Ordering M17x Soon; Couple of questions ...

Ave,

I'm about to order the Alienware M17x soon and I had a couple of quick questions:

i. Is there a big performance difference between the 720qm & 820qm. The cost difference is significant ... does the performance difference justify the cost difference?

ii. Is there any possibilities of overclocking either the 720qm or 820qm at all in an Alienware notebook?

iii. With the GTX 480M just released; would there be a very 'significant' performance difference ( If/When Alienware were to offer them) between GTX 480M SLI vs 5870 CrossfireX? Significant enough to actually hold off & wait for 480M SLI? Right now I'm planning on going with HD 5870 CrossfireX ... is there any reason I should wait & see if 480M SLI is offered soon?

iv. Is there a 'Significant' difference between 6GB vs 8GB memory? Is it possible to upgrade 6GB -> 8GB later down the road myself?

v. Lastly, I'm going to attempt Phone Ordering to try & get as much reduction/discount in total price as possible; Any word of advice for me?

Thanks Guys!!

 

i. The difference between the two is about 2K in 06. The 820Qm would be my choice, if i had to choose amongst the i7 cpus.
ii. The only possibility is for dell to release a new bios to overclock it. As i have tried to get abo to get setfsb to work but it doesn't. Provide better cooling to the 820QM and it will do a bit better
iii. There is going to be a huge difference between the two. But for the TDP its not worth it, it uses alot of power and dell will probably handicap them like the 5870s. But i am currently waiting for them or the next cards to be released.
iv. You will not notice any significant difference between them, even 4>8. You would have to use extremely demanding applications to make use of them. Yes you can upgrade later with an even better quality ram like hyperX.
v. Just keep haggling and quoting your best price, and try a few different reps.

 

Awesom! Thank you so much for your detailed response; just what I was looking for.

The larger Cache on 820QM is also standing out; I'm definitely going with 820QM.

That's a pity; but I guess I'll reserve my OC'ing feats for a PC down the road.

What does 'TDP' stand for? It does sound like the performance difference is worth it. CUDA is something that has always attracted me towards nVidia; but I'm not sure if I really need all that in my notebook, I could go 5870's in notebook and get whatever's hot in GTX world when I build a PC. Do you have any vivid approximation on when M17x might see 480's?

That is interesting; I might consider 4GB for now then; definitely no more then 6GB.

That's my plan!!!

Thanks again, much appreciated.

 

You should call team BlackHawk from dell to build it for ya i order mine with them and got it build in 6 days its heres link there number is on there Thank you for choosing Dell | Dell

 

TDP= thermal design power.
According to a few sources one GTX 480 is going to use 100 watts. two will obviously use 200 watts, and if you count the processor motherboard, ports hard drive ram etc... It gets to around 300 or more. The current PSU uses 240watts. So we might see a redesign at E3 to support it, im not quite sure when but i have good hopes for it.

4GB, is definitely the max im going to use for a few years. unless you have applications that will make use of more, then you dont need it.

 

Check this thread out.

 

Awesome!!

I think for my notebook I'm going to skip on the GTX 480M, and just go with 5870 CrossfireX. For my PC build down the road I'll look at nVidia GTX options.

Thanks a ton - Mirito & TheCodeBreaker

 

That would be a great combination/configuration.
I'm glad i could help

 

5870's are elite man here my set up to give ya an idea kinda was the low end high perf budget combo 2970$
Space Black - Anodized Aluminum
Intel Core i7 720QM 1.6GHz (2.8 GHz Turbo Mode, 6MB Cache)
6GB DDR3 at 1333MHz
Alienware M17x 240W A/C Adapter
17-inch WideUXGA 1920 x 1200 RGB LED (1200p)
Crossfire 1GB ATI Radeon Mobility HD 5870
320GB 7,200RPM SATA-II HDD
8X DVD+/-RW Dual Layer Drive,QuickSilver

 

720 vs 820 is only 15% difference in real life not noticeable 720QM is best bang for your buck

 

Ave,

Quick question guys ... how many memory slots does the M17x come with? If I go for 4GB DDR3 1333 right now, will I be able to add another 2 X 2GB DDR 1333 Dual Channel to total 8GB later down the road? Does it come with 4 total slots? Where 2 initial slots are used for the basic 4 Gb Dual Channel configuration?

Thanks!!

 

You can upgrade your memory anytime it only scales up to 8gb for the m17x i think atm and from what i seen on the alienware site highlight the m17x page bar where it says memory shows only 2 sticks so im guessing 2 slots man u can prob add another 4gb down road and you will be at max
heres the link let the alienware video at top finish than u can see the diff hardware animations
http://www.dell.com/us/en/home/note...efid=laptop-alienware-m17x&s=dhs&cs=19&~ck=mn

 

you will have to buy a 2x4Gb kit to upgrade the ram and replace your current sticks

 

Oh wattos so m17x come with 2 sticks all time like x2gb kit for 4gb and x2 3gb for 6gb etc? i thought u get 1 4gb chip leaving 1 empty slot

 

They use whatever is cheapest, naturally. Supposing you have two RAM slots, you'll 2x2GB for a 4GB kit, and 2x4GB for an 8GB kit. They won't use 1x4GB for a 4GB kit because two sticks of 2GB RAM are much cheaper than one 4GB stick. Also, I've never seen a 3GB stick of RAM. I'm assuming it's a 4GB and a 2GB for a 6GB kit.

 

There are 2 slots in the sytem. If you order 4GB, they will ship it with 2x2GB.
The RAM dell ships really sucks with the timings and all. If you want the fastest 4GB RAM its HyperX. If its 1333, some types might be better than others, and ofcourse Kingston HyperX is the best out there.

2x2GB hyperX
Newegg.com - Kingston HyperX 4GB (2 x 2GB) 204-Pin DDR3 SO-DIMM DDR3 1333 Laptop Memory Model KHX1333C7S3K2/4G
2x4GB Mushkin
Newegg.com - Mushkin Enhanced 8GB (2 x 4GB) 204-Pin DDR3 SO-DIMM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Dual Channel Kit Laptop Memory Model 996647

These are probably the best on the market. I prefer HyperX.

 

Speaking of chips has anybody tried the laptop memory heat spreaders
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835207003
will they have any effect on the m17x performance better yet will they even fit lol i dont want my chips to burn out cuz of these little copper things somehow

 

I never knew they existed, i thought you buy them with the memory like G.SKILL. I know it would decrease temps but i would have to ask myself why? Will it really affect performance/benchmarks?

Though i do think it can help when increasin the RAM voltage. Thanks for sharing that

 

Yea pretty sweet they have to help i just read some review all good better to have heatsink than not to especially if gaming those model c are design for laptops pretty sic i just ordered mine lol

 

Tell us how it goes post it in the benching thread. temps before and after, and the improvements you noticed.

 

Wow the price from Newegg is great! But CodeBreaker would you be able to explain to me the benefits of having HyperX RAM over the stock one?

 

It would improve the system's stability and performance more than anything else. The hyperX ram has great timings. It is according to CL-tRCD-tRP-tRAS-CMD, the HyperX ram has 7-7-7-7-20. That is really good for RAM running at 1333. These timings are the latencies for the RAM when doing certain tasks. The lower the timings the better the performance provided the two you want to compare are running at the same speed.

EDIT: the one dell provides is most likely 9-9-9-9-24.

 

Wow - first of all I never knew they had only 2 slots; I imagined they had four. The Kingston HyperX definitely sounds like a good deal on Newegg. If I do end up getting the 4GB with the system ... I'll definitely upgrade to 8GB (4GB X 2) hyperX at some point.

 

Pulled the trigger this morning!!

Scored a 21% discount + Free Shipping on original cost ($4,060) using some codes I was given here. Whole order was done through their Online Chat; just had to confirm a couple of things over the phone at the end.

Configuration:

 

Wow,nice price! Wanna share any of those codes, I'm looking to buy soon myself Thanks.

 

How'd you manage to get the 21%? I'm stuck at ten right now.

 

I was given codes for the discount; but they expired today
Also scored Free Next Business Day yesterday by emailing my rep & telling him I needed it sooner. He upgraded at no charge!!

 

Ten is pretty bad, that's just EPP or Student Discount, have you called them? I've noticed that oddly enough the representatives stationed in India seem to be able to give the best discounts.