how do i up my Ghz?

very simple yet complex question i think? I'm not too good with computers, but i got the i7 core, 4gig ram, 250gig hardrive, and when i check my system, im getting 1.2ghz. I think that's not the best i can get? Can someone help?

 

heres a video from youtube
YouTube - How to overclock Alienware M11x CPU

 

thanks, ill look into it.

Edit: That's for the r1, i have the R2, and is the overclocking function the only thing i can do to up the GHz? and i can only get maxed to 162 without the BSOD i'm pretty sure.

 

Read around the forums, you may find as I did that overclocking the i7 doesn't show best results, if any.

 

Thats such BS. I don't even really "feel" a huge gain from having an i7, i don't really know how it works...

but i'm trying to overclock w/ turboboost, and my system info says:

[email protected] 1.46GHz

isn't it supposed to overclock to a way higher GHz??

 

i dont think you fully know how the i7 works..

see the i7 when processing something lets say for ex your playing a game and for some reason the game only allows dual core, so instead of the i7 turning on all 4 cores it'll only turn 2 on, and re allocate power, also even if your playing a multi core game that allows 4 cores after your cpu sees your temperature and sees its fairly cooled it'll OC itself automatically to a higher GHz.

in Laymen terms:
Lets say your going on a highway theres 4 different highways A,B,C and D but it just so happens only highways A, and B are being used. Thus the government says lets change highways C to A and D to B thus expanding the highway, which allows for more cars to pass through A and B.

Now lets say all 4 highways are going through but it just so happens the amount of cars going through are going very fast and not slowing down(temperature) The highway then will intake more cars going through the highway thus higher GHz.

hope that helped.

 

It doesn't matter if you have the R1 or R2. The process for overclocking is the same. Most people seem to get overclocks between 160Mhz - 166Mhz, so your 162 is just about right.

 

Don't worry so much about the numbers. Once you have a CPU that is "fast enough", then increasing CPU clock speeds even more has diminishing returns.

If you own a Honda Accord that puts out 250HP, then "overclocking" that Honda Accord to put out 275HP isn't going to be very noticeable. The 250HP that you had before was "powerful enough" to do what you wanted your car to do.

 

How is it BS?

overclocks are not guaranteed, as each and every chip will overclock differently. Ive had chips that can overclock great and Ive had chips that dont...

The i7 640 is not know to be a great overclocker thusfar...

 

I've owned both the R1 and the R2, and I ended up selling my R2 back because I thought the i7 was a joke. Doesn't perform like the desktop (and even other laptop) i7s I'm used to.

I posted a review a week or two back on the R1 (core 2 duo) vs the R2 (i7).

 

Why would you expect them to?

 

Why would you compare a ULV (Ultra Low Voltage) processor to a Standard Voltage processor?

The ULV version in the M11x is meant to have performance up to 2.26ghz but able to operate at low voltage to maximize battery life.

The i7-640UM is a great processor given its low voltage useage. Comparing it to other standard voltage processors is just plain silly.

 

That's why I don't trust reviews from people who don't know much about computers. They tend to compare apple to orange. M11x is not a desktop replacement people!

 

+1 seriously...

 

In my opinion M11x IS a desktop replacement.

It's fast and can run any game or the latest software out there. It has its limitations but you can still do a lot of things with this notebook.

Just to let you know guys I'm a computer technician and I work with computer every single day and I can tell you that.

If you don't like the netbook that's fine, you are in your right but don't be a hater.
There's a lot of people here who loves this machine...and I'm one of them

I know this notebook will get better and better as soon as they get better video drivers and uses the software to take advance of the new i7

Peace,

 

^^^ Hope your post is not directed to me. Just because I said R2 is not a desktop replacement, does not mean that I am hating on the R2. In fact, I own one myself and loving it.

 

I love my Alienware M11x too. But it isn't a desktop replacement. For one, it does not have an optical drive built in to it, nor does it have gigabit ethernet. It has a small 11.6" screen. The CPU is an ULV processor. And the keyboard is a 92% size keyboard.

All of those qualities make it an excellent portable gaming machine. But it is definitely not a desktop replacement.

 

Well , let me put it this way...

I work in IT and I do almost anything relate to IT. I loaded Windows 2008 R2 in my Alienware using VMware and it worked fine.

When I'm talking about desktop replacement I'm saying that it could run anything that it's out there right now, fast and get the job done.

Of course it is a netbook and it has not DVD drive, but if you want one you just spent 30 or 40 dolars and you get a USB DVD, the same with a bigger monitor or a bigger keyboard.

The alienware is a powerful machine. Maybe you just think about games, I'm talking about everything. I can carry this little laptop anywhere and I have all my software and I can do all my work from anywhere. For me , this machine is a desktop replacement , let me tell put it in these words...

"My alienware m11x is my bread and butter"

Peace.

 

yeah...i'm going to be reallll pissed if the extra $300-400 i spent was for nothing.

 

thanks, that really did, because i am just a consumer, and i don't know too much about the new stuff. +1.

 

For me my desktop has been demoted to gaming only, with some transcoding when needed. It is there if I need grunt and it's easy to upgrade & replace as needed.

However, the rest of my life lives/operates on my Atom powered netbook (email, docs, vids, surfing etc..). Even aspects of that position is under threat from my phone (HTC Desire).

So for me the M11x continues my move away from the traditional tether of a "Desktop" bound PC by adding my gaming to the things I can take with me.

 

Sure, except it doesn't. It's been proven by all benchmarks that it gives you LESS battery life than the previous M11x version with an SU processor, and it does not seem to justify this battery loss of as much as 2 hours, by never showing much improvement over the SU.

In most benchmarks the differences in score are just too close to lose 2 hours of battery.

Not saying the i7 is a bad processor, but it's also not a great one. Seems very mediocre for being 150 dollars more expensive.

 

Emphasizing your point, it's actually $300 more than the SU7300. The base difference between the R1 and R2 is $150 ($800 vs $950), and it's $150 to upgrade from the I5 to I7. That's a lot of money for what it offers compared to the SU7300.

 

The i7 640UM is definitely more power hungry than the SU7300, as it uses 18W opposed to the 10W used by the SU7300.

However, the i7 640UM supports hyperthreading and turbo boost so its definitely better in that aspect.

Having test drove both the M11xR1 and M11xR2 in a side by side situation, the R2 is definitely snappier than the R1. The R2 boots about 30 seconds faster, and on average loads games 25% faster than the R1

Both units seem to get very similar battery life as both of their respective owners have been comparing them endlessly (they are roommates). The R1 does beat the R2 out by about 45 minutes in normal day to day use, and only by 20 minutes in gaming.

To me thats pretty close as my netbook and my wife's netbook (exact same models) vary by about 30 minutes in battery life...

 

The "18W" is 18W TDP... Thermal Design Power. That means that they put out a max of 18W of heat. It does *NOT* mean that they consume 18W of power.

 

Your numbers are wrong. 10w and 18w are the TDP, which refers to the cooling system, not the energy used.

The actual numbers are
SU7300: 1.05-1.15 volts
I-5 520UM: .725-1.4 volts
I-7 640UM: .725-1.4 volts

 

Thanks for correcting me

 

These are interesting numbers - I guess we all looked at the .725 as the optimal, but in day to day use the i7 is probably more likely to be in the 1.4 range...

Besides, the desktop i7's have been so impressive, we mistakenly expected the same from the CULV version.

 

i5 and i7 has integrated GPU built in, so the .725-1.4 includes the integrated GPU.

 

LMAO boots 30sec faster? thats garbage! When I had my 160gb spinner it booted in 47 seconds... How can a laptop boot in 17 seconds? not even with an SSD which I have!. Actually with my ssd it boots in 26 seconds, ok with your i7 it will boot in -4 seconds...

The m11x R1 gets 2 more hours of battery life PERIOD. I compared the 2 laptops because my cousin got one (R2), and he will return it tomorrow because of the MEDIOCRE performance when compared to the R1!.

 

this scares me, because i really don't want to return my laptop for performance problems compared to its "lesser version" (not really i guess)

 

Yeah, a CPU upgrade will not change load times that much. At best, a CPU upgrade *MAY* improve boot times by about 10%. And even that is considered phenomenal. I think the guy who posted that is a little confused.

And my laptop boot times agree w/yours. I get power button-to-desktop in about 25 seconds, with 8 seconds of that as the system POST. Windows load time is about 17 seconds.
YouTube - Alienware M11x Boot Time - 25 sec

 

The two units that were compared varied in boot times. At the time of comparison the R1 booted to desktop on average at 1 minute 16 second. The R2 booted to desktop on average in 49 seconds. That's 27 seconds average difference.

Having said that, the R1 was about 6 weeks older than the R2 and had a few more programs installed, and that would contribute to the difference in boot times. I didnt actually check to see what was being loaded on startup, but the machines had very similar programs loaded (Steam, Nod32, Xfire, Ventrilo and a few others). One I did notice is the R1 had Adobe CS5 which the R2 did not, but Im not sure if that would effect bootup.

Regardless, the core i7 will only get better as the drivers progress and the optimus performance gets sorted.

 

Why do you have anything ON at startup? Just keep nod32 on at startup, the rest is bogging your system down.. start them as you need them

Run > msconfig > startup > deselect all > checkmark nod32 > apply > reboot

kthxbai

 

I don't think so, what games were you playing? Are they GPU dependant?

Can you please prove how the R1 is actually BETTER than the R2 based on the cores?

Some people just don't care about the battery life, (me) and more about performance based on there needs. I play BFBC2 for instance, and that extra fps is vital to play the game. Based on the benchmarks for both I'd say it's a pretty big performance boost.

 

Bingo.

In general, the things that impact a system's boot times into Windows are listed below, in order of importance:

1. The applications loaded at startup. (0% - 1000% impact)
2. The hard drive technology used - mechanical drive or SSD (0% - 300%)
3. Hard drive technology used - mechanical rpm, mechanical areal density, mechanical cache size, SSD controller technology (0% - 50%)
4. Fragmentation of mechanical drive (0% - 15%)
5. CPU Speed (0% - 10% per generation of CPU).
6. Memory bandwidth / FSB speed (0% - 5%)

Your "tests" of boot times between R1 and R2 have differences in items #1, #4, #5, #6. It is also possible that you have differences in item #3, if your hard drives are different capacities (and therefore different areal densities).

To say that your boot times are different between R1 and R2, and therefore, it must be because of item #5 (the CPU) is incorrect. The far more likely reason why your R2 booted faster was because of item #1 - it is a newer system, which means that you have installed less crap on it. The R2 simply doesn't load as many programs on startup.

 

takes me literally a minute to get to desktop, with bootracer showing.

 

did you disable startup apps you don't need?

 

Well, I have a totally clean install of Windows 7 running on an SSD. The clean install is basic Windows 7, plus drivers and Alienware apps, as described in this post here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/501695-ssd-m11x-question-2.html#post6497525. I also will go in later and use msconfig to disable any startup items which are not necessary.

I also have things running on a fast SSD (OCZ Agility 120GB). It's not the fastest SSD out there, but it's pretty darned fast and was a good value.

If you notice, those two items (clean install + SSD) are items #1 and #2 in my list two posts back. CPU speed is irrelevant to my boot times.

 

yeahh :/ i have like 0 startup programs.

 

Can you run "msconfig" and go to the Startup tab? What do you see there?