M17xR2 Bios A09 Discussion Thread

You probably won't see any difference if using a non-extreme CPU. But it won't hurt to upgrade to A09, IMO.

 

just got a question on how to install and which to install/update first...i've had my M17xR2 for about a month and half now and have never done any updates to AW bios or to the amd - mobility hd5870 bios and/or driver...so with the new updates dell has released today, i'm not entirely sure which comes first:

AW09 BIOS
AMD BIOS
AMD Driver

?? and do i need anything else?

 

Can I ask if the engineers have looked at the polling rate issue as it applies to the keyboard? It is fixed with the touchpad, but the keyboard is *much* slower than any of my others (logitech external or my work dell e6410). It really feels like a slower repeat rate, so I thought maybe it would be similar to the touchpad issue.

 

I am surprised you got yours with A08 - I received mine 4 days ago and it came with A05.

Sandy

 

Heh, that IS odd. My tracking showed that my laptop came from Edison, NJ. Perhaps different assembly locations for east coast/west coast with different builds?

 

No, there are not.

Back on topic please. Thanks.

 

System BIOS first
Video driver second (making sure you follow the usual steps to completely clear out old driver remnants)
Video BIOS third

 

Is the video bios installed from within Windows after you have installed the new driver?

 

No, the new NON-BETA VBIOS Installer is a Memory Stick or CD Creater to boot from and is flashed in DOS then. You can still use the Beta VBIOS Windows Flasher found in the other thread, it's the same VBIOS flashed, up to you, regardless follow the instructiuons given on support site.

 

my average is 60hz with touchpad (synaptics always installed). i dont talk about around 470hz when using the alien TactX mouse

 

But that IS the touch pad rate I have posted after the BIOS update. And it seems ALL my scores increased a little bit.

 

thts what i said too. that i have 20hz less than you

 

if your rate is around 40, you probably tried uninstalling the synaptics driver right ? if so, please reflash the bios and do a power drain to restore the touchpad rate.

 

as i said i have 60hz and synaptics is was aways installed (never uninstalled it)

 

Got a problem: I've installed AW09 and AMD Newest Driver but when i try the AMD VBios I'm not sure what to do...I run the setup and then it puts files onto my usb but dunno what to do from there. If anyone could provide a step by step instructions on what to do. And should i use any removal programs to get rid of the old driver and etc?

 

I'd suggest you use the new one via either bootable CD or USB key. We had 2 confirmed bricked cards with the Windows flasher. Yes, this is a very small number for how many people used it, but better safe than sorry.

To use, run the downloaded application from within Windows. Either make a CD or a USB key, boot to whatever you chose (F12 at startup) and it will automatically flash the cards (provided you meet the requirements, e.g. 5870(s), new video driver, proper system). Nothing to it.

 

Ok, thanks Brian for the official instructions on the new VBIOS, i won't suggest the Windows Flasher anymore then (Though i'm sure if you had a clean system with proper drivers and read carefully, it would be the more comfortable way). Since i'm already on the latest VBIOS, i only looked at the new Utility to create a MS or a CD, but i was aware on how i would have to do it, but now everyone knows too, i hope Batboy can Update your info to it's corresponding thread. Cheers

 

I am having all kinds of trouble downloading a09 off the dell support site...can anyone check if they can get the download to come up so I can know if it is just the internet connection at my present location?

Also...and this is really odd...when I enter my service tag at the dell support site it now comes up as a "Dell Latitude e1550" where as before it always came up as an m17x-r2 (and yes I made sure I entered it right...twice)

 

im not sure what i did wrong...i updated the aw09 bios and the amd 5870 driver last night...but just a moment ago i was watching a movie and i unplugged the power and it froze and everytime i restart the computer it either black screens and mouse is frozen or blue screen of death...dunno what to do, im in safe mode atm. im thinking about using the alien respawn and just restore it back to a couple weeks ago...so im guessing all my data will be lost...

 

did you update the vbios of the card as well?

 

Liger, it sounds like you updated the system BIOS (which is fine) and the display driver. I believe you still need to flash the VBIOS update. Please see post#1 and #2 (and post follow-up discussion in) this thread...

http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...5870-gpus-5870-vbios-discussion-non-beta.html

This thread is for system BIOS A09 discussion only.

Thanks all.

 

i tried to...but wasnt sure how it works as it...the boot from usb was confusing since im not entirely sure the steps to do it.

 

Hi theres LigerZero,

If your in safe mode I'd suggest removing the Ati drivers run driver sweeper and cc cleaner as well while your at it. Then reboot back into normal OS mode.

Go and dl the latest dell drivers that were released on the 20th of this month. You probably already did that and were using them. Install them and reboot. You did all the right steps so far buy you missed the crucial final step.

That was to also download the new Vbios update for the 5870 gpu cards also on the dell support site. You need to run that update. It will give you 2 options. To either make a bootable usb vbios flash or cd rom flash media disk. Choose either one. You will have to use a usb flash drive that is no bigger than 2gb if you do choose the usb option.

Once the usb or cd rom has been created. Restart the notebook with the usb or cd plugged in then hit F12 when booting up to get to the boot menu. Just keep tapping F12 when the notebook restarts and during also after the alien head pops up. The boot menu will load. Select either usb bootable flash drive or the cd/dvd rom drive to boot from. Press B to flash and update your gpus vbios. Once done it will tell you. Restart and your all good to go.

The problem you experienced before will be now cured by the vbios update.

Cheers.

 

Somebody tell me how I can +rep...cause there are several of you on here I think I owe!!

Otherwise:
@Liger

I agree with Batboy and Reborn...update the VBIOS as explained (its not very hard...trust me) and your problems will be solved.

 

Its the icon next to the green online status. You click it and give rep under the avatar

 

So, where do I see the speed of my touch pad ? and it should be around what ?

 

Free Mouse Rate Checker 1.1b

Around 60Hz with Synaptics Touchpad Driver Installed. Cheers

 

83 on my m11x

 

Got mine on 9/14/2010 and came with AO8.

 

So, anyone know of issues with Everest? My GPU2 shows 99% all the time. Wonder if it's jacked up?

Also posted this in the AW return/warranty issues thread.

__________________

 

Just a quick question, for those of us who are still on A07, do we bypass A08 and flash to A09 directly, or is A09 purely for XM fix? Not touchpad? in which case we flash to A08 instead?

Hoping for a quick reply. Many thanks!

Edit:

If it's A08, shall we just grab it from the link in A08 discussion thread? - http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m17x/515247-m17xr2-bios-a08-discussion-thread.html

 

Skip A08.

10char

 

Alright, so straight from A07 to A09. Thanks bud

and i'm quite happy for you and the rest with this XM cpu update.
Enjoy as you should!

 

Thanks again, finally, a bearable touchpad

 

well i tried doing the vbios. After it finished, every time i boot up it gets to the screen just before login and says "Please wait..." and the loading circle stops moving. Did i install/update to vbios incorrectly? do i try again? i did a ccleaner and driver sweeper just b4 doing the vbios update. its actually making me worry quit a bit. (I'm using my 3yr old Inspiron 1721 atm...cause I'm not sure what to do. HELP PLEASE.

and thanks for everyone that helped

 

looks like windows 7 issue to me. first try use windows 7 dvd and select fix boot. if issue still remains then if you have a backup (be careful to be with at least P02 Dell beta driver) use the windows 7 dvd and recover. Otherwise you may have to do a fresh format.

I dont think its a bad vbios flash issue.

 

Did you install the latest Dell drivers again after running CCleaner/Driver Sweeper? If not, and your internet connection was running, you may have unknowingly downloaded an ATI driver via Windows Update. This would cause your issues.

I would suggest booting into safe mode and uninstalling the current video drivers, whatever they may be. Then reboot and install the latest Dell drivers. This should hopefully fix your problem.

 

if you had a post 10.6 ati driver driver sweeper can sometime gives very strange result

but yyour isue is mostly driver cause if you get that far your gpus is working

 

I installed A09 last night and gamed for about four hours. No problems so far and the turbo boost is showing correct numbers. I haven't done the vbios or graphics drivers yet though.

 

I am way late to the party here...but after flashing to the A09 BIOS and having latest vBIOS and drivers my 3dmark'06 was ~13688...based on my config below...does that sound right to everyone?

 

so i should remove both the driver and its video bios...umm is that under control panel and uninstall program? then reboot and install the new dell driver and vbios after or at the same time...cause i think the new driver says to reboot after installing.

 

As I understand it...there is no removing the vbios. I think what you are being told is to go into safe mode, express uninstall ati software (via the control panel), but dont reboot until you run driver sweeper for "ati display drivers", click analyze, click clean, then reboot. Then install the latest dell driver.

 

Sounds good to me

Here is my run from just before:

 

As Megatony73 said, you can't remove the VBIOS. It's flashed to a ROM chip on your video card(s), and is now permanent.

Follow these steps to get things working:

• Boot into safe mode and bring up your Device Manager. Uninstall both video cards, choosing to remove the driver when doing the second card.
• Reboot.
• Run the ATI driver uninstaller.
• Run Driver Sweeper.
• Reboot.
• Install the Dell A01 driver.
• Reboot.
• Run the VBIOS program, which will prepare either a USB flash drive or a CD-R with the VBIOS flash utility.
• Reboot. When you see the Alienware alien head BIOS screen, start hitting F12. Keep hitting it every couple of seconds until you get a boot device menu.
• Boot off the VBIOS boot media you created.
• I'm not sure what to do here. I haven't flashed my video cards with the official VBIOS yet.
• When the VBIOS flash is done, reboot.

If all went well, you should have the latest drivers and VBIOS, and all should be good.

 

well thanks but it didnt work...said error couldnt detect driver or something...so i couldnt take any more of it and did the AlienRespawn...and restored its back to factory installation i believe. sigh, i think the boot up is slower now it loads to a black screen and flashs off and back into black then loads to the login page...is the amd vbios still effecting it? what should i do?

 

At what point did you get this error message? Was it when trying to install the 8.763 A01 video drivers? Was it when you ran the program that's used to create the VBIOS boot media? Was it during the VBIOS flash? Some more information would go a long way to helping track down the source of the issue.

Your current problem is most likely caused by the new VBIOS, assuming that you managed to get either the beta or the new one flashed onto your cards. The original display driver will not work with the new VBIOS, and you'll need to follow my steps to get the latest official driver loaded. The only thing you won't need to do is re-flash the BIOS, so you can stop once you've rebooted after installing the A01 video driver.

 

The Bios is somewhat irrelevant, more or less, in windows, it's normally the video driver, please continue discussing that in the specific thread, so people with actual Bios and/or performance issues post their problem or experience.

I also set up an easy guide on page 15 for how to flash VBIOS after downloading it, make sure 8.763 is installed, if you can't install it and you don't know how to clean up the mess left behind, do a clean windows install from CD.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...vbios-discussion-non-beta-15.html#post6728179

You might post your problem in detail again there and i'm sure we'll find a solution for it. Cheers.

Also TIP: read the full thread and try to understand the process involved, it's all there.

 

So, for the AO9, whats the big deal with XM chips? I know I read something about slowing it down or locking, but I am kinda clueless as to what the previous BIOS's did for the chip and performance.

 

08 basically nerfed (reduced the performance) of this chip that we have had from day one by reducing the multipliers used in turbo mode. So 09 has had this returned to the same setting as 07 and previous versions along with the new touchpad fix that was implemented with 08 to address the low polling rate of the cursor.

 

If you really want to understand the issues A08 caused for XM CPU owners, check out this post. Lots of info if you study the CPU chart of Argus Monitor in the screenshots.

940XM/920XM BIOS A06, A07, A08 Tests Comparisons