*OFFICIAL* M18x R1/R2 Owner's Lounge Thread

yea man build quality is nice, if you dont run into ones with issues, its the same for everything you buy though. but when you get a good m18x, it's the best. now let just hope in the next m18x Dell will upgrade it's internal hardware, mostly usb 3.0 controller/media card or probably just the entire mobo LOL. getting a bad taste in my mouth after finding out usb 3 speed and expresscard slot tech isn't all that great.

 

Yeah hoping this thing lasts. My last AW has held up like a champ for 4 years now. I don't expect any trouble with this one. I'm testing it pretty thoroughly in the first few weeks, any issues and I'll return. Otherwise warranty is for a year. If something is gonna go wrong, it will happen in the first year. Like I said though, my old m15x is still running perfectly. I've had to use the recovery disc a few times, but otherwise no complaints!

Who cares about the usb and expresscard slot? usb is usb to me..and it's better than usb 2 that I have on my desktop! These things change so often..whatever tech is has though works great for me. At a certain point you buy in, and you be happy with what you get rather than keep looking at whats new and what others have learned that from my Dad after watching the new ls3 come out when I had my ls2. Ls3 would be nice, but ls2 is still sweet!

 

its like saying to people who purchase dual 680m, who cares if its 680m or 7970m? only driver issues and only 10% faster, get it?. what I want is max external transfer too because I need and want that speed, if you dont want it thats fine but I think paying over 4k and not getting it is dumb. I will most certainly use it. some people maybe able to accept slow HDD, some aren't and thats that nothing more, I am unable to accept slow usb 3.0 speed and no thunderbolt when crappy macs already have them lol.

and didn't you get your new system because your old is getting slow now and you wanted something new and fast? samething, i want something new and fast, and fastest possible.

 

ok so I got my replacement 2960xm off ebay for $450 and the guy gave me 2920xm instead LOL, losing about $50 dollars aside when 2920xm should have been around 400 I just didn't care all that much and try it out isntead. after switching CPU, my computer does 4 Beeps which indicates bad RAM read/write, now that didnt make sense cause I didn't touch anything else.

thinking that I might have killed my computer/ mobo while disassembling, I gave in and re-seated my RAM, strange thing is computer started up if I leave only single stick of ram in it, doesnt matter which stick, and doesnt matter which ram slot, if its 1 stick, it works. that was messed up and I went into BIOS to set overclocking to test CPU however now only one GPU is detected from my crossfire.

is it possible with a faulty CPU say example damaged pins? or poor connection when I installed my CPU? I have yet to try putting back my old one in to try it gonna do that soon. any suggestions of what it might be?

 

Edit: All is good, again - order is incoming, ha ha.

 

Been reading forums like this for a long time and thought I'd share my recent experience.

I've been using an m11x r1 for almost 2 1/2 years now and while it has worked very well for me over the years an upgrade had become needed. So i ended up ordering an m17x r4 on black friday/cyber monday weekend and got a pretty nice deal. It had an EDD of january 8th. While that bothered me being so far away I was just happy to be getting my new pc.

Well, two days ago I got a call from dell telling me that they wouldn't be able to supply me my m17x in a timely manner so they were going to upgrade me to an m18x at no cost. Which was fine by me. However they were out of single 7970s so they let me upgrade to Xfire for a minimal increase.

Long story short, my m18x r2 is scheduled to get here on the 19th and it only cost me $1969.92 before tax! Cheaper than the base model! I am extremely happy with how this has turned out and can't wait to get my hands on it.

 

So they didnt have just one 7970 but they had enoughto provide two in xfire? Either way even with base everything else you got a killer deal! I wish they delayed my order! Lol

 

I got it because my old m15x with 64mb of vram can only play SC2 on lowest settings and even then it stutters. Kinda hard to win games that way, and being able to play Far Cry 3 is nice also...But really I got it because I am home for Christmas break, away from my desktop. It would SUCK that the only time off I get I have to spend without a computer or my games. When I'm in the middle of a semester of pharmacy school, it's pretty much study eat sleep study eat sleep. There is no time for anything else. But on break, damnit, I need my games, even if it means spending thousands of my loan money to get it. I know I could have gotten an MSI or something, but the AW is just so damn cool.

Honestly though, I will likely be returning this monster m18x at the end of the return window, because when I go back to school, you guessed it, I won't have any time for fun. If I do have time for fun, my desktop is right there. So this thing will just collect dust until summer when I come home again for break! Besides there are other things tugging at my wallet which are probably more important, like this trip to Jamaica my girlfriend keeps talking about, and a ring I need to buy, or something...(she's not telling me to buy the ring but it's been several years of dating now and it's crap or get off the pot time soon I figure lol). Man I hate growing up!

 

Yeah, I didn't really understand why they could do two but not one either. But I'm not complaining. The cpu and ram I left base but I did get the 750gb hdd with 32gb ssd as well as Killer Wireless. It's going to be one hell of and upgrade over my m11x.

 

Anyway....

If your wanting to oc that m18 call and see about changing your order to a 3840 or at least one step up. The base cpu cant be overclocked..... wish I had known that and regret not upgrading so I tell eveyone I can to upgrade from base cpu... also id ditch that hybrid hdd crap and look into getting a 830 ssd and keeping the base hdd for storage. HUGE difference between the ssd and hdd plus the 830s arent too expensive. Whatever you decide your gonna love that beast. Just dont be a tool and return it at the end of the return period window for no reason other than to drive up the prices of these machines for us honest alienware fans like some people

 

Believe me, I have no plans to return it unless there is something truly wrong with it. I debated with going for a better cpu but most people tend to say the 3630qm wont be a bottleneck in gaming. I would have liked a true ssd but seeing as how I'm purchasing it around the holidays money seems to be leaving my wallet faster than I can fill it. Initially I wasnt going get a new pc till next spring. I also figure I can upgrade the hdd later myself if I truly want increased performance. I do appreciate your advice, though. What is your oppinion on the cpu bogging down the graphics cards?

 

Hi guys,

I am under the impression that the M18X R1 has two sata 2 ports and no sata 3.... i installed the ocz vertex 4 256 gb today and attached are the crystaldiskmar benchmarks... its definately running at sata 3 speeds... i just dont understand or am i wrong about the sata ports and they are indeed sata 3..... thanks

 

Not sure where you got that information at, but it's not true. The M18XR1 has 2 sata 6gb ports and at least 2 3gb ports. (One being esata)(One being dvd drive)

 

yeah thanks my info was wrong... so disk 0 and 1 are sata 3????

was punching in the air when saw my benchmarks... lol

thanks john

 

u guys got nice reviews at TI, loved the one with dual PSU on m17x R2 rofl too bad 940xm isn't powerful enough lol. hopefully the next haswell extreme processor will be enough for next gen graphics card, heard it'll be big improvement over current ones.

 

your bench results looks right btw. with stuff installed on the SSD you will get lower performance anyway so nothing to worry. if you looking for higher results, then turn off your cstate and run CDM again but you'll also get higher CPU temp by turning it off.

 

No problem
Yep, 0 and 1 are sata 3

 

hey John do you know if a faulty CPU will cause computer not to boot up unless theres only 1 ram stick in it? i got a replacement extreme CPU and i swapped it and started into windows and it was VGA donno why, then after another restart uses the 6990m but now only 1 GPU is detected in windows and BIOS.

also for computer to boot I can only leave 1 stick of RAM in the computer, any single stick of RAM at any RAM slot is fine, or else comp black screen and beeps 4 times will not boot.

could it be a faulty channel thing in the CPU pin/socket not connecting properly? imo it shouldnt boot at all if CPU just not work.

 

Had that problem or similar to it. It was the motherboard. when i tried to run 2 or more chips...it would not boot. I added voltage and it would come on, but would error out and not boot again. you can try resetting the bios back to factory settings (f9) then try to boot.. The other thing is removing the black cable from the screen to the board and then plugging it back in. I had to do that a few times, but in the end...I got a new board and all problems went away.

 

ok i'll try the F9 and try other CPU as well. would resetting CMOS be same as F9?

 

Yep, so to speak.

 

thanks i'll try that out soon.

anyone know m18x orion backpack, how big is 2ndary compartment? the main one is 18" x 13.5" x 3" how big is the 2nd one compared to the main one? looking to fit a 17 inch notebook in the 2nd compartment..

 

Its only about 1/2" shorter. Id think a 17" would fit in there. There is a zipper n the second compartment that could possibly scratch it though.... and that thing is gonna be HEAVY with a second lappy in there lol

 

Should fit with no problem. The middle compartment is just a little shorter from top to bottom, but has more storage space than the one where the M18x belongs. I would (and do) use a sleeve along with the backpack for extra protection.

Also, try pulling the CMOS battery in conjunction with a power discharge operation. If using F9 does not work or it causes your system to freeze within the BIOS setup, definitely do that. Sometimes the InsydeH20 BIOS gets corrupted and using F9 doesn't work as it should. You could also try a blind flash recovery before giving up with that does not work. Residualvoltage had a corrupted BIOS and could not get his system to function correctly. Characters in the BIOS were in another language (Chinese, I think) and things were really messed up. Doing the blind flash fixed it.

 

thanks guys for the help, mobo for m18x still quite a price to pay should have maxed my warranty a year ago LOL will do that for my next machine though. guess i wasnt careful enough with my machine i'll look into BIOS blind flash from TI and go from there.

as for backpack, shoulder strap is strong right? i have had many bags rip cause laptops are too heavy and have to sew it back to strengthen it, just looks ugly after sewing though not something i do well either.

 

Hey guys, just curious, what was the build time for your systems? Mine is in its second week, just wondering when it will ship (is the estimated date usually longer than normal?). Thanks.

 

mine took almost 1 month because they were out of parts. I was too inexperienced to ask for any compensation when they told me it'll only take a week and half, or I was too nice and waited the whole time only to receive a refurbished laptop lol. after that I learned and became pushy and read more advices and learn from this forum

 

Alright, so it's hard to tell then. Perhaps I should ask the person who managed my order.

 

My original order was supposed to be delivered by the 14th but there was some kind of glitch, and the order was never actually placed. On the 6th my second order was placed and should be delivered by the 19th.

Yesterday I made a pain out of myself and the person I was speaking to "escalated" my order so it would ship sooner. He might have just told me that though to shut me up and get me to hang up.

 

Similar thing happened to me, but I had to cancel and reorder three times. I just placed the final one on the 4th and its supposed to be delivered by the 17th. I actually just checked with the person who managed my order and there are no notes on the order, which means its all good - on time.

Can't freaking wait!

 

its already in December though, i would have waited for another 4-5 months for R3 to come out. from the looks of things haswell CPU looking quite good, probably a very good overclocker it has high chance to cool better than ivy bridge CPU and with new chipset arriving it'll be at least four SATA III ports. at least thats what I am waiting for.

 

Hi guys,
I purchased this beast 1 month ago, and I'm running win8 with no problems.
I have only one question:

Is the recon3Di able to do DTS and DDL using the S/PDIF ? I'm connecting the Home Theater with a toslink cable and a mini toslink adapter and the HT Display only shows PCM stereo sound.
My HT is not that new, and have no HDMI (only Toslink, Coaxial and RCA). Any way to have 5.1 from it?
I remember that my old X-Fi did not have DTS/DDL support and I had to buy the $5 software. Same problem here? I'll have to buy an external sound card?

Thanks and the Best Regards.

 

Actually, it's more like 6-8 months. I would wait, but I need a new pc. Currently on my phone, no pc at all. I'll upgrade if its worth while doing so when the R3 comes out, I don't think it will be though. I'd rather keep the R2 for a couple years, whatever comes out in 2014-2015 will be even better. I can get some good deals because I'm a student, especially if I get the IT guys to order with the schools EPP code.

AMD and NVIDIA pushed back the release of their new GPU's to meet the release of Intel's Haswell generation.

 

Woohoo, just finally put my order in and got a good deal I feel like. I kept everything stock except the video card and went with the SLI 680m's. I just ordered my own SSD, went with the Samsung 840 256 gb, so hopefully the whole SSD issue is Dell's and not with the 840's. Now the LONG wait begins.

 

GPU looks like will be another big leap, but who knows. R2 has an advantage over R3 for now is that you are able to flash unlocked bios by going back to A03 first? i think then flash unlocked A08 bios. turning Cstate off from start of booting a computer is a huge advantage. if you have Raid0 of any fast SSDs you basically getting into windows in less than 6-7 seconds lol, then when window starts you can turn it back on with softwares.

not sure if R3 will finally give us an options in Bios to turn off Cstate. there are also bunch of other things im really looking forward to in R3 which it may not have. thunderbolts, better USB3 controllers, esata6G and faster expresscard slot.


edit: i also want to give my thanks to John and MrFox. I unhook CMOS wire and let it stay for about 2 mins but that didn't do anything. finally I put back my old cpu and dual graphics is recognized again in BIOS. maybe I did something to CPU and mobo's connector socket, too tight or too loose unknown but I just did normal thing, flat head screw to lock/unlock cpu like i did in all other laptops.

im just glad I didn't have to replace mobo thought I might have damaged few parts when disassemble it. looks like partially broken CPU could have this kind of issue, although it worked and overclocked just fine, but partial hardware detection fails.

 

Honestly, I probably won't overclock at all, except maybe once, so that doesn't concern me. I bought this machine to game.

 

did you get extreme processor? if you did is kinda a waste not to OC.

edit: btw just curious as to anyone tried upgrading to a m18x R2 mobo into m18x R1. not getting Trim in raid 0 and 1 less 2.5" and 1 less msata seems kinda off lol. would it fit?

 

Yeah, I did. I don't think it's a waste, I ordered it overclocked already. I'll probably bench once or twice but not as much as John, haha. And I do want to bump up the frequency to 4.5 Ghz, all four cores, which will be insane... Now I just have to get MSI afterburner going for the GPU's.

By the way, it's never a waste if you're satisfied and happy. But what you consider "waste" is different from what I see as waste. Sure, it isn't necessary to get an XM CPU, but I wanted the latest and best technology available now so that it lasts me longer considering programs and games will only become more and more CPU intensive.

I can't wait till it gets here! I was just told it will ship by Friday.

 

you know these ivy/sandy CPU comes with overclock capabilities, its not im trying to force you to change or anything but intel clearly states turbo boost and they even have these turbo boost technologies software to show you CPU is being overclocked. even if its not extreme CPU it'll go towards 3.3-3.7 overclocked on its own, and overclock have a lot of performance impact on everything else you do.

better CPU performance = better memory performance, better storage performance (SSD, not sure about HDD), better graphics performance, just better in everything. I have my firefox open with 80+ tabs and like 3 VMware running. with 16gb of 1866mhz ram and stock overclocked to 3.5mhz, firefox kinda stutter and lags, but when overclocked to 4.5ghz and cstate turned off it lag way less.

at 3.5ghz and cstate off my single SSD performance QD1 read is at ~300 MB/s when overclocked to 4.5 its around 340MB/s. as you know QD1 read/write and low latency is probably most important thing when comes to SSD, if 300 MB/s means loading a game/software in 15 seconds, then 350MB/s probably means less.

just to name a few example though, RAM will most likely not be the bottleneck of anything at 1866mhz, it'll be the CPU/GPU/storage if you dont OC enough.

 

That's not overclocked, that's turbo boost. Overclocking is going over the factory clock by bumping up the frequency at which the CPU operates. Turbo boost is designed to increase efficiency, don't mistake that for overclocking. The 3940XM stock clock is up to 3.90 GHz, I ordered it overclocked up to 4.20 GHz - it's already overclocked! I honestly wouldn't have gotten the overclocked one but they weren't offering the regular one anymore for some reason. With that being said, I plan to overclock it more to 4.50 GHz, but I may not - I will definitely be overclocking the GPU's some!

And there's no way I would downgrade, if I can afford it and I want it, why not indulge myself...it's also my birthday this weekend. I explained more as to why in my previous post. Now that I think of it, it may even be best to have an XM CPU if I plan to upgrade the GPU myself in the future.

Anyway, as I said before, I will bench some and it will help me with better scores.

 

imo turbo boost is overclocking. intel can call it w/e they want cause if stock is 3.0, it should stay 3.0. anything beyond that is just overclocking. turbo boost and overclock are the samething, upping multiplier so its no different. btw, the "turbo" boost you call it 3.9ghz, thats only on 1 core, if you going to 3.9ghz on all cores, then its not "turbo boost".

you see, intel, like other companies like the list the highest clock speed to advertize so im not surprised you didn't know this. these CPU originally with their "turbo boost" can only up the multiplier so much on all 4 cores, then 2 and then 1 which is at 3.90 ghz. having all 3.9ghz on 4 cores is against what intel has intended which is not turbo boost anymore, and is overclock.

 

I'd love to debate this with you more as we can both take away from it, but I'm on a phone and my thumbs are killing me. Long story short: I sold my laptop and then my dell order got screwed up three times, so I'm without a pc until my new system arrives. It is horrific! I hope it is worth the wait. However, Andrew at Dell has been extremely helpful and has taken great care of my order. I am very pleased with the service, hope it continues. :thumbsup:

Edit: By the way, turbo boost is not overclocking. That's all I'm trying to make clear.

 

I did and all my drives fit.


J.Dre
Their version of the over clock. They clicked 1 setting in the bios. The same thing you could have did once it was in your hands. And the voltage is still to high for it and not enough amps.
Congratz on you new purchase though!

 

Yeah, I know, but they don't offer the regular one anymore - check the site. I got a great deal though, so it's no problem.

And thank you.

 

Now that's the bottom line! A great deal.

 

Works great. You need mobo, I/O daughterboard and ribbon cable, SATA interposer and HDD caddy. I kept a HDD in the optical bay, and my BluRay burner in an eSATA enclosure, so I now have 4 internal drives... two RAID0 memberships with 1.4TB (480GB SSD RAID0 for the OS and 1TB Momentus XT Hybrid RAID0 for data). And yes, TRIM works. In fact, you can even watch it working in Windows 8 by doing a manual TRIM operation.

Spoiler

 

@J.Dre I understand the frustration of afraid system might blow up, if you have gotten warranty then i recommend you to OC, its good. also congrat on your new machine, it has a very sturdy build quality you'll love it for sure.

@John/MrFox
looks like you two are always ahead lol. ive forgotten where i read it how it might not fit because the bottom piece seem to have height difference. just to repeat to make sure, " You need mobo, I/O daughterboard and ribbon cable, SATA interposer and HDD caddy" I/O daughterboard is the media board right? (the one with esata/usb combo and expresscard card right above optical bay? is it possible to use the old one?) HDD caddy becomes 3 drive bays and sata interposer is for the caddy?

if the old I/O board is what i think it is and able to use old one then ribbon cable is not really needed, i kinda want to keep three usb 2.0 ports on the right side.

 

You need exactly what I mentioned... nothing more. The I/O board (eSATA/USB/express card is the same board I am calling the I/O daughterboard) for the R2 is different. The ribbon cable is different and it will not work with the R1 motherboard. Why do you want to keep the USB 2.0? I am finding no issues with the USB 3.0... works fine and dandy for me.

The bottom cover fits fine. It is a bit snug, but the total height of the 3-drive caddy is not much more than the R1 2-drive caddy. And, the Sandy Bridge CPU works perfectly with the Ivy Bridge chipset. I cannot overclock my 2920XM quite as far, but that is the only negative. I can still run 4.5GHz as solid as a rock, and it runs cooler by a noticeable amount. At 4.6GHz and 4.7GHz it is still very stable and cool, but under heavy load it throttles back before the temps get high enough that it should be throttling. I think the reason might be the CPU socket has more power control than the R1 to account for Ivy Bridge heating concerns, so my 2920XM starts to run a little short on juice with a 4.7GHz+ overclock. A 2960XM might not have that same problem because it is more power efficient. When pushing a high overclock, the 2920XM requires more flex and pri plane than the 2960XM does.

This is not a deal-breaker, because 4.5GHz is still wickedly fast. The other upgrades associated with the new motherboard make up for the small performance decrease. When cash is not so tight, I am going to grab myself a 3920/3940XM proc for this bad boy. I have even kicked around the idea of a 3720QM ES unlocked CPU for $289 off of eBay, but I don't think I would be as happy with that as I am my 2920XM. I don't want to waste $289 since that will pay for a big chunk of the price for a 3920XM CPU.

 

yea i get you. problem when this goes R3 mobo socket completely changed so changing mobo = CPU. right now if i change the mobo, CPU gets to stay so its a pretty sweet deal. imo since ivy bridge increases in mhz, but core per core isnt all that much different probably, a 4.5ghz sandy and 4.5ghz ivy maybe differ only 5% at most but i obviously dont know for sure though.

sucked i dont get to keep USB 2.0s i needed them for external mouse/keyboard also to install window 7 under usb 3.0. i fail to slipstream usb 3 driver into window 7 CD so only way is to use a usb3.0 drive to boot, then to put in another usb drive into usb 2.0 port to install the driver. 3.0 ports can't be used under window 7 installation.. sucks

 

The E-sata USB combo port is usb 2