M18x R2 HD 7970M Xfire GTX 680M SLI when ?

Yea i will wait May 10, but one thing that i know now for sure i will buy in usa

I just dont know if i buy an M18 or M17 waiting the updates lol

 

If you want max performance -> 18
If you want very good performance with a lower price-> 17
120Hz screen-> 17

 

Is it May 10th yet?

The what for IB was long, & 7970m x-fire is excruciating. Damn 1st world problems.

Atleast Diablo 3 comes out on the 15th.

 

Diablo 3 will make me fail my university XD right in the middle of finals

 

Meh, I'll take hardware anytime. It's still 2.1 though, there's a limit on what you can tweak with the software. Soundstage shouldn't be a really big improvement if it's still the same hardware.

 

I just took my last final today, and the summer semester won't start til the 29th so I'm good to go.

 

...Thats just so unfair my finals continue until 24th of May..
Either way..we digress !

 

Whats the difference between the mx18 and mx18 r2?

 

I'm not the most qualified to answer this but as far as I know its,

- Motherboard chipset (I'd assume it's z77 on the r2, and z68 or p67 on the r1)
- CPU the r2 supports the new Ivy Bridge Procesors, while r1 is Sandy Bridge
- The r2 has an mSata slot
- The r2 will have new graphics cards available from the factory (7970m around may 10th, and 680m later this year)

 

R2 has support for MXM 3.1, 3 hard drives and ivy bridge cpu + chipset HM77... as far as i know.

 

Also judging from part numbers and talking to a sales rep has pointed towards an improved screen though that's more or less speculative ATM

 

Improved in what way, it won't be OLED .

 

Only time will tell
The product code look up and chatting the rep up didn't help

 

I hope they don't start shipping the M18X's with chimei panels because mine is going back in that case

 

I'm a bit surprised you ordered an R2. It's almost exact same product as the R1 with only about 10% CPU improvement and mSata instead of WIHD. Are you expecting to see something special?

 

You mean besides the AMD's?

 

I think Aikimox means as 7970m is not available, 675m sli and 580m sli are the same thing.. but speedy should have some reason to it

 

I don't own an M18X since last year and I sold my ALX recently so my only computer is the iPad

Since this time the GPU improved like 70% I think is the time to buy, the M18X is the only decent machine to get so I am waiting to place my order with 7970's

 

The mSATA drive is in a different location than the slot where the WIHD card goes.

This photo is from page 16 of the M18x R2 Owner's Manual. (The Owner's Manual is also the service guide. It contains all of the information for teardown.)

 

Excellent location!

 

so can the m18xR2 run three hdd's & msata? the HDD caddy holds three.

 

What is the benefit of MXM 3.1?

 

We're not allowed to know yet.

 

We are actually I'm a bit laZy to find my original post but the full spec sheet was posted in the speculation thread
The main advantage to consumers was mainly pci express 3

 

MXM Graphics Module

 

NVidia is having a May 15th event, which people are speculating being the release of the next generation series of desktop GPUs. Perhaps we'll at least get a road map for the next-gen mobile GPU series (discounting the rebrands as a part of it, of course).

 

Hi Hello

I am wandering if this make sense!!

Lets say i order the M18X R2

With 500GB 7,200 RPM + 32GB mSATA Caching SSD

Ones get here I will ad an SSD that I already have in wish I am planing to put the system

And will use the 500GB 7,200 RPM HD on an othere slot to put my music files movies and so on

Do you think the 32GB mSATA Caching SSD be of some use?

 

Use the 32GB mSATA for Windows and maybe a few programs, put your games and other programs on your SSD, and put your files on the 500GB HDD

 

@blink_c

You think Windows system will fit on a 32GB mSATA?
If i do that i will have no space for expansion and windows update and restore Points!!!!

 

^ If I was you I would go with the 500GB+64GB SSD. I always partition my windows at about that size. Always you will want to download / install something. 32GB SSD is too much congested (I am not saying will not fit). My current windows and program files have about 21GB + pagefiles 37GB... Imagine having the hibernate as well enabled...

 

Why is your pagefile so large with 16GB? I also realize you have SSDs.

 

I guess I didn't bother to change it...

I do not know if anybody has observed on Canadian website, if you want to upgrade to dual 675M it says $350 but actually it takes $400.00

 

IT'S A CONSPIRACY!!!!
Um it's probably confusing btwn us and Canadian dollars :/

 

Whatever it is, they charge people extra money when it shows different... I am surprised that such a mistake is not yet rectified?!

 

The power supply goes from from 240W to 330W, and that's why it's $50 more.

 

everything, IT'S A CONSPIRACY!!!!
when it come to competicion. brother B.S

 

Ok that makes much more sense

yes yes it is !

 

Definitely looking forward to 680M SLi action. I won't touch 7970M Xfire, I've had enough of AMD drivers.

 

Looking at the R2 manual....same CPU/GPU heatsinks. Nothing was improved there. So, one extra HDD and mSata instead of WIHD. Sadly, that's where I turn away from this refresh, if it can be so called. Was expecting more from Dell, really...

 

I don't disagree that there could have been more in terms of features, Aiki.

But for those of us that are primarily interested in brute force over features, it's not so bad. Ivy Bridge is not much to write home about for Sandy Bridge owners. Higher memory clockspeed and bandwidth for owners of Ivy Bridge Extreme procs may prove interesting, but the 7970M (and potentially 680M... which will hopefully be released) represents substantial improvements in performance for new Alienware systems so equipped. By all appearances, the 675M appears to be a renamed 580M, but there are some subtle changes in GPU architecture that might bring a small boost over 580M. We will have to wait and see what the benchmark results look like to know if the 675M is an improvement worth caring about. Personally, if I had to choose between horsepower and features, I would go with the former instead of the latter, but both would be nice.

BTW, the mSATA drive is not occupying the WIHD slot. It occupies a slot we don't have in our systems, so the WIHD hardware still has a place to be installed. I hope that option becomes available again. It could be a supplier issue, or maybe just something with low sales volume that they don't want to support any more. Here is a photo from the M18x R2 owner's manual showing where the mSATA drive is installed.
.

For someone that does not already own an M18x R1 or an M17x R3, they are getting better tech for their dollar than we did. I wish I had the third HDD bay. I would not need to have my BluRay burner in an external enclosure if there were enough drive bays in my current system. Although, I did finally find a use for the Alienhead dome decals, LOL.


So, yes... nothing really amazing other than GPU horsepower. A couple of things I really do wish I had, but nothing compelling enough to replace my system. Having said all that, there is no way to dismiss the new models as not representing very welcomed improvements. An RGB LED or IPS display and matte screen would have been very nice options, but I suspect that some buyers on a stricter budget would give those added costs a pass in favor of more powerful CPU and GPU options, SSD versus HDD, etc.

Edit: WIHD not being available may be a temporarily vendor supply issue... hopefully. Saw this posted in the WIHD thread.

 

I discussed with a rep today here in Japan. There is currently a huge promotion campaign with almost 500 dollars rebate on m18x r1.
When I asked when the campaign would be over, he told me on the 9th. When I asked if it was the schedule for ivy and 675m replacement, he told me he expected 7970m as well!
I asked him where the source came from and he told me"inside dell" ressource.
Take it with a pinch of salt, but the date is quite a coincidence...

 

Wow Mr. Fox very well said I'd quote you but that'd take too much space either way + 1

 

So it is true that there won't be a WiFiHD for M18X-R2. This is a massiv drawback as I would like to play PC Games on my TV via WiFiHD. Is there no chance of ever getting it??

 

I doubt they'll take out such an option the new wireless cards are just around the corner so you might wanna just wait a bit and see if dell is just waiting for that to come out

EDIT: http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/Alw_M18xR2/en/specs/specs_en.swf
Go to that then about your system, communications and you can see that there is wirelesshd they must be out of stock or something

 

AMD Radeon HD 7970M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-3920XM Processor Extreme Edition,Alienware M18xR2 score: P10310 3DMarks

 

Nice that defo beats out a 590 as expected

 

Wow! That's serious Horse power, wow...!!!

 

Yh it is and the best part is it should go up by another 1-2k when proper drivers are out ( a single can go almost 6.5k I think : http://3dmark.com/3dm11/3301607)

 

That why I don't like about nv, renaming the the cards. This is a good example of AMD. The performance of the 7970M is twice of the performance of the 6990M!

 

Where did you get this score? Do you have an M18x with 7970M CrossFire?