Problems With My Alienware M17X

A brief introduction:
First of all, greetings from argentina, im pretty much new in this forum, and to be honest, the purpose of making this account was to find the proper help to the issues that i have with my machine.
I Buyed from a Friend of mine an Alienware M17x their specs and issues are detailed next:

i7 3720QM @ 2.6 (supposedly but idk if this behaviour is normal)
the clock goes down to 1.25 - 1.6x Ghz and not more than that unless i use TrottleStop to keep it on base speed.



16gb of DDR3 Ram:
Im not having any problems related to ram, but i just wanna add , i buyed the notebook from my friend because he didn't get it to boot , (3 beeps), after buying i replaced the faulty ram and booted normally.. but its not the same model of ram ....idk if this influence on performance.

GTX 660m 2gb DDR5
i know that this video card its not the best on this kind of machines but i find it lacking in performance and sudden freezes (like a 1 second freeze ) every time i play a game, even i tried playing a battle royale called "Cyber Hunter", mind it's a cellphone game ported to pc, its not very demanding and still have those freezes.
i readed a post that maybe is related to the card BIOS. but that post had links to another forum... that has a policy on downloading files... (make 5 "quality" posts to gain download privileges...). so im stuck there if i wanna try that posible solution.
for any reference on what im trying to say check this video from the user OWNorDisown at the 4:00 minute mark starts showing the exact issue i have w my card.


Here is the issue?? of the power brick... OSD_Main says that the AC adapter is not supported, and it will continue to run on battery... cool!, maybe replacing the AC adapter with a good one solve the issue...NOPE i found out that even if i boot the machine w/o the AC adapter connected it still prompts the same message.



the rest of the spec are:
2 500gb HDDs (one w OS Installed)
windows 10 up to date with drivers.

Well this kinda sums up my entire experience with this notebook. i always dreamed to have one, and even with all the bad criticism made on this brand still like it a lot. i apologise for my sloppy english. i hope to find a little help on this topic.
cheers.

 

Welcome! When you say that you replaced the adapter with a "good one" do you mean it is a Dell Adapter? The sticker on the adapter will say Dell up the top somewhere if it is. It will also have to be a 180W or 240W adapter. If the Wattage is too low then it may not charge the laptop.

You can also try removing the adapter and battery and holding the power button down for 60 seconds. Then replace the adapter (not battery) and see if it turns on.

 

Tank you for Replying!
responding to your question. NO did not replace it, what i said was, that i was about to , but i noticed that, if i boot the notebook without the power adapter connected, OSD_Main still will show the message even without the power brick connected at all. idk if its a bug on the program- i know the battery is old because doesnt hold a steady charge dough

 

I'd try doing the power drain method first and rebooting without the battery installed.

It can also be good to run the pre-boot diagnostic (you'll have to have the battery connected for this or it will give you an error). Press f12 while booting to get into the boot menu. Select the Diagnostic.

It will give you the battery health and information on the adapter. It will also run through all your other hardware to see if there are any other faults.

If the error still comes up without the battery connected then you probably have an issue on the motherboard

 

well i tried what you said, still getting the message, prompted diagnostics... everything is running great, of course the batery is no longer in condition but, i'm starting to think is a software thing, i readed in some experiences that windows 10 its not fully supported in terms of software (i can tell because was a pain in the bum to getting the software/drivers installed), idk, kinda don't want to come to a early conclusion on a motherboard issue. it would suck to buy one and find out it has the same issues (here in my country that kind of electronics are way expensive...). researching from other places, possibly the processor thing could be normal behaviour, whats your opinion on that?

 

It must still be charging the battery since it's at 100%. Does the laptop power on with the battery removed and only the charger plugged in? If it does then the warning notice doesn't really mean anything.

 

yes, the system powers on without any issue without the battery and charger plugged in

 

It seems that maybe it's just a weird bug. If it doesn't impact performance then you should be good. Maybe if you disable the adapter warning in the BIOS it will go away.

 

well idk if thats a bug, but that only one of the issues i listed, i agree that maybe is only a software issue. still slow performance is noticeable on boot (still have my doubts on the processor downclocking, but didn register high temps), and still have the video card issue. u.u hope more people can see this post so maybe get more views on the subject, and maybe possible solutions, fingers crossed.

 

Hi,
Judging from the symptoms it might be center data pin in the psu jack not making contact in the socket or being broken off. Try to gently move the DC jack, push it left right, up down in the socket and see if this makes to recognize the psu. Wiggle the cable just behind the jack cos sometimes it gets broken there apparently.

Sorry mate. Just disregard that. I just realize that laptop was having this behavior even without power supply connected. So it cannot be related. But it behave almost like in the situation I described. It more likely looks like some kind of glitch. Most of those kind of problem seems to be resolved by disconnecting psu and battery and doing power drain or by restoring default settings in bios. So it looks more and more like another win 10 ...eet

 

yes, that appears to be a glitch, stil cant find the reason why the prossesor downclock itself to 1.xGhz , makes the boot slow (not painfully but very notisable, and handling it its very notisable the slow performance, the notebook should be snapier, and very responsive, and the graphics card... oh the graphics card... idk what to do with that ojne u.u