Possible to use GPU in Slave only ? AW 18

Sorry but i am new to AW 18 i just replaced the mosfets which seemed to be of poor quality on the AW 18 and used to burn the mobo badly . As my laptop is having 880M (SINGLE) in it i want to know if it is possible to move the GPU from MASTER MXM to SLAVE MXM Slot to avoid excessive heat from the card which is almost above the MOSFET'S of the motherboard which commonly burn . I replaced the Mosfets from AW 17 R1's motherboard and so far they seem to work fine . My 880m ( pasted with ARCTIC SILVER 5 and applied in CROSS) cannot seem to hold the heat of this GPU . It goes to 93 Max and the HDMI area of this laptop feels like it is going to burn or blast any second lol .I cannot even touch the HDMI connector for even a second. I just want to know if it is possible to move the GPU from Master slot to Slave. Waiting for your replies thank you

 

Unfortunately no. You need a card in the Primary slot to run the display.

The 880M is a hot card and the 780M is a much better card in my opinion.

 

damn i dont know what to do now its hard to find any other card in PAKISTAN.. i have applied thermal pads on the mosfets as well and undervolted my gpu by -25mv .. the temps dropped by 5-6 Celsius . I dont feel comfortable in using this laptop for gaming. i think i might end up building a desktop then

 

93 is still very hot even for an 880M so it's possible the card is having some issues.

 

NO. Actually i am running a modified vbios from svl7 but downclocked it back to STOCK and then UNDERVOTLED it to -25mv as well now i have like max temp of 80-82 but in ambient temp of 25-26 in AC.. but when the Air conditioner is not running the ambient temp of my room is around 33-35.. secondly i added extra thermal pad to the mosfets on the GTX 880M'S aswell because they were not making contact with the heatsink properly before but now they do .. so the gtx 880m works fine , its all about the heat it produces and i think i have no other way to cool it rather than applying LIQUID METAL ( already on its way ) and cutting the PWM wires of the fans....

 

They have a high failure rate compared to the 780M which I would assume has a lot to do with how hot they run. 80 is a lot better.
Also check to see what the CFM rating is for the GPU fan. I know that the 17 R1 and M17x R4 had different fans available with big differences in CFM. I think the lower grade one had a CFM of around 3 while the better one was up at 10-11.

 

1- as its been said before , u cant use the second slot for the master GPU.
2- yes a temperature of 93C is high , actually its considered to be the limit for either the 780M or the 880M. PUT speaking from experience since i have both cards ( the 880M on the AW18 and the 780M on the M18XR1) i can tell u that in the M18X R1(even with the 75W heatsink )by using IC Diamond on my 780M rather then artic MX4 dropped the temperature from 37C idle and 89 under load to 32C idle and 76- 83C max under load!! while in the AW18 the 880M in SLI mode by using IC Diamond rather then artic MX4 dropped the temperature from 38C idle and 90 under load to 35C idle and 84C max under load!. BUT to be absolutely fair , i'm using the VBIOS from svl7 which is ( in mu opinion) is the best i came across since its locked to 1V ( which is underclocking ) but gives up to 160% more power . ( the maximum i have reached on each card is 124W) so as a conclusion to this point i would say YES the 880M runs a bit hotter then the 780M but by using svl7 VBIOS and IC Diamond as a thermal paste i could reach better performance with the 880M over the 780M while increasing the maximum under load temps to about 1C which is as 84 is very safe for the 880M.
NOTE: i'm using HWINFO to control the fans manually as 1700RPM all the time on idle and light use , and full speed under load.
3- regardless that most of the guys here will agree that the M18Xr2 (which i never had) is a better machine then the AW18, i would say ( since i used both the AW18 and the M18X r1 ) both seem to me like they are both are reliable machines that u can use for years and u will gave up on them before they do !
4- i dont wanna start a war here but i will say this ! IC Diamond is far better thermal paste then Artic silver
u wont see big different between them on a desktop PC but on a laptop U WILL BE AMAZED. specially on an old alienware machines like AW18 or M18X since first the heatsinks are separate and the gab between the GPU main chip and the heatsink is very very narrow and very tight lock ( which ICDiamond loves ) u will get much better results then any other thermal paste EXEPT liquid metal and GC-Extreme.

 

just checked my fans ( for both gpu's ) , they are of 5.5 CFM

 

thanks alot for sharing your experience .. I tried rthe SVL7's vbios it is a bit overclocked but stable at 1V which is nice but i just dont know how to make this card work better atleast with decent temps .. less thank 84 is fine for me but anything that crosses that mark gives me tension lol . As in my country it is hard to get any other paste , it was kind of a miracle that i got an ARCTIC SILVER 5's tube somehow. On the other side, its been like 20 days since i have ordered thermal grizzly conductonaut and waiting for it eagerly and it is stuck somewhere somehow . So i hope i might have better temperatures when i will have TGC , someday lol

 

Try undervolting more and dropping clocks to 780M level.

Hate to say it but a M18xR2 is much more reliable than the 18. @Raidriar and my friend have had issues with AW 18.

I only owned one for about a year or less so I never experienced any issues myself.

You can also see if HWInfo can control the fans and increase them. I know the AW18 fan curve is much crappier than the older models.

 

yeah i just undervolted it by -25mv and now temperature seems to be better...i saw in the forums that NVIDIA heatsinks dont fit properly on the Gpu's and create a bend from the vram's side .. i might open it up soon and use a dremmel tool to lower that part of the heatsink and see if there is any improvement... I always loved the 18 inch laptop, especially the AW 18 and i read alot of replies by raidriar in the forum telling that the mosfets used to blow up .. i replaced those mosfets from the AW17 motherboard and now i am expecting that they wont blast atleast lol .. i even installed a thermal pad on top of mosfets but still the HDMI port near the DC jack feels like burning so i wonder what those mosfets might be going through . Just a poor design for mosfets section by Alienware i must say .. apart from that the machine is awesome . I might go for PWM switch in future

 

actually i was running the 780m on the same clock of the 880m for 6 years and the temperatures was as i mentioned above , i know that the 880m runs hotter then the 780m but thats not due to that the 780 is better card , i believe its just as good. i even overclocked it to 130+ on the core clock and 350+ on the memory and the tempratures gut up to 91C within 12 minutes so i like to keep it stock clock with svl7 bios. however all these temps above is while rendering and very little gaming ( i dont do a lot of gaming ). i mainly use my machine for 3d modeling and rendering and just to be clear here, 3dsmax with V-ray rendering engine use GPU rendering more intense on the core rather then the memory . with that been said i think 880m are very stable with the moded Vbios.

 

i think i red that u ordered the liquid metal and it is on the way so if thats true then this is the best u can get. just be carful since as i'm sure u know liquid metal is conductive so u need to do some search on how to isolate the chip ( spoiler alert , clear nail polish )

 

if u dont mind, can u send a picture of the mosfits on the AW18 motherboard and the parts that u used to replace them ?

 

I'm not sure of the compatibility with the 18 GPU fans but it's possible that the 10 CFM fan for the M17x R4 will work. It could help your temps if it actually fits. There is a thread around here somewhere with the part number of the better fan.

 

yes i am aware of that as i once applied coollaboratory liquid ultra on my Asus G73jh's GPU (HD 5870M).

umm actually i didnt took any pictures which replacing them but i can definitely provide you with the part number you need to order and just replace the mosfets, also the area of the AW 18'S MOSFETS which usually FAIL.

MOSFET Part Number : SI7149DP.......The ones i removed from AW18's mobo were having different number which i dont remember now lol but according to the SCHEMATICS of AW 17 R1 and AW 18 , they both use the same MOSFET PART NUMBER.

PICTURE of MOSFET AREA :

Well the AW 17's fan doesnt seem to fit need to make some modification for that so i will take a look at that but the main culprit of temps which i seem to have found is the NVIDIA HEATSINK as it doesnt fits on the COILS and VRMS and bends the GPU'S PCb as shown in @DaMafiaGamer 's GTX 1070 Upgrade post . My gtx 880m also bends like this and reason is also explained in his post so i might use a dremmel tool to grind that area of the heatink and see the results.

 

Hey there, ll_r1d0_ll! I too have an Alienware 18; mine is running a single 980M in it's Primary Slot. An issue mine has is almost exactly as you are saying and seeking a solution, a world, and I MEAN an EXTREME WORLD of difference was made when I ventured into adding an external laptop fan; my temps on that top left side of the keyboard decreased drastically, in accordance, I don't experience throttling or any lag whatsoever when I do any gaming anymore! Now, the best and maybe even the only external fan that is effective is this one: https://www.amazon.com/OPOLAR-Tempe...mobile_desktop?ie=UTF8&psc=1&ref_=ya_aw_od_pi
It draws heat out of the laptop and the fan of it is the highest rpm's of any of the other laptop external fans offered; in addition to that, this Opolar fan has a 1 of 3 shrouds that fit on the fan opening that are big enough to accommodate the AW 18's rear vent. I'm pretty confident this will satisfy your issue; it did mine.
It's simplest solution so effective for me, I even received another one of these fans just today as a spare so I would have another in the case the one I have attached that something would happen with it. The auto feature of the fan is a bit quirky though: just make sure you set the fan on it's highest setting, which is 13 and do that manually. Then, when the fan draws heat from the laptop, THEN, you can set the fan's auto function simply by turning it off then immediately it on again and it should work as intended in it's auto mode; some graphically demanding games may require the manual setting of the fan's highest setting of 13 though. Just keep in mind of that. Definitely, try this solution before you do any other; again, I'm pretty confident you will be satisfied even shocked of the result. Would also like to know how this worked out for you, so please comment back about it. Thanks!

 

hey @Chivalrous Roamin thanks alot for this idea. I tried that with one of a server fan running at 12V 1A , and the temperature decreased drastictly. The thing is that i cannot carry this fan which u showed or put it all the time on my desk as i depend alot on ALIENWARE'S cooling system itself which should have been better . My first experiment would be grinding the HEATSINK to make it sit properly on the inductors and coils and vrms and if there is no difference, i might go for one of this thanks anyway.