RIP MX 18R4

Hey guys, sad news here. One or possibly both of my 7970m cards just died on me. Again.
The first time this happened was in 2013 and luckily I was still covered by warranty back then.

Now I have following questions:

1. Can I get the computer to start using only one of the cards without taking it apart ?
2. How can I enable my on board card ? I mean the Intel thing. It won't work if I boot the computer in secure mode.

3. What options do I got ? which video cards work in this thing ?
4. What price could I expect if I were to sell my beloved Alienware ?


cheers guys and thanks a lot..

 

WHY? You do not ever want to leave faulty equipment socketed into your computer.

 

Because that thing is a ***** to open ; (

 

At any rate, while the risk isn't super high, there is a chance to damage the socket if you leave it in there.

I never had an AW M18x, but users have been able to put 2x GTX 980m easy enough.

Also I would post in the AW 18 and 18x forum with a "need help" tile

 

Unfortunately i see all the amd cards from that era die in my environment. Seems to be a bit problematic. However i do recommend to remove the card and get a nvidia gpu instead.

 

couldn't agree more.

You will see a single GTX 980m is just about as good as a 7970M Crossfire setup, but with none of the crossfire/SLI drawbacks

 

hi guys, thanks for getting back to me.
I will probably open this guy up this week and remove the faulty card to see if I can run it with at least one card. Then I will decide whether or not I should get a 780m or 980m.

Would the 980m work just fine on windows 7 though ?


cheers

 

The guy that can help you best with that information is @woodzstack

 

hmm, whats what ?

 

BTW, never heard of a M18X-R4.. do you mean M18X-R2 or AW18 or like the M17X-R4 ?

anyways, you do not want to do windows 7 with these cards, support was dropped 2 years ago, so you would have to use very old drivers and would get no DX12, SLI could be an issue too, and just no - I do not recommend it. Windows 7 is obsolete years ago. It's almost the same as asking for Vista or windows XP or windows ME or such...

I can help you with a purchase if you like too, but maybe I can help you trouble shoot your old card just incase, you;d be surprise by how many people have a faulty card only because of a windows update.

 

Just install Windows 10 Anniversary. After installation downlod ShutUp10 and remove spying services and auto-update. It will work even better than Windows 7. You can also download unofficial windows 7 similiar themes for Win10 from deviantart.

 

I meant the R2. The sadness must have clouded my memory .

how could a windows update brick a card ?

cheers

 

I don't know about brick the card but it could be trying to force UEFI compliance only and the way it interacts with legacy devices is questionable at best.

 

hey guys, after swapping videocard 2 into slot one the notebook won't recognize it at all. When trying to install the drivers it won't let me choose anything.
Isnt the main card supposed to be on the left side next to the vga port ?
I also removed the crossfire cable.

cheers

 

do I have to change something in the bios after removing one card ?

 

In M18xR2? Nothing I could remember.

Left side is main gpu. You need modified drivers from techinferno to make new GPU work - http://cloud-3.steamusercontent.com/ugc/439487687762985697/0F1E98BCFFE5902CE56282FAA3744BB1CC38468A/

I personally recommend 368.25

Use a Windows testmode cmd (admin): "bcdedit /set testsigning yes" to install drivers. They are modified to work with non-original configurations so you need a testmode.