RIP - Alienware 18

Game7a1,
That does speak volumes about the Alienware 18. Even the discontinued AW18 models still carried that model's traditional LOFTY price. It's reassuring to see there was still demand for such a beast.

 

http://www.dell.com/us/p/alienware-18/pd?oc=dkcwx01sb&l=en
Huh, it's back. I wonder why. The darn thing just won't die.

 

Maybe limited supply to make money. Can't seem to configure anything. Take what we got

 

Seems like the clearance is about to end. They only have one configuration available that is pretty much set in stone except for the OS and accessories. No more R9 m290x.

 

RIP - This thread. Long live the 18, lol.

 

Dell has shaken up Aw18 with gtx980m. All too late. 9 months to late with this... Gtx980m is old now. Why launch same old 2013 Aw18 with a nearly 10 months antiquated gtx970/980m graphics ? Sad / tragic...
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Dell-introduces-new-Alienware-18-gaming-laptop.148357.0.html
http://hothardware.com/news/alienwa...th-its-big-18-inch-and-dual-gtx-980m-graphics

 

someone is lacking push power and so many people need to be fired out there in DELL in AW R&D department, is just so bad its hilarious.

 

Sorry Alienware. Too late. Switched to camp MSI GT80 Titan.

 

Late yes little no the 980m is still the fastest mobile card to date and there is no new graphics yet. Also the new 18 2015 will have socketed cpus a 4940xm and a fully unlocked motherboard like the late great m18x r2 so seems like a worth update with how powerful the 980m is if you sli them bad boys there is nothing you can't play it's already overkill for 1080p

 

Sorry to bring this up again but had another go on far cry 4 and can see that my Gpu speed is all over the place and never on a constant 993 so maybe this is causing the low FPS? tried it with update 10 and and still getting anything between around 40 and 20 FPS in SLI with everything maxed out. I haven't noticed this throttling issue with other games ive been playing like GTAV.

 

Yes, the cards do throttle but my experience generally remains the same. Although I have read on plenty of forums that the Nvidia soft shadows are just far too demanding and glitchy in terms of their impact on performance, even with faster cards where performance might not dip as much as ou describe, but still gets impacted too severely. Many opt not to use them altogether.

Perhaps you should take a pragmatic approach to playing this game. Just scale back the anti-aliasing to SMAA since it is seen as having better coverage in this game than even TXAA (which is more demanding as well), and put the shadows on ultra. You are still leaps and bounds ahead of the console experience with a beyond ultra look to the game and likely to maintain a frame rate that could hover in the 50-60 territory.

 

Just don't understand why were getting such different results, maybe your GPU's are newer?

As per update 10 you can't use SMAA in SLI lol!

and the game crashes when I die, so just have to make sure I don't die.

runs pretty well if I turn off soft shadows and TXAA down to 2x.

 

Alienware 18 is RIP again they took off the prices on the alienware website and removed it on dell's website

 

RIP indeed. Google A18 cached page from March 7
It was a Limited Edition, & seemingly very hard to order / take possession of one for the brief time it was 'available'; their difficulty in filling orders was, well, embarrassing. 18 looks like it's been disappeared (put out to pasture) & no FlagShip in the stable, the natural qwestion is: what next? ... talk among yourselves ...

*** A18 ... we hardly knew ye ... ***​

 

Yup, it's gone. References are gone on the main Alienware page and if you look for it, it says "call for pricing" aka....its dead. Good bye Alienware, you've killed your last remaining real computer!

 

I'm glad I got a warranty. And I'm hoping for the best to come on their next revision.

I purchased a max specs off the oulet for 35% off. I still have faith in Alienware. I'm sure they had a good beating on the AW 18 issues and " hopefully " their next step forward will change.

 

There will not be another revision. This is the end of the line. The Alienware 18 was brought back for a limited time to milk whatever leftovers they had left in the factory.

 

I know that the AW 18 is gone. I'm talking about there next model. They will have to come out with another laptop to be competitive.

 

If a competitor even comes out it WILL most likely be BGA, most likely a BGA SLI crapbook with a new "slimmer" alienware 18 "r2" with skylake and graphics adapter, in fact they might just have a 18.4 screen and 1 BGA 980m and 2 graphics amplifier slots to make more money, then if you get bottleneck you buy a new alienware 18 with a newer skylake

 

Disappointed to hear of the news about the Alienware 18 disappearing again. We never even had it listed here in the U.K.

That isn't a coherent explanation as our other game results line up nicely.

Again, I have looked into this and people with Titan Blacks and desktop 780 Ti units are having trouble with soft shadows creating too much performance disparity with certain dense jungle scenes causing larger dips in performance. The soft shadow feature as implemented in this game is just not up to the ideal mark. FYI: I'm able to use SMAA with SLi, but I get some of that ghosting effect when I change settings while in the game.

Also, if I recall correctly from our earlier exchange on this topic, you aren't using an actual Uplay copy, which might also be part of the problem.

Just continue playing it without soft shadows, which aren't even that magnificent a feature in the case of this game.

 

Yeah. If... I said if Dell come out with a brand new Aw18 with Skylake, will the new model be totally crippled with an locked bios. Probably also with power limit like previous model. None will manage to flash a mod unlocked bios on an Dell machine. Then, what's the point to purchase a expensive new gaming laptop that never will manage to compete with Clevo laptops powered by @Prema ?

 

It's still available on the Canadian website with dual 970's.

 

Seems like the stock are getting exhausted and soon there will be no more AW18s.I think It's much better to invest in Clevo P870DM, who knows what problems may arise with future MXMs, they will not provide the sBIOS update again next time to the AW18...

If only they get the secure flash gone the system would be still worth considering...atleast to Alienware fans.

 

the market isn't going anywhere...the Titan is ugly and unfunctional with the keyboard placement, id never even consider it

im sure another 18" gaming laptop will come around soon enough...hopefully with 980 GTX SLI

 

I will finish this for you.
<im sure another 18" gaming laptop will come around soon enough...hopefully with 980 GTX SLI> + Skylake i7 soldered on the motherboard!!

 

sorry for the noob question but why people hate so much soldered chips , (besides the obvious is not upgradeable reason)

 

Oh no!!, what have you done?!!!

 

i said i was sorry for the noob question xD

 

It might not be too late... step back slowly and quietly, maybe they didn't hear you...

Spoiler: whisper mode

It's not you man, it's Papusan, you asked the question that opens the flood gates of BGA derision.

Surpassed only by Mr. Fox's elegant stomping of BGA.

It's not pretty...

 

Long horrible story in short format http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/alienware-15-r1-cpu-issue-warning.788446/
+ all Alienware sub forum. I shall post some more info about the BGA crap later. But FIRST start to read the thread I posted. Maybe you dont want to see the rest after you read every post in that thread. You can be very sick and want to puke all day and can't go to your work for 10 days

 

thanks mate , i will read it and will notice in advance i wont be able to go work next week

 

Yeah. After I have seen all the horror stories... You know I can't work anymore.

 

me personally id take a soldered cpu if i had no other choice just as long as it was the TOP OF THE LINE unlocked available at that time...look at m18xr1 - people that got the 2960xm couldn't upgrade anyway...m18xr2..people that got 3940xm couldn't upgrade...

 

I'd somewhat agree with this. Problem with upgrading a CPU is unlike the GPUs which use the same standard (mxm) CPUs change socket interface after a few years making it impossible to upgrade the CPU. Even with my desktop if I want the newest CPU I'd have to replace the motherboard and even the ram as well after a few years. It would be alot different if CPUs used a similar universal standard.

I'm kinda sad that there doesnt seem to be anymore m18 I am split right now as while I still love having my m18xr2 its starting to show its age expecially since theres no more updated bios or drivers for windows 10 bar the GPU drivers (I managed to get it running stable for now and the latest nvidia drivers possibly helped as well since Ive had no OS corruption or real glitches since I installed them). Hopefully those working on modifying the m18xr2 bios will be successful and we can use the 980ms in legacy and without modified inf files.

I'm trying to get the best out of my 980ms I bought last year to at least get my moneys worth outta them but I'm waiting for either a new 2016 AW18r2 (depending on quality) or Eurocom to put out an 18inch+ Gaming laptop. That sky x9 is nice but I REALLY dont wanna go back to a smaller laptop. Must have a big screen!

 

I too am waiting to see what is there next release. I still got hope in AW.

 

Dunno when they release their new line tho. Think I heard something about april or may for em. Wondering if the 980mx will also be coming out soon as well.

 

I am hoping for new alienware 18 with skylake and geforce 1000 series. Latest rumors about pascal based geforce release date was 27th of may. So i guess that's when dell can announce new model of AW18 at the soonest.

 

That que sera sera perspective is one example of why they get away with peddling trash to people that view themselves as an enthusiast.

And, what about the people that buy lower spec and upgrade later when prices are dramatically better? Not everyone starts off spending big bucks on an Extreme CPU. Some opted for the cheapest option and paid $500+ less for an Extreme CPU upgrade later. That's how I did it and I saved a ton of money. And, several years later these fully unlocked beast CPUs still spank just about all of the non-Extreme mobile processors, BGA or otherwise.

Problems with BGA design other than upgrades:

• BGA CPUs rarely perform as well as socketed CPUs in the same product family - almost all throttle to some extent and even the "unlocked" versions generally have lower TDP
• Service parts are too expensive - motherboard with CPU, GPU, or both, costs more to make, more to sell and more to buy
• Winning the silicon lottery once is hard enough... if you replace the mobo and get a crappy CPU, you're screwed (you get to keep your good CPU if it is socketed)
• You don't get to play the silicon lottery even if you want to... you're stuck with what you have... like it or not... better luck next time
• BGA serves nobody well except the people selling it... the intent is to make them more money by selling inferior products that cannot be upgraded or easily serviced
• Even if the laptop dies or is retired in need of major repair, you have less to sell... CPU and GPU both have some degree of value to them, but they are utterly worthless attached to a motherboard that nobody wants or needs... did I already say "disposable" junk?

Any way they want you to slice it, BGA is a sucky dead-end downgrade for products that might otherwise be regarded as something desirable. For a $300 Walmart/Best Buy consumer turdbook that's probably OK. For something marketed under the pretense of being high performance it's a really lame second-class cop-out when you know better and expect better.