*Prospective* News/Discussion: Alienware M18x R3

I got my first alienware august of 2011. 2 months into it I had 4 support calls for over heating and failures in hardware, 2 months later I ended up getting a replacement due to more failures in hardware. After not having a working computer for over a month. I got upgraded to the Alienware I have now. While I had this downtime I needed a laptop, so I got a macbook pro. Not one over heating issue, can play wow fine, can do all my photoshop fine and all my video editing fine, can handle all my vm's that I run on it.

The price of my macbook pro wasn't 2-3k. It was 1500, but I did get it on sale(like you can do with alienware). Also Alienware has gone to the all on board with everything with the m11 and m14. But I was really just talking about the customer service part of Apple. You make an appointment, you show up, they fix your computer and you walk away with a working computer. There is no tech that has to look online or call tech support because they don't know how to repair the system.

While there is very little people who would use thunderbolt up to what is it made for I am one of the few that would. I have a drobo for a reason, Amazing raid back up. My Alienware is hooked up to the usb 3.0 and the Macbook pro up to the thunderbolt.

While I hope there is a r3, I will be skipping it for an r4. My r1 does everything I need it to do for the time being.

And there is many good ideas in this thread some of them really make me wonder.

Edit: below...

I would blame the uniformed customer. If it wasn't Apple, it would be another company. But one thing I don't understand is why people have to hate on Apple so hard. If no one wants it then why do they sell so many? I mean when the ipod came out. There really wasn't a market for it. There was some players, but apple did it better. Same with the iphone. 2007 you really didn't have a smartphone besides getting a blackberry or nokia. http://reviews.cnet.com/4321-6452_7-6600061.html

Ok, I will try to stay on topic now.

I really do wish they would get better usb chipset or something to improve the speed, or thunderbolt. Transferring 10 gig files sucks at usb 3.0 speeds that I get. It is faster to transfer it over gigbit Ethernet and then from my other computer to the drobo.

 

Two stock 680MX would beat a single 680M overclocked? Sure, I agree. Would they beat two overclocked 680M's? No, I doubt it.

Hey, if Alienware/Dell can figure out a way of putting in the system, great. I'm all for it.

 

I don't understand what you are saying.

 

Whatever business or design practices they use you don't like, you can't say they don't have god standard warranty service. Dell, asus, lenovo, etc... are all garbage compared with apple service from what I have seen. Sometimes you get a good rep, and sometimes you get jerked around for up to 9 months or never get service at all. With apple if something goes wrong and its not your fault, you just walk into one of their stores, tell them what wrong, and they fix it right there, and if it can't be fixed, they let you walk out of the store with a brand new item in the same visit. Their phone reps are also helpful and knowledgeable. if You call dell there is a 50% chance you will be talking with someone in India, and a 90% chance you will know more about computers than the rep does.

 

I don't know about hate, I actually admire Apple's efficiency when it comes to delivering new products on time, servicing them, quality control and marketing. It's clear to me that people buy their products for a reason. Most people don't need the power, don't care about long term upgradeability, and don't worry about compatibility or versatility of their systems. They need stable working machines that will do the limited number of tasks without the need of calling support every few months. But that's the thing, AW is an enthusiast-oriented brand (at least originally). It packs maximum power, best cooling, features, etc and as such exists in a different realm. I really really hope, Dell never crosses the border, at least with the flagship models....

 

I guess this is where I don't agree, it does have the best power for cpu/gpu. But it lacks on many other features, crappy usb controls, the cooling is good, but isn't the best it could be, and well customer service is not consistent. I do understand where you are coming from, you want to be able to run your system as hard as you can. If I didn't depend on this system for work I might think about over clocking mine. Problem is unless you know how to get the play in the bios and vbios, these systems are pretty well locked down.

Is it really wrong to want to never have to call tech support because of a problem? That is my goal. I want it to work without any problems. If I went by my standards of how many times I have had to call alienware for problems with my system I would never touch one again, and I would tell everyone of my friends to never touch an alienware. alienware is the best customize-able laptop there is, but if I have to spend 50+ hrs on the phone (which I did when my gpu's was getting over 104c) with tech support to tell them it isn't working right. Well then something is wrong with that picture. I had to send the person a screenshot because he flat out called me a liar saying the system would thermo shutdown at 100c. Spending 2k on a paperweight because it doesn't run is not very much doing me any good. Having a good non running computer isn't doing me any good when I am paying too much money to try to degree and work to pay for that degree.

I still don't understand the line about a limited number of tasks. There is one thing my macbook pro can't do as good as my alienware, game. I can mix music fine, runs autocad great, 3d studio great, ms office great, hell it compiles my c+ code better than ms does. So please besides gaming what can the alienware do better than a macbook pro.

 

alienware needs to offer unlocked bios, at least for cstate on/off and esata port multiplier and a bunch of other CPU power related configs.

imo AW should be able to do all the work you mentioned better because you can overclock your CPU higher than 4.5ghz with better cooling too. I got alienware cause it's got biggest screen, dual GPU, decent looks and solid build.

USB 3.0 and esata were bonuses i was really happy with two usb 3.0 ports, then I learned it won't give me more than 230 mb/s when I raided three HDD externally, it was really disappointing. an advertised 5gbps on their website went to as low as 170MB/s write, sucks.

 

1) It takes 1 hour on the phone with DELL and maybe 1 email to fix the problem you had. I have done so for some of my clients when was still selling gaming notebooks. Unlike Apple, if you need to replace your GPU's/mobo/etc, there's no need to have a tech come to you or go to the nearby shop. All you have to do is ask them send the parts and you will DIY - as with all high end systems, it's assumed you know how to handle the beast. BTW, your sig says you still have a AW machine,

2) I have owned macbooks and have seen their limits: You can't run windows operating systems on macbooks with 100% stability (and before you ask, no, OSX can't cover the variety of tasks I need, if it could - I wouldn't be using laptops). You can do bootcamp, which is another gimmick, the drivers are not as stable, temps are way higher, bios is as locked down as OSX itself. I have had many issues with my MBA and MBP when trying to setup my virtualization environment. It failed on so many levels.
And just for kicks, here's what I do on my machine:
Running Server 2012 Datacenter as the host OS with hyper-V and about 30 VM's comprising several test domains with every possible IT simulation: Exchange DAG's (1000+ users), SQL, fully blown System Center 2012, some linux/UNIX integration and much more. That alone is a deal breaker when it comes to MBPs. However:
At the same time, I'm using my machine on the go quite often and benefit greatly from 5 hours of battery life and a 18.4" screen ( anti-glare).
- stream HD content wirelessly to our plasma tv (WirelessHD) and thus eliminated the unnecessary cable tv subscription.
play all games on max (right now waiting for the new video cards to arrive)
enjoy occasional overclocking and benching.
greatly benefit from macro keys, 2 headphone jacks, and other connectivity options.
5 hard drives in a laptop including a 2TB one in the optical bay (yes it does fit )

I could continue....

 

lol
Bottom line, dell is not putting a 122 watt card on their board so forget it. That goes for the R1 or the R2. (R3 would need to be approved for a 122W card and not by dell) Not one let alone two. The 680MX is for apples only. Now if someone goes and takes one apart and then tries to make it work in an Alienware. That is something different. Our current PCIE slot is 100 Watts with an over flow (so to speak) And that card goes past the "all" laptop standards of 100W pcie and 100W card envelope.

Would I like to see one in there? Of course!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Is it likely to happen through normal channels? Of course not!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But you guys keep up the debates, you see we are already pushing 427W super over clocked.And that far exceeds both pcie and card envelopes. Just because we want it, doesn't make right. And they would have to seriously go above the 100W barrier or cripple the card and hear our mouth's. Like they heard them about these 680M's when they first came out. haha

Just an opinion only.

 

care to tell us more about your 2TB drive in optical bay? I believe I saw a 2tb 2.5" drive on japan news never thought it was released on market but that was months ago. I'd want to fit in a velociraptor and it's 15mm, should be the same as the 2TB, it would work... right?

my dream is now onto 785m and 8990m , hoping 780m would at least be 30-40% more powerful than 680m, the same goes for AMD's card

 

My dream is to own a 1290M or 1295M with quad core on board. 12 gigs of memory and running off of 15 watts. I think ill wait for that to be released.

 

by the way, I doubt there will be a 30-40% boost over the current 680m, reason being that the architecture will 99% remain the same; this was one of the core differences between 580m (aka 675m) and 680m

 

yes, i doubt it too, but theres hope at least for something like 785m/8990m.

so haswell CPU will probably be delayed. Intel Haswell CPUs delayed until June 2013 this go for both desktop/mobile CPU. good news is, vrzone stating haswell CPU will be more than just 10% core per core performance than ivybridge, which reminded me of sandy vs 1st gen i7, was over 11%, another big jump indeed. again nothing is for sure until haswell comes out though. 11%, a 3Ghz haswell CPU means a ~3.3Ghz in ivybridge, although frequency dont translate into performance, I think it is safe to say a 4.5ghz 4930xm would mean closer to 5.0ghz 2960xm!

at least another half a year till we see R3 LOL, cmon Dell, improve those USB3.0, change esata 3G to 6G and add thunderbolt! dual screen? smaller battery more HDD bays? maybe..

 

If what I have heard of the GK11x series then they are much like the 4->5 series in terms of changes, like I say a power tweaked fully unlocked part would be nice.

 

I started learning laptop hardware on 5 series, just how much were improved from 4->5?

 

Look up some benchmarks comparing the GTX485M to the 580M.

 

Wow has this gotten off subject over the last couple of pages...



Here's what I want in the yet unreleased M18x R3.

Next gen intel processors and chipset (which should bring more sata III ports).
Next gen AMD and NVIDIA cards.

And that's all. Cause that's all we are likely to get.






But I would love to see a matte and higher res display (seriously still 1080p?), and TB port.
I would also be fine with losing some of the battery size/life to increase optimal performance and possible configuration options.

 

I can tell you it didn't take 1 call or email. I glad maybe you could get it done. Mine didn't. It took 4 visits, with the tech breaking 2 things, and sending it to depot. And it was still broke. Also I payed good money for it. I shouldn't have to fix something that is broke, I understand you like to take yours apart. I don't, too many things can break on a laptop that are small and be broken easily. could I do it, yes, do I chose to do it, no. also I asked for parts only and got told no. I would be happy to send you the pm's, they do say no.

I do have both laptops and I use both laptops.

 

Again, that would require 18.4" panels made beyond 1080p which I am not sure exist.

 

I know that. The point is that until people request them, nobody is going to bother creating them. We are still calling for high end next gen video cards which don't quite exist yet. Then as soon as those get released, we will be calling for the generation after that...

If our 12lb laptop doesn't get us any better resolution than a cheap 15" laptop can offer, how special does that make you feel?

 

WD20NPVT. Your velociraptor would probably overheat, it's a very tight squeeze. Also, not sure it would have enough power. But the WD green does fit and run cool, cooler than the drives in main bay by about 7-10C.

Alas, using Dell's warranty isn't all that straightforward. One is required to do some serious research. You need to shortcut to AW reps, otherwise will get stuck in the eternal loop of stupid questions and redirections to wrong departments. Also, it's best to avoid their 3rd party techs as those guys have little to no AW training and will break more than their fix. I used to provide crash courses on AW flagships to our local techs here in Calgary but it didn't help much - the whole system is wrong to begin with. Dell should have their own specialists in the AW field instead of hiring IT companies. IMHO, systems built for enthusiasts have to be serviced by enthusiasts.
Anyway, once you establish the channel and find the reps that do the job, - you will have the best support ever, unbeatable by any other company. Personally, I only use Dell's warranty for getting upgrade/replacement parts. Always do it myself. After opening the machine more than 100 times over the past year (only last week had did it about 25 times with all the new heatsink testing, lol), not a single part was broken So it's not that bad, it actually feels good.

 

IIRC the raptors require the 12V rail in the SATA power slot that most people especially in notebooks don't provide.

 

EXACTLY, thannks for pointing it out again which there are many people think its pointless to try, which gets nothing done. pressure needs to be applied or they'll just do w/e they please. Im paying 4-5k for this damn machine, I want the best, period. if people dont agree with it or what not, thats fine they could go for m17x. I just wont waste money on another machine with crappy USB 3.0 ports, no esata6G, no thunderbolt port and sloppy locked Bios.

AW should be changing mobo regardless because of chipset and CPU socket, so why not just make it bit better in one go. no point getting the machine hands down, if thunderbolt port comes in R4 broadwell, then I'll get it when broadwell comes out. otherwise I'll just upgrade my R1 slowly lol

I assume main bay and ODD bay not the 12V?

 

Special in a way of less strain on your retinas. Try working on a 1080p 15" screen for 8-10 hours a day for a year or two, you vision will plummet. Would I buy a higher resolution 18.4" screen upgrade for my M18x? - sure! But only if it can scale down to acceptable res without affecting the image quality. Otherwise, - no way.

 

I don't understand why it would strain them. how does a cleaner image do that? I am not trying to pick a fight really, I just don't understand the concept. And for the record I worked on a 15" monitor 12+ hrs a day for 5 years. While it wasn't 1080p. It was a close worse at 1600x1200. My vision didn't change at all.

 

I cant stand 1600x900 even at 17 inch LOL, well thats just me cause I use external keyboard so I sit a bit further away. with my 15 inch laptop I use it's keyboard and 13**x768 was just enough for it, any bigger than that would be hard for me to see =/ even my alienware m18x I use 1600x900, not the 1080p

 

If you are ok with 1200p on a 15" screen - that's amazing! I really envy you. I couldn't handle it, especially when writing code, to much eye strain The safe limit for my eyes is 17"@1080/1200p. Higher res or smaller screen would be really pushing it.

 

you know what i really want in the r3 if it comes out.. a new bios that works and is not crippled with stupid settings for default.. thats all.. you can keep the hardware the same i want the most out of are machines and not some blankity blank backwards bios.. i want to do what i want to do with my system.. (all the new goodies would be nice also.. heck Id take a brand new bios right now.. if it was done correctly..)

 

ok maybe I responded wrong, why is higher ppi bad? I do notice a difference on how things look.

 

just different preferences but I do have hard time seeing things that are too small. when using firefox I up the text a bit too, although window text I left it remain the same. higher resolution isnt necessary bad, I would love a 1920 x 1200 on m18x but I dont think I'll ever use it, icons/text just too small to see it all, on top of that I sit just less than a meter away from the screen so I cant use anything higher than 1600x900.

im sure if I were to use laptop without external keyboard it'll bring in about another 50-60cm closer to the screen, then I wouldnt mind using 1080. but this doesnt change the fact that even 1080 doesnt fit all sub boxes/ windows on some softwares like adobe though.

 

I am not talking about raising the resolution. I am talking about raising the amount of pixels per inch. Keep the 1080p just increase the pixels.

I have put my older MacBook next to the new one. At the same resolution there is a difference in how the image looks. I just want that in a 18" screen.

 

That is a very good point. I'd like that as well.

 

As far as a higher resolution screen. This seems to get people in an uproar.
When I say I want a higher res screen(I would still use the higher res for work, but that's just me.), it is strictly for gaming or those with eye problems. once out of the game, it would look as sharp as it does when dropped down to 1200P or 1080P with 1440P for gaming with dual card setups.
Which can be done, but people complain about having boarders around the screen when dropping to lower resolutions. I think it can be fixed with profiles, but I'm not the display expert here. Wish I was though.

 

Pixel density, or PPI is really not a good way to quantify the quality of a screen as it only really makes a difference depending on how far you sit from the screen. You could have a 300+ PPI tiny little smartphone which looks great because you view it up closer than you would normally view a monitor/laptop display. You could get the same "feel" by viewing a 50" HDTV with a PPI of around 50 because your eyes are further away and can't make out the difference anyways. The human eye cant really distinguish any PPI increase over 300 anyway, because that's around the visual acuity limit of the human retina. Having insanely higher PPI won't actually make a blind bit of difference.

A good read on it here: Why Your HDTV Is Already A Retina Display - people tend to "rave" about Apple's Retina Display because it's an Apple marketing terminology - nothing more. Some of the best high end monitors in the world have much lower PPI than a "Retina Display" - it's just a bit of crApple "hype" in my opinion.....

Personally, instead of higher PPI, I'd prefer to see a true RGBLED panel (for more accurate colour representation) coupled with a higher resolution, like the UltraSharp monitors getting utilized in the next refresh. If Dell stuck a panel similar to that of the Precision into the R3, that would make my day......if they upped the res. from 1920x1200 too, that would be very nice to be able to have more workable screen real estate....along with a higher refresh rate. Don't want much, do we? LOL

 

Why can't one have the option to upgrade for what he desires? Such as(assuming standard FHD 60Hz TN panel):

A) HD+ E-IPS panel @ 60Hz

B) FHD H-IPS panel @ 60Hz

C) HD+ H-IPS panel @ 60Hz

D) FHD TN panel @ 120Hz

E) HD+ TN panel @ 120Hz

Who said anything about compromise? Of course, some of the things I listed don't exist for this screen size—yet.

 

with 5 choices I dont see how is it not possible to have multi screen as a 6th. if it cost too much or bulky maybe AW can do something like this would be cool MSI to launch S20 Slider Ultrabook for $1199 - Notebookcheck.net News. but it would change design =/

I'll be looking for matte though if they offer it and 60Hz is enough for me I think.

 

Exactly. Plus, I wouldn't want to have to push games to run at 3840x2160 or 3800x2400, that would kill gaming performance entirely!

 

That would be interesting, and that MSI ultrabook looks really neat.

That should be an option for all panels; one should be able to chose between matte and glossy.

I believe it is even more important for brands like Alienware to have high levels of customization; if someone were to want a high resolution screen then let him have it. He does not have to play at that resolution, but maybe he could if the graphics card of the generation allow for it. Maybe he wants a high color gamut(H-IPS screen or RGB LED backlight), but does not want the higher resolution screen. Maybe someone with a bigger wallet wants both.

Personally, I'd like a higher resolution H-IPS display. Thereby I get the resolution for normal tasks that would benefit from HD+, but I can switch to FHD when gaming for better performance, yet still have amazing color depth. The only negative would be the black bars, but that is why we have scaling.

 

Getting outstanding performance from an Ultrabook seems like an unreasonable expectation. You cannot put 10 gallons of gasoline in a 5 gallon gas tank. Something has to give. High performance hardware will not run cool enough because there is not enough space to provide the necessary support for it in such a wimpy little form factor. Changing design would not be adequate. You would have to lower your expectations.

 

If I were to design a mechanism that attached a 10 gallon tank to a car with a 5 gallon tank and regulated the flow rate of the gasoline, I could then move the car at such a speed whereby the consumption of the fuel is greater than, but nearly equal to the amount of gasoline coming in, thus I have put in 10 gallons into a 5 gallon tank until I have consumed all the gasoline in the 10 gallon tank.

Expectations must not change. This is why we innovate, but at the moment you, sir, are right.

 

If you're referring to the comparison of the classic macbook vs the Retina macbook, you're talking about resolution. OS X shows you the 'same' resolution by rendering the screen with a much higher resolution and scaling it down. Windows has a similar scaling feature, where you can make Windows render text and icons to be much larger (thus 'simulating' the experience of a lower resolution).

To change PPI, you change either the resolution, or the size of the screen. I assume you don't want to change the size of the screen, since we're in the M18X forum, so the only other way is resolution.

 

saw this @ PCPer

Maybe one day Dell will give it to you guys.

 

not interested in touch screen tablet. no keyboard and no mouse? no game

 

So, about what time of the year do we hear about the next revisions? It should be soon.

 

last year I think it was around feb or march they announce next gen stuff but this time around haswell delayed to June so maybe a bit later.

 

Yeah, you can say that again. I tend to view that kind of junk as an obese cell phone minus the cellular radio. Perfect for gadgets and gizmo junkies, but not performance enthusiasts and gamers. It is certainly out of place in a thread speculating about what might be revealed as the successor to an Alienware M18x R1/R2.

 

agree hands down man. it still struck me every time I see tablet comes with it's tiny little keyboard but then theres no mouse because its a tablet so just how are they suppose to play game? and carry additional keyboard/mouse defeats purpose of owning a tablet may as well jsut go for something like ultrabook, I just can't seem to accept those gadgets at all.

 

I think this fits well in this thread also... it's on my wish list.

 

I think watercooling can be done as an external tank, problem I see i have run across is I can't find a waterblock with side in and outs to keep the fan.

 

I got a funny feeling something is gonna be unveiled tomorrow by Dell Alienware. I was talking with my rep the other day and he was kinda saying to me "wait till Thursday....." He's also been telling some of the guys I send his way from NBR pretty much the same thing...."hold off on buying until Thursday....."

Of course, I could be mistaken but coming from him, it seem's something is gonna go down tomorrow.....let's see!