Aw m18x R2 Dual 980m SLI upgrade!!

No one calls my beast old .... LOL Joking mate...

Yes, Indeed they need a lot of attention.
I am confident that after Prema releases the vbios everything should work properly from what I hear.
whenever these beast working properly I am sure they will kick some serious butt.

 

Here's a link to the newest Hotfix driver Nvidia 353.49:

http://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3698

 

Has anyone tried this driver yet? I'm so cautious now that I finally have a working driver on my beast kinda don't want to be the 1st to try lol

 

Yeah, I installed it earlier today. Still makes my 780M SLI throttle like a piece of crap, so back to 345.20 again. So sick of this... NVIDIA sucks, but they don't. But they do in an Alienware with screwed up NVIDIA drivers. Sometimes I hate NVIDIA, sometimes hate Alienware because of what they have become under their new agenda. I try to keep things in perspective by just looking around at how so much stuff labeled "high performance" or "gamer" (LOL @ gamer) is too messed up for words.

Cracked open the latest issue of CPU magazine after work today, and with great interest dove into the article on the new Nitro R9 390 AMD top end GPU only to have that glimmer of excitement--for the first time in about 4 years--of something potentially nice and new in an AMD wrapper, with great specs on paper, offering an alternative to NVIDIA's crippled (but better) trash just having it's cute little red "gaming evolved" fantasy fanny shredded to pieces by sucky benchmark results compared to GTX 980.

Micro$lop dangles a DX12 carrot and all the kids scream for ice cream, but these evils slobs bundle it in Windows OS X, which by most measurements appears to be shaping up to be an even bigger and more pathetic piece of poop than Windows 8. It feels like every corporate driving force in new tech with a pedigree in awesome geekness has magically morphed into a certifiable retard.

Why is it that so many people cannot see that a turd rattle-canned with golden-colored spray paint is still a smelly colon loaf and not a gold nugget?

 

wow, such rage, much anger, very intense
calm down pal, and have you tried it with your 980m sli?

 

Nope... those parts are in Clevo. I have no reason to believe those drivers won't work right with my 980M SLI since those GPUs are not installed in an Alienware.

I'l check in a day or two to verify that, but the P570WM beast runs great no matter what I throw at it. What it lacks in beauty and build quality, it more than makes up for in performance and functionality.

 

Oh i see, i still think that you still have 980m sli in your m18x r2, well maybe i'll jump to clevo train as well, my friend offered a barebone exchange, my m18xr2 with his p375, still undecided because clevo looks kind of boring


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

Beware of Greeks friends bearings gifts. *wink*

P570WM/Panther 5 is monster thanks to the hexacore CPU and a throttle-free 980M SLI environment. I really like it, no regrets, but it's far from perfect. The other Clevos are pretty nice, but they have some issues as well. Their thermal management is inferior compared to what you have and they do not overclock nearly as well. If and when 980M SLI or the next better NVIDIA offering works right in the M18xR2 you might regret that swap.

I used to have 980M SLI in the M18xR2. I got tired of the nonsense and gave up, bought a barebones P570WM from an awesome gent here in the community and dropped the 980M beasts into that machine. I have remained extremely satisfied with my M18xR2 with 780M SLI up through 345.20 drivers, then after that everything started turning to crap with driver-induced throttling. Still the best laptop ever built in the history of computers, but broken really bad with NVIDIA having every driver since then screwed up.

This too shall pass. It's just not a very fun time right now.

 

Will it be equal crippled benchmark results with gtx780m oc and new Nvidia drivers in a Eurocom Panther (P570WM) also? Or is it only Dellienware who is the sinner along with Nvidia?

 

Not sure. I've been too busy with other things to drop the 780M SLI into the P570WM to find out, but I suspect it will be fine because 980M SLI works fine in it. It would still be good to find out for certain, even though my assumptions are probably accurate. I have spoken with people in positions of influence at Alienware and NVIDIA just this week about the situation, so there is a chance the driver-induced throttling might get fixed. If it does, I suspect it will quietly disappear without an explanation or apology.

What will be interesting is, if the new 780M SLI driver-induced throttling phenomenon magically gets fixed in a future driver release, if nearly identical 980M SLI throttling that we have been fighting since day one suddenly and mysteriously heals itself. I think there is a chance it could play out like that. I think there has been a sneaky little stinker thing going on somewhere in the background to fulfill a hidden and unspoken evil agenda, but it just took NVIDIA more time and effort to figure out how to cripple 780M SLI updgrades for Alienware machines in the same way as 980M upgrades in a three-generations old unrivaled Alienware beast laptop were broken by design on day one. Well... that's just my cranky old man/worn-out overclocker conspiracy theory.

What I mean by that is the M18xR2 has been able to rip the head off and poop down the neck of everything before and after it, and letting that reign of terror continue into a fourth generation without slipping us a mickey to try and stop it is bad for new notebook sales. Stop and think about it. Who rules the roost (at least in terms of power, money and influence) in gaming notebook world... even today with messed up stuff? It's not Clevo, MSI, ASUS or Razer. All of them combined are still small potatoes compared to The Godfather.

 

Why ruin one, two or three generations old Alienware18? Is this a joke? A planned Nvidia and Dell cooperate. I see no other explanation... Dell has tried something rotten. First problem was upgrading to gtx980m in Aw18xR2 and (Aw 18), now problem with gtx780m. This stinks.

 

Maybe so. Or, perhaps another financially capable unidentified OEM quietly donated a very large sum to NVIDIA R&D to ensure the success of their 980M SLI crapbook with a BGA CPU so their new flagship product would not be raped by an antique Alienware that still runs on steroids. Or, maybe just incompetence on the part of the NVIDIA driver team. I am confident that we will never know the answer to this riddle, and I won't care as long as it gets fixed.

Anecdotally, there seems to be a connection between GPU throttling and an Alienware hardware ID, whether by accident, coincidence or by design. Most, if not all, of the OEMs are like politicians... as crooked as a dog's hind leg, and only care about their own bottom line... not customers, or their good and faithful resellers that keep the candles burning.

 

NVIDIA has managed to make several proper drivers previously to your Aw laptop. They know for sure what it will take to get this fixed... But they have not wanted to fix the issue. This is not about incompetence on the part of the NVIDIA driver team. This is guaranteed planned. Nvidia has not wanted to do something about the problem. Then you can even imagine what is the reason for this.

 

I dont know why you say that when the 980m's never came out for the m18x r2 for the alienware 18. They work great in other laptops.

 

I say that because it's true, I didn't say 980M's were bad nor that Alienwares are bad - it was a statement of observation, this is a thread for 980M and Alienware afterall, it's pretty relevant!

 

Well this is the Alienware section and the m18x r2 section also, so for most people on here, including me, I would think you are talking about the 980m's in alienware m18x R2s. I was just making a statement of observation.

Its why I said that, the 980m's never came out for the m18 line. Its why they are "finicky".

 

Of course!

 

These Maxwell cards are something entirely different though. 780m and a whole host of other Kepler cards weren't officially released with the old Alienwares (eg R2) but worked flawlessly for people upgrading.

 

The 970m weren't released on the m15x but it still works. These maxwell's works on some and doesn't work on others. Its why I left Alienware and went back to Clevo. I still miss that huge r2 with the insane cpu overclock.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/970m-m15x.766985/

 

Yes for whatever reason unbeknown to us, Maxwell works as it should in the m15x.
I sure as hell miss my R2 too.

 

Does anyone know if some Alienware M18X R2 has somekind of Motherboard power limit? I've been told that this exist but not all the motherboards has it and this limit belongs to the order of 150 W or so for each GPU. I am just talking about this w/o any official info.

I'm looking if so for other motherboard without this issue but first need to know how to identify them :S

 

First time I have ever heard of different power limits for the PCI slots on M18x R2 motherboards.... I would have thought an unlocked bios would solve any power limiting if it existed....

 

haven't heard about anything like that either.

 

Neither.. Hey quick question would having an unlocked bios help with GPU throttle at all? I recently updated to A12 Bios for hardware button functions. Wondering if I'm missing a setting that would be beneficial for gpus

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The only thing I know about even remotely similar to this is the power handling limit of the Alienware 18 motherboard that prevents it from being able to use the extra power provided by a dual 330W AC adapter. I am not aware of any differences among M18xR2 motherboards. I am on my third motherboard and they have all been the same as far as I can tell. Good luck finding a new motherboard. They are getting harder to find. If the one you have now is working, I don't think you will accomplish anything by replacing it. What sort of problems are you experiencing other than throttling?

As I now have throttling with 780M SLI using any driver released after 345.20, I would urge you to stop doing vBIOS testing with any drivers except 344.75 or 345.20 because you may not be able to get an accurate read on the effectiveness of the vBIOS mods that @Prema is working on. You cannot expect the same results as @j95 with a single 980M because the throttling is being caused by the drivers trying to limit the power draw and 980M SLI totally dwarfs the power draw of a single 980M. I can use any of the newer drivers I want to use without throttle running one 780M because it doesn't draw enough power to trigger the driver-induced throttling.

Not really, but using a stock BIOS will cripple your CPU performance potential if you have an XM CPU. I would not recommend using anything newer than A10 if you have an XM CPU. The other issue is you don't have access to the menu to manually select IGFX, PEG or Auto video configuration modes except with an unlocked BIOS. That's not a big deal unless or until the situation arises that you need to and find that you cannot. When you need to is a bad time to discover that you can't. That is also one of the huge problems with owning an Alienware 18 with a locked-down BIOS that cannot be flashed with an unlocked version.

Why do you actually need the media panel buttons that don't work with Windows 8 to work? I ask because I've rarely ever used mine for anything, but the couple that I do on occasion (volume control) still work fine. There is no important functionality I can identify from those buttons offer that does not exist elsewhere other than the WiFi switch, and that still works with Windows 8 using older BIOS versions.

 

I did notice something was off with my xm CPU but presumed it was adding the 980ms. Is rolling back to A10 unlocked bios possible from the A12 stock?

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Hello Guys

any update on the vbios by any chance? haven't heard anything new for a little while now..

 

No news at the moment, sorry can't tell you anything else because I do not know anything new :S

 

If you are waiting for any new bios, just give up. They wont release sh**.

 

Think he is talking about a new GPU vbios from the community not a system bios via Dellianware..

 

oh ok, sorry

 

yes I am talking about the @Prema Vbios that should be near completion (hopefully)

 

I have a chance to buy a brand new alienware m18x r2 with 980m sli are the problems with throttling still happening because i'm getting mixed messages from several people.

I want the Alienware because it has the best cooling system possible and i can also have multiple hard drives as in more than 2.

If i buy it and apply the mods required will it basically function like a any other sli 980m laptop or is there still going to be a problem? I don't overclock and i just want to be able to update the drivers normally after i apply the vbios mods.

Can anyone point me in the right direction?

 

Beta Driver anyone

353.51

http://www.mediafire.com/download/r...desktop-win8-win7-winvista-64bit-NDA-beta.exe

 

This driver works on notebooks too right? And can we just use an older inf file?

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It works for me, so yeah.

 

I merged your post with this thread. All the answers are here.

It is not without issues. There are multiple problems, including the inability to use Legacy BIOS and Windows 7. If you are running stock clock speeds it is definitely stronger than anything else as long as you can avoid severe throttling. At stock clocks and using a stock vBIOS it does fairly well, throttling is minimized, and you'll likely be OK with it since you are not interested in overclocking.

You will not find any laptop with non-standard GPU configuration where drivers can be installed without INF mods. This has always been required and probably always will be. NVIDIA only includes the hardware ID of "authorized" configurations that are sold by each OEM. If the OEM did not sell a particular model with the GPU that has been installed as an aftermarket upgrade, you can pretty much count on having to use a modded INF. Once you learn how and get used to it, this is essentially a non-issue. In the ideal scenario they would move away from this flawed laptop driver model and go to the generic driver model used for desktops, wherein the installer only looks for the GPU hardware ID and doesn't care what system the part has been installed in. There would be no need for proprietary INF files for each notebook OEM.

 

I wanna try this driver. How did you mod it to work ? I usually wait for j95 magic

 

It doesn't need to be modded. It installed for me with 780M SLI in the M18xR2 as is and for @Scanner as well without modding the INF.

 

Thanks Mr Fox, Ill give this a shot once I get home. How are they working on your 780m sli setup ?

 

Like the pure NVIDIA driver garbage that seems to be the new status quo... Unfortunately, I have EXACTLY the same throttling as all drivers after 345.20. I just haven't had time to make a new public service video to highlight the flaws in this driver yet.

 

Thanks @ Mr. Fox
I was about to try this driver but I think I'll stick to what I have working for me! One question though, what is the difference with notebook drivers and their desktop versions? I've always wondered just out of curiosity

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At a technical level, I don't know but I doubt very little or nothing. I suspect the differences are probably more to do with extra registry crap for laptops more than a difference in actual drivers. I like using the desktop drivers better.

 

Thank you Mr Fox as long as i can get a Alienware M18x r2 brand new and with the features i want and as long as their isn't throttling at stock vbios and stock drivers i think i'll go ahead and buy it.
I feel really excited like i'm buying a rolls royce or something similar lol.

 

the 353.51 Beta driver posted here earlier seems to work pretty good.

FYI this driver works pretty good for me... Not perfect and there is throttling when overclocking but pretty good on stock clocks. more like 353.00 with @j95 magic

 

^ Nicely done there, Juang. Does it throttle at all when at stock?

 

I have not seen it throttle at stock clocks But I had to go back to 353.00 because it was acting strange between 2d clocks and 3d clocks. 353.00 is the best driver for me overall. waiting for premas vbios not sure if is going to be release still, this thread's been pretty quite for a few days.

 

This is for the benefit of all the 780M SLI gamers that think they might be missing something to die for and are itching to spend money on an upgrade. Interesting comparison between GPUs... 980M is a lot better at some things, mostly benchmarks, but not remarkably better at all things.

In spite of the much higher core clock, the improvement in Metro games (one of the most demanding titles) certainly is not remarkable. In fact, in most games I don't see a remarkable difference between 780M SLI and 980M SLI... not usually more than just a few FPS difference. If you're mostly a gamer rather than overclocked bencher, there doesn't seem to be a compelling reason (especially not a $1,500 reason) for the upgrade. I still do most of my gaming on the M18xR2 and the experience is just as good as the Panther with 980M SLI with very few exceptions.



Alienware M18xR1

• 2920XM @ 4.3GHz
• GTX 780M SLI @ 1007/1500
• 16GB DDR3-1866 @ CL10-10-10-30 2T

Options: Resolution: 1920 x 1080; Quality: Very High; SSAA: Off; Texture filtering: AF 16X; Motion Blur: Normal; Tesselation: Very High; VSync: Off; Advanced PhysX: On

Average Results

• Average Framerate: 81.00
• Max. Framerate: 246.79
• Min. Framerate: 16.65

Alienware M18xR2

• 3920XM @ 4.3GHz
• GTX 780M SLI @ 1007/1500
• 32GB DDR3-2133 @ CL11-11-11-31 2T

Options: Resolution: 1920 x 1080; Quality: Very High; SSAA: Off; Texture filtering: AF 16X; Motion Blur: Normal; Tesselation: Very High; VSync: Off; Advanced PhysX: On

Average Results

• Average Framerate: 84.00
• Max. Framerate: 244.56
• Min. Framerate: 12.41

Clevo P570WM (Eurocom Panther)

• 4930K @ 4.5GHz
• GTX 980M SLI @ 1302/1403
• 16GB DDR3-2400 @ CL11-13-13-25 1T
• Dual 330W AC Adapter

Options: Resolution: 1920 x 1080; Quality: Very High; SSAA: On; Texture filtering: AF 16X; Motion Blur: Normal; Tesselation: Very High; VSync: Off; Advanced PhysX: On

Average Results

• Average Framerate: 81.00
• Max. Framerate: 329.71
• Min. Framerate: 14.29

Same as above with CPU set as PhysX Processor

Average Results

• Average Framerate: 86.00
• Max. Framerate: 260.15
• Min. Framerate: 13.29

 

I didn't see a difference in games at all either the 980's over 780's.

 

I am itching to upgrade my 680m's to 980m's in anticipation of DOOM 4. There really hasn't been any other heavy hitting pc games in a while.