*OFFICIAL* Alienware M17x Owners Lounge - Part 2

Thanks mate.

 

When I go into the bios and change the Integrated Video and Hybrid to disabled why when I reboot on battery does it re-enable the integrated video card? I have to go into the bios everytime and disable it. Am I doing something wrong?

 

Buh, this is bullcrap..

The ATI card in this thing is DDR3, not 5 like they advertised originally.. I would have gotten the GTX 280 if I knew this was DDR3..

 

hoesntly I like ati better then nvidia. The 280m vs the 4870 is great but I would prefer the 4870 over the 280m anyday(when we can find a way how to overclock it.)

crossfire is better then sli.

 

I know they've been hyping the crap out of the 4870's and I myself am sick of nVidia, but do you really think this is a good choice? I haven't seen any benches, but I read in real-world tests the 280m is still superior, and it's the game performance I'm concerned about.

I really don't know which way to go. Anyone have links/articles on the graphics cards options/performance?

 

such a turncoat donda....you hate ATI's driver support lol

 

Lol. i change like the weather.


the 4870x2 is factory overclock and it will get higher scores then the 280m stock in benchmarks and real world gaming IF it has a good cpu behind it to push it.... i'm sure of that. how much is to be determined.

 

RIght. If you boot up on battery the system automatically enables the integrated card due to power constraints..

You will have to disable it every time after booting up on battery.

 

Mate

I think you've made a good choice really with the 4870s, from what I see they're already outpacing the 280's in stock speeds on benchmarks even with DDR3. Take it from me, I've been through SLI with the 8800M GTX and i'm not impressed. SLI was so f***ing terrible all the time, worked in about 2 games and bugged out the rest. It got to the point where I noticed (honestly) that my performance would be BETTER overall experience with one card disabled. Stuttering happened in almost ALL games. Personally for me as a previous Mobile NVIDIA / SLI owner, I had ZERO hesitation choosing the ATI solution. Just like those who voted for Barak Obama, I was driven into the arms of the Other guy after my terribly buggy and unpredictable experience with Nvidia.

However, that might just be the experience of GPUs in general, but from what I understand ATI might not have the solid mobile/desktop integrated solution that Nvidia has for their driver model but you can get around it and generally speaking ATI is pulling ahead in performance and Crossfire compatiblity. I dont think Crossfire suffers from stuttering and they havent screwed up on mass GPU failures the way Nvidia has. Pretty much every single one of my Nvidia cards has died on me now..

 

crossfire is better then sli. crossfire just plain works on every game i have done except 3 games. and it was because of the 512mb ram and the 320sp on the 3870x2.

nvidia on the other hand you need to update your drivers for some games to work. that's what i don't understand. how does crossfire work in everything without really driver updating where as sli needs to be updated all the time to support one game? they both use afr/sfr/ and two other ways of utilzing multiple cards.

crossfire and sli also both do suffer from microstuttering. but i know with my 3870x2, scaling was a big problem if you tried to go lower then native res. where are my 280m sli just plain works unless i disable scaling.


catylst control center vs nvidia control panel.

ccc
is simply and you set it and go. there's no real options and your cards will wor without ccc. also you have to mod your inf files to unlock hidden features.

ncp
has so many options and you can really do things with your card, the lcd and many more options. ncp comes with your driver and you can't uninstall it one without the other coming off.

 

ah ok i stand corrected regarding microstuttering. And I know that Catalyst Control Center is pretty terrible with small amounts of options but, here's hoping that Software is more easily changed than Hardware.. and they take a CUE from Nvidia and beef up their control center!

 

Lol. they changed the gui on 9.10 ccc. does that count.


hopefully they will change it up. i can see ati passing nvidia if they focus. FOCUS!!!!! ATI FOCUS!!!!

(why does it look like i spelled focus wrong?)
(lmao)

 

CrossFire works differently from SLI, but for SLI the profiles are carried in the drivers. That is why the new drivers bring new support.

They are both very competent and matured technologies and work well.

And for what it is worth, the ATI drivers support TV's MUCH better than Nvidia ones

 

Ok. First thing first. Im in
Second: Im proud to be here. M17x Nebula Red is the most beautiful lappy Ive seen Stable like hell. Work like a charm
But... Is there any way to make screen looks better?

 

No issues with the stuttering. Was starting to get worried with all the post? How did Crysis run? That Red is sweet I bet.. I probally would of gotten it too if I wasn't on such a rush to get one.

 

sometimes, very rarely, my computer boots with extermely poor graphical performance.. its like it could be fine for 2 weeks, then it suddenly happens.

its like my gtx280s are performing worse than the integrated 9400.

the temps rises as normal underload but the performance is just really bad. like 3 fps in a game. for eg: sf4 where i usually get stable 60 fps all the way and about 100 fps in benchmark mode. gpu-z also reports that the cards are clocked properly, meaning it isnt downclocked to 2d mode.

when this happens, the computer will sometimes automatically shut off suddenly and when i reboot it, everything is back to normal.

or i can force shutdown it and reboot it again.

if i restart or shutdown and reboot using the shutdown/restart button on windows, the problem stays.

is there any reason for this? i dont think its the drivers because ive tried many drivers and ive uninstalled and wiped the reg with driver sweeper and reinstalled them the proper way.

is it a windows issue? im running on win 7 ulti 64bit. my qx9300 isnt overclocked and my cards are not overclocked as well.

 

Could be something really wrong with your OS install. You can check your event log via the Management Console and see if there are any problems windows logged just prior to shutdown.

I also suggest contacting Dell. This just sounds bad. Something is definitely funky.

I know you don't want to talk to those folks again so soon, but you have warranty coverage, use it.

 

my event log services refuse to start haha.. im not sure if its due to the os install cos i know my os is now really quite corrupted. there are many services that are not able to start and other problems like programs being unable to uninstall because their temp files are missing etc etc.

im going to reformat during my holidays. i was just wondering if its a definite hardware issue. i wouldnt contact dell anytime soon cos im afraid if they want to send a technician to swap the cards, i would end up getting refurbs and that would be really really bad

 

Very soon I will be posting here from the M17x. Anyone else using the nVidia 730i/9400 nForce drivers straight from nVidia's website? I think those are the ones i'll throw on when I re-install windows 7..

 

Sounds like a virus.

 

hmm.. im quite sure its not becos prior to all this i had been playing around wif modification of ownership,registry settings, wiping of temp files/installer backups.

in other words, i screwed my own os up with vista tweak tools such as auslogics boostspeed. they never gave me problems when i used them on my xps 1730 but on this install the program seems to wipe off essential temp/backup/registry files as well.

 

system restore?

if that doesn't work, you could try repairing windows.

Most likely, that's what Dell would tell you to do anyways.

 

Anybody have any info on why the MCP gets up to 90+ C when playing certain games?


I caused the comp to shut off twice last night while gaming. =(

 

Helo m17x owners, I've a question for you. Do you knnow when will it the m17x have the i7 option and the new graphic cards??(speacilly the broadway ati graphic cards??)

cumps

 

If i were to take a wild guess i would say no sooner then late first quarter 2010.. but more likely second half when all that comes together...

 

what the hell is a broadway ATI graphics card?

 

The directx11 cards codename...

 

Well the graphic cards I do understand but the i7 they already have do you think what it will be available during the christmas??

 

Sory about the poor specification :/

 

During Christmas ?? no way at all will they be ready so soon... I think when the new video cards are available we will see a CPU refresh as well..

 

: ( and I wanted to buy a AW and I just sick of waiting :<

 

I also got DDR3 not DDR5 which was advetised. I think Dell put the ATI option on thier website before they even had them. Is this going make much of a difference?

 

I posted this in the diagnostic thread, but didn't get a response, so I'll try it again here.

And as an update, it takes me exactly 2 tries to get it to boot up / restart now. First, it comes up to the black screen and hangs. I hit the power button to turn it off, hit it again to turn it on, and it works. This has been going on for several weeks now. I hope someone has an idea, this is getting both frustrating and worrying.

 

<style class='Hidden'>I haven't hung out in a lounge in a long time</style>

 

I can tell you that from my experience, I get the black screen if i'm OC'n the CPU to the point where it's too high. When I revert to stock speed and it boots normal. So I try to OC the CPU speed a little at a time.

Another thing also is that if you are either in SLI or CrossFireX.

 

17 more days of this waiting torture until it ships! Gonna have the kids stationed every 2 blocks away with walkie talkies just to let me know the uPs man is coming!!

 

yes put them to work

 

Hi guys. I've been stalking this thread for months now, and now I've finally gotten my M17x. It's a beautiful thing of a laptop, and all the Chinese people that've seen it still couldn't believe it's a laptop. (I am Filipino, and working in Ningbo, China.)

So I've updated all that I could (BIOS, nVidia drivers 186.81, and so far, it's doing really great, and really impressed with its performance. I got a few bumps along the way, but thanks to this thread, I've smoothened the bumps (and also avoiding some bumps too!)

So I'm one happy guy. Even with 1440x900 resolution, a q9000, and dual 260m's, I'm really happy.

Guys, as of now, i'm playing Prototype, and well, i'm getting a constant 35-40 fps (as Fraps would show). I've also disabled the HID devices as well, still 35-40 fps. Shouldn't I be getting more frames? 260m's on SLi? Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks. ^__^

 

lol , yea prototype is a console port so overclocking the CPU would boost it by a bit. Also i would try to update your drivers.

That may be your bottleneck(CPU), but i get 30-40 with my single card and p8600.

 

I've overclocked my Q9000 to about 2.39 ghz. Any more and Celsius (yes, I name my gadgets ^_^) would not boot to Windows. I've also updated to the latest Nvidia drivers.

I've seen those Forceware drivers, and those modded inf drivers. I'd want to try them out, but well, I don't know how. Simply a noob at those things.

30-40 fps isn't so bad you know. It's fluently playable. Is it alright to expect more from this machine, or I'm stuck at 30-40?

By the way Moo, you're the man. Your posts are really informative. Thanks. ^__^

 

Your girlfriend said that? Hahahaa that's awesome.

 

haha yeah. I made her carry the box when it got delivered. She freaked out when she saw the actual laptop. She has a Sony Vaio FW, and she thought her laptop was HUGE.

Now, she's completely loving the M17x and she plays The Sims 3 and Prototype on it. As of now, we're playing Left 4 Dead...she on my M17x, and me on her Vaio. ^__^

 

Well Try Dox 182.xx drivers. They are VERY simple to install and will work without any modded inf you just simply install.

Not sure if a SLI profile is there for Prototype

You could try to newest mobile drivers off Nvidia.com or BatBoy's custom ones on here. They should provide a boost. If not then your CPU is bottlenecking.
EDIT : Batboys Driver : http://support.dell.com/support/dow...typeid=-1&dateid=-1&formatid=-1&fileid=341036

My fiance love/hates mine. Its way to big for her and its kinda funny watching her use it. She is 5'5 and kinda small .... While I'm 6'6.... Her hands are like extremely tiny on the palm rest while mine take up the whole thing lol

 

hows both those games perform on the m17x

 

prototype for me with a p8600 and single card runs between 30-45 FPS stock on the GPU , OC on the CPU

Sims will run alot better die to it being .... less detailed .....

 

Simply put, AMAZING. Left 4 Dead is glass smooth, not dipping below 60 fps. All settings to the MAX.

Sims 3, all settings to the MAX. Not dipping below 60 FPS as well. When I take off Vsync, it rockets up to 70, sometimes 80.

Prototype? I'm not sure if I'm getting the right FPS for that game, but well, 30-45 fps. It rockets to 60 to 70 to 80 (sometimes) when I look up or running up a building.

This laptop is a monster though. It definitely can game.

 

cool, hopefully ill get close to those ratings on my rig... ..specs below

 

My girlfriend thought opposite. When she saw the laptop, she went "What games can it play???"

She's 5'5 too, and she looks funny playing on it. It's like the M17x would gobble her up when she's not looking.

Regarding the Dox 182.xx, where do I get them? I'm gonna try those ones from BatBoy (respect for BatBoy!) later when I get home.

I bring this baby at work, and it's heavy, but given the right backpack for it, it's good.

EDIT: I checked out BatBoy's drivers...and well, they're for the gtx 280's. I'm dual gtx 260's. I'm downloading the ones for the 260's right now.

 

You kidding me? You've got the i7!

Since Prototype is more CPU, it'll prolly steamroll through the FPS like nothing!

My girlfriend actually is thinking of buying the m15x, but she says it's "just too damn thick, and it took the M17x a month and a day to get here!"

 

dont get it ... go for the Sager 860 or 870cu