M18x BIOS A05 released - Discuss here....

I would agree with littleone - anything under 70c is brilliant. Mid 60's is fantastic.

 

eyric101 - if I did not know you were serious I would think you are kidding around. With temps in mid to upper 60's under load you're wasting your time with Speedfan. Those temps are excellent and you have nothing to be concerned about. There is no reason for undue concern until you have sustained temps in the mid-80's and above. The thermal junction max (thermal shutdown) for the AMD cards is around 100°C.

 

I guess it is just the combination of the bezel being warm/hot to the touch and Speedfan showing the little burning flame icon next to the temps when i first fire it up.

 

I could be slightly off a bit since I don't often use SpeedFan, but I think the flame icon merely signifies that the temps are reaching a user-defined threshold for a fan speed change.

 

It's simply impossible that the temps under load are that low....There's some issue with the reporting tool you are using. I'm 99.9% sure...

 

For comparison, when I max the fans with speedfan and play skyrim, the temps get to low 70s (room 24-25C), as reported by CPUID Monitor and HWinfo. Speedfan reports 10c lower, which is incorrect for sure.

Here's is the proof (idle):

 

So the idea is to use speedfan to control the fans but NOT to use speedfan to monitor temps....use something else more reliable for that, right?

 

Thank you for the post but skyrim is not really demanding game and I doubt it will 100% stress the gpu. Give us temp. when runing really demanding game such as crysis 2 at ultra setting.

I recommend you running FF14 bench

 

Yes, that's the idea

That was a snapshot of idle temps.
Here is another one after 3 hours of gaming (2 hrs of Skyrim and 1 hr of Crysis). Everything on max.

2 notes: I forced the CPU to 99% in power management so it never goes above 2.7GHz under load and also, my room temp is now @70F.
No elevation, no cooler pad.

I know it looks ridiculously low, but again, the CPU is locked at 2.7ghz across the board and the fans @ 100% all the time.

 

Thermal 'junction' max temperature is different from thermal shutdown temps.

Thermal junction temperature is the temperature past which the transistors used in the chip will physically break down. This is higher than thermal shut down temps. And most companies will not be willing to disclose this temperature accuartley as it gives away clues about the secret recipes to the actual make up of their fabrication process.

So you can see it should not wait till it reaches 'junction' max before a shut down is executed as by then irreparable damage would have been already inflicted on the chip.

 

Nice temps Aiki....66c max gpu after 3 hours of gaming is pretty "cool"

 

Aiki, are those temps running speedfan or letting A05 have its way? Those look like my temps running speedfan

 

That's with speedfan fans forced @100% all the time. If I let A05 BIOS have its way the temps will peak at 80c+ for the GPU's and CPU.

 

Aikimox, What reason made you lock your CPU at 2.7 ghz?

 

Lower temps and no FPS gain in games even with the highest OC'

 

Yea same for me i discussed this before , it doesnt seem for me anyway that without speedfan the system doesnt take full advantage of the fans , mine is defo more noisy with speedfan running than without which tells me the fans are running faster , i was suggested to repaste which i no will help with temps , but thats not the point , my cooling is definately more effiecient with speedfan running and to be honest we shouldnt need to run 3rd party software to keep our laptops cool or cooler should i say .
Cheers.

 

@Aikimox, excuse my ignorance but what do you have to do with speed fan to get tha fans at 100%. Do you have it all the time, or just when gaming?

 

Here you go I have it all the time but when idle, I set the fans to 50% (2000rpm).

 

Great, thanks, will have a play with it.

 

Why has the bios been pulled from the site? Thought it had been released now!

 

Nope... download it from the link here on NBR... or, is that the one that is not working?

As of yesterday, the Dell Support site did not have the new BIOS or AMD driver available for public download.

Edit: just checked our links here and they're good...

Just checked support.dell.com and... nada

 

What these links work?

ect Download - Dell - Support or,
ftp://ftp.dell.com/FOLDER00181378M/2...32_X64_ZPE.exe

Not in the UK they don't!

 

I just clicked the links above and both work.

I just tried both of the links in your post and neither one of them work.

Try mine. How odd.

 

FYI, Mr.Fox's second link works for me (first one didnt an Im in the UK too ???? - weird)....should be good to go for everyone I imagine.

ftp://ftp.dell.com/FOLDER00181378M/2/M18xR1_A05_W32_X64_ZPE.exe

 

I'm sorry if this is a dumb question, but the last time I flashed a bios I used a floppy disc. Do I just run the executable file from windows? Is it that simple?

Thanks, I feel dumb even for asking.

 

No need to feel dumb for asking a very valid question. The integrity of your system is most important when flashing bios.

There are two methods - via dos or from within windows. Given how you feel about flashing, I would suggest flashing from within windows.

Basically, this is just as you said....running the Dell .exe file you downloaded.

Just ensure you are plugged into a/c, have no other apps running and you should be fine. You may need to extract/unzip the executable from your download but once you have done that, running the .exe will flash your bios.

 

Beware that you may also need to run the extracted .exe as administrator. Ie right-click the extracted file and choose to 'run as administrator'. I know I had to (win 7)

 

Did anyone get this to bios-mods for unlocked bios? There is one over at techinferno just wondering if the guy that did a03,a04 unlock has seen a05?

 

FYI: The A05 BIOS update is now available from Dells Drivers & Downloads area (UK & US checked)

Dell SW,BIOS,ANW,M18X
Release Date: 08/12/2011
Version: A05
Importance: Urgent
Download Type: BIOS
File Format: Hard-Drive
File Size: 3MB

Fixes & Enhancements:
Improve AMD graphics fan algorithm to fix system shutdown issue.

 

Also the AMD 69xxM BETA driver is up there now as well.

 

Is there any point of upgrading A04 --> A05 with the 6970s?

 

Not unless you prefer the keypad NumLock state to be on by default so you don't have to manually set it at every boot. Otherwise, the only customers that seem to benefit from the update are those that had malfunctioning 6990M cards.

 

Did they hot fix A05? The driver page shows a release date for A05 now of 12/22/2011 along with an URGENT classification.

 

I downloaded it even though i already have the A05 installed. No warnings at the installation about that i already have it installed appeared. New bios with same name?

 

if you unpack the 12/22 .exe file (M18xR1_A05_W32_X64_ZPE.exe) and you make a comparision between it and and the previous A05 bios (you need to unpack the .exe file as well), you will find that they have the same crc... only the archives are different (crc doesn't match), but the two bioses (M18xR1_A05_W32_X64.exe) are identical

 

I know that NUMLOCK state defaults to on now instead of off. There are other changes to settings that are subtle and can only be viewed with an unlocked version of the BIOS. A05 is only important and needed for the AMD 6990M CrossFire setup.

 

Hi all,

Does anyone know how to set the Num Lock key on my M18X to On as the power up default?

Thanks

MP

 

i think you can just leave numlock on and once you finish turn the laptop off with the numlcok still active. the next day of use when you turn your laptop on you will notice that the numlock led (on the upper left most part of the keyboard, just above the highest macro key) is lit. it happened to me several times and im still using it now as a default. you can give it a shot.

 

Hello, if there's no option in BIOS (I don't have a M18x), do this:

Press the start button (orb button) in windows and search for regedit.

Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Keyboard.

In the right window, right click InitialKeyboardIndicators (or something similar, sorry, I say this from the back of my head on Christmas day..) and choose Modify.

In the value field input 2 for Num Lock on.


I'll just leave other values here in case anybody else needs them:

0 - Num lock, caps lock and scroll lock off.
1 - Caps lock on, Num lock off, scroll lock off
3 - Caps lock and Num lock on, scroll lock off
4 - Scroll lock on, Caps lock and Num lock off
5 - Caps Lock and Scroll lock on, Num lock off
6 - Num lock and Scroll lock on, Caps lock off
7 - all three on

Enjoy!

 

Hi,

I have tried both the suggestions above and neither option works.

When changing the registry value I noticed that it is already set to 2. I tried changing it anyway to another value but after a restart the value sets itself back to 2.

There is no option in the Bios to set num lock to on as default.

Any more suggestions?

Cheers

 

watching this place for a solution, i need the numpad to logon

 

I believe the updated BIOS A05 has numlock on by default, pls see;

http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...-a05-released-discuss-here-9.html#post8182642

 

Yes, with A05 that is correct Kev... NUMLOCK is on by default.

It is not recommended for the typical user, by the modded (unlocked) BIOS has the ability to turn on NUMLOCK at post. For some reason, Dell/Alienware chose to hide this switch in the factory default (locked) version of the Insyde BIOS.

 

OK Now I am going to throw the spanner in the works.

My M18X is only a few days old. I have just checked my Bios version and it is factory installed as A05. However there is no option in the bios to change the num lock default on / off. At power on it is off.

So the saga continues.

MP

 

Try re-flashing the A05 BIOS from the Dell Support web page and see if it changes. If there is nothing wrong with your machine otherwise, I doubt that Dell/Alienware would see this as a legitimate issue. NUMLOCK was off by default on all of the prior BIOS releases. It was not until the release of A05 that this changed. The BIOS released by Dell has hidden the settings to change NUMLOCK at boot.

Note: it looks like something possibly got updated on the A05 BIOS. The release date on currently published A05 BIOS is only 4 days ago.

Dell Alienware M18xR2 System BIOS

Release Date: 12/22/2011
Version: A05
Importance: Urgent
Download Type: BIOS
File Format: Hard-Drive
File Size: 3MB

Download Here​

I am merging this "Num Lock Question" thread with the established A05 thread because it's a question and discussion point that is related to A05. Let us know if the NUMLOCK state changes after re-flashing A05. If it does not, the unlocked version of A05 has the NUMLOCK setting un-hidden. Otherwise, you'll have to live with manually setting NUMLOCK at each boot.

 

Has anyone else noticed that the version A05 Bios download on the Dell web site is titled as 'Dell Alienware M18xR2 System BIOS'


Is this just a typo or what?

Also what is a 'Alienware Laptop AV'? Does the AV mean 'All Versions'? Thats what is listed in the compatibility list.

 

Typos... seems they have them frequently. With so many things outsourced to foreign countries where English is not the primary language, it's amazing it's not far worse. Who knows what the AV means... possibly nothing but another typo.

 

Mr Fox - I was more interested in the 'M18xR2' bit. Is this a hint that the R2 is about to appear I wonder.

 

Think about what still has to happen in the world of tech before the M18x is ready for launch in a r2 version. The technology expos for 2011 are behind us and 2012 is ahead. Ivy Bridge isn't ready yet. We don't speculate on such things in this sub-forum. It's a typo, but it does hurt to wish.

 

would this bios do anything about the darn raid array dropping all the time? i have tried all the major hard drive brands out there and once in a while the raid 1 array will simply drop one of the disks from the port. this forces me to shut it down and restore power to the drive and then wait 3 hours for the array to rebuild itself.

i went about 2 months without issues and them it just dropped the array so it ticked me off and hoping dell does something.