*OFFICIAL* Alienware 18 Owner's Lounge Thread

Yea, it really blew me away with how huge it was when I got it. Got used to it very quickly though and now it's pretty comfortable no matter what I do with it. Even sitting on the couch web browsing with the iGPU turned on, it's pretty comfortable. And the screen is definitely great. Absolutely blew away my step dad's M17xR4 and my little bro's M14xR1 side by side, and it's much less reflective. Only downside is the giant, hideous bezel. It's a monster though. Doesn't take much work to get some great benching scores, especially compared to the 17 I had for a couple weeks, which had several issues with the GPU. The cooling is way better as well, remaining very quiet under full load and absolutely silent otherwise, and helps stabilize those higher overclocks.

 

Any insight into how long the system lasts on just the iGPU? I remember the M18x being able to to last 6+ hours with its 12 cell battery.

 

Igpu is not available in the sli system. I don't see it listed in the device manger as not display options for anything but my 780's through the nvidia stuff. No intel display options are present in my system.

 

That shouldn't be the case, though I do not currently have a system to verify that claim with. There should be a way to manually switch to the iGPU from the sli 780m's with a button combination (or single press).

 

You have to make the switch call to change to iGPU for it to be visible. I think it is Fn & F1 on the new machines.....

 

Fn+f5 on my AW 14. I suppose it's the same on the 18. Ill try it at some point.

 

Out of curiosity, does running CPUs and GPUs at their limits during overclocking wear them out faster? I ask because say in car racing, the engines are pretty much pushed to the brink in terms of rpms, HEAT!!, etc...and after a car race, the engine is toast. Was just curious since these are electronic parts and heat is generally bad for electronics, machinery, etc...in terms of wear and tear.

Maybe it's something where it won't last 20 years, but now lasts 5 years so it's still good, but was just wondering if this has ever been tested/researched...

 

It is FN+F5 on all the new machines, whether manual (18) or Optimus (14, 17). The only systems that cannot use the Intel HD IGFX are the 17's with the 120Hz 3D display.

 

My bad. I must have gotten confuddled somewhere along the lines....I knew it had changed from the old Fn & F7 switch call combo...

If you run anything hard enough and long enough, it's gonna take a toll on how long they will last. If I boiled my kettle every 10 minutes continuously for a sustained period of time (us Brits like Tea, y'know LOL) then it ain't gonna last long if I do that ALL the time.... I think the hardware is robust enough to take a fair bit of hammer, but running insane clocks 24/7 is just going to ask for trouble.

I think you would be fairly safe running a moderately heavy gpu OC for gaming sessions, same goes for cpu - the cpu probably will take a LOT more abuse than gpu's due to Intel's built in safety protocols/thermal limits - and then back it off for normal use, and you would be fine....

 

Just Ordered, Alienware 18 BTX Base Mod Max Out with 780M in SLI, Estimated Delivery Date 09/30/2013

 

BTX Base Mod - ? What's that?

 

It's just Dell jargon on the order - each model/order comes with BTX base model on it......the upgrades are 'on top' if you like....just the base model from each 'tier', really...

Side note: I had to laugh at Brother Bumbo's reason for editing his post above: None - nice one, Bro! - made me chuckle, probably unintentionally!

 

That's what I was thinking when I first saw that. I think it's really redundant though because it doesn't matter which tier, as long as you order an AW 18 you always get "Alienware 18 BTX Base Mod" as the machine.

 

the strange thing is that I called alienware sale department this morning to order. and I was unable to order with 780M, so the dell representative call me back to tell me that now he can do it with the 780M. and I got 10% off, mUhahahaha!!!

if any body want my agent contact inf. just let me know

 

Well BF3 is downloaded. Ran on high settings, 1080p res max temp was 60c, max frame rate was 115 but CPU utilization was only running 54% on both cards.

The CPU utilization should be higher o think?

 

I've noticed the agents internally have always been able to do more custom configs. Most likely, the 780 is in limited supply so they don't want it to be open season on the website since delivery times are so long already.

 

Send it my way!

 

I would greatly greatly appreciate it if you could send the contact info my way as well

thanks!

 

That's good to know, because I want to order the third tier maxed out, but with the 780's, which of course is not available on the website... I'll give them a call.

 

Hi

Test Alien 18 3Dmark 11

CG Stock SLI GTX 765
CPU Stock

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 765M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-4700MQ,Alienware 01W2J2

 

That's a pretty nice score for 765M's.

 

O/C +50 core +400 mem
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 765M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-4700MQ,Alienware 01W2J2

 

outta curiosity, how much did your config end up costing?

 

about 5 G.

 

*whistles* good to know, I can't afford to go that high sadly, just what were your full specs? you must have decked it out more than just the 4930MX and 780M SLI listed in your sig

 

Man... I saved that money specially for this. I got 4 years warranty and 4 years accident damage.

If you just going to play games, just get Lower CPU and the 780M in sli, and you will be ok. My M18XR1 still running games very well.

 

Just thought I'd share this with you guys.

Regards
Steve.

 

yeah I'm aiming for the third model but upgrade to 512GB mSATA and the 780M sli, hoping to get in at $3500 with this 10% off for veterans coupon and have a $4000 limit

though if they won't do mSATA with Win 8 I guess I'll have to wait on it, can they sell me the mSATA separate? I've never tried ordering parts from Dell before

 

Well, I had my aw 18 since august 5. So far I'm happy with my "base config" 4700mq, 765m and 64gb SSD cache.

I did a slim OC on the cpu and GPUs. the cpu oc is quite limited, but damn those 765m OC well. Quite a nice performance increase OC over stock.

A bit disapointed some games still dont handle SLI very well (aka wow run on 1 card...) and the 770m are better for that kind of scenario. (the 780m would be even better) but for the price of the 765m I'm still quite satisfied.

Most of the more recent game run and look awesome using the sli 765m even if not on par with the 780m monsters wallet munchers.

I'm planning on installing an 840 ssd pretty soon and reinstall the os on it. but the 64gb cache ssd on the 750gb hdd isnt slow either. As for the 8gb ram, i was planning on installing more, but I just dont see the need for it yet.

I think my only real complain is there is never enough usb ports on those laptop lol

 

What core and memory clock speed are you able to hit with the 765's? I agree with your comments on the USB ports,..you can never have enough. Glad you are happy with your purchase.

 

what did you use to overclock the cpu? how much did you get out of it?

 

via the bios on the overclock setting. I've set the max limit multiplicator to 36, 35, 34, 34 (instead of the default 34,33,33,32). And I been able to overclock the 100mhz FSB by a few mhz. like 102.5mhz. the 4700mq is locked so cant be overclocked by much. Running prime95 the cpu was running around 3.3-3.42 ghz. So really, not a very big overclock. :/ the 4930xm should see way higher OC.

As for the 765m, using msi after burner I run it at +135mhz core (limit of the software) and +800mhz on the memory clock. I was starting to see diminishing returns and somes glitches in kombustor going higher memory clock than this.

(You need to import a sli profile for kombustor to run the 765m in sli, by default it only stress test on 1 card)

 

So, for you AW 18 owners out there: Does the 4 900MQ come with a triple-pipe heat sink?

 

I was so sure I'd seen a picture somewhere of the GPU and CPU heatsinks, but can't find it again. From the technical manual it seems like it's a twin pipe setup for the GPUs and tripple for the CPU. Attached from the tech manual




EDIT --> found it :hi2: if you go to this video and skip ahead to 0:53 you'll see the heat sinks in all their glory

 

Here are a few of my teardown photos showing the inside of the Alienware 18.

<iframe class='imgur-album' width='100%' height="550" frameborder='0' src="http://imgur.com/a/qDOan/embed"></iframe>

 

Thanks Mr. Fox! That's what I wanted to see... The video must be showing the base model AW 18.

It's good to know that the 4900MQ and 4930MX both come with the same heat sink.

 

Cool... glad that's helpful. I posted teardown photos of the AW 17 over here... http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...ware-17-owners-lounge-thread.html#post9236305

 

Nice pictures. The 18's chassis looks much more solid than the 17's.

Those metal prongs in which the hinges rotate look like aluminum or steel, but I have seen something like magnesium alloy on other units.

 

Thanks! The 17 and 18 both are well made, but the 18 chassis is "bulletproof" LOL. It's amazing how it's built.

I need to disassemble both of them again, so I will take more photos of the 18 and add them to this same album/compilation.

 

Great Pictures Mr. Fox. Maybe a teardown video coming soon...hint hint.

 

where do u get the HDD bracket that goes in the DVD slot?

 

You can buy it anywhere. Amazon or Ebay. Just Google it. Usually less than $10.

I think all AW 18 with the 780M will come with triple pipes for everything. Not sure about the other GPU configs, but no matter what CPU you choose it should come with triple pipe.

 

if you get the model that doesn't come with a blu-ray drive do you need a bracket to put a blu-ray drive in it?

I feel sorta dumb having to ask this >_<

 

The model that doesn't have the blu-ray drive has the DVD drive. The bracket is there.

 

Finally made it to the UK and got a hold of my aw 18. So far looks like a good build. No wifi problems when gaming online. And GPUs work well. But as some user do have some bleeding of the screen when in darker areas in game or at boot screen. It is kind of a green glow.

Did a backup with respawn so now need to go SSD hunting

Edit: The aw 18 fits into the asus rog backpack that game with my G73jh lol.

 

Nice to see you finally got your hands on the beast, shame about the backlighting issue. How bad is it? - can you post pictures?

 

It came with an extra HDD and no optical drive. I prefer that configuration since I almost never use an optical drive and already have an external optical drive that I use for the M18xR2. I can use it on the 18 as well... just swap the eSATAp cable for USB.

 

Only have my phone to take photos but it shows the green bleeding light.


Also move the screen or press on the bezel ( light touch) and it gets greener were it already is bleeding Other areas are not efected.
not touching the bezel

touching


I cant see the green if the lighting is normal in the room. If turn light off then you can see the bleeding.

Defective screen ?


Temps seem ok on the 780m-s 80c on one gpu and 77c on the other when heaven benchmark was running. Funny thing is then the win 7 admin screen pops up when installing something for a sec you can see the glow of the alien head in back through the screen

Other then that really like the new machine. And thanks again steviejones133 for hooking me up with dell rep to get the beast. I owe you and Shashi a round of drinks :thumbsup:

 

Yeah, I noticed that too, that the 512 mSATA is not compatible with Windows 8 - what's the deal with that?

 

Found this over on TechInferno, not sure if it's done the rounds already as it was "back in the day" when the laptops were somewhat protected by the sleeve. Painful to watch !

http://video.sina.com.cn/v/b/99873463-1705961623.html