*OFFICIAL* Alienware 17 Ranger (2013) Owner's Lounge Thread

FWIW, my frame rates in Metro LL were great, as long as SSAO was turned off. With everything maxed and PhysX turned off, I averaged 80+ with a minimum in the low 60s, and with PhysX on, averaged 50+ with a minimum in the high 30s. SSAO completely killed my frame rates though, and does the same on my SLI 680 desktop rig. On my desktop rig, I can turn everything up with PhysX on and SSAO at 2x and get 80+ averages, but any higher SSAO settings bring my frame rates to barely playable ranges.

 

I'll go home and reset my control panel back to default in that case..

Those frame rates are amazing but I noticed in your sig you're running 780m SLI correct?

 

Did anyone's alienware 17 show up sooner then expected? I'm starting to get anxious and I ordered it on 7/25 with an estimated delivery of 8/13. Hurry up!!!! Lol

 

Thanks guys.combined 30% with dells gift card deal back in december..not an alienware virgin anymore.excited for it to arrive

 

Not mine. It took over a month. Mostly because they cancelled my order and re-processed it without my knowledge. My experience in terms of reliability of service from Dell has been the absolute worst of any company I can recall dealing with. 3 cancellations of my order, zero discount on the machine with haggling, constant bounce backs with out of office replies on my emails to service/sales reps, laptop was shipped with the wrong OS installed, sent me Win 8 by mail but in French instead of English and then to top it off no software was pre-installed for using my bluray player. They sent me that a few days ago as well.

If you get your order early and correct I'd say you're in great shape.

 

Sorry for your problems man. I think a lot of it was that dell were totally unprepared for a fixed release date of the new models. Their in-house builder software accepted discount codes from earlier models, then it allowed the rep to build configs that the factory was not setup to deliver on, blah, blah. And then they compounded the problem by giving stupid reasons for cancelling orders and not giving discounts.

Hopefully it's all sorted now and back to the usual week earlier than the EDD. Fingers crossed.

Oh yeah, and they had Canada down as a French speaking country, I believe that they have now fixed that but I don't know how you get to select . Check if you now get two support numbers for different languages, you should. French speaking is out of an ex-French territory in North Africa if I recall correctly...

 

Anyone else here experiencing quieter sound from the speakers and decreased internet speeds when a Bluetooth device is connected (i.e. iPhone 5 playing music)?

 

Is there any reason why the discrete wont engage in Optimus mode when running games? I generally don't use Optimus anyway but i've just noticed that its only using integrated graphics for games when Optimus mode is used. It has worked in the past when I first got the machine and the only thing that I've changed is the updated beta driver (326.19) everything else is stock with no vbios or EVGA, which obviously points to the driver being the issue.

Anyone got any ideas or had this themselves?

 

Sounds like the driver has broken optimus (it is an nvidia product, AMD call it Enduro). It's a pretty crappy system IMO and often gives these problems. Have you tried to force the iGPU? The profiles section - game specific profile, in the driver control panel has it in I believe. I bought the 3D model specifically to get rid of optimus but found the 3D is actually very good!

 

I just got my laptop, but noticed that it doesn't include a windows 8 DVD. Can I request dell for a windows 8 DVD?

 

You can. They obviously still haven't got around to finalising the AW specific one and putting it at the factory.

 

You can order a recovery disc now while configuring a system on the site. It's free as well.

 

I have my AW17 since the 11 of july and I like pretty much the system but there is some annoyances, they are mostly related to noise:

I bought a laptop because I thought that when not gaming, the PC would be pretty much silent. But with the AW17 this is not always the case.

The fan control could be a lot better. Every time I change webpage the fan is picking up then goes down for a second and then pick up again. Even on idle I can hear the fan going a bit faster and slower every second. Could it just run a bit faster then stay at that speed, what annoys me is the constant fan speed variation. And the room temperature is only 23 degrees. Is there a way to know the current fan speed so I can confirm the constant variation?

I don't know what it is but every time the hdd is accessed there is a sound like if a fan was picking up, but I know that it's not the fan. It's just weird that a hdd can make this sound. that's only audible when the environment is very calm.

Am I the only one with a squeaky keyboard. Mostly all big keys squeaks when typing, I think that it is unacceptable and very annoying.

Today it began to make this continuous little high pitch sound whenever the fan is running slow. It sounds like if a distant neighbor is vacuum cleaning.

I was planning to upgrade to 32GB later but they installed 4x4gb modules, I was assuming wrong that Dell would make a bright move and would install 2x8gb modules.

When on optimus, even Firefox is slow. Is the integrated card that bad?

Is there anything I can do to fix some of the annoyances or should I call Dell for the warranty?

Thanks

 

I agree, better compatibility and performance by setting up the graphics options in the games themselves rather than messing with the NVidia Control Panel options. I do use the control panel though ocassionally to force x16AF if the game doesn't have that option, but I set that up via game specific profiles (not the Global Settings).

 

First, yes call dell and get them to fix it.

On mine (I know, a different machine and I shouldn't be butting into you guys lounge!) when I get the CPU fan start to speed up and slow down annoyingly, just in FF or opening windows, I have to clean out the fan and repaste the CPU.

The HDD noise will probably because you have a short power down setting in your power plan, Change it to always on and you should be good. make sure that on battery it goes off after a short time of non-use.

Dell use whatever memory is cheaply available so there is no consistency with what combination you get

Other than that over to you real owners

 

The fluctuations in noise might be a BIOS issue. My m17x r4 is usually silent at idle.

 

Man, I literally just ordered my brand new alienware 17 as well this morning, and only differences is mine was the 4800MQ processor and I got a blu-ray reader...and mine cost $2,500 with the 20% discount coupon. Looks like I drew the short stick lol congrats though man, you got a deal!

 

Find toaster.exe in the processes list and end it. See if that helps with the idle noise/temps. That fixed mine.

 

No, that was when I was running a single 780M and a 4800MQ in a 17. I wound up returning that machine for a 780M SLI 18.

 

Someone please help me out I'm looking for the mystery coupon code.thank you

-ry

 

Wow, I don't like this one bit. I was playing BF3 on ultra for maybe 30 minutes and then I had a huge FPS drop, like down to 7 - 12 FPS and it slowly went back up. What's the deal?! This game is what? Almost three years old? The 780M isn't living up to its reputation. I never saw this with the 680M in my previous M17x R4. Could it be the vBIOS? It wasn't a temperature issue because it was under 70C the whole time - I checked the log on MSI Afterburner.

 

Have you used EVGA Precision X? try using it and set the temp limit to 92. Haven't had issues on mine since I used EVGA

 

what does the AW Perf (Fn+F10) do?

 

Windows Mobility Centre in win 7, are you using win 8? Might no longer work

 

I'm using Win 7. Thanks for the info

 

thanks!!! was waiting for a good deal for about 8 months and then this finally shows up and finally an alienware system. lets see what all the hype is about haha. hopefully all my configurations check out for the laptop and doesn't bottleneck anything and everything i throw at it runs smoothly.cant wait for it to arrive!!!!

 

I have the same sound issues you describe. Thought it was the bottom plate that was vibrating, so I put some soft patches underneath the laptop's feeth and vacuum cleaning noise has been gone sinds.
(the sound also stopped when lifting the laptop on one side)

 

I'm getting sick of calling Dell and they kept pushing the date for me to receive my AW17. It's been 1 month now, and today they said they just received it and it's counted as the "6th working days now." FYI I'm in Asia for vacation right and was considering buying this Laptop. Also, I found a German video review of the AW17 and the FPS of BF3 was terrible. 47-50 FPS.

youtube.com/watch?v=Qw7moM56tEA

Should I seriously consider getting this Laptop? Or should I get a refund and buy from another site with a SLI GTX 780m with the same price of the AW17?

 

I'm guessing that was on all ultra settings, maxed everything, hard to tell with the language. Quite the machine in my opinion if thats the case getting 47-53fps. My desktop i built, i7, 16gb ram, amd 7970 can't do that.

 

It's suppose to be an improvement over the previous Alienware laptops. But the 680M/7970m is looking waaaaay better with BF3, Tomb Raider and Bioshock Infinite. I hardly called that improvement IMO.

 

Yeah, it's probably on ULTRA with Everything Maxed out including AA. I get around 50-60 fps if everything is maxed out to ULTRA with max AA. It only goes to 47 when there is heavy fighting which requires a lot of graphics power. So far, the only game I can't seem to Max out is Crysis 3. I have to set eveerything to High and SMAA x2 for AA

 

Did he mention on what driver he was on? I found improvements when I switched to 326.19

 

Good point. And nice FPS you're getting. I might keep this laptop IF it arrives tomorrow. It's partially my fault for ordering it when I'm going back to the states.

 

I couldn't do company of heroes 2 but I think that everyone has that problem

 

My AW17 handles BF3 on Ultra at 60+ FPS, with some drops. On Crysis 3 it can play with everything maxed out, but it's like 25 - 30 FPS, and can get laggy. Tomb Raider plays around 40 FPS average on max settings, with some dips into the 30's depending on the scenes in the game. I'm using the latest beta drivers - 326.41 or something.

About my post earlier, it shouldn't have anything to do with the temperatures. As I already said: the temperature of the GPU never rose above 70C. And the temperature limit was removed when I upgraded to the A03 BIOS. I'm still not sure what caused such a huge dip in FPS while playing BF3...it only happened that once.

I'm probably going to flash the vBIOS, as some other members have, to unlock the 780M. This will also allow for a 3DMark 11 benchmark score of 10,000 or above.

 

Haven't tried playing company of heroes 2 yet.

 

maybe it's Nvidia's driver. 326.41 is still Beta. same with the driver I'm using (326.19).

 

I'll have to compare my performance later though I feel it was about the same when I ran those games. However, Metro Last Light on maxed everything seems to be most taxing for me as frames were in the low 20's on average while running the benchmark demo.

Has anyone noticed the trackpad doesn't work while pressing keys simultaneously? Is this normal? For example, BF3... trying to move forward AND use the trackpad to aim at the same time doesn't work. I have to stop moving with the keys, then move the aim with the trackpad, and then press the keys again to move. Mind you I use the 360 gamepad 99.9% of the time but I was demoing the game for someone quickly and noticed it doing that.

Lastly I have yet to see 4.5 hours of battery remaining show while unplugged. I go on battery saver, even adjusted the screen down and still seeing like 2.5 to 2.75 hours remaining. Not sure if I should be changing something else.

 

On "Balance" I see maybe 3 hours and 30 minutes, at the most. However, I'm not using an SSD (which saves battery life).

 

I think you guys might be missing something. On all the earlier NV cards I have used they have a power throttle that cuts in when the card is drawing too much power. It will happen in poorly coded games and benchmark programs and at low temps (I see it at 64c sometimes). Usually, as an optimised driver is released for a game it happens less and less. To see the clock speed of the power throttle load up NvidiaInspector, go to advanced settings and look at the clock speed for P1. Then use afterburner's OSD to set the clock speed, FPS, and voltage, on-screen while you game. If you see the clock speed drop to P1 then you know the power throttle is the problem.

Now, you might think that with nvidiainspector you can raise the clock of P1. Well, you can. The problem is that when P1 cuts in a voltage drop also occurs. Double problem and artifacting or a BSOD will probably occur. The only fix is a modded vbios with matched clocks AND voltages. Then you can OC both clock speeds to your hearts content, well at least until the card gives up and starts to artifact. Avoid over-volt Vbios' on a lappy, they often burn cards for good

Please check it out, I'd love to know if the problem is still there in the new machines.

HTH

 

That's what I thought my issue was related to: voltage limits. Which is why I suggested flashing the vBIOS should help.

Thanks for the tip, though. I'll try using NVIDIA Inspector (and reverting drivers).

 

Are you sure you're running on IGP? If you have a look in the toolbar of NCP, you'll see an option along the lines of "Show GPU indicator in systray". If it's anything but grey, you've got something using the NVIDIA GPU, and that's what's eating your battery.

My girlfriend's laptop has Setpoint (Logitech's keyboard/mouse software) forcing use of the NVIDIA GPU for some reason. Removed that process from the startup list, and her battery went from two hours to five. No joke.

Edit: For anyone remotely concerned about battery life do not use the high performance setting. This will completely disable Speedstep, forcing the CPU to run full tilt, full voltage, 24/7. Other than working around Optimus issues or something, I don't see a reason why anyone should be using high performance for this reason.

 

Yeah, it's a shame. Not sure why, but the game performs horribly.

 

Is it always grey? I thought it was just when it showed an application when you click on it? Sometimes mine was coloured in but nothing was using it

 

It's grey if nothing is using the NVIDIA GPU. It should always show something using it if coloured. I think it's a single-click, and after a second or so, the processes using it show up in a pop-up with icons.

 

On "balanced" and "power saver" profiles I see pretty much the same life remaining on battery which is about 2:45min remaining. The only changes I've made are I prefer screen brightness on full brightness and I believe I have my "prefer maximum peformance" within my Nvidia control panel. I have GPU selected as "adaptive" however in the global settings.

I do game sometimes on battery but my goal here is to have it set up so that I can just switch from "balanced" to "power saver" profiles for just basic, non-gaming use and pull 4 hours or more out of it. But I just don't know what I need to adjust to get that out of it.

 

What is Intel management engine interface? I used to have everything installed and working fine but I looked in device manager today and noticed it has a yellow exclamation mark. I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling the drivers multiple times and every time it comes back with an exclamation mark. Is it possible that this, or some sort of hardware issues related to it could be causing my shut down problems on boot?

 

I think the Management Engine primarily monitors various board temperatures to control fan speeds for cooling. It shuts down the computer if acceptable temperatures are exceeded. If you are using a 3rd party to override fan control it might think its not working properly.

EDIT: wait no The "Intel Management Engine Interface " is a part of the VPro technology of intel. This IMEI technology allows to manage your PC remotely. And is more designed for enterpise than for home users. I found online that the simple solution is "download the Windows Vista driver for it, although it says it does not support this operating system, just right-click and go to compatibility, then set it to run as Windows Vista and run as administrator"

 

Got my AW 17 yesterday, updated the Bios to A03 and newest besta Nvidia drivers. Overall its a solid machine, I really enjoy the keyboard better than a m17x. The 780 handles games like a boss. Only thing I'm disappointed is the boot speed. Coming from a m17x with 64gb caching drive I didn't think I'd notice much of a difference with just a regular 750gb hdd but it's huge. I have to throw a SSD in this thing and see how it performs.

Right out of the box the AlienFX drivers/software or controller didn't work as well. The entire right underside of the laptop wasn't lit at all, which looked strange because the left side was green. The rest of the laptop had random colors that couldn't be changed with FX Editor. After a few hours fussing with it, I rebooted the machine and hit F9 in the bios to "reset to factory" which it should have been which strangely corrected the problem. Not sure what caused that but its working now.

Also the trackpad doesn't seem to be evenly lit, it appears to be brighter on the edges with a dark void near the middle. Anyone else have this problem?

 

I don't always use the touchpad, but when I do, I don't notice the lighting issue c: sorry.

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