*Official* Alienware M18xR1/R2 CPU Overclocking Thread - Learn How and Share Tips Here

Thanks Aikimox... yes, actually I didn't tought to get the 2820qm cause 200 over the 2720qm... I guess I'll get the 2720qm...

 

How do i do that?

 

Unless you have an extreme 2920, you wont be able to. If you have one, simply go into Bios (F2 at startup) and under performance options you will be able to see the multipliers. You can adjust them up and down to a max of 45 per core ratio.

 

I read the m18x with the 2920xm oc comes with two heat pipes heatsink... the non oc version too? Cause people say the 2630qm, 2720qm and 2820qm comes with only 1 heat pipe...

 

In the end... is it possible to overclock the 2920xm non oc from factory? I ask to know if I can avoid the 75 usd that Dell charge for the oc...

 

YES, just select OC profile 1, 2 or 3 and boom.....saved you $75.
(Listed as Level 1-3 Overclocking)

You can pay me my usual fee in beer

D.

 

Only the XM comes with 2-piped HS with extra copper, but you can always grab one from Dell (part # HD9NJ)

 

Sure, but... I'm really a noob in this... can you explain me please step by step how to do that? does that oc don't avoid the warranty?

 

No, does not void your warranty.

Hit F2 at boot to get into bios... go to advanced.....performance option menu.....enable "overclocking feature".........then go down to "Level 1-3 Overclocking" and enable either level 1, 2 or 3 (3 is the highest pre-set oc option).

Hit F10 to save and reboot

Done..

Now.. beer

D.

 

if some of you guys remember i repasted my cpu and everything on the graphics cards with ic diamond 24 carat.

well the temps were fine not going above 88 on max load, but now cpu temps are going to 100 and throttling down. no change in settings.

maybe it is just the hot weather, but i though the paste got better with after a few days of initial job?
probably is just the hot weather though, not much air circulation either

 

do you have a OEM CPU?

 

must be, he's sig says factory oc

 

yeah its factory oem

 

Something is wrong with the paste or HS. I'd repaste again and make sure the HS is sitting ok.

 

i used it all up on my system so im gonna have to wait before i can open and check contact. it was fine for about 2 weeks, which is why i thought it might be the hot weather. maybe i put too much on the cpu?

 

Well, if your room temp jumped by 10C - could be. Or maybe you didn't stress the CPU that hard for the past 2 weeks to see higher temps. Applying a bit more paste wouldn't make such a difference. The ICD24 shouldn't bleed @ 80-100C. If anything, it should harden.

 

something is defanatly not right, becuase i stressed it out to the max before, and now it is going too high and its a cooler day today, so im begining to rule out temperature

edit: actually i think maybe it is the weather, it is cooler now, and from a cold boot, temps are where they should be. Aikimox your right, my stress testing environment is different.

before i was doing pretty much cold boot stress tests in the morning, after i repasted, now ive been doing them late in the evening in hot weather with the machine been on all day, so the high temps are expected.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but when you put it in the m18x it showed up in the bios as a completely different chip right?

 

Of course, since it's a ES chip. BTW, I got it up to 3.8 on all cores and 4.6GHz turbo.

 

What are your temps??? I have repasted with MX-4 and still when I try and get 4.0 on all cores I get well into the 90's. Even at just level 3 I hit high 80's.

 

do you actually get all 4 cores though? or does it cap off at like 38 or something?

 

I get to about 3.98ish on all cores I believe.

 

hummmm.that's a nice over clock.
any wprime 1.55 numbers?

 

Sure don't, sorry... I backed it down to sthe standard level 3 settings due to temps.

 

8.569 seconds with 40/40/40/40 bclk 100.00 threads set at 4 - 32m test.

 

ok. thanks guys!

needs to be 8 threads stevie.

 

oops. Lemme re-run it..... - OK. Done. Same settings but with 8 threads. Max cpu temp was 82c btw if your looking for single pipe vs dual pipe info. I let my AV run too - just ran the test without turning off any processes etc etc. Could probably get better scores if I shut down a load of stuff 'eh?

 

I just bought an M18 with the 2920, and seeing temps ranges here kind of shocked me!
What is the limit temp with that processor? Aren't temps above 80°C too much?

 

thanks. trying to get an idea of the difference between the es and the oem

 

Actually, my best was 7.125sec, similar result

 

i got some numbers as well...nothing even remotely close to nick though.

 

yup, his result seems unreal to me. Do you think it's because of the cooling he used or just a ES vs OEM difference?

 

http://img819.imageshack.us/img819/9760/wprime15532m1024m2920xm.jpg
http://img163.imageshack.us/img163/9760/wprime15532m1024m2920xm.jpg

 

what's your secret?

 

no secret...i just over clock and throw out a hail marry. then hope for the best..lol

 

Haha, nice approach, reminds me of re-rolling starting stats in BG1&2 series. There's always a chance...lol

 

Could be that on one of his runs, he was at 45/45/45/45 105 bclk

I did a run at 43/43/43/43 100.00 bclk and got under 7 seconds ..... dont think these xm's will stick at over 4ghz on all cores with wprime....

 

These are my everyday clocks. Seems fine on wPrime to me.

 

i got those same exact numbers with the same clocks...

 

I flashed to bios A03. Had to reapply the "factory overclock" to 3

 

So does that set the base clock at 4Ghz on 4 cores? What is the turbo top end?

 

should be 4.5Ghz on a single core with level 3 OC) How's the new bios working for you? it was mentioned it speeds the GPU fans after a game lunch for a better cooling, did you observe the same with CPU? any temp drops?

 

Apologies if it's already been figured out. If not, perhaps can help make an non-OC systemboard into an OC one by:

MSR dump of OC systemboard?

Anybody want to do a CrystalCPUID dump of their OC and non-OC m18x with i7-2920XM so can try to deduce which is the lock bit preventing CPU overclocking? Then it would a matter of undoing the code that sets that bit in the bios. Could it be checking the systemboard revision to set such a bit?

Often systemboard manufacturers add a systemboard resistor somewhere that sets parameters. In this case the "OC" and "non-OC" lock bit. ould be worthwhile comparing to see if there are different hardware revision numbers on the systemboard itself for the OC and non-OC models.

Doing a copy of the flash eeprom

If Dell have hidden a switch somewhere to turn on/off the OC mode that they use DMI tools to activate, then can do the same by doing a complete copy of the eeprom. There are $30 USB SPI eeprom programmers on ebay to allow you to copy a OC systemboard's bios on a non-OC one. That would work *if* the bios doesn't do checks for physical hardware differences, like the resistor noted above, that the bios uses to determine if it's a OC or non-OC edition.

If Dell wanted to be really tricky, they could put the setting in the EC firmware instead.

 

even easier...all we need is the bios editor...

 

Yes - if it was publically available. Flashing a dump of an OC bios could be more timely if you can organise a dump from an OC-ed system.

 

but am i missing something? the m18x can over clock the 2920xm so why would we need to dump it to view it?

 

I am under the impression you need to buy a OC option with the m18x to be able to OC a i7-2920XM. Please correct me if I am wrong - I don't have a m18x.

So then those that didn't buy that option but still wanted to overclock would need to apply some other hack. A bios editor doesn't exist to circumvent the code that locks down the CPU so then the fastest way of likely getting a solution would be to copy the OC bios to a non-OC system using a USB SPI eeprom burner.

 

ummm...that's a big 10/4 negative.
it's unlocked for extremes...it's the non extremes that are locked down.

 

Apologies then. I know a Lenovo W520 bios writes the lock bit that prevents extreme CPUs from being overclocked and had volunteered the bios copying method as a of circumventing that if the m18x users were affected: W520 i7-2920XM Extreme user information request - Lenovo Community

 

yeah, alienware seems to be a bit more friendlier when it comes to over clocking...lenovo is more of a intel (locked down every damn thing) laptop.