great for tinkering with and decent if you get them for cheap but no real reason to use them for gaming, they can fulfill specific niches that other devices don't such as @TheReciever 's 17 R1 HDD mods.

People have adapted the BGA 4980HQ into LGA (desktop usually) and PGA (laptop usually) packages, if you go into HWbot listings you can see people using it on Z87 etc, and laptops that would never have had a 4980HQ due to it being BGA can have it due to it being on a PGA form factor (precision m6800 comes to mind.)
However, stock for them has basically dried up.

 

Hi, is there a thread about the RTX 5000 and the M18x R2 ?

 

@Baddemichl is the man. He’s the only one to experiment with such and expensive card

 

About the above statement about 6+cores gaming it got me a little philosophical over here - I may not be the best representation of a manic gamer that gets the hottest gear as soon as it hits the shelves, but most of the stuff that pivots my interests runs perfectly fine in these old Alienwares. When it comes to new stuff - Jedi Fallen Order went well on M15xR2 soon after its release. Disco Elysium runs perfectly. Games that have any substance and interest to me. Not a shooter guy (anymore). I don't require 10000000fps and 16K resolutions. To me these are pointless gimmicks, I may be blind to it or tainted by my console-peasant past, but so far these are, well, pointless. I don't see the resolution difference, and 99% of people don't either. Especially on a screen that is 17" or less. The pixel density at 1080p is high enough for most people. Image quality and colour pallet, well, that's a whole different story. Wouldn't switch the M17xR2's RGB-LED for anything this world has to offer. Tech companies would like you to believe that you need 8K or you'll die from lack of entertainment or something. Personally, I would CONSIDER, very briefly, buying a 4K TV only if it was smart-free (the Android TV is cancer that forces you to upgrade as soon as support stops, which is faster than the hardware cycle) and only if going 70"+. Got a 3D BRAVIA 50" hooked to my Alpha R2 and it's the best and clearest image I could ever need.

Same with processing power - I'm not trying to solve the mass of the Higgs boson over here, I just want to game. My Alpha served me since 2017 if memory serves me, and most likely will for a couple more years. It's a solid PC, works as an office machine, works as a gaming rig, works as an entertainment lounge, and fits well as a smart part of the smart TV. With good fortune, and if nothing fails, the Ranger I've just finished pimping will too, needed a decent portable and gaming-able rig. Same with the old M15x, and the M17x (if the crossfire will behave for 5 minutes, I mean, Jesus Christ...). I often wonder, what does one get with those i-9 2080Ti SLI machines? I mean, you play the 'game' part. Not the 'graphics' part. And if your GPU renders 300fps then you don't even have the screen to see it. To me Dark Souls (any part) is still the best type of balance between graphics and gameplay. Furthermore, there is a reason why Minecraft is one of if not the most popular game of the recent decade, if not of all time.

We've hit a technology wall, where graphics can only be pimped so much, and it's time for gimmicks, Raytracing being the most recent one. What was wrong with smoke, mirrors and body-doubles when it came to emulating light sources? Damn, Half Life 2 and Doom 3 had splendid tricks when it came to that, and they were released when most of us still believed in tooth-fairy. The worst part of it is that it's not even that effective, but IS incredibly resource consuming. What's next? DTX 70000, which emulates dust particles in real time? This is kind of sad, you know. we can name hundreds of AAA games with beautiful, eye-gouging graphics, but name one, precisely one that is from last year that is astonishing visually and stays in your head longer than a sugar rush from a very pretty piece of candy. This year it's Doom Eternal, and if my compatriots deliver, Cyberpunk 2077. Both of which are supposed to work well with machines such as AW17 R3, tops. In Ultra Quality 1080p@60Hz, of course. And with a bit of OC I can run it in 3D on the Bravia if the developers will be so kind to include the option, which they most likely will not, because 3D was another 'THE FUTURE OF VIDEOGAMES' that died sooner than it seemed in their heads. Remember that? Remember 3D Gaming? I remember, because I was absolutely, ravingly indifferent to the slogans; to anyone accusing me of hipocrisy - I got the 3D Bravia only because it was a very cheap listing of a decent TV and I wanted a branded 50". It was the same story - IT'S THE FUTUR... oh, it's dead. What about VR? Is it the future we were supposed to believe? I mean, it can and in an ideal world it SHOULD be more immersive than regular gaming, I guess, but again - it's too niche, too expensive for wide spectrum adoption, and for some reason most games look like Minecraft played on EGA card, or looks just stylised enough to masquerade it's ineffective poly count. As a Borderlands fan I tried Borderlands VR. Same like with my 3D, I ran it two or three times, but when the first wave of innovation passed, it went straight in the bin in favour of a proper experience.

Am I rambling? I feel like I'm rambling. If it seems that I am, then most likely I am rambling.

All, of course, depends on what you want from gaming. If you go into e-sports and have such hightened perception that less than 144fps is too low - be my guest. If I sold all my toys at once I would most likely get a higher if not top tier desktop with newest gear. But to me there is more to it than that. There are of course obvious technological advantages, like faster drives with more capacity, more lightweight chassis (Thank you, M17xR2, with just one sitting by you I don't need to go to the gym anymore), less power hungry, but again, same with smart phone industry - give us what we need, not what you say we need. We don't need a laptop that is 3mm thick, we need a reliable machine that will last. Old Alienwares have that quality, point being proven by the vast majority of this forum having machines working and even keeping up with contemporary stamped-sheet silicon single use machines with nasty BGA sockets. Give us better batteries, give us faster systems, not ones that consume the same percentage of resources generation after generation and the general perception of a system always stays the same (funny how Windows XP was a smooth runner while weighing around 400MB, and Win10 takes a couple of GBs, while most of it is unnecessary BS). Give us backward compatibility in all aspects. Not single use, disposable machines. Don't follow Apple trends. We need diversity, not uniformity in the market. We need proper progress. We can see through the facade, but thanks to market influence we have grown indifferent. But if it's better games that we want, well, we get only prettier ones, not necessarily better.

And I don't believe it's the end of an era, either.



Sorry for this stream of consciousness, the thought was kind of nibbling me at the back of my head ever since I read that comment.

 

Ramble on brotha! I'm delighted with the replies that a somewhat poorly thought out topic has generated.

I am still happy with the M17x unit but fingers crossed there is one more GPU unit that somehow works and allow HDMI-in. Do I use hdmi-in? no. but something about it not working on the 1070M drives me mad. Kind of like having to remove the laptop battery to keep hwinfo from freezing. Just seems wrong.

So is the RTX 5000 or P5200 that card? The next/final update from the 1070M?

 

Thank you for some recognition, I was kind of expecting an angry PC Gaming Master Race pitchfork wielding mob

Just as a thought I have experimentally ran an intergenerational DP to HDMI test between M17xR2 and M17xR5, but no luck, black screen on the P4000 Mobile maybe some other device will do (I'll try Xbox One later). I'll keep my eye on a P5000/5200 as well to make it peak efficiency. In my country for some reason it's cheaper to get an MXM Quadro card than a proper gaming equivalent (vide myy P4000 being half the price of a GTX 980M, 1300PLN compared to 2500PLN)...

 

Its the same argument people made for P55 when Intel EOLed it. "its a useless dead end platform", "you should get sandy bridge instead". When really it performed just fine for like 4-5 years. Especially considering the xeon equivalent was dirt cheap.

Its basically the same argument that has been crapping my threads even when explicitly stating multiple times I dont have the need for it.

That all being said there are games that DO benefit from having more cores/threads. Battlefield being one of the popular choices to point towards, but lately I have had little to no interest in those games anymore because its a brainless shooter 98% of the time and I dont have the time to chase those singular and rare instances of excitement.

I have no doubt that my secondary machine, the p750zm will serve me quite well. Especially with the 5775c and a 1070.

 

If the like system had a spectrum, this one would get STRONGLY AGREE. Last shooter that got me mostly excited was Borderlands 3, just because I'm a sucker for that series. Previous one? Spec Ops: The Line, because it was a shooter to end all shooters. CoD series went severely downhill with quality and self-awareness, oh, yeah, Doom 2016 got me hooked a bit, but not enough to finish it though.

I am not denying the fact that they do benefit. But if a game is made, it should be made with respect for common resources, not with demands for upgrade. Crysis, all positives aside, was very irresponsible with hardware requirements due to extreme size of texture files and so on, and in many cases poor optimalisation is the cause for high specs required. Same with RDR 2 - both Jim Sterling from Jimquisition and Ben 'Yahtzee' Croshaw from Zero Punctuation tackled the issue with good points - all that detail need to serve a purpose.

 

Oh man Crysis came out during the PERFECT hw time though G92 and the Core 2 Duo. One-two punch.

 

Doom 2016 was made much better with the inclusion of vulkan api, and is still one of my favorite titles to play.

Crysis Ive always thought of a benchmark first and game second.

Most of the games I enjoy are still a bit older and it's not even because I played them on release and therefore rose colored glasses and such. Mass effect 2 I didn't even own until I think 3-4 months before mass effect 3 was releasing and my friends told me it's worth playing especially since steam at the time always had it on sale for 5 bucks. Take that and overhaul it with texture mods and you can still play it well above 1080p120 if desired.

Hell I was playing dead space 2 at 4k144hz a few months back. This was on my 27" monitor.

Is there better? Yes of course, is there a need? That's up to the consumer to determine

 

Yeah I guess I can't complain too much since w the 1070 the R4 can support Occulus. Runs the newest Half-Life game great.

 

He mentioned he is testing in SG mode. I believe the R4 has to run in PEG mode with the 120hz screen for 10 series cards.

 

What type of 1070M should be used? The Zotac/others version or the differently abled with their shape CLEVO variants? Are they regular sized MXMs?

 

I have a Zotac (as far as I know) 1070 that is normal Mxm shaped at the moment. On eBay there is a black Dell card where someone soldered on the 1070 core but not sure if anyone used that in a M17x yet.

Performance is good but on the R4 you have to use HwInfo and unplug the laptop battery to keep the fans from locking on a set PWM. I did buy an external PWM signal generator that is triggered on an external temp sensor but did not swap that in yet. I believe the 1060 does not have this fan issue.

I was hoping to sell the Zotac 1070 and swap to a RTX 5000 or P5200 but no one can tell me for sure that will work in PEG mode. I might have to swap to a 60hz LCD and then use SG.

 

The black 1070N are hp Cards made for 80W. they are running fine in AWs. But they don´t like going over 120W. Over that, you see some smoke and a black screen.
For 1070N you only Need the wright Vbios for automatic fan Control.
The P5200 is running in peg with 120Hz Display. But be careful when you buy on. You have to solder a Bios chip. That only works on rev A and B of that Cards. Rev C and D the lanes to die are not in pcb.
RTX should work in PEG to, i don´t see a reason why not. In clevos they work.
Could you sent a pic of your zotac Card, please.

 

AW18 and M18x r2 in SG mode, both cpus on 4.3 on all cores.
https://www.3dmark.com/fs/15278884
https://www.3dmark.com/fs/17020060

 

OMG you are my hero! With default VBIOS and playing VR half life alynx here is my output. I will take a picture of the card itself soon but it is the Zotac card. Can you link me please to the VBIOS with auto fan control? I will send you flowers. I hit with default VBIOS ~160Watts and card and system are doing fine.

 

Zotac 1070 do not work via peg. Before i can sent a bios, i have to know what Card it is.

 

I perhaps do not know what mode this card is running in. I do have a M17x R4 and gets like 12.8k on firestrike and runs HL Alynx like a champ.

 

It´s a gecube Card.
Could you sent your vbios, please.
Card did not match to your hwinfo wattage.

 

This attached photo is the actual card and VBIOS I am running. I would love to not have to run HWInfo for the fans.

EDIT: Wow you are so amazing. Thank you again for the wealth of knowledge.

Let me know how to dump the VBIOS.

 

use gpu z. there is a arrow left near uefi under nvidia logo.
Here you can save your bios.

 

Thanks again! Posted, hope it helps you or others.

 

What do you mean that one has to solder the BIOS chip? There is no vbios chip on the card itself? How does that help and what does the lack of it preclude? It won't work without a chip in AW machines or what?

Ok, I've just checked the photos of a listing of 5200 and I believe I see what you mean. Even though it states that it's revision D, it has a spot for the chip. Does it mean it's not wired? Won't there be a vbios conflict between the one programmed by default and the soldered one?

 

This Cards have no Vbios on gpu. That is on Mainboard. Because of that, there is no bios chip on Card. On rev. A you can solder it and it works fine. Rev D, there you can solder it, but it is not conected to die.

 

Ok, a couple of questions:
1. Is it possible to run the card on the AW 17 before soldering the chip? Does it run at all (even without fan control)?
2. Is it possible to overwrite the board embedded vBIOS if the first question gets a yes?
3. What are the benefits of soldering the chip on the PCB (except for the obvious possibility of attaching an external flasher)?

Edit: sorry for the line of questioning, I just want to understand the situation fully, you are far more knowledgeable in this discipline, thus my prying questions.

 

The Card don´t have any bios on it. So it will not start at all.
The bios is on Mainboard not on gpu.
Soldering a chip is the way to get it running.

 

I really want someone to solder the VBIOS chip and try a Rev A/B on a M17x & P5200.

 

I did it and it works..

 

Oh, I see, on main board as on on the motherboard I get ya
As soon as I get my hands on the 5200 (the one I was going to buy was rev D, but will need to look for A or B then) I will do that. So, now the hunt begins
What exact chip do I need for this? Can I use any vBIOS chip (I have a spare broken 570M that can be stripped for components) or does it need to be model-specific? 8MB or 16MB?

 

Yeah the R1 ec is limited to about 118w, any time I hit 120w or over it would throttle.

 

I am also asking about the embedded vBIOS, because my current M4000M was taken out from an HP laptop, also has no visible bios chip, but it has an embedded one. I had to go to a service point where they have flashed it on a riser with dell vBIOS and now it works fine with the M15XR2.

Out of curiosity - these HP laptops have some sort of onboard repository of vBIOSes or do they work with one card and one card only?

 

Do you know if they remade the pcb or they just remove some "shunt resistance" so the eeprom pad are not connected to the core anymore ?

 

How was I hitting like 160W then with 1070 in Half Life VR?

 

This is behavior exhibited with my own 17 r1. System would power limit the gpu at anything above 118w and ultimately why I moved on to clevo laptop / desktop. This was a motherboard restriction not a gpu limit. Could probably figure out how to shunt it but I was tired of modding the laptop instead of actually using it.

 

At the moment i don´t know. I have a rev D here. If i find some time, i try to find the difference.

 

You might be able to blue wire and connect the SPI chip

 

From what I can see with internet picture it seems like they modified at least these parts.
If you could send a picture of the card, front and back without the black sticker on front, we should be able to see the difference, other thing to look is trace of the eeprom pads, follow them with a microscope or macro lens to know where they end up

 

https://imgur.com/a/tj8vO0B

 

I think I can still see the lane on the pcb for the eeprom, but I think if you make this it should work because it will be like rev.A pcb

 

Aaaand...? Should we do a drum roll? Any success with the card?