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

does this look OK? its loose doesn't go in alot??

 

That ribbon should slide inside the connector. Then you use a small piece of plastic to wedge it in place. The plastic shouldn't go down and interfere with the pins though. That connector is pretty chewed up. I had a busted one of those plastic clips but the pin header was in decent shape. That is pretty bad looking.

Does it at least post when you turn it on?

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk 2

 

Hi, i did push the ribbon in to the connector but i didn't know what side or where and how to put the plastic wedge in? the laptop didn't know the HD was connected but i think i didn't fit it correct, is there anybody out there that can help me please? laptop is only 8 months old according to the service tag details

 

might end up selling for spares but such a shame the laptop is in VGC

 

You might want to send the laptop in to dell and try to get it repaired, even if they charge you some. it might be worth it. I believe the plastic clip goes in the connector on the side opposite the HDD caddy.

 

Where you meant to upload a picture here?

Please post a picture if you can.

 

I would try calling DELL UK and send it in for repairs.

 

So I have had my replacement m18x since December 30th but havent had a ton of time to set it up. I went to finally do that last night, and discovered my USB ports did not appear to be working correctly. It will recognize my house and my external USB drive the 1st time I plug it in, but if I remove the drive and plug it back in, the computer stops recognizing the drive, same issue with my mouse. When I go to shut down, it sits at the windows is shutting down screen. I tried running windows update and it downloaded a few, and on a reboot reinstalled on my USB devices, but same symptoms, if I plug the mouse or hard drive in, or have them plugged in when windows boots its fine. Once I remove the drive and plug it back in, it stops working.

I ran windows update again, and it tried to download the latest AMD drivers windows has, and of course I ended up with a black screen, and was forced to power down the PC Manually. I know better than that with AMD, but figured it couldn't hurt to try.

I played around with it a bit last night but gave up, my intention is to try and figure it out tonight, and if I can't get it to work right I will reinstall windows tomorrow.

I intend to uninstall and reinstall all USB drivers, and try updating the chipset drivers as well. Anything else I should look at?

 

If that does not work I would suggest trying an AlienRespawn.

 

I tried alien respawn, same result. I can't plug in and unplug a USB drive and have it work, nor my mouse.

Edit*** might have been an enclosure/drive issue, appears as though using a dual USB plug for that particular enclosure works well, my other usb sata drive enclosure works fine and so do both of my external USB drives. Must have been an issue, and I was seeing it with the mouse after the fact.


The killer wireless is killing me though, does anyone have one of these routers with a Netgear WNDR 4500? I've had 2 Killer 1103s in 2 separate M18x-R2s. both of them were a total pain to, always locking up and dropping signal, etc...

The 1103 I had in my M17x-R3 worked very well.

Any thoughts on this issue?

 

Did you try drivers from DELL and Killer Gaming?

 

This time only from Dell. What kills me is that the original install seemed to work properly and now that I did a clean install I have no respawn from the factory. I shouldn't have been so quick to reinstall Windows but I don't have time for this troubleshooting stuff. I ended up buying an Intel N 6300 card. Will be here next week.

I sort of think it's some sort of issue with my wndr 4500 router but who knows. I went through this the last time. I spent a ton of time on it with my last r2.

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk 2

 

Sorry if this question has been asked already, but last time I asked it no one replied Is there a good a/c wireless card compatible with the M18x R2? If so, has anyone tried it yet. I've got an Asus RT-AC66u router which unfortunately I didn't get to try properly since the only a/c capable device I have is my Xperia Z1

 

I'm using an Intel 7260AC card in mine with no problems. It regularly connects with super-high connect rates (>700Mbps) and I don't have dropouts or any issues. I only use it around the house, though, with my Apple AirPort Extreme so it doesn't get much variety with regards to connecting to different access points.

I'm happy with it, though.

 

7260Ac works good. You could give that one a try as lancorp suggests.

 

i second the 7260ac it is blazing fast.. and i hope they release a 3x3 soon..

 

Hey Mr. Fox!

I've been reading all the posts regarding the BIOS on the new 18 and it got me wondering something that I think would be best suited for you to answer:

What's the best move when it comes to upgrading the BIOS on an M18x R2? I received mine back in November 2012, and I haven't touched the BIOS at all. I've based that on the general consensus of "if it ain't broke etc...", but I keep seeing owners posting about unlocks and updates in some of the newer builds. Is the smart move to not touch it at all or is there some performance increase waiting out there in a BIOS update I just haven't applied yet?

Thanks!

 

What CPU do you have ? I'd say if you have an XM you'd want to unlock it. Otherwise I wouldn't worry too much.

 

I would not recommend going past A09 or A10, because we do not know what kind of crippling might be introduced. But, I would go with an unlocked BIOS. I believe it was A09 that included a new Intel OROM, so that would be a good choice for an unlocked BIOS.

As TBoneSan states, unless you have an XM CPU the benefits of the unlocked BIOS are less of a benefit, but even with a QM CPU you get access to settings that are hidden with a stock BIOS.

 

Thanks guys! Since I don't have an XM processor, I'm not going to sweat the BIOS stuff.

I do have a relevant tech question that perhaps somebody can help out with. My laptop will not output a signal via HDMI. I've tried two different TVs with two different cables and I get absolutely nothing, even after cycling through all the projector modes. Is there a driver update or something simple that I"m missing that enables this functionality?

 

This is a common issue. Unless you have something different going on, you simply need to trim the plastic from the TIP of the HDMI cable so it can insert deeper into the HDMI port. The port is recessed too far in the chassis for the tip of the cable to make a solid connection.

See the first post in this thread and click the photo to enlarge: http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...sues-look-answers-ask-new-questions-here.html

 

I have also found that certain cheap HDMI cables actually work well. I bought 3 off ebay for 99 cents a piece. All of them fit deep enough into the HDMI port. I can't say the same for my high quality 10 ft cable.

 

So I finally got the original warranty on my replacement M18x, I want to extend my warranty.

They have a couple levels of warranty, the standard and enhanced and then accidental. The standard warranty will cost me around $250 to last until EOL. but the Enhanced is about $1500 until EOL. Both of which carry my warranty until the end of 2017 I believe. I figured it would worth it to get the $250 warranty, but I am concerned if it ever came to it, that I might not get the same treatment with repeat repairs as the enhanced service. Most of the stuff listed in the comparison chart did not really interest me, I don't need router support or any of the other stuff, all I want to know is that my laptop is covered in the event that there is a hardware failure. Does the $250 price seem low? I don't even need to call up and haggle, its the price I can pay by doing the warranty extension on my laptop through my dell account.

I can't get the exact number but they are pretty close, I also can't seem to get the right comparison chart that is available to look at when I was trying to compare the services. It seems like I would be losing out on a lot for the huge price discrepancy.

Any thoughts?

 

Greetings everyone,

I've been lusting after the Alienware M18x for quite a while now. The only challenge so far has been obtaining one without 'donation' of a kidney.

However, some seller in my city has managed to snag a shipment of used, most likely refurbished Alienwares, ranging from M14's to M18x's. There is only on M18x R2. Quite a few months ago, the very helpful people on this forum assured me that the M18x R2 is the one to go for. And although there are quite a few M18x R1's, my goal is to go for the R2.

The specs are:

M18X R2 Core i7-3920XM
8GB RAM
1TB HDD (5400 RPM!!)
Nvidia GTX 675M 2GB Win7

(yes, sadly just ONE 675M, it seems to be incredibly underpowered compared to the 675MX). So its more of a barebones machine. How much would you guys put its price at?

Anyways, this is the only R2 that is available and I will have to move very fast if I am going to snag it.


I must also add that there is no warranty coverage in my country and probably none on the laptops and I will have to depend on friends visiting from the US or myself going on a visit should I ever need parts etc, and will have to make repairs myself for the most part, although I do know a laptop repair technician who can help me.

The most complex thing I've had to do so far is to reapply thermal paste on a couple of laptops, one of which required quite a lot of dismantling (Lenovo W520)

So whatever I can manage to check at the shop is whatever I get stuck with.

I would really appreciate if you guys could let me know if or how to use whatever Alienware has for a diagnostic app to perform a hardware check in the shop. And if I can take anything on a USB drive (benchmarking applications etc) to see if the hardware is functioning like it should. The shop selling it does claim to give a '7 day checking warranty' though, although I would rather not check whether they uphold it or not.

I would also like to ask what tell-tale signs are there on the exterior of the laptop and screen that might be indicative of major issues down the road.

Also, how much would a new battery cost, as the ones in them will most likely have many discharge cycles on them. Other things I am worried about are motherboard replacement, fans dying out, and the display dying.


I know this is a lot to ask, and on top of that there is a time factor as well, because these laptops are nigh impossible to buy from here, so there will be others in on the hunt as well. But I'll take whatever help I can get, and really, really hope to have an alienware M18X R2 in the next few days.

Thank you in advance.

 

Though you asked what it's worth, how about sharing this guys asking price?

 

Around USD 1300

 

Hi guys - it's been a while......

Anyway, gonna be selling off loads of my M18x 'memorabilia' as I'm not re-entering the gaming laptop scene. Many of you will know my story....so.....I will be listing lots of goodies in the Marketplace soon....just wanted to give you a taster of what is up for grabs. PM's welcomed.

x1 512gb Samsung PM830 - brand new and sealed
x2 256gb Samsung PM830 - used, working unsealed
x1 NotePal U3 - fully retail boxed and working
x2 8gb kits of HyperX 1866 - fullyo working, full retail packaging
x1 Harmon Kardon Soundsticks III - pristine, fully working, full retail packaging
X1 Logitech G19s (not G19 - the new one) factory sealed
x1 Wireless XBOX Windows controller & Quick Charge kit (used, perfect condition, fully retail packed)
x1 HP HD5210 Full 1080p Webcam (sealed)
x1 Netgear WNDR3700 Dual band Router (sealed)
x1 Dell 30" UltraSharp U3011 Monitor - light use, full retail packaging, zero pixel problems, zero defects, 100% as new, fully retail packaged - long warranty remaining.

And anything else I can think of........

Keep an eye out in the Marketplace or shoot me a cheeky PM - bear in mind, I'm in the UK for shipping.

Cheers,
Stevie.

 

Stevie Jones where have you been and why you leaving the notebook scene?! Sad to see such a valuable member of the community go. If youre transitioning to desk-top I fully understand as I intend to make that transition one day myself (waiting for Haswell....).

 

Hey Vulcan! - I've been 'floating' (much like the characters in the Stephen King Novel "IT" - they all float, there!) I'm not going desktop either.....I'm just 'making do' with what I have in my signature......priorities have taken over....photography looms as my next best hobby. The main reason for leaving is as quoted from what I had just posted:

 

That is an extremely fair price, a good deal considering most of us paid over $4k for that with 680M SLI. ($4300 here.)

You could pick up a pair of 780M for roughly $1400-1500 OR for slightly less performance, say maybe 10% less, you could pick up a pair of 680M for maybe $1100. or so.

Don't forget you will need a 330W PSU, GPU heat-sinks and an SLI cable. Mr. Fox has a tear-down video on youtube.

Potentially, you could do all of this for $2500.

But if you are asking if that system in its present state with a single 675M is worth $1300, even though that is a low price I would have to say no. If I am not mistaken 675M is basically a rebranded 580M with a better driver. A single 580M might run some older games at reduced resolution ok but you won't be playing the newer games with decent graphics at full resolution. That system is only really a good deal if you intend to pick up a pair of 680 or 780M to complement that CPU.

If you have your eye on a good deal on ebay yet cannot purchase it due to the sellers stand on international shipping you might be able to get someone on here to receive and then forward the system to you for a small fee, say $20 or so. It is only a matter of making a trip to the post office. There is the issue of trust, which is understandable as we are all strangers here. But this is an idea worth considering.

 

Oh man, yeah I would've done the same, I imagine you were like "no listen, everyone knows the 675M is basically a rebranded 580M and I had TWO of the AMD equivalents in the previous model WITH A BETTER CPU" and they, not knowing what they are talking about half the time were like "the list value is the same, you will be getting a NEWER graphics card".

Well it is good that you are getting into a productive hobby with the potential to possibly earn you a living whereas playing video games and helping others on the forum here, which I owe you a good deal of gratitude, is a mostly thank-less activity.

I have a good feeling we haven't seen the end of you, I bet you'll be back with a Clevo 570PW. Just my prediction.

 

Thank you for that very well reasoned and detailed response!

I have to say that I agree with you on the issues that you've raised. Also, ordering new GPU's (and I just saw the staggeringly high prices they are going for) would make the cost shoot up quite a bit. The prices of mobile GPU's make already overpriced cards like the 780Ti seem like quite good deals.

I called up the shop and they informed me that the M18x R2 was sold pretty much the first day it was listed (I called on the third day after listing).

I guess this also gives me the opportunity to think over this, as this is the year that thunderbolt external gpu's are also about to take off, so I hope there are quicker developments on that side.

Thank you once again for your help.

 

Yeah, I was pretty miffed to say the least. I was unfortunate enough to get someone from the Executive Resolutions Team who must have missed the 'let's compare graphics cards and processors' tutorial that Dell ran that day......go figure

Still, I got my money back - it just left me in a situation whereby I could not get a similar spec machine buying new from Dell because I had a killer deal originally from Dell and right now, those kinda deals are just not available - I'm talking like close to 30% off here......

So, because I couldn't 're-buy' the same kind of power without having to stump up more of my own dosh, I took the decision to bail......Dell's loss really, although I'm sure they aren't worried about losing £3k or one customer - but bad publicity is bad publicity. I'm sure that through it all, some people read my story and thought 'whoooaaaa - steady on a minute.....'

I may well return to AW or high end laptops at some point - I've been bitten by the bug, just that right now, the photography is gonna take priority.

Watch this space, though....I'll be back 'tooled up' at some point!

 

This was indeed the fix, thank you Mr. Fox!

 

Awesome! So glad this simple fix worked for you.

Thanks for letting us know. +1 Rep

 

And I'm back gentleman. Got good news today. I got a call from the guy who is importing the refurbished alienwares, and this time, he's actually offering one as quoted above, same price, ~1300 USD, but with SLI'd 675M's.

As Vulcan so helpfully informed me that a solo 675M was not going to cut it, I think that this is a pretty good deal. There is not much in the way of warranty but at that price I think a risk can certainly be taken. I can always import the parts I need, which is atleast easier than importing the gigantic laptop itself.

I inspected the laptop and the body was immaculately clean and scratchless except for a scratch on the lid. Its easily visible and arcs near the center, but not an issue at all.

Another thing is that the screen has a 2 or 3 millimeter tall dead pixel of some kind in the bottom right corner, close to the edge of the windows task bar. Should I be ok with that? It is not noticeable enough (atleast at the moment) to be an issue in this size. Will the issue get worse?

Also, I saw that the nameplate at the bottom had only 'M18x' on it. Should it be 'M18x R2'?

The shop also accidentally got a 240W power adapter with it instead of the 330 watt version. But they said they will get a 330 watt one very soon.

I would again like to request how to run a diagnostic scan so I can verify that atleast everything functions as it is supposed to. Also, some basic benchmarks to check temps/fans or screen anomalies.

Thank you in advance once again.

EDIT: Reading around on the net, I've found that some people are swapping in ES/QS cpu's into laptops as well. Is the CPU-z utility going to be enough to detect that the 3920xm CPU is the real deal?

 

Here is how you can run the PSA.

 

Thank you so much Luis! +rep

 

has anyone tried the new qlacomm driver for the killer 1103?

 

interested in feedback on this as well. I ditched the 1103 for an intel card a little while ago as the constant instability was driving me nuts. Ever since windows 8 the card has been terrible.

 

Another quick question guys:

What level of desktop equivalent performance (in games mostly) can be expected from:

M18x R2
3920XM
8gb RAM
SLI 675M

There are numbers on notebookcheck as well, but I wanted to ask the people about practical experiences here. Also, what if I were to sell the 675M's for a single 680m or 780m? How much would that upgrade cost and how much of a upgrade would that be? I would be comfortable with decent overclocks on GPU but not on CPU as I doubt more than a few games are CPU dependent.

I am waiting till the end of the week for the importer to get the 330Watt charger for me so looking around at all the info on this incredible machine.

 

SLI GTX 680m would be as great or better as a desktop version GTX 680, and if properly OC'ed maybe surpass the GTX680. So we're talking about 675m which in SLI may be about single 680m power, which means about half power or less of desktop GTX680. 780m are better performer by little bit vs 680m so if youre moving from 675m - go for 780m SLI, or single for the begining and upgrade to SLI later, otherwise if you were on 680M SLI, I wouldnt upgrade anywhere yet, wait till better GPU to be released.

3920xm if stock clocks ... well I dont know, I'm not good at comparing CPU's, but I feel it should kick i7-3770k if OC'ed @ ~4.5GHz otherwise it compares very close stock to stock 3920xm vs i7-3770k

( DONT TAKE MY ADVICE TOO SERIOUSLY, MOST ARE JUST ESTIMATES AND YOU SHOULD REALLY DO LITTLE MORE RESEARCH ON COMPARISON BY YOURSELF )
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Ok so, the cake of today for me was this (BEAUTY MEETS THE BEAST) :







Massive THANK YOU goes to Mr. Fox !

 

I don't think you need a CPU upgrade. Selling the dual config you have to go for a single of any of the 2 specified isn't going to improve gaming a lot. I would recommend you to go for the 780m dual. That's going to increase the performance on gaming a lot.

What games do you want to be able to play with the new setup that you can't play on the current one?

 

........or dual 680m's - that would be a good upgrade as well, basically because they are probably cheaper than the 780m's and for the platform (M18x R2) will not require any driver .inf modification as the 680m's are a genuine upgrade path for the R2. Performance should handle pretty much everything you can throw at a pair of 680m's......

 

That's true the 680m would be able to be covered (if bought from DELL) with the machine's warranty and would get a lot more support since it's a verified upgrade for the R2.

 

I re-installed my 1103 to try these drivers out and I can confirm they're still a piece of and the wireless craps out doing large file transfers.

It's a shame as this card was rock solid in windows 7

Back to the Intel

 

Alright people, everyone who owns M18XR2 in R1 bottom chassis, how did you do DIY to make the mSATA slot bracket fit R1 chassis properly? Any info/pics/guidance on DIY would be highly appreciated before I go and do the mess out of it myself

Im moving to red chassis (which is M18XR1) on the weekend and doing LiquidUltra CPU repaste (hope it arrives by Friday...)

Since I have bare chassis here I thought I could just do it right the first time while its all apart and be done with it, and on another hand I was thinking I could just slot my mSATA together, fasten it on neat small plastic board some way, wrap it in plastic and just lay it down on to the motherboard near to the RAM DIM's? Or otherwise just get mSATA to SATA adapter plate and use it in my 3rd SATA slot as Im currently running just 2 2.5" drives...

Suggestions/opinions appreciated

Thanks

 

Thanks for the helpful replies.

Hypothetically speaking, for how much could the 675M's be sold off for? I'm assuming I would need different heatsinks were I to consider moving to 7970M crossfires? I say that because AMD is usually cheaper. When are the maxwell mobile series cards supposed to be out? I might upgrade to kepler then to keep costs down.

 

well 675m is = 580m in hardware perspective so is the performance @ same clocks, but you should get about 200eur for your 675m so if two of them could be about 400eur, fact is you wont be able to find single 780m for this little money, so by all means I would hold on to your 675m SLI setup still for a while if you're on a budget, since 7970m cfx kit will set you off easy 600eur alone just for two cards before shipping, then you will need pair of proper matching heatsinks with proper x-braces to suit 7970m's, and crossfire cable and of course grain of luck and grace of God (AMD ... ) so that these 7970m dont crap out and die on you before you decide to sell them and upgrade some time later down the line. There was some bad echo going around lately I heard that many people get them ditched due to reason listed earlier and go green... so just beware of the possibilities, learn play with some max settings unticked

 

I have Killer 1202 in the Alienware 18 and it also works better in Windows 7 than it does Windows 8. I am not sure what Micro$oft did with Windows 8, but it seems to do bad things to WiFi unless you are running an Intel card (and even some Intel WiFi cards don't work as well).