m18x and windows aero

Does the M18x come with Trixx pre-installed?

Edit: Never mind. I read your post more carefully and you were asking who had installed it.

 

Thought as much. Oh and btw, that score really does seem to suck.....tell me that was your M17x R3 score and not your M18x score....I wonder if you have other issues.....

I have my cpu multipliers set at 45/42/38/38 and i get 27000+ so surely to god my 2920xm cpu and extra ram dont account for that much of a gap.....SSD's dont really contribute to the overall score afaik. (Dell stock drivers and no gpu overclock fwiw)

 

Restarted and got 22357. A lot better-but still seems low.

 

Nah, that seems alot better....remember, '06 is quite a cpu dependant benchmark and i have OC'd my 2920xm to 4.5ghz.......my stock run is about 25k....seems that your run at 22k+ is about right for 2820....afaik, as I havent seen many benches for '06 with 2820 and dual 6970's

 

Actually, quite good without an Extreme CPU like Steviejones'. Have you visited the M18x benchmark thread to see how your benches compare to others? I'd like to see your Vantage and 3DMark11 scores more so than the 3DMark06. Can you run some benches and post them on the other thread for us?

Below is how the base M18x with the 2630QM CPU seems to fare.

 

Exactly, you can see how cpu dependant '06 is....19k+ for a 2630.....id say a 3k jump to 22k+ with a 2820 is about "on par for the course"......

 

M18x scheduled for landing by 3PM tomorrow.

 

Here are some benches!
Nothing special but I don't need too much. It'll still play anything!

 

QFT. I have yet to encounter the Aero issue again since disabling virtualization, but my case may be isolated - and I also put my computer to sleep often rather than shut it down. Seeing as users with all cards are having the problem, we all have different hard drives, memory, and versions of the sandy bridge cpu as well as various versions of windows and drivers - I find it difficult to blame any of those as being the root cause.

This may require a new bios from dell...... hoorah for waiting a year for that to come about. My only other hypothesis would be the chipset software. The last update was 4/21/2011.

Other laptops affected by faulty cougar point chipsets

 

I doubt Dell/AW will provide a proper fix for this. Instead they will most likely move on to the M18x R2.

 

You are really frustrated with Dellienware, M8. They will fix it, 100%. Can't say for certain how long it will take though.

Honestly guys, if the aero bug, sleep brightness and USB halt on boot are the only issues of this system, I consider this a great success.

 

Nice! Those are great scores, massey.

 

I agree. And this^^^ is coming from someone that really knows computers and the business. Mine has been great and little quirks will not bother me.

 

I agree, too. After all, this is bleeding edge stuff.

 

I'm glad you guys are so optimistic. I purchased a R2 back in January. I Immediately discovered the following problems:

1. Plugged in not charging problem( NOT RESOLVED)
2. Resume/sleep brightness problem( NOT RESOLVED)
3. Code 43 problem( NOT RESOLVED)

To this day these problems remain unresolved. Instead of fixing these problems, Dell/AW has used it's resources to develope the R3 & M18x. Today I had a very interesting conversation with a level 3 about these problems. I was told that there is nothing we can do to fix this problem. It is a hardware issue. The ONLY way to fix this is if AMD/Nvidia decides to address this issue. Dell/AW finds this issue to be a little glitch that's not really a big deal.


To me it is a big deal because today I was showing off my M18x and it flaked out and switched to basic mode. An on looker said; why do you use basic? You know Aero looks waaaay better.

I didn't even feel like explaining the issue and just restarted.....................how embarrasing



Can someone sticky this thread?

 

Dell support forums

I posted this problem on the Dell support forums since a tech rep requested it. He claims that I'm the first to ever call with this problem, and that the higher level techs often check the forums to resolve issues. I'll take that with a grain of salt, but I suppose it wouldn't hurt for us to start a ruckus on their site.

It's more of a nuisance than anything, but I (and the rest of you) would prefer to not have to deal with it. If dellienware can't fix the problem then I think I'm done. I've had more replacements than I care to mention - and I'm actually pretty happy with this one.

I noticed many of you mentioning 'restarting' your computers to fix the problem. I can confirm (and I believe this was mentioned earlier) that you can just log off/on to repair it. Sometimes I have to log off more than once.

 

Some issues MAY remain totally unsolved. But, I will say this-I got a NEW R3 as a result of the bold print bc AW decided it would be best to just replace the computer. Sounds to me like it was resolved pretty well in my case. I know-not all owners have the same outcome. But if there are 20-25 people bringing up this issue in this forum-only 1 has actually (Officially) reported to Dell/AW-how can they fix it if they don't know it's broke? Just my $.02

About changing to Basic-shoulda asked him if his computer was smart enough to recognize onlookers that aren't accustomed to such great hardware and can automatically detect them and 'dumb' them selves down to Basic mode. Hahahaha!!!

 

that was to funny. +1 rep!!

 

Hilarious!

 

M18x Aero issues - Laptop General Hardware Forum - Laptop - Dell Community eveyone needs to contribute!!!

 

Done! Let's get it fixed!

 

Added mine Hope we can get this resolved

 

Mannnnnn, I'm sooooooo looking forward to tomorrows post. I really think this is the answer to all our problems with cloning the system to other drives with no size errors. I can't wait to see how it works out for you.

Are you going to use Acronis? If not, what?

Thx

 

Nigel8600, can you please voice your thoughts about this issue in the dell thread?

 

Absolutely........... anything for the team.

 

I am about to start wiping my old drives and doing a clean install to prep the R2 for return, so I will be offline for a while.

I use the retail version of Macrium Reflect. It is supposed to work good on RAID images. I will find out. I use it for my regular imaging and backup tasks.

Here's hoping it works.

The only thing I am not looking forward to is reinstalling all of my apps and games. That will take hours, especially all of the Steam downloads and CS3.

 

you know you can backup all your steam games on an external hdd through steam and reinstall them on another volume or the same volume through steam.

 

It won't let me create an account/username. Already have a Dell account.

 

Nope, I sure didn't and it's too late now. R2 is all clean now with a fresh Windows RAID0 installation and nothing else added except Google Chrome. I'll be putting back the factory 4GB of RAM tomorrow so I can add my 8GB to the M18x and she'll be ready to go back to Alienware.

 

Added myself to the list over at Dell Forums.....

 

Ouch, ya, I do this all the time, saves me HOURS of downloading games at 450KBSPS.

Poor Mr Fox. What kind of dl you get?

 

I wish I could but my long time ago returned system never boot... So, I can not testify on this issue...

 

I added myself to the list.

 

I have a bad feeling that they may just idle along with these current issues until they release the M18x-R2, where the issues will get fixed. Those with the R1 will just get left in the dust without anymore support. That would follow in the footsteps of the previous M17x-R1 to the R2.

 

Nah, it'll be OK. I'm such a geek that I actually enjoy it in a sick kind of way. The only thing that's not good about it is that I am also an impatient person. Fortunately, I do have an excellent ISP and download speed is not a concern. Whether or not I have a slowdown will depend on Steam traffic.



On another note--and this will be of particular interest to everyone that has owned or still owns an R2--after doing a clean install I no longer have an issue resuming from sleep with loss of display brightness control. I also cannot replicate the plugged in, not charging problem.

In other words, the R2 is now operating flawlessly. Go figure... M18x is arriving today as a replacement, and now my R2 decides to act like it is supposed to. I did 2 things differently this time and I want to capture them for anyone that wants to try to get their R2 to behave. Here's what I did...

1. I installed Windows from a source other than the Alienware Windows 7 installation disc (which I think is irrelevant); and,
2. I manually installed AMD drivers from within Device Manager by browsing to the folders extracted from the catalyst package and do not have CCC installed.

​

I manually changed the registry entries (see quote below from one of my previous posts) and CFX is working great without CCC, and there is no AMD Powerplay resident on my system. I am using RadeonPro as a CCC substitute.

So, now I am curious if CCC and/or PowerPlay is the source of all the evils with the R2 as well as the cause of this aero bug. It's only a guess on my part, but we have done extensive testing. To my knowledge, nobody has tried a driver-only installation to cure the R2 problems. I think it's worth a shot with this M18x aero issue.

I offer the possibility of using a Windows installation source other than your Alienware Respawn or Alienware installation disc, and doing a driver-only AMD installation as a possibility for R2 owners to have a trouble-free ownership experience. We just need more people to test it.

For the M18x, the possibility of an installation free of CCC/Powerplay being a cure for the aero bug needs to be tested. Looking at these posts from skygunner27, the strong correlation to AMD is inescapable: LINK - LINK - LINK - LINK - LINK And, the fact that other systems (not made by Alienware) that have Intel graphics switching and AMD GPU also have this aero bug is a compelling corroborating indication that we have AMD to thank. All indications are there is a conflict/software incompatibility causing the AMD and Intel graphics to not play nice together.

As I was typing this up, my M18x arrived. Catch you guys later. Somebody want to try my driver-only suggestion? Don't forget the registry edits to make CFX work.

 

I agree with you on this.

I am awaiting your initial thoughts and impressions. I'll leave Steam open.

 

Hey champ, Mr. Fox: Congratulations on your new arrived 'little' alien... hope it will grow to become a real Fox...

 

Strangely, I rarely see this issue when running on my HDTV with the desktop at 720p. Pretty sure I have seen it at 1080p on the TV and the internal display, but I so rarely run either way these days. 50" HDTV gaming FTW! LOL

 

Has anyone called alienware tech support. This is pretty ridiculous.

They have a 30 day 100% satisfaction guarantee which this would fall under.

 

I know it's not a definite result, but I am still yet to have the issue since turning off virtualization.

I will play a blu-ray movie again tonight which always triggers it, and see if the result sticks.

 

I have. They say it is up to AMD/Nvidia to provide a fix.

 

Or they could take back our laptops and return our money via their own policy.

In turn we can all just replace them with 6990's...

 

In addition to my suggestion yesterday, if you haven't nixed CCC yet, try going to "3D Application Settings" and adding a check mark to "Disable AMD CrossFireX power settings" to keep both GPUs in a high power state. Restart and see if it helps with the aero issue.

 

Just barely getting started with the M18x testing and I am going to work today. Here's a quick side-by-side bench on the R2 I am returning and the M18x that arrived yesterday.

Compare Alienware M17x with Alienware M18xR1 : Geekbench Result Browser

 

Get this. I called tech support. The guy was an idiot.

Anyways, I talked to him about this issue and was told it was not covered under warranty because it was a Win 7 issue and that I would have to go through a different department and pay a small fee for them to help me.

I told him that Alienware has a 30 day 100% satisfaction guarantee and that if he didn't help me I would return it. He said, "Ok, do you want to return it.". I said sure and he transferred me to return it.

After this I am seriously considering a return.

BTW, Aero's is working on this boot up. lol.

 

Lame......................in the past, I have been told the exact same thing.

 

Yeah...thats lame...the just wanna direct you through to Dell's "solution station" and charge you an arm and a leg for the priveledge of having them try and help you with your problem...even though they cant fix it....

 

I've been transferred there over 6 times. Everytime I get a really rude Filipino lady with a heavy accent.

 

Yeah...i have seen your posts. The lady who likes to say "NO" and "DEPOT" alot ......

 

Wow, nice speeds, this is what I get: