*OFFICIAL* M17xR3 Owner's Lounge Thread - Part 1

Well said!

 

Even more reason to not call it a mid-low end card.

 

Ok my first post here and I have my ordered my new beast

Alienware M17x
Date & Time: January 18,2011 7:12 AM CST

SYSTEM COMPONENTS
Alienware M17x Qty 1
Alienware M17x, Soft Touch Stealth Black, Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64bit Unit Price $2,644.00
Estimated Delivery Date 2/11/2011

Alienware M17x price includes $225 instant discount
Expires Sunday, January 01, 2012
- $225.00

12 months special financing on XPS systems with Dell Preferred Account!
Limited Time Offer!


Catalog Number: 29 DKDWVN1
Module Description Show Details
System Color Alienware M17x, Soft Touch Stealth Black
Operating System Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64bit
Processor Intel® Core™ i7 2720QM 2.2GHz (3.3GHz Turbo Mode, 6MB Cache)
Memory 8GB Dual Channel DDR3 at 1333MHz (4DIMMS)
A/C Adapter Alienware M17x 240W A/C Adapter
Display Panel 17.3-inch WideFHD 1920x1080 120Hz WLED w/ NVIDIA 3D Vision Bundle
Video Card 1.5GB GDDR5 Nvidia GeForce GTX 460M
Hard Drive 750GB 7,200RPM HDD
Nameplate Personalized Plate (Joey Lees)
AlienFX Mars Red
Adobe Reader Acrobat SW Adobe Acrobat Reader
Optical Drives Slot-Loading Dual Layer Blu-ray Reader (BR-ROM, DVD+-RW, CD-RW)
Sound Internal High-Definition 5.1 Surround Sound Audio
Wireless Intel® Ultimate N WiFi Link 6300 a/g/n 3x3 MIMO Technology
Automatic Updates Automatic Updates: On
Security Software McAfee® Security Center – 30-Day Trial
Service 1 Year Basic Plan
Factory Installed Games World of Warcraft Preinstall Edition
OS Customization Alienhead Chrome Red
Standard Nameplate Trigger Thank you for Purchasing Alienware

estimated delivery 2/11/11

 

Complete newb question... Which wireless card would u recommend the 6250 with wimax or the 6300? I will be using the laptop mainly for photo and video editing and will be taking it on the road quite a bit. The wimax looks intresting but I don't know a lot about it.

 

6300...reason I say this is this, you will be on the road, in a hotel, most hotels I stay in for buisness have wifi, 6300 has superior reception. WiMax....nice conecept but in reality not readily avaliable.

 

For WiMax you need coverage and a paid plan, it aint free. You are better off just tethering your smartphone (assuming you have one - most do these days)

I just set up wi-fi tethering on my Droid Incredible and it works great! (just don't tell verizon )

 

Yea I have a BB and teather also...

 

The tether app for droids and blackberries is excellent and the only tethering solution I would recommend to anyone unless wifi tethering is an option. (you do not have to pay your carrier to tether if you already have a data plan!)

Just go to tether.com and pay once for the license and you can use it for life. I would recommend this over WiMax to ANYONE as it will offer the same coverage if not better and makes it so you only have to pay for one data plan and not two.

 

Not sure if it's been posted already or not, but the M17x R.3 is now available through AAFES with a whopping 30% off, and of course NO TAX and FREE SHIPPING for all those US Military Members out there.

 

WOW. Is that a record or has AAFES always had a ridiculous discount?

 

Thanks everyone. That makes the decision pretty simple.

 

I was shocked myself. I had to double check my calculations three times to make sure I calculated the EPP Discount Correctly, but it is definately 30%. The base system at $1499.00 Regular price is $1049.30, and with the i7 2820QM, 8GB Ram, 120Hz Screen, GTX 460M, 750GB HDD, Blu-Ray Reader and WiFi Link 6300, which would normally be $2844.00 is only $1990.80! Thats a discount of $853.20. Less than $2k for an awesome system. And no tax and free shipping helps as well.

 

And there's only six gaming oriented, single GPU configs above it. When you count how many are below the 460M, it's clearly a high-end mobile chip.

The 460M is probably 35% faster than my GTX 260M, and the 260M is still a high-end chip.

The 8800M GTX is only 10-15% slower than the GTX 260M, and will dominate a 335M or 5650M by serious margins.

It scores 8k in '06, because he old M15X came with 2Ghz Core 2 Duos. I did this, with that GPU + a decent processor:



Moral of the story: the GTX 460M is not to be underestimated. Plus, it overclocks like mad.

 

If it really does overclock like mad, it's a good thing the latest Alienwares have come with excellent cooling systems. And hopefully this one will have a suitable PSU...

but as Kevin_Jack pointed out, the 8800M GTX is still not a bad chip by any measure. It's more powerful than a single ATi 3870M and I can tell you from personal experience that a 3870M is still a good chip. With decent tweaking it'd be able to play Crysis on High at lower resolutions, or Medium at higher resolutions. Definitely better than the M11x's 335M.

People are only losing perspective here because they expected the R3 to be a dual GPU powerhouse. I'd wager there'd be no complaints if it offered SLi 460Ms, like the 260Ms in the R1 (which were only marginally slower than the 280Ms in the first place, offering much better price/performance).

 

The thing is though, dual 485m's will crush dual 460m's (unlike the 200 series)

And as for the PSU, 240W for a single GPU system should be a dream You will have a hard time getting close to the limits of that, even with a 100W GPU

 

Damn, are they re-releasing the 8800 GTX for the r3? Crafty business move, nVidia!

 

Its true. Bad Company 2 at lowest possible settings at native res (1440x900) and I'm getting 30-45 fps. A lot of that could be due to my slow processor, though, as Kevin_Jack2.0 points out.

Exactly. I have my system pretty well optimized on all fronts (short of overclocking) and I still can't push many frames in a lot of the better games out today.

I guess your right, its higher up than I thought. Its still not anything special. Personally, if I'm going to spend $2500 or so on a new gaming laptop, I want a top end card - GTX 485, 6970, etc.

I said 2-3 years above. If you're buying the R3 with the 3D bundle and the GTX 460, good luck being able to game in 3D for more than a year and a half at most. Then you'll have to turn 3D off and you'll have to start turning settings down in games. The original post I was replying to was asking about a laptop that will play games for 5 years, which no video card will properly do. By then the technology has advanced way too much.

Its not a bad chip, but its certainly feeling its age. In BC2 I have everything turned down. In NFS: Hot Pursuit I have what little options that game allows me to turn down set to lowest and I get under 20fps average. Fallout: New Vegas.. low/medium settings. I haven't played Crysis on my laptop in a long time, but I doubt I can play at high settings.

I actually prefer a single GPU setup. I think, in a lot of cases, dual GPU setups are more hastle and cost than they are worth. If they had a single 6970 in the R3 right now, I'd have already purchased one. That being said, when you can get your dual GPU setup working properly, its quite nice and will last you longer..

Yes, you're right. The GTX 460 is further up the scale than I thought. I was thinking from a desktop standpoint where the GTX 460 is more towards mid range in my opinion. Its a $160 card that is beat by:

5850, 5870, 5970, 6870, 6950, 6970, GTX 465, GTX 470, GTX 480, GTX 570, GTX 580... That, to me, puts it pretty far down the line, at least in desktops. Since less than half of those cards are out, so far, on laptops, that puts the GTX 460 a lot higher up on mobile.

The major thing you guys are also forgetting is, there are no video drivers for the 8800m GTX past late 2009. Nvidia went to the "verde" reference drivers that won't work with the 8800m and Alienware stopped releasing them. You can expect at least a 10-20% performance drop in todays games from that alone. Nvidia optimizations for current games help out a lot.

 

wooohoooo my order for my r3 has shipped.............to bad its only my laptop bag lol
who has the earliest delivery date? i know its not me, i have 2/8

 

2 things:
GTX 465 < GTX 460 (nvidia numbering fail)

Flash you 8800m GTX to a 9800m GT and enjoy excellent driver support

 

Holy crap thanks for posting this, reps!

 

Wow Dell loves their troops - good job Dell

 

Noted.

Hmm... interesting. I thought someone had posted in the 8800m driver thread saying they had the same issues with their 9800m GT.. I could be wrong.

Any guides on doing this? Never flashed vBIOS before.

 

LOL! i faced that same situation yesterday when dell sent me a delivery notification. got as excited as a jack russel for a moment until i read that it was for my backpack! what a bummer. my current EDD is at 28/01/11!! i hope that it stays that way, or even faster!

 

Not sure if this was confirmed or not before but it seems the 3D only works with Nvidia graphics as described in the email I got this morning. (For the M17X R3 of course)...

It says: 3D only works with the optional 3D WHFD 120HZ WLED screen and an Nvidia graphics card.

So that means the 6970M will not allow for 3D which basically means until a rumored 485M shows up, the choice is going to be either graphics power or 3D.

 

I think it just means right now with the current software and available configurations. Extrapolating that to what has not been released doesn't make much sense.

 

Wow, I just checked the aafes discount, and it is pretty awesome. The aafes discount sometimes isn't the cheapeast way to purchase a dell, but right now its clearly the cheaper choice. Now, do I have the patience to wait for a stronger video card

 

Yeah that kind of sucks, i know Dell hasn't added the option yet but in the manual it has 3 screen option

900P
120hz 1080p
120hz 1080p 3D

hopefully i can get the 120hz screen when the 6970m becomes available, or maybe they will allow us o get the 3D screen and someone will find a way to get it to work

 

Yea, and going with the 6870m (or possibly future 6970m) currently in the R3 should allow for Eyefinity given the 3 video outputs.

Hopefully.

 

Will the HDMI input support audio through the speakers too?

 

Luckily, I'm not all that concerned with gaming in 3D...
In either case, I'm thinking these little caveats merely leave plenty of room for upgrading at a lower cost than the initial option to blow big $$ to be the first on the block with the latest and greatest

 

Yep I agree and I could not care less about the 3D but I do want the 120HZ screen.

 

dang, will be needing a secondary hard drive assembly i guess. anybody know the part number yet>?

 

I know for sure 3D/120Hz doesn't work natively with the 5870 either.

 

That deal at AAFES is tempting me. But I want to hold out on a better gpu. If my will power fails me, how hard would it be to install a more powerful gpu later on. I know no one has there R3 yet. But relatively speaking how hard would it be.

 

It would be very easy but be prepared to spend at least $700.00 to upgrade to the rumored 485M.

 

anyone by chance talk with an alienware rep and ask if the second caddy comes standard like it does with the r2? tried calling a couple numbers but only get a fax modem on the other end...

 

They will tell you yes and then you won't get it. lol Honestly calling them is useless most of the time.

 

the first year alienware was bought out by dell when i went to alienware for support i got real helpful technical support from a dedicated alienware team. not so sure that happens anymore.

by the way, best dell service I get lately has been for my dell streak. they have actual answers and when i had problems with my streak, they mailed my a replacement next day. wish alienware was like that.

 

Alienware is like that.....I have had brand new replacement parts on site less than 24 hours after calling 3 times now......

Parts next day they do, systems they do not. Of course expecting a replacement system in 24 hours is also completely unreasonable. A phone is essentially a part....they are all the same

 

The problems always seem to be with Dell Home. Dell EPP or Small business is a much more professional sector of Dell. I always tell people to stay away from Dell home support/ordering if possible.

Plus all Alienware support/development has been officially pulled out of the US ans sent to China. You may still find some third party support floating around locally.

 

agreed about small business being better, but my preferred account with no interest financing is with dell home. anyways... tempted to cancel order but don't want to spend an extra $150 for a 640gb raid setup when I just want to use my 96GB SSD and 1TB drives.

 

Just call them up after you get it and use the 1-800-Alienwa number.

 

rather not have to wait and find out the assembly is missing and have to order it and wait another 3-5 days (or more). if the assembly is not included want to either order it now or cancel my order and re-do it.

 

With my R1 they were able to overnight me the missing assembly. They were very helpful about it.

 

As scook said if you talk to the right person they'll overnight it at no cost. With the R1/R2's I had it was hit and miss with it being there unless you ordered the computer with 2 drives already. Some reps may tell you no, may tell you there's no parts available, etc but if you talk to the right person they'll send it

 

Unfortunately it will be very difficult to get a straight answer before hand.

 

Looking forward to youtube reviews of the r3 over the next few weeks. Curious on overall performance, new look, and benchmarks.

 

The system have hit the build stage. Assuming there are no delays shipping should start next week.

 

With all the screwups Dell has done with my DFS/DPA account they finally got it fixed and placed the order this morning. The DFS/sales rep guaranteed mine to me by no later than 1/27/11 so with any luck I'll be able to share some insights next week

 

Does anyone know if the 120hz screen comes with a glossy finnish like normal or a flat finnish. I've looked at other company's 3d laptops and some say they have a flat finnish. I wonder how that would effect picture quality when not viewing 3D images?