m9750 Downloads - Drivers / Apps

Just added:

RealTek High Definition Audio (v1.90) - Thanks Walujam

Yes another one!!! RealTek must have the bugiest drivers or is just the best software/hardware company around. A driver update every week??? Crazy.

 

hello guys,
I'm really sorry if this has been talked about and i can see through the sticky alot of helpful stuff. But I have a problem since I tried to update my display driver automatically through windows to fix the nvdkkkm or whatever problem but now even though i fixed that problem my laptop doesnt recognize my 8700 gt and gives me a rundll32 problem...I'm not actually a computer genius so i dont know what that means..,If you could advise me on what display driver/s to best install and how do i go about fixing this rundll32 problem...I would be grateful!
thank you so much guys!

 

Well first of all I would system restore, to before you automatically updated your driver.

The best driver which doesnt give any rundll errors is 174.31, however for best performance i recommend 174.82, which only occasionally gives the rundll error (once on every 3-4 restarts).

Download through laptopvideo2go. This is assuming you know how to manually remove drivers from device manager.

 

A new Wireless Lan Driver is there..
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/fil...32-bit+version&lang=eng&strOSs=153&submit=Go!

11.5.1.15/9.1.1.15 4/11/2008

 

Just added:

Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG & 4965AGN (v11.5.1.15)

Thanks Hoshie

 

I would really like my DVD drive to be regionfree. But I am quite the noobie on how to do this. Will the bitsetting 2.01 firmware from liggydee do this? And is there any downsides to it.

I have the 5540A Optiarc burner, with original 2.01 firmware

I hope someone can give a "for dummies" answer to this

Thanks in advance

 

The burner comes Region Free, atleast mine did. But to verify, the settings are in the Device Properties.

Go to Control panel. Open System and click the Device Manager button.

Find the DVD driver under DVD/ CD-Rom Drives.
Right Click on the Optiarc driver and choose Propertie.
You'll see a tab for DVD Region
Under Current Selection it should say Non Selected.

 

Mine is set to Region 2 with 3 changes remaining?

 

That sucks. Does anyone know how to change the Region back to 0? I did some digging and found a few utilities that do it but they are device specific.

 

New RealTek High Definition Audio ( v1.91)!!!

When I try to install the Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 4965AGN (v11.5.1.15) the setup just say that I have to wait. Then the window disappear without any notice or confirmation.

Anyone got the same issue? Are the drivers correctly installed?

Greetings
walujam

 

New benchmark for Vista!!!

3DMark Vantage
http://www.futuremark.com/download/3dmarkvantage/

Greetings
walujam

PS: Can anyone answer my previous question about the Intel PRO/Wireless 4965AGN drivers?

 

walujam,

When I updated my wireless drivers, I had the same thing i.e. setup starting and then disappearing with no notification of success etc.

To be sure everything is properly installed, check the driver version in the device manager. It should have updated properly (mine did).

 

The " HotKey (FingerTouch Keys) Utility " link is broken .....

Someone fix pls ....

Thx

 

Sorry I was replacing a network switch. It should be back up now.

 

New nVidia driver 175.12 for Vista 32Bit:

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=18448

Haven't tried it yet, but should be the best driver for 3DMark Vantage.

Greetings
walujam

PS: Driver for Vista 64Bit: http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=18432

 

People are not going to be using vantage for a little bit until DX10 becomes a little more popular because it is hard to compare lets say a M1530 and a M9750 since the M9750 (assuming you have 7950GTX's) cannot run vantage because it does not have a DX10 card.

 

@Stone825

I got 2x NVIDIA GeForce Go 8700M GT SLI in my Alienware m9750, an Intel Core 2 Duo T7600 and actually use the 175.12 drivers wihtout any problems.

However I'm not really satisfied with the 3DMark Vantage score, bacause I only got 5678 points....

 

You can't compare your score from 3DMarks06 with the one you get from Vantage. I'm sure their benchmark scale has slid to factor in faster/current video cards. 3DMark06 is most likely based on 3 year old video cards. Since a 8700 is actually pretty slow compared to DX10 cards available for Desktops, it is best to compare it against a similar config posted by someone else.

I hope that made sense, dead tired.

 

@eightd

Yeah, you're right.

However the new 175.12 driver works fine. I've played Crysis and the Witcher without any crashes.

I recommended this driver instead of 174.74.

Greetings
walujam

 

Hi everyone,
I was just wondering what the best current driver is now. I'm still using the 174.16 driver, and I can't seem to find one better. I tried the new 175 set the other day. However, it seems to make things a little jumpy.
@Walujam - How are you getting around the shuttering sound? The sound loop fix doesn't seem to make it any better
Gabe

 

nVidia just released 175.16 and laptopvideo2go should have it posted soon. Might want to try that! 175.63 work well atm also.

 

I'll be staying with 174.16 for a while. I've tried 174.74 and 175.12 they worked OK. No crashes but had bad performance spikes while playing COD4. One thing I noticed with these 174.xx+ drivers, is that you have to really really make sure you uninstalled the previous driver. I have to run DriverCleaner.net twice with a reboot inbetween. If I don't my system seems to run Hot and some screen glitches.

 

I recently changed my drives to 175.63. No glitches, no problems and less heat. But there is no really performance boost compared to 174.16.

@GabeZ
My sound runs perfectly, but I don't use the internal soundcard of my m9750. Instead I've installed a Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme audiocard for notebooks.

 

Hello ppl,

i got myself a Alienware M9750 with 2x 8700s cards in SLI.
Ive been following tutorials and guides and everything i found on the web for the past 4 days now. My problem seems to be pretty common around here.

With SLI all the games i try to play get a max of 15 FPS.
I play Crysis (worst performance), CoD4, Bioshock... and nothing is playable.
With some drivers its better, with other drivers its worse.
So far i tried it on Vista x86 and Vista x64. With and without the SP1.

Used drivers so far:
174.74
174.16
169.12
175.70
174.70
175.12
Original AW Drivers from the Website
Nvidias Beta Drivers for the AW Laptop
some more i already deleted...

I DID enable SLI everytime, and i removed old drivers everytime with
Control Panel, then reboot, driver sweeper, reboot, new driver installation, reboot, game testing, reboot, change settings and stuff... and nothing really give the performance its supposed to give.

After all this trouble with the M9750 im close to throwing it out of the window by now... if anyone has an idea how to get it to work... please help

 

Hmm.. I don't know exactly what you have.. but there are some games that just don't run all that well at max settings.

I like to run games at my native resolution of 1920x1200 and I use the below settings:

CoD 4
AA - OFF
Shadows - OFF
Dynamic Lighting - OFF
This gives me the best performance during the heaviest parts of the game and outdoors. I get no less than 35 fps. All other areas are pretty smooth (>45 fps)

Bioshock
High detail post Processing - OFF
If you have a slow HD your system will still stutter a lot, but with a 7200 rpm drive, it's A LOT smoother ( at least for me it is, stutter was really pissing me off ). I haven't played this game in awhile, but it was VERY playable with just this setting off.

Crysis
My desktop performs better than my Alienware and this game gives it trouble. I have not yet tried this on my laptop.


Defrag your hard drive. For some reason, a lot of the slow downs, stuttering, etc, have to do with hard drive seeking. Like you, I was also about to throw this laptop out the window, but when I changed my HD from a 5400rpm drive to a 7200rpm drive, most of my issues went away. Just something to think about.

 

It seems that your problem are not your graphic drivers.

What CPU do you use? And how much memory?

I played Crysis on my m9750 with 2x 8700SLI with high details and good frame rates.

Greetings
walujam

PS: RealTek High Definition Audio (v1.92) is out!!!

 

Hello and thanx for the fast replys.

My Spec:
2,00 GHz CPU
4GB Ram
Dual nVidia 8700m GT SLI
120 GB 5.400 U/Min SATA
Native Res: 1920x1200

I know for sure that the m9750 IS able to perform perfectly on CoD4 and Bioshock with max Details and stuff. With some of the drivers i was able to get excellent peformance, but it only lasted for like 2-3 mins. After a quick stutter, the performance goes down again and stays there.
Its like showing a little kid a chocolate bar, and then eat it yourself

I will think about the hard disk. But seriously, when AW delivers a laptop, it should work right from the moment i unpack it. Even my Old Desktop Comp (1.86 GHz, 1GB Ram, 8600 GTS) worked better than this notebook atm.

I will probably send the laptop back, if i cant find a solution for the problems over the weekend. So if anyone has some more ideas, im ready to try them out.

PS: I went back to Vista x86 yesterday. Again Tried without SP1 and later today im gonna try with SP1.

 

Hey Assazzin,

Sounds like you are doing everything correctly. I would like you to try a few more things if you can. First undo SLI and run in Single card mode for a while. See if things become more stable or even run better. Be sure to look for any artifacts and also try to measure temps with RivaTuner (or some other way that you know). Also just try to run the games at lower resolutions to guarantee that there is something wrong.

Next I would remove the plate under the laptop and check the SLI cable just to try to see if it is seated properly. I know how you feel that it should work from the moment you get it, but if you turn to Alienware tech support you will get a much longer run around trying to get this fixed.

Wish I could offer more help.

 

Got the same problems as Assazzin, although my specs are different.

Area-51 m9750
Video: 2x nVidia 7950 GTX 512 MB (SLI)
RAM: 4,00 GB (...I wish, but the system won't use anything more than 2,5 GB. Vista SP3 indicates 4,00 GB though)
OS: XP SP3 32 bit/Vista SP3 32 bit (happens under both)
HDD: 2x Hitachi 200GB 7200 RPM (SATA/RAID 0)
Audio: Intel High-definition Integrated

I just cleaned up my nVidia drivers and installed them again, my current version is 175.63. I'm going to do the same for my realtek drivers in a moment.

I've been checking my SLI cable (the black one that connects both video cards, if I'm not mistaken); both sides were properly connected.
Also, my system randomly reboots when playing heavy 3D games (CoD4/Crysis, happened with GW too, oddly). My guess is that it's due to overheat, but all fans seem to be working properly. My GPU temp won't go under 70°C though.

 

just a thought guys, but my rig - m9750, 2x7950GTX in SLI, 2.0C2D, 200gbHDD,2.5Gb RAM - was acting funny when it had 4 gigs of RAM installed...I switched one of the 2gb sticks for a 512mb stick and it has been best kind ever since...it just didn't seem to like 4.0gb for some reason...

 

Hey hey,

so far nothing worked out for me.

I tried with Vista x32 and SP1 now and i get no change at all.
I tried the CoD4 settings from grey and they make the same problem as with full details.
I start CoD and after not even 1 minute of playing perfectly smooth and fast, the game stutters for a sec, and its slow again. At that moment my cards have 70°C and 65°C. And they go down to around 60-65 very quickly after i stop playing. So its not really a heat problem im having.

The graphics are nice with and without SLI. No artifacts, or pixels or anything wrong with it. Just the performance sucks. 10-15 FPS.

I already wrote an email to the AW support 2 days ago, and if they dont reply by tomorrow, im gonna call them and send them the notebook back next week.

Im still thinking it could be the drivers, but im not sure what to do. I mean, its strange enough that the game starts perfectly, but goes down after not even a minute of playing. Maybe graphic card memory is broken?

 

@Assazzin

This is what I suggest, make you are up to date with all the Windows Updates, this may take a few days. Make sure Virtual memory it turned on, use auto or the settings specified in the SLI guide, if your running memory intensive games your system will eventually go crazy when you start to run out of memory. Then one by one shutdown all of your background apps, Anti-virus, IM, email, etc. You need to eliminate all variables. Then make sure COD4 has the latest updates.

Now start COD4 and run your benchmarking. Write down your results. Next shutdown and remove one memory module, do the same stuff from above and then run your benchmarks again.

If you are losing performance while playing the game, it sounds like a memory issue. Memory leak or disk swap IO slowness.

Let me know how it goes.

 

Hmm.. I'll have to try this out.

 

@eightd

I tried with Vista x64 and x32. Both times with a clean install, no apps, no antivirus, no IM, no nothing on it. Also i ran different settings for my games with SP1 installed and without it. I even searched for hours to get every single update for the OS and installed them.

I followed every single guide for SLI i was able to find on the internet, forums, friends, etc. Im pretty sure im doing everything right.

Only thing i didnt try so far, is to remove one module. I may try it tonight when i get home. Maybe someone else already tried it? If so, some infos if it worked would be sweet

btw. thanx to all the people trying to help.

 

Definitely make sure that virtual memory is enabled like eightd suggests and is at least equal to your ram. I've had a bunch of things resolved because of that. But im guessing that isnt the problem if you are always doing fresh installs. Mmmmm....stumped as you are really.

I have also heard that the m9750 really doesnt like 4gb of ram, so the memory module removal is certainly a good idea.

The last hope is to get a 7200 rpm drive for gaming. The extra speed and having a seperate drive for games may help alleviate thrashing on the hard drive when it accesses virtual memory.

Good Luck!

 

@Assazzin

I only listed all of that because I wanted to cover everything, for you and others that may have a similar issue.

But definitely verify virtual memory is turned on and initialized at an high enough setting that Windows is not trying to write a 500MB swap file while your playing COD.

Here is a few more things to look at Turn off or Remove nTune. Change all driver settings back to Default. Make sure COD is up to date.

Does anyone out there that has 8700s know your average COD4 FPS? I just noticed that everyone who responded is running 7950s, which I get over 60fps with COD4. I would think a 8700 sli should be able to get atleast 45fps.

 

Under what settings are you getting 60 FPS, eightd. Like resolution, waht features off, and what are textures set at.

 

Everything set to default, even textures set to Automatic. Only thing I change its the maxrate setting, I can hit 200fps at times and down to 20fps. Res is set to 1280x960 and Depth of Field = Off.

Be carefull with the maxrate setting some servers will ban you if you have it set too high. Even if there is no way you machine can achive that speed.

 

I checked Virtual Memory, it was set to 2GB. No nTune.
I tried to disable Virtual Memory. That way it should load everything directly to RAM, which is faster than the hard drive. Though the performance in CoD wasnt good, it was much better. Still, i cant play it properly.

Only thing left to try is to install WinXP or remove a memory module. Since i dont want to remove the memory, i will try XP over the weekend. Instead of removing the memory or stuff like that, i will send the notebook back.

Well... i will try. im waiting for around 80 hours for a reply from the AW Support...

 

That sucks, Maybe just a bad box. I doubt xp will help those new Nvidia drivers are optimized for Vista SP1.

I wouldn't wait for AW much longer. I thought with that Roswell phone line they were required to solve your issue on the first call? Maybe thats Sprint

 

Update:
I monitored the graphic card with Rivatuner.
And if was able to find out that every time the game starts to loose its performance, the core clock / shader domain AND the memory clock goes down a LOT.
Rebooted and started to monitor.
Core clock: 1350 MHz
Memory Clocl: 799,20 MHz

After loosing performance ingame i get
Core clock: 364,50 MHz
Memory clock: 100 MHz

It actually looks like a heat problem so far. GPU Z says its at around 60-70 °C

P.S. I wont call Alienware support because im from germany. Not gonna pay a huge phone bill after all this trouble.

 

Hey Assazzin, Im also from Germany. PM me if you want any additional help on this.

And the behavior certainly looks like a overheating problem like you said, but if the temps are always 70 or below then that is really strange. RivaTuner also can force over or under clocking, so we may be able to learn more that way, but for underclocking like that it almost sounds like it is going to battery mode and then also underclocking. Very strange. Try to track the temps again with RivaTuners Graphs. They keep a good bit of history so maybe you can catch a spike or something.

 

Hey folks. Just formatted my PC with XP SP3 and it won't detect any sound card, nor will installng either the drivers in your list, OR the official AW ones. HELP!?

also, i've noticed that for some reason my cpu clock speed keeps changing.

i go into system one minute and its 2.33 then i go back in and its 1.33

loaded up cpu-z and it tells me its @ 933ghz, and only 6x multiplier... you ever heard of this before?

any help at all would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance

 

yes ! nothing wrong.
your CPU can downclock itself when it have nothing to do... most of time...
It reduce T° and extand batterie life !

 

mint... cheers bud

 

so what are the latest updates out anything? oh also about the BisonCam NB Pro, it has such crap for picture is there an update or anyway to get a better picture out of it?.. thank you

 

There isn't a new update for Bison. It is strange that driver hasn't been updated in years. And there seems to be a different driver for each laptop that only works on that brand. But installs without errors.

 

Realtek HD Audio Driver R1.94 is out!!!

@Assazzin
You can use the free phone number of Alienware Germany for support:
D) Kostenlose Hotline:*: 0800 100
*Gebührenfreier Anruf bedeutet, dass Sie der Anruf von einem Festnetzanschluss nichts kostet. Von einem Handy aus könnten jedoch Gebühren anfallen. Fragen Sie bitte bei Ihrem Anbieter nach.

 

Hi guys, my first post. I just ordered the "Gamer's Choice" edition pre-configured m9750: Core 2 Duo 2.0GHz, 2 GB RAM, Dual GeForce 8700M GT SLI, etc. Is Alienware really still packing this thing with video drivers from October 2007 (156.72), not even the betas on Nvidia's site specifically made for this rig (167.51)? How do those two compare anyway?

I know most of you recommend 174.16 or 174.74, but I'd rather not mess with unofficially supported drivers right out of the box. I would like to run Crysis at fairly high settings though. Possible, or pipe dream? I'm not a stickler for resolution and could drop that down as low as 1024x768 with no AA if necessary. Thanks for any feedback!

 

@Snatcher42, you maybe disappointed with the machines performance with Crysis. You'll probably not get more than Medium with a 8700M.

As far as drivers I would use the AW Beta driver at the very least. The 156.72 driver causes major issues, including random reboots. I do though, recommend taking the step to a 174.xx driver, you'll notice a major boost in performance with Vista SP1 and XP SP3. People have reported this performance boost is huge with the 8700M.