M17x r3 680M compatability

Agree, until someone that has done this gives 'the word' play safe

 

Damn, that's really saddening.
I imagine plugging your AC off and going through with battery on a 680m exhausts it in a matter of minutes without the iGPU...

I thought that was only the issue with 780m.

That is REALLY a DlCK move by Dell/Alienware, as I bought my m17x R3 for the sole purpose of potentially upgrading the freaking GPU...

How long does the battery last on 680m while non gaming?

 

Mine automatically downclocked to it's lowest setting (75mhz) as soon as it was unplugged. This R4 does the same. Battery life for normal use is around 2.5 hours - but no gaming!

 

Christ... First and last Alienware I bought.

I bought it with the SOLE PURPOSE of having an UPGRADABLE MXM slot in the freaking notebook. That was my top priority.
I specifically researched that, and bought an R3.
I take it it's a simple matter of BIOS support?

This is beyond my comprehension, and beyond any acceptable customer treatment.

From what I take it, its official they won't ever support it.

 

It can feel like that at times. Especially if you've (like me) come from years of desktop builds.

I got angry when the 680 was released and I'd have to give up 3D on my R3. I don't have the iGPU anyway so why does it not just work? Over time I see how it works. Remember that dell sell you a complete 'PC-in-a-box'. They test all their stuff to all sorts of international standards to sell them worldwide. Once they provide support in the bios for an untested config then they could arguably be responsible when that new super duper card overheats the whole system!

Luckily it's not impossible, people write bios mods and tricks to get this stuff to work. Pain is that there is usually a compromise somewhere (and it's not as simple as it should be).

Once a model goes out of production dell will never revisit it to add in new cards, only fixes for known issues

 

It is upgradeable, it's just like MickyD says, there are compromises. I'm quite happy with mine, the compromises (loosing iGPU) aren't an issue for me - best laptop I've ever bought. Upgrading my GPU for £230 made it nearly 3 times as fast and extended the life of it by another 2 yrs at least.

 

Compromises in the case of the hardware working BAD with the whole spec I could understand.

But when it's proven that it COULD in fact work, and people are doing it, is just lack of the company's proper support and a downright neglect.
I bought my system with 580m, and thought that it could last more than 2 years worth of upgrades; turns out it "KINDA" does, and in no way thanks to Dell/Alienware.

They didn't even look into it from what I've read in the thread.

Tell me one last thing then, please - what's the deal with the onboard sound not working?
I saw it being the case with 780m - is it the same with 680m?

Lack of iGP I could stomach. No gaming on battery is OK; I rarely ever do that in the first place. OK - as long as the system doesn't drain out of juice in 30 mins.

Just curious - what did you upgrade yours from?
680m isn't "three times as fast" from 580m, as far as I understand.

 

As far as I've seen the sound problem is only the 780m. It was never mentioned in any of the 680m upgrades I followed.

The 680 came out around 35% faster than my 675m (same as 580m) and the 780 around 10-15% on top of that in the tests I saw people doing.

 

Sigh; I think I'll go with the 680m then.

I can get a rather "cheap" 580m, but I think it'd be wiser to grab a 680m.

 

Yes, I suppose it's just business!

Oh yeah, you were referring to my '3 times faster' comment. That is comparing my overvolted & overclocked 670MX with my overclocked 560M that I used to have in this laptop - 6700 GPU score vs 2350 GPU score in 3DMark11. Stock 680M is 6000 GPU points, stock 780M is 7700 points. Here's a link to GPU info that might be useful for you:
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680M - NotebookCheck.net Tech


The 680M would be a good call for you. 680M is about 80-90% faster than a 580M/675M according to 3DMark11.

EDIT: but in game benchmarks the difference is not that great, only about 60%ish between 675M and 680M depending on the title.

 

I just wonder if having the iGP disabled really does anything for the battery life.

I've only played OLD 2D games on battery using the iGP.
Are they still playable on the 680M, with the same battery life?

Is Windows battery life and fan noise rel

 

From my research when I got the 120hz R3 it's quite a bit of battery time lost, around 1.5 to 2.5 hours!

The iGPU is pretty capable these days and most older games run just fine. Try them on an NV locked to it's slowest speed and it's painful though

 

I didn't measure difference in battery life, but idle at the desktop, the difference between iGPU and dedicated Kepler 670MX is about 3W from my memory - when I compared like for like using a Watt Meter attached to the wall. So, idle went from about 27W to 30W, that's an increase in consumption of about 10%. Maybe Kepler is more efficient than Fermi, so perhaps less relevant if upgrading to a Kepler GPU like the 680M.

Fan noise is the same, the GPU fan never ever comes on unless it's running a game, and the CPU fan when it does come on low doesn't make any noise anyway with regular internet browsing.

No idea about gaming on battery, never done it.

 

This 335.23 Game Ready WHQL driver ensures you’ll have the best possible gaming experience for Titanfall

Driver installation / vbios flash guide M17XR3 GTX 680M installation

[Guide] Modding Nvidia OEM INF Files

Quadro Notebook Driver 334.95 [Alienware] Aftermarket Upgrades Driver Support - Modded INF

GeForce 335.23 WHQL

 

I'm now on the lookout for a 680m to replace my 580m. If anyone knows of one in the UK then please give me a shout. Ta.

 

New in GeForce 337.50 Beta drivers

• Performance - Introduces key DirectX optimizations which result in reduced game-loading times and significant performance increases across a wide variety of games. Results will vary depending on your GPU and system configuration.

Driver installation / vbios flash guide M17XR3 GTX 680M installation

[Guide] Modding Nvidia OEM INF Files


GeForce 337.50 Beta Driver

 

as always you are awesome. Shame Nvidia doesn't just include the correct files to save you the hassle.

 

I've just got a 770m for my R3 i've followed the steps and got the unlocked bios but if i disable audio igfx and set main to peg i get 8 beeps. If i leave everything on i get stuck at the bios loading screen. If i disable igfx and set main display to peg i get stuck at a blank screen. Now I'm wondering if the card is defective or if im an idiot and there is something I'm not doing right.

Anyone have any advice i can follow? I've checked most of the guides and could find much more to do.

 

Hi, I'm sorry to say I have seen at least three people try a 770m in the R3/R4 and none had success. Same problems as you, although it does not make much sense it just seems that the 770m is not usable in earlier machines.

 

I find it weird that it does work with a 780m though

 

Me too, that's why I said it makes no sense. If it was to do with bios GPU ID (since it seems not to recognise it exists) you would expect the same for the 780m

 

I've seen this problem a few times with the 770M, I've yet to see a proved case of the 770M working in the R3. No idea why it doesn't work in the R3, makes no sense, but the evidence points to it being incompatible. One of the most reliable cases proving the 770M doesn't work in the R3 is when a user called Reborn tried it - he's quite knowledgeable on the PC front, so I'm pretty sure it doesn't work.

 

What is the deal with replacing a 580m with a 680m in the non 3D display R3's? Any special things that need to be done?

 

There are a ton of threads on this - I know, I'm in a lot of them!

You need an unlocked bios to allow you to set the graphics to the NV only, otherwise optimus gets messed up and will not select the NV. The other thing is a modified driver that includes the machine/card ID's in it. You have to replace one of the original driver inf flies and it is version specific. Get the inf from: LaptopVideo2Go: Drivers. Drill down on the driver you want to use and you will see a link for the inf file

 

Easy enough then. I used to use modified drivers when I owned a rebranded Clevo laptop so good.

 

M17XR3 GTX 680M installation

 

This is cool, I've done it several times now and got 8.1 installed now too. Now if only I could get 3D to work.

Sent from my SGH-M919 using Tapatalk

 

Yeah, it is frustrating since there is no good reason it does not. I have often wondered if it would work with an external emitter but nobody has tried it.

I can tell you why. There is a '3D certification' list somewhere in the BIOS and since the list only contains cards sold with the machine it does not get detected. There was a push quite a while ago to get one of the bios gurus to help but nothing came of it - small audience I guess

 

Hi guys. Would something like the below be ok for the R3?

GTX 680M GTX680M N13E GTX A2 2GB DDR5 Graphics card FOR Dell M17X R4 M18X R2 020HTK 20HTK VGA card laptop-in Graphics Cards from Electronics on Aliexpress.com

 

Don't see any reason why not. It is a 2gb so should have the dell vbios. As long as you've read up on the unlocked bios and driver modification you should be good.

My only concern is that the pics do not include the x-bracket. It's always best to use one designed for the card even if the old one seems to fit.

Good luck

 

I did notice the 2Gb versions tend to be Dell and I wanted to keep to Dell parts as much as possible. I believe my laptop is already using the A12 unlocked bios update as I did it ages ago to bring back the SATA 3 speed on the 2nd Hard Drive. Does the vbios on the 680m need flashing or can I just use the default. What are peoples recommendations for that?

 

That's cool then. Do you know about getting the modified inf file you need to replace in the driver install?

Personally I am the same as you and would prefer dell branded since dell spend so much time making these things incompatible (they simply do not support any upgrades after a model is superseded) it's better to start with something that is going to report Dell. Although I have not seen a single problem from using clevo or other brands.

The only downside to the dell vbios is that they limit the overclock to +135mhz, or something in that area, I'm not sure today - brain fuzz . As long as you're not going to get into extreme overclocking or overvolting I would think this is enough for most people

 

I would never dream of overclocking laptop components because heat is always an issue so I guess the stock vbios will be fine.

 

You could just go play in a cooler or get a cooling pad, mine actually cools it to about 3 or 4 degrees lower. Also keep up on you paste.

Sent from my SGH-M919 using Tapatalk

 

Decided to upgrade from 580m to 680m. Thanks to j95 for his guide on page63. Everything went well except a silly mistake of using nvflash windows instead of nvflash dos version. Though so far I don't feel the increase in performence with dishonered(still finishing brigmore). Gonna see how's titanfall perform after i finish that.

 

Yeah, the DOS method is safer.
Dishonored, try this NVidia Anti-Aliasing Guide (updated) - Guru3D.com Forums

 

just thought I'd quickly hijack this thread for a few q's:

1. Is the modded 337.81 available yet?? (sorry for the pressure j95 sir!)

2. Will my R3 support a GTX 880M 8GB ok??

3. is there a difference between these 880M's?

Nvidia GeForce GTX 880M 8GB DDR5 for CLEVO alienware upgrademonkey | eBay

Nvidia GeForce GTX 880M 8GB DDR5 for MSI clevo alienware upgrademonkey | eBay

Thanks guys!

 

MSI cards do not have an SLI bridge connector for multi card setups.

MSI use Hynix ram while sager use samsung.

 

Thank you sir! £498 card it is then! Thanks again

 

8½....♫...:hi2:

M17XR3 GTX 680M installation

GeForce 337.81 Beta Driver

 

@j95 man, you're doig some sweet job! is there any way you could create a separate thread for updated modded inf files? I done it myself once and it worked, ever since I cant seem to repeat the process altho i documented it manually. save us bro

 

Infierno... [Guide] Modding Nvidia OEM INF Files

[Alienware] Aftermarket Upgrades Driver Support - Modded INF

 

I followed that guide, worked the first time, left me wonderin around the other few times....

oh and for some reason tech inferno doesn't let me download stuff (tho i got 5 posts).

We want our own NBR threads with courtesans and milk!

 

Yeah, from Belgium 1,000 year old Trappist, Verboden Vrucht...


M17XR3 GTX 680M installation

• Game Ready - This 337.88 Game Ready WHQL driver ensures you'll have the best possible gaming experience for Watch Dogs.

GeForce 337.88 WHQL

 

You sure do know about Verbuden Vrucht
And thanks for those drivers.

Hey can I ask u about something else? I got this stuttering problem in games when I play something resource-intensiive and I can't figure out whats the problem (attached GPU and CPU monitoring screenshot during a gameplay session). Any ideas what might that be???

 

So max temp 69C, try flashing the unlocked vBIOS. Clevo 4GB (MSI 4GB) blue PCB or Dell 2GB green PCB NVIDIA Kepler VBIOS mods - Overclocking Editions, modified clocks, voltage tweaks

Dos method (bootable USB stick) [GUIDE] NVIDIA VBIOS flashing
Rename "Nvidia GTX 680m - 'OC edition' - revx" to 680m.rom

Backup first (unique Kepler Id)

Code:

nvflash.exe -b backup.rom 

Flash

Code:

nvflash.exe -6 680m.rom

Type 'y' twice when requested.
"Flash successful" -> Ctrl+Alt+Del

 

Thanks for the advice mate. Does it matter that I have 2gb on my 680m for the purpose of flashing? the clevo one is supposed to be 4gb by your description.
Will do this first thing when I get to home.
Also, I have modified bios for my m17xr3, think its done by a guy from TI (his nickname is Sl7.. something. sorry, dont remember exactly )
And I believe I flashed vbios for gtx 680m when I first got it (it was in june 2013)

 

Flash the proper one Dell-680M-80.04.33.00.32__ocedition_revised_00 (2GB Dell) svl7's vBIOS, backup first.

 

you got me a bit confused. so insteald of flashing clevo/ dell green ones i need to flash the one u just told me about in your last post - is that correct? what about svl7's bios? should I update it as well?

sorry if I'm being stupid. the last time I had to flash anything was a year ago

 

Yep, Green PCB 2GB Dell card. Flash Dell-680M-80.04.33.00.32__ocedition_revised_00 (stock voltage). BIOS A08 till A12 are all fine.