*OFFICIAL* M18x Owner's Lounge Thread

what games have you tested?

 

I don't have the m18x yet, but I play the witcher 2 at a stable 60 fps with my desktop.

everything on and at max except ubersampling

 

Hello Aikimox,

Thank you for your proposal but I want a 18 inch laptop screen with a SLI or CrossFire of the best graphics cards. I also want a good keyboard.

The autonomy of course goes into the background in my decision making.

Does anyone know when a new version of the m18x comes? And if there is a chance for an upgrade version of the screen in 3D Visioin (120Hz)?

One last question, in case I buy my m18x Now, is it possible to change the screen with a 3D version later?

 

As far as "best graphics cards" goes, thats a choice of either 6990m or 580m Sli right now. Asking for a definitive answer as to which is best, you would be hard pushed to find anyone give you a 100% correct answer. Both are extremely powerful. They may handle different games "differently"...heavy tesselated stuff should be suited to the Nvidia's. If you have a look at the M18x Benchmark Thread you will see how the two compare.

I dont think anyone knows WHEN an M18x R2 will be released...I would say it WILL be done but none of us have crytal balls or Tarot Cards to tell exactly when...

No Idea about 3d Internal Screen - Obviously, that would be tied in with the release of a mythical M18x R2

As for upgrading later if Dell actually introduce a 3d screen, that should be do-able but likely would be very expensive....unless someone like Aikimox sorted a 3d custom option....

 

Does using the HDMI output of the laptop cause lots of input lag?

I have a 3D Panasonic Plasma TV.. using the HDMi from my desktop PC causes noticeable input lag...

If this laptop has very little input lago I would be able to play in 3D with my TV.... if the 6990's allow playing in 3d...

 

You won't even notice it, I played Witcher 2 and Crysis 2 on my Panasonic VT25 and it was amazing, hard to go back to the Xbox360

 

Yeah I know and that's why I did not ask about it

I was wondering if Alienware had a habit of releasing a new product for Christmas for example. Someone can find a chart or the release dates of products Alienware?

I prey for it !

Prey for it too


Anyway thank you for your answer !

 

^^ Second that.

As for the 3D, you won't be able to upgrade later on even if such panel appears on the market, in order to remove the stock screen you have to tear off the Edge-to-Edge glass cover and that would void the warranty.

 

Guys! Anyone having stability problem with the M18X?

At start up the labtop freeze with black screen and four BIG BEEPS (this happen randomly and not every time)and then it restart again many times till OS start up.Dell sayed it may be caused by MB or Mem malfunction and they send a technician who did only change the gpu!?
I told him that this wont resolve the problem but he ignored my comment. I was not happy with changing the gpu as the new one run hotter than the old one (53) when idle. 1 day later the same problem occured again. I called dell and they told me they will send a mb, mem and both gpu.

Anyone had the same problem? Heeelp?

 

Hey guys, i have just installed the latest 280.26 Verde from Nvidia with Modded nvdm.inf and just want to share my 3dmark bench before and after new drivers.

Default Dell driver
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-2920XM Processor,Alienware M18xR1 score: P23861 3DMarks

Verde 280.26
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-2920XM Processor,Alienware M18xR1 score: P28105 3DMarks

 

Have you tried considering getting one from HIDevolution.com? they got pretty great prices with aftermarket add ons with great deals also..

I caught one dead pixel only on black you can see it though

 

gpu score is the same but cpu score has increased uuuum...

 

they are the same.... one is using physx and the other one isn't...speculation of course

 

Ivander'd the same thing....(sorry, couldnt resist.... no offense meant to the OP btw....j/k)

 

Yeah, but do-able, right? - with the right screen and the "Cajones" lol....

 

Lol your second run is with physix on 50000+ CPU I think not

 

You probably need to reset the BIOS (unplug the BIOS battery for). Don't forget to enter the BIOS, set the SATA controller back to whatever it was, set the system date/time.

Power drain would also be a good idea.

Oh, you can reflash the BIOS too.

 

Tank you Aikimox. I ll try that later.

 

I am having a quandary. I have the 6970s in my m18x ( great deal as they handsomly compensated me due to the 6990 release right after I bought and rushed my shipment to me). Games are playing great! LOVING maxing out crysis which I couldn't quite do with my old R2. However, these 6990s are looking beastly. Worthwhile upgrade or should I wait for the 7 series? I really have no problem with games out now (and probably most in the future). However I REALLY want to play MW3 and BF3 at native resolution. I can deal with maybe toned down shadows as long as my shading and textures stay at max. I KNOW this is speculation.

So:
1. Are the 6970CF a powerful solution (right now they are proving to be a decent upgrade from my 5870s). Should they run next years games?
2. They seem to OC VERY WELL.
3. Should I just upgrade and sell off my 6970s? I would easily justify it if I had 5870s due to the greater than 50% gain in performance (likely to get bigger due to bandwidth and overall design. The 6990 is a harder value prop....seems like I would be paying a lot for 5-10FPS more.

What would you guys do as I do take that into consideration to what I ultimately would decide to do.

 

Hi Aikimox, did you refer to coin-cell battery by "BIOS battery"?? cant find any battery directly mounted on the mb.

 

your links go nowhere

 

Should be a rubberized covered coin size battery right on top of the RAM, it has a cable (couple of inch one) that goes from the battery to the Motherboard.

 

Thank you Xeneize for your help and thanks to you Aikimox, however I tried your idea but no luck. Tomorrow dell technician is coming home and Ill request changing the mb, gpu &mem. I hope this problem is not related with other interfaces malfunction (circuit shortage etc) for usb hdmi interfaces etc.

 

can any owners chime in to my questions posted above? I'd appreciate it. Thanks all.

 

Here's how I look at it - if the 6970 xfire can run anything you throw at it (and will likely be able to do so far the foreseeable future), why bother spending over a grand on an upgrade that will net you minimal results? As you said, upgrading from the 5870s makes sense, but the 6970? I PERSONALLY don't think so.

Then again, if you have a ton of disposable income burning a hole in your pocket...

 

Heh thanks for the reply. I definitely don't. I basically have two hobbies, cars and gaming. I got the m18x and then the Air conditioning went out in my Viper GTS ACR. Too afraid to see what that would cost to repair..and i am NOT rich. I just happened to get a great deal on it in 2009 when the economy was completely tanked and a desperate seller. People are shocked that my car cost less than a loaded mustang GT.

 

how do i get my macro keys to work? Its not recognized in command center and I dunno how to configure them, perhaps theyre off by default?

 

Nope they re not off by default. I had the same problem in my case the lights wiring was faulty.

 

damnit. they dont even respond and Im not sure where to configure them. do you think its a hardware issue then? I just got the laptop today.


the amount of flex on the keyboard is phenomenal as well. I really dont want to deal with a repair or dell's cs. besides nactowag, every dell employee ive spoken to has been nothing short of incompetent or condescending

 

1) launch the command center
2) click on the "macro keys" icon
3) click "change color"
4) choose any color by double clicking and see if the keys color change.
if not you may 1st need to check your macro keys connector to MB

 

theres no macro keys icon in command center. Im not sure if i wanna open it up already

 

Glad to hear you got your laptop. I'm not looked into the Macro keys yet.

I do have a rattle unfortunatly coming from the top left by the screen hinge.

I think I'll have to get it looked at......could be a screw...could be a capacitor....?!?!? All seems to work though.

 

um so do your macro keys work inoton? and did you update your bios?

 

No I havent checked my BIOS version either yet.

I have noticed that when in the bios my machine is set to RAID, yet I only have one harddrive....so I'm confused about that.

Many years ago I remember having RAID enabled when only 1 drive slowed things down.

My AlienFX takes a while to open too!

 

Macro keys seem to work fine. They are all assigned to F1-F5 at the moment.

 

time to process an exchange I guess

 

you could look at taking the keyboard out.

do the keys have light?

could be a dodgy connector....getting to it should be easy...as it is what you would need to do to add RAM to slots 3+4.

Although appreciated we shouldnt have to do this. My rattle is in a place where I think it needs major dismantlement to get to....Everything else is fine, so I think I'll get a repair guy out to do it for me.

 

I can't believe how fast GPU's are coming out now eh? I looked at the 7 series roadmap and "supposedly" it's due first quarter 2012 and double the performance of the 6 series. Fortunately it looks to be compatible with our systems and if that performance is true....I will upgrade those for sure. When I had my m15x, the 8800GTX stayed strong for quite awhile. The next two cards were improvements but not orders of magnitude of what is coming out.

 

RAID is the default setting. It does not cause any problems and doesn't slow anything down. I think the setting merely enables the RAID configuration utility during boot.

 

Cheers Fox

Also how do I disable SyncUp? I no likey.

Also installed my 16GB ram....went looking for the rattle and a screw fell out. No where obvious to screw it into, so I've left it out.

Guess I'lll just live with it.

Taking off the surround was harder that I though and I ended up bending one of the clicky bits, so I does sit completely flush...no big deal.

 

Inoton - what is SyncUp? I'm not familiar with that.

Edit: I just Googled and found this - SyncUP powered by Nero Details | Dell ...appears to be some kind of crap for transferring data to mobile devices... I don't have it on my M18x. If you are not going to use it, I would just uninstall it. If you want to keep it and just don't want it running in the background, you can look in the All Programs > Startup folder and move or delete the shortcut, (if there is one,) or run MSCONFIG and find/uncheck it on the Startup tab.

I generally disable all startup programs for everything that I can find that is not absolutely necessary, leaving only startup items such as antivirus software.

 

when I put even the slightest bit of pressure to push the lid back, the lower right portion of my screen gives a weird liquid effect like someone pressed too hard against it. Is that...normal?

Im not bending the lid all the way back or unnecessarily roughing it up or anything. The faintest touch will do it

 

Nope. Thats not normal. I can move my lid about till the sun comes up and no image distortions at all...(apart from the "glossy reflections" in sunlight....grrrr)

 

Doesnt sound right. If your having problems I would seriously get the tech round. You could send it off I guess.

I've just installed my other 8GB of RAM and found the screw....fell out when I took the control center off.

The surround hasnt gone back on flush...but you have to actually look to see that it hasnt sat back on properly near the hinges...

So all in all I'm pretty happy...

Two changes I would make:

Stop leaving empty screws in the laptop...I'm not the only one this has happened to!

Put all four memory slots more accessible....stupid design.


Question: If I ever need to get it serviced, I take it I don't really need to take out my memory and put the old back in? Unless I guess I'm sending it off.

 

You got it. Unless you wanna give Dell the memory you paid for! - I have kept my 4gb stock Dell memory in the blister pack that my HyperX came in...tucked it away nice and safe and should the need to return arise...out comes my ram and in goes Dells stuff.

 

Think I'm missing the trick with the tactx keys. TRied to configure them but they do nothing, other than command 1 seems to act like an F1 key.

Note: Fixed the problem. Looks like I have to restart the machine for the changes in the macro settings to take effect. Or perhaps I just need to restart AlienFX

 

sorry I didnt wanna convert a avchd so i took the vid in poor quality mp4 format. The problem with the screen is seen as that anomaly on the right. Its a bit hard to make out but slighting putting pressure on the top or anywhere else on the screen deforms the bottom right.

I just got the computer yesterday night and already my macros dont work and the screen is acting very weird. =/

Video - TinyPic - Free Image Hosting, Photo Sharing & Video Hosting

It isnt a reflection or noise from the camera, its a ripple in the screen

 

Cant watch the vid at the moment mate...on an ipad and it looks like it needs flash :-(

Id phone tech support and be polite about getting them to fix it.

Maybe get them to send a new one out while u continue to use that one?

 

im on the phone with them now, indian call center =/

 

Good luck!