*OFFICIAL* Alienware M17x Owners Lounge - Part 2

Yes look here, LINK

 

Hey guys whats up? I was wondering when will this machine be on sale again and how much cash back can i get? Also if i decide to order the m17x with a single 4870 how much would it cost to me order another one in the future? How easy it to put one in an alienware machine? I read that their boards are a lot more flexible and the graphics card can be interchangeable. Also how good do you think the rgb led screen look on the new R2?

 

When it'll go on sale again...no one knows. Buying a second GPU will cost a lot more later then it will up front. Dell charges the soul of your first born child for one GPU down the line. How easy is it to install? Pretty easy if you know how to take apart the laptop, just watch The Moo's Guide. The RGB Screen, we all think it's going to look sweet. No one knows for sure since no one here actually has the system. We'll all just waiting. And waiting for reviews.

 

I have a precision m6400 and the screen is amazing, and i would like to have something just as like that either this or 1647 but i have never owned an alienware before. I always wanted one and it seems like this one is going to be less prone to issues especially with ati. My quadro fx 3700m has a 256 bus bandwtih and i see that now the new ati 5870 is only 128! So that's why i am deciding on 4870. How much percentage is there between 4870s and a single 5870? I have just been looking for a job and its hard man. So thats why i don't want to spend to much. I can't even get a credit card plan always being denied. So your in Iraq? Your in the army or marines? Be safe out there, be blessed. Also thank you for replying so quickly. Also i probably will get a core i5 not a core i7 i have one right now and i really don't see a difference much just with some gaming, i do other things like video editing etc.. and i still don't see a difference thats why i was excited for a core i7, my friend and i even did a covert file between a core 2 do P8700 and a i7 and it was only about a 5 second difference.

 

Hopefully the screen will be better. I'm not sure how the 5870's will compare, but the 4870's are great cards. I have no doubt the 5870's will be slightly better, but who knows what the price on them will be. I totally understand about how hard it is to get a job. Kind of the reason I'm out here. I'm actually out here as a civilian contractor, did my first two tours in the army out here, so this is my third trip. Couldn't find a job except this.

 

well i tried to install modded drivers to get my comp to run 1680x1050 and for some reason that didnt work either, anyone else have an idea on why it wont go into 1680x1050 with my 4870 card? it worked fine when i had the nvidia 260 gtx

 

Yes that is what is going to happen until we stand up for our country and get our jobs back! So your in blackwater or something else or just a contractor working on stuff? How is the 4870 for you winte420? What games are you running?

 

i like it. it runs roughly the same as my 260gtx maybe a bit better. it fixed my stuttering audio problem so that was my main concern. Id still like to use 1680 x 1050 on some things though. i run COD MW2, HoN occasionally, and CSS

 

What stuttering audio issue did you have? So wait your saying that you can't run full res on your screen on normal tasks such as video,photo editing and surfing the web?

 

http://en.community.dell.com/blogs/direct2dell/archive/2009/11/18/dell-dpc-latency-and-you.aspx

thats the stuttering issue

and no my screen is 1920x 1200 i just cant downgrade to 1680x1050 for certain things id like to

 

Seems like the A03 fixes it slightly, so this is what is plauging the first M17x? Well do you think it will have the same issue? Even with the ATI cards from your perspective seems to be the same thing.

 

No, I had an nvidia card and I got the a03 drivers and it did not fix the stuttering problem. They replaced my nvidia card with an ati card and the stuttering problem is completely fixed. My computer works great, I just am not able to use a lower resolution than recommended for my pc, not really that big of a deal. Also the problem I guess from what im reading lies within the motherboard and it is going to be recalled and replaced with a newer version

 

Well so i read that it was going to be fixed and was a lot better with ati cards, 1200P bothers me a lot sometimes i only use it once in a while but its great for screen real estate, should i get a long warranty with it, since it has a lot of problems? What games do you play? Games do after a while becoming quite boring but why have a high end system if not only for that right? Well also the picture comes out so much clearer than an intel card and well a lot of programs are becoming written for non gpu intensive stuff. So when you use your battery it uses the 9400m will the new one also have that feature and how long battery life do you get?

 

Id recommend the longer warranty. I mean why not? if something breaks they fix it! 1200p is pretty nice but unnecessary in the long run i guess. on the computer i have played mostly COD WAW and COD MW2 but also have played CSS, HoN, and WoW. All run great. Although I don't use it unplugged much it gets roughly around 3-4 hours with the screen brightness turned down a bit

 

3-4 is pretty awesome on a machine like this, well i am stuck between this one and a lenovo t410 or a asus g73jh. Its the warranty thats going to really kill me.

 

i got a 3 year warranty just for the reason of I'm probably going to upgrade in 3 or 4 years

 

Its just in this economy sooner or later its not going to sell that well, thats also another reason people are selling their machine. It should be so much cheaper, its actually cheaper for them to order all the parts a whole bunch, and while we sit here talking about machines people are being paid cents to make the parts what a profit. lol

 

the economy i dont believe is going to get so bad people stop buying computers. i actually returned my macbook pro because this was a better buy and i got a better computer for cheaper so.... i dont know....

 

Well eventually yeah it might, a lot of econmists are predicting it. Well anyway i don't want to doom you but one must be told. Anyway so i am not really impressed with the i7 and its performance, what do you think? Also you having 1333 ram what do you think about the difference and also have you tried gta IV on yours?

 

From what I've understood while studying economics is that they can't predict anything especially the sales of a single laptop.... either way why does the resale value of it even matter? Are you looking to buy a product that you're disappointed with and going to have to resell shortly after the purchase? If so I wouldn't recommend buying an alienware computer. Why not go try out a macbook if you're looking for disappointment..... The i7's from what I've read out perform everything on the market. That being said I myself have not tried them yet and therefore do not have a set opinion on them. I'm currently running a core 2 duo. I bought my laptop before the i7's were available on m17x's and no I haven't played gta IV

 

Fellas,

If I put 4870's on my M17x will that be better than the 260's I have in now? I know, it sounds like a noob question, but here is the reason: I've read the ATI's are more CPU dependent, and my CPU is not top of the line, so will the performance be actually lower, equal, or noticeably better?

If my CPU is going to be the BIG bottleneck with the ATI's then I will not go for it.

(No, I won't pay for them)

 

You will see an improvement. I wouldn't call a T9600 a bottleneck, especially one you can OC.

 

OK. Thanks bro. We'll see next week what they say then. This is only half the good news if I am lucky enough

 

I can see where this is going, good luck.

 

anyone on question 1 and 2?

 

Quick question. I just had a hard drive failure and upgraded to Corsair ssd's. I read there is a firmware update on these Corsair drives. I am running my drives in raid 0. Where can I find which firmware version I am running? The newest firmware allows W7 utilize the trim commands which the old one does not. Appreciate any help.

 

Don't use RAID because there is not TRIM support for RAID. You can find out your firmware version by looking at your hardware ID in device manger for the disk.

 

I tried to look in hardware id, it wasn't listed there most likely because of the raid configuration. I guess I should take them of out raid and reinstall windows 7.

 

ati's are lazy if you gace a low clock speed it will be low. The higher you bring up your core the better it is for the gpu.

unless the game supports and needs a quad your gaming performace will go up. I would recommend anything over 3ghz to move on to ati's.

war your fine. Make the switch.

 

Thanks dude. Question: What about 4870's on an i7 720M vs. 4870's on an i7 620M vs. 4870's on a T9600? Nothing overclocked. Rank them if you can.

 

The ATI cards are going to be good regardless of the CPU, they will just do better with a better CPU

 

question...i forget...
does the qx9300 stutter bad if you run it in dual core mode...running the correct 2 cores?

 

I never had any issues with dual core mode

 

hummm, then i would get a qx and just run it in dual core mode till the bios catches up.....(speculation that it's just the bios)
or
the fasted dual core out.

 

there are no issues with running it as a quad that I am aware of

outside of the known issues with SLI and quad cores (do ATI cards suffer from this?)

And John, any tips for benching ATI cards? I know the driver tweaking is a hell of a lot simpler with ATI - so many less settings to fiddle with lol

UPDATE: Just did a quick run, looks like 06 just likes dual cores for the GPU tests in general. The 2 GPU scores were both better than my best run with all 4 cores for stock speeds.

 

What are the real benefits on purchasing the R2 laptop?
Performance?
Graphics?

what are the pros and cons of each systems?

 

yes, there apears to be something to this core dual/quad core running stuff...

what did you get?

and ati seems pretty straight forward from what i have been testing. and that dreaded screen tearing seems to be a thing of the past...lol

 

well i cant reall judge them since i dont know the performance of the i7's. are you thinking about making a switch?

 

I just did one run for kicks to see if the dual core thing mattered (it did). But here is my best run at stock clocks so far - quad core here (and it aint bad!)

14521
SM2:5530
SM3:7370
CPU:3714

 

nice run. i like it.

 

ya the stock scores of these things is amazing so far, I'll add them to my sig. Have not OC'd them yet - aint had time to spend some outside time with the laptop lol

udpate: scores added to sig now

 

@ winte420. I have a toshiba qosmio with the i7, its awesome its really good but what bothers me is the fact of the hype around the new quad core, but hey its a quad core you know. I am not interested in a macbook. Actually from my perspective of studying economics they can predict many things not from a computer perspective of course you miss understood that. I am just very picky, i guess i am thinking too small concerning the processors. Yes they out preform everything on the market with ease, its amazing! No i am not looking to buy a system and then resale it, this will probably the most money i will spend on a machine whenever i do.

 

Wasnt there a video of someone upgrading the processor in M17x. I have been searching but I cant seem to find this. Anyone know who was the user doing the video? Was it Moo?

Thank you

 

How to change your M17x CPU Guide

 

One thing I know Quad core have very little benifit for Games. There a few games that will use more cores. I hope that will change in a year or so.

 

I've recently installed Win 7 and I was wondering how I get programs like the Command Center and PowerDVD back? I checked the Hive thing on the Alienware site but I need to log in with some account and whatnot... and the PowerDVD now requires a CD key to use... any help appreciated.

 

You received an M17X Resourse DVD. Theses programs are on there. I had to download the Command Center from Dell. Install the OSD before you install Command Center. They are under applications in the driver support page.

http://support.dell.com/support/dow...V4K1&SystemID=Alw_lp_M17x&TabIndex=&typeid=-1

 

Also install the nvidia driver under chipsets for your onboard video.

 

Ah of course, thanks.

 

The main reason is the i7 processor... it is a good idea since it is the direction Intel is headed in, they are adaptable processors giving a good yield on processing vs. power consumption (important for a laptop). The P55M board they are on is also a good, proven chipset. Graphics are enhanced via the option for the RGB LED screen.