M9750 + ATi Mobility 3870. Does it work?

Short answer: Yes. I finally got my OCZ Whitebook today and simply swapped the graphics cards with my Alienware M9750. Both cards work on both platforms (meaning to a lesser extent, a 7950 GTX works in the OCZ Whitebook).

UPDATE: Now TWO ATi 3870 Cards CAN WORK IN THE M9750. See Below for details.

First here are some actual pictures of the systems (and I apologize for the horrid image quality):

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/5165/Sidebyside.jpg

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/6558/Sideby2.jpg

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/8854/sideby4.jpg

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/9475/M9750WhtBk.jpg


GPUs:
http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/1160/NVidiaAti.jpg

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And these are screenshots taken of the M9750 with a Single ATi 3870:

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/7364/screenshot1.jpg

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/6035/3870temperaturesM9750.jpg

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/5825/GpuzCpuzCCC.jpg

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And 3dmar06; Note: This was done with a T5500 processor, a really low end processor. For comparison purposes, this system got a 4997 with the 7950 GTX:

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/4350/3d06score.jpg

Also, I forgot to take screenshots of the temperatures after 3d06 ran, but as I stated in another forum, it hit 84 degrees C. But because I didn't apply thermal paste properly (I didn't clean the remaining paste from the GPU cores and the heatsink; I just applied over the residue), temps could probably be lower than that.

------------------------------UPDATED SECTION BELOW ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

- Putting just the Slave 3870 will NOT work on the M9750: blank screen during boot-up.

- I got BOTH cards to work in the M9750. The Master card goes in the middle, and the Slave card goes where the daughter nVidia card would normally go (on the left). There was enough space under the heatsink of the M9750 to connect the bridge cable between the two cards. This is shown here:

http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/273/M9750BriConATi.jpg

^ Interesting to note, Although the plastic/seethrough material was touching the heatsink, there was no damage or melting done, even after benchmarking, so it is safe to "maneuver" the bridge cables that way if you do decide to replicate such an upgrade)

The following is a picture of the M9750 with both cards (the two cards effectively make up a single 3870 x2):

http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/8900/M9750DualUndr.jpg

And some screenshots of the M9750 with the Dual ATi GPU solution:

http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/4674/2GPUM9750.jpg

Temperatures of both GPUs (left = master, right = slave):

http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/9332/2GPUM9750temps.jpg

3dmark06 with 3870 x2 + T5500:

http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/5013/2GPUM97503d06score.jpg

In fairness, the T5500 is a weak sauce processor and thus, only about 1k gain over a single 3870. Also, temperatures after the 3d06 run:

http://img377.imageshack.us/img377/3585/2GPUM9750temps3d06.jpg

^ add 5-10 degrees in real life because it was on a notebook cooler with the cover off.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to take screenshots when I did the Counter Strike Source Stress Test. The system got 123.37 fps at 1920x1200 with everything maxxed out (8xMSAA, 16xAF, reflect all, etc) Temperature after that test was 64 degrees C and 63 degrees C on both GPU cores.. for comparison purposes, this system with the 7950 GTX gets around 75-80 fps on the CS Stress Test (4xMSAA, 4xAF), and my Whitebook with the Ati cards got 166.7fps with a C2D P8600 (Also 8xMSAA, 16xAF). So really the CPU is holding this system back...by a lot.

Side note* All benchmarks were done with the ATi Catalyst 8.7 drivers (177.80 drivers for the 7950 GTX)

 

No way... (10char). Does Crossfire work?

 

Woah woah, isnt a 3870 about equal to a 8800? So 1 3870 should outperform dual 7950gtx? If those are true and it works on crossfire my head will esplode.

 

Nah in real world performance the Dual 3870's are a hair quicker than one 8800GTX.

 

welcome to the board.
M17 has that already, and some other OCZ has it for few months already.

 

what you mean a 8800m gtx is equal to 3870 crossfire shouldnt is be shouldnt it be a little faster and how much can you overclock the shader cpu to on the ati

 

I couldn't test Crossfire because the M9750's heatsink physically blocked the cable/bridge connector on the card. This will be shown in the pictures I have taken, which will be uploaded soon.

Edit: by soon, I mean sometime tomorrow. I need sleep.

 

A single 3870 should be just as good or better than dual 7950s in SLi. I highly doubt crossfire would work, but MAN! Having something that single card solution where you ALWAYS get the performance of 7950 SLi without dealing with drivers or scaling would be sooo worth it for me.

Now to just find someone who'll sell me a single card to try out....

 

do you just take out the secondary card in the CF and the primary card will work on its own?

 

Stray question? How good is the sound quality on the M9750

 

Ok guys, I updated the OP (see first post for pics, screenshots, etc). Sorry for the distorted first 4 or 5 pictures.

dondadah, the sound quality on the M9750 is pretty good.

 

Wow, impressive work ichime! I guess that's good news to m9750 owners.

 

Dam my resulotin is only 1440*900 not 9999999999999*99999999999 ona 100 feet screen lol.

 

huh, fancy that. nice work.

 

Dondada88 - The sound on an m9750 is great and has a subwoofer for deep and loud sound. It's not a stereo or anything, but definately above the average for laptop speakers.

ichime - The cards may not be interchangable for crossfire BUT would using the slave card alone in the system (either the whitebook or m9750) still work as a single card?

 

Awesome work, that's cool!

For clarification, was your 4997 3DMark06 score with the 7950GTX using just a single card, or running in SLI?

 

Single card

 

I'll test that after I get back from work.

 

Just as I suspected .

 

Very impressive, the 3dmark score seems to be right in line with the original 6860fx gateway laptop. Its quite obvious the cpu in the system is holding it back so anyone who has a 2ghz+ cpu should see even more performance from this gpu upgrade.

 

Update: my thermal paste is finished, so I won't be able to test to see if the Slave VGA of the 3870 would work in the M9750. I'll probably get some on my way back from work tomorrow and test.

 

Thanks

I have a m9750 for about a year now. Can't really afford to get a m17 or I would have already. But if 1 3870 is performing close to an 8800 and outperforming dual 7950gtx in sli I might be able to shell out the few hundred for it.

 

Thanks a lot that answered one of my posts, i asked! Can you get some benchmarks on the single 3870HD on your M9750 and crossfire X on your white book. Pls, thanks!

 

So if it is not any trouble can some one post game benckmarks like:
crysis, crysis warhead, fear, oblivion, farcry2, DMC4, world in conflict, and anyother game maxed out.
also i think the the ati's does stand a chance against nvidia's cards.


and thanks for the sound quality and how is the sub, can you tell if it is they are not. is the mid and treble at a good quality and quanlty. also what kind of audio is the whitebook. i love my hp realtek and the features it has. so i'm wondering when i switch what to expect

 

Whitebook also uses Realtek. Though the sound for the M9750 is good, I must say that improved it with the Whitebook: you can hear the bass better and adds more of a 3d sound effect.

As for benchmarks, check the OCZ forum because Alienware and OCZ use the same exact card.

Side note: I'm also interested in testing this on an Alienware M9700, but I just have a broken motherboard of one. So if anyone wants to send their M9700 to test to see if the 7950 GTX and the 3870 works, that would be great. I'll pay for shipping, and in the event that your M9700 is damaged under my care, I'll give you my M9750 as a replacement. I reckon it's possible to test both GPUs in the M9700 because the heatsink design of the M9700 doesn't block the GPU bridge connector of the 3870s.

 

Update 3: I tried using the slave 3870 card with the 7950 GTX and it did NOT work: screen is blank throughout the booting process.

However, remember when I said the M9750's heatsink blocked the bridge cable connectors for the ATi cards? Well, there was enough space under it for the bridge connector cable to fit, so I was able to install BOTH ATi GPU cards on the M9750 and connect them. Both cards were seen in the M9750 meaning that it can also run two 3870 GPUs. Although after installing the drivers, Vista reported the cards as "Unknown", GPU-Z and Catalyst verified that BOTH GPUs were working in the M9750. Stay tuned, I'll post screenshots and benchmarks.

 

That's freaking awesome! I hope that CrossfireX, can use software, to run instead of the actual chipset built on the boards. Can't wait to see your next post, thanks for the inputs!

 

+Rep for you

 

THAT'S interesting! subscribed :|

 

Ok, I updated the first/original post with pictures and screenshots (and benchmarks) of the M9750 with two ATi GPUs. Check them out.

 

ichime - Thank you for the GREAT infomation! I really want to try this out now! maybe when the 4850s come out, people will start putting their old cards up on ebay and I can snag a set just to extend the life of my m9750 a bit more.

 

ichime, you're a rock star man. Thanks for this info and reps.

 

anytime hopefully I can get my hands on a M9700 and test that too.

 

Hmm I don't think I'm going to upgrade my 8700GT's until I get a lot more into gaming again and the driver support gets better. That connector for the ATI cards is crazy though.

 

Thanks a lot for you test Ichime !

I'll try to have those 3870 for make more tests in games...
Have to phone my favorite shop (not Alienware ) !
Cross Fingers

 

Ya know I've got a m9700 I wouldn't mind sending off. How long would you have it for? I think I would be willing to work a deal in a pm.

 

Pls, update us on Xfire mode and the M9700! I want to see more pictures and results!

 

no xfire because the connector ribbon is blocked by the heatsink.

 

I actually got around that; there was enough space under the heat sink to connect the cable. So you'll have to connect the cable first and then the heatsink over the cable. And as documented in the orignal post, "Crossfire" works in the M9750 because both cards were detected in the system via device manager and GPU Z. Although the 3dmark06 score didn't reflect it so much due to the CPU being a T5500, I'm sure an M9750 with a T7600 should see around the high 9k or even 10k 3dmarks (my Whitebook has a 2.4ghz P8600 with 3mb cache vs the T7600 with 2.33ghz and 4mb cache, with my Whitebook scoring 11.2k in 3d06)

The reason why I put Crossfire in quotes above is because the two 3870 cards aren't separate cards: It's really a single 3870 x2 GPU solution that's divided into two cards. I'm guessing the cable is the internal crossfire a.k.a the internal bandwidth that is featured in the x2 cards from ATi, not the PCI based crossfire. This best explains why it was able to work even on the M9750 even though the M9750 has a MXM PCI SLi chipset.

 

Also, from a diagram standpoint, the issue of the heatsink overlapping the cable connector shouldn't be a problem for the M9700 as the design of the GPU coolers is very similar to the design the Whitebook uses.

 

Anyone remember this post in the thread about these cards I made awhile back?

Armando, now that it has been confirmed that these cards will work in the M9750 will we be offered an upgrade option?

 

do you think that if you do it yourself, it will be cheaper than go through Alienware?

 

At this moment we are unable to say yes or no an upgrade will be available however in the event this is offered, we will make sure to notify our customers. Also keep in mind third party hardware is not supported by the warranty as it is only applicable with original configuration.

Thank you.

 

Hi !
More information from France : one of our P4G member phone to Alienware, and it seem upgrade should be possible.
The prices : 293€ HT for one HD3870 card, and 586€ for two. The crossfire cable price is 4€.
But alienware will ensure cards, but not what will happen in M9750...

 

Thats very interesting to hear. I am going to call Alienware US and see what the say. Will report back with their reply.

 

Ok called Alienware. They refused to sell me the Radeon cards and said they would not work in the M9750. After I told them that they do in fact work he put me on hold and said Alienware is currently working on validating these cards in the M9750 and would offer them if they work. In short, none of us will likely get these cards from Alienware and will have to look elsewhere if we are interested in trying them out.

 

That's typical of Alienware; either they're intentionally holding back information or they really don't test their products as true system builders do.

That 586 figure is roughly 730 US dollars. You can thank our weakened economy for that

 

For those of us curious and williing to take the risk (and thus most likely voiding our warranty) could we at least have the option to purchase the card(s) regardless? A sale is a sale after all... I'm sure Alienware can't officially take a stand on this yet, but come on and just let us make the purchase!

 

I'm really curious to know if a single 3870 would work in an m7700 hrmm

 

Nope. Two different types of 7950GTX's and the M7700 used the older one. The 3870 has the same fitting as the new 7950GTX's on the M9750.