*OFFICIAL* Alienware M18x Benchmark Thread

If there are any folks reading this thread and wondering about enabling AMD Overdrive in CCC that are a bit apprehensive about it and would like a step-by-step with images, I have created one just for you.

I have posted it for public access on Google Docs. Here is a link.

 

+rep for that fox.

 

Thanks, John. Favor returned, buddy.

 

no problem.
yeah...i really need to get on that...dave keeps looking at me like i forgot him..

 

Great guide Fox.....top marks buddy....repped already!

 

Thanks. I might have to do this on my benching drive.


+1

 

The heat from a fan is negligible but its hard to measure unless in a lab with suitable equipments as the heat from nearby devices or the very device its trying to cool can skew the readings.

MTBF depends on the coils and components used to make the fan, Forcecon might have the documents, but I couldn't find them on their site.

 

Hey guys, the search function is acting up so sorry since I'm positive this has been answered

What would be the max I can push the 6970s to before bad things start happening? I have them pretty stable at 850/1175 but I wanna know if I can push more for benchmarking

 

Every card is unique so everyone's max limit will definitely vary. Mine can't go over 800 on core and 1200 on VRAM. So you are sitting pretty right now.

Whatever highest clocks you can go upto without crashing after 20-30mins of heavy game play is considered stable. Crysis games are very sensitive to overclock instabilities so if the clocks are good enough for Crysis it should be a stable overclock.

Target higher core clocks first as they yield the most improvement in fps, once You have determined that go high on the VRAM, the moment you see artifacts forming on screen that is when you know you need to back off by 20Mhz atleast.

Keep close watch on both GPU temps don't let them exceed 85C on Core and VRAM.

 

Great advice.. would you say don't go over 85C when figuring out max overclock or you mean in games?

 

If you would like your GPU to last 3-4 years then you shouldn't exceed that level of temps.

It depends, some people are sure they wont use it for more than 2 years then its fine. Take out the old toss in the new faster GPUS. But if they planned on selling them thats not ethical as those cards are sure to fail after all that abuse it took while the first person overclocked it very high.

You might get even higher overclocks and it may still be stable, but if the temps are going up, you will only be taking life out of it.

Try your overclocks, study them and find the thermal and highest clock limits. You can make an excel sheet or something that we can go through and we can easily tell what is the best sweet spot for you in terms of long term usage.

 

Great seems for me 1000 on mem may be better than the 1200 and 800-820 on core I'll have to get some testing to get some results to post. I had been concentrating on a lot of work on my cpu.

 

Hey All,

Just got my new Beast today. not doing to much with it (how can I restrain myself???) until thursday when I'm off work and can install SSD and RAM but I did a 3Dmark Vantage just now.

Is P23023 pretty good for straight out of the box?

Thanks for input.

 

Seems in the ballpark to me....my system also has 6990 and 2960xm and I think my stock vantage was in the 23k area....high 23k I think.....done before installing ram and ssd and updating video drivers....(vantage can be a bit hit n miss though....scores can vary quite a bit I found....my stock 3dmark 11 was a smidge over 6500 fwiw)

 

Thanks, will get to work optimising drivers etc once the SSD is in and give it another run. Shame I have to work the next two days..

 

Same scores here, lol. BTW, your sticker has shipped.

Enjoy your beast! Great setup, m8!

 

Your the man Aiki! - thanks buddy. Let me know what the score is regards settling up with you....

 

There's no score!

 

Top man Aiki! - thanks a million - I owe ya one

 

No worries! Invite me for a pint of Weihenstephan some day

 

Hahaha - consider yourself invited. Anytime!

 

Gotta say, not much of a fan of the new HWBot.org since they changed over to the new revision.

 

It's really buggy and almost impossible to make points with mobile hardware... but afaik it's the only way to easily compare and show off scores.

 

True, If you look at my points in my profile, you can see when they made the switch. I went from around 125pts, down to 47 or so. And now when I make submissions, they don't even go toward my total points, just team points. I like the old one because when I made submissions and gained overall points, it felt like progress. Not it just doesn't give that kind of satisfaction.

 

join the points lost crew. i dropped quite a bit, but still stayed around the same place.

as to mobile... it's because they is just not enough people in the mobile benching comunity to raise the points. so when you submit...the bot only takes your top 20 scores for personal. so with 2 points being the most you can gain, (98 percent of the time)you can't get higher then the max. 20 x 2.

but it is a great place to have all records stored for compairson.

 

I need to havest some organs to get some powerhouse systems!


NICKSHIH, I'M COMING FOR YOU!!!! as soon as I sell this kidney on ebay...

 

or just sell yours and catch the outlet slipping with a high end setup for 2500 to 3100 bucks..

 

Too much money in mine, I'd make 1/5th of what I have in it

And the wife would kill me lol.


Have you purchased the registration to PCMark7? I'm comtemplating it. I like the PCMarks as they are full system benches, but this one is $40.

Another thing I noticed is that it definately doesn't seem to make use of Crossfire during the benchmark tests. Max load on my second card was 11.4%.

With a CPU TDP of 90W and stock everything else, my score was 4183 Marks.

 

I have not paid more than $9.99 for a benchmark

 

Nice. Think i paid the standard $19.95 for most of mine.

 

same here. 19.95

i havent even looked into pcmark7 yet...but i do run the others...so maybe in time...i might grab it.

 

LOL. I can't even get upgrades or anything on my rig. I have the opposite problem most have. The hypothetical "wife will kill me" already happened....nasty divorce. I just am keeping the m18x and viper gts acr...HOPEFULLY. LMAO. Tis life. Enjoy what you have, while you can!

 

The trick is you get 01 on sale and then only pay for upgrade price for 03 from 01, then 05 from 03 and so on

I already had 06 and vantage free from desktop parts

 

Nice, I wish I had done that. +1



@John - Didn't even realize till yesterday you swapped your system. Hows 2960XM treating ya? Is it similiar to the 920XM vs 940XM? Also how are your impressions on the 580M vs 6990M? Or hav eyou even had time to play?

Pretty sure it does. Havn't had a chance to ride in just over two years since I went overseas and came back and moved. Bike is still at my parents Since I havn't ridden I havn't missed it too much. Occasionally I get the itch, and want to ride some wheelies, but then I recall all the times I've almost wrecked due to others not seeing me (not doing crazy stuff) and I kinda shy away from wanting to ride. Not to mention I've managed to walk away from a few wrecks with minimal damage. But nothing beats riding a wheelie down the freeway in down town Cleveland in a suit and tie with a cop cruising behind you with his lights on. Didn't see him there till I put it down Felt all James Bond like. He didn't even ticket me, just said I had poor timing, even complimented it

Ok done with my OT rant

 

i haven't gotten it yet....it'll be a few weeks.

and that's "good looking out on the police"

 

is there an 11.9 driver?

 

11.9 WHQL: http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m15x/610133-catalyst-11-9-drivers.html

11.10 Preview: http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m15x/614251-catalyst-11-10-drivers.html

 

first run on my new m18x

http://3dmark.com/3dm11/1909812

830/1140 cats 11.10 preview

cpu 2760 @ 106bclk

1600mhz ram @ 11-11-11.... this garbage from dell is killing me

 

wow...best to not flaunt any new toys when bills or home improvements are needed...

 

Wow, that's just sick. Congrats.

I cannot get my 6990M CFX to go over 800/1100 without the drivers crashing under load in FurMark or freezing in 3DMark11 and I am running 11.10 preview as well. Our systems are essential configured the same and I have CPU set at 106 bclk. (My signature has not been updated yet.)

Are the cards synch'd at that speed? Not sure what I'm doing wrong. I could not get the 6970M CFX in the other M18x to go past that 800/1100 wall without freezing either.

Getting the "Display driver amdkmdap stopped responding and has successfully recovered" error. I have tried Dell, 11.6, 11.7, 11.8, 11.9 and now 11.10 Catalyst packages, and always the same result.

I'm checking temps and they're fine. Also running HWiNFO64 with fans full blast and staying around 75ish under full GPU load.

 

3DMark11 Score: P7797
Graphics Score: 8153
Physics Score: 7526
Combined Score: 6125
Graphics Test 1: 34.68 FPS
Graphics Test 2: 38.73 FPS
Graphics Test 3: 48.67 FPS
Graphics Test 4: 26.58 FPS
Physics Test: 23.89 FPS
Combined Test: 28.49 FPS

Spoiler

Vantage Score: P25325
Graphics Score: 26475
CPU Score: 22405
Jane Nash: 79.46 FPS
New Calico: 75.58 FPS
AI Test: 3087 operations/s
Physics Test: 30 operations/s

Spoiler

 

Alright Fox ... I am going to assume you have checked disable ULPS ? (i know thats assumed but just checking)

I would suggest not syncing your cards, opening two different copies of Trixx and independently OCing your cards to see if one is failing ....

 

Shaden - thanks for the response, buddy. Yes, I have disabled ULPS.

I have tried doing the cards unsynched and get the same result on both cards. I can leave stock clocks on one and move the other up and usually hangs 3DMark11 in the very first test once I set core clocks over 805 or 810. It's inconsistent on both cards. Set at 800 performance is consistent and never hangs. I switch and do the same on the other card and get the same result.

As far as temps go, the driver crash occurs so soon after launch they don't even get a chance to overheat. As I mentioned, temps are usually 75ish. I use FurMark run in a window to watch my desktop during testing an get the same behavior as 3DMark11, 3DMark06 and Vantage. When the crash occurs, I get the "Display driver amdkmdap stopped responding and has successfully recovered" error. Sometimes a BSOD occurs that points to the amdkmdap driver. I have run the HWiNFO64 logging utility to confirm the CSV file shows no issues with temps since I cannot see my RealTemp systray monitoring utility while running FutureMark benches and that also rules out overheating. The driver crash usually occurs under 65C.

I thought perhaps using AMD Overdrive might somehow make a difference, but the behavior is the same as using Trixx... rock solid up to 800/1100, inconsistent around 805-810 on core and totally unstable with a guaranteed "Display driver amdkmdap stopped responding and has successfully recovered" event at 815 or higher.

Here's what I think is really strange. My first M18x with 6970 CFX had the exact same issue. The cards were replaced. They had the identical problem. Now I have a brand new M18x with 6990 CFX and it does the exact same thing, at the exact same clock speeds. That's why I asked what I am doing wrong here, or am I just that unlucky. Because it's unlikely I am just unlucky three times in a row (but not impossible) I am reluctant to accept it as defective video cards.

On this new M18x I have not installed any of my normal games and apps. The only things I have installed are FurMark, 3Dmark11, 3DMark06, Vantage, RealTemp, HWiNFO64, Google Chrome browser, DriverSweeper and CCleaner. So, I doubt it's an installed app that is causing the driver crashes.

I have tried skipping past intermediate clock speeds on the chance that something odd happens at varying core clocks. I have tried 820, 825, 830, 840 and 850. The only thing that changes is at higher speeds the freeze happens sooner (like within two seconds) or the benchmark refuses to launch and the driver crashes while it is loading. Again, identical experience on two sets of 6970 and the new 6990 cards.

 

Everything works fine at stock speeds though right?

 

Yes - everything works perfect at stock speeds on the new system and it did on the old system with the original and replacement cards. (Under those circumstances, I probably cannot expect Alienware to do much, LOL.)

 

This is the weirdest thing ever ... I had a very similar situation with my first system with 6970s as well ... it wouldn't OC to save my life, always crashed out, was very disappointing ... new system obvs OCs like crazy with 6990s. I can't imagine what you might be donig wrong though fox. You would think there would be some change, like these cards would hit 820 core or 830 or only 790 ... SOMETHING. To have the same clock threshold at random is like winning the lottery ... in the worst way possible.

 

It is not unlikely to happen 3X. I guess you are going to have to ask yourself do you want to go through this process to get another system simply for OC? I mean technically not all cards OC the same; or even at all.

There is only a slight chance I keep my system for two years. I will likely get the R2 at it's mid maturity and upgrade to the likely successor of the 7 series. What I have is fine for until that day and my system is weaker than yours as I have 6970s. Based on your posting and passion for gaming I would imagine you are a breed like myself. However, I think a dell technician will likley just come to your home and replace your existing GPU's and you will call it a day. If it still doesn't work..stay away from me at all costs because I don't want that luck around me

 

i would drop that bclk over clock first of all(stock). then see if you can over clock the cards higher.
set ccc settings to amd defaults as well.
put up gpuz x 2. (one for each card. and set it to temp page)
run jane nash for 20 seconds then stop test and check temps.

 

I often set the temp page to MAX temps as well, instead of just temps.

 

you can always just click it at any time...it keeps a record once gpuz is started.