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    *OFFICIAL* "All Powerful" M15x Owners Lounge - Part 4

    Discussion in 'Alienware M15x' started by BatBoy, Feb 27, 2010.

  1. N20D5OH

    N20D5OH Notebook Evangelist

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    Anyone want to help me with the 5850 vs 5870 thing. I really don't want to read back 540+ pages. Is it a physically different card or is it just a software or driver difference between them. I see many of you with 5870 in your sig and have been wondering. I read Jstarnino's flashing guide and it seems fairly easy for me, but I just wondered if there was a huge difference between them or if they were in and of the same. I know I could probably find this by Googling but I'd rather get the answer from you guys. Thanks.
     
  2. inap

    inap .........................

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    i have had both the clevo 5870 and the dell 5850. i can honestly say there is pretty much no difference other then stock clocks speeds. if you check out my benches the dell 5850 actually out performed my clevo 5870.
     
  3. Wattos

    Wattos Notebook Deity

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    The reason why we have the 5870 is not because its vastly superior. The reason is that at the time we bought our machines the 5850 was not available with the M15x. Also, the 5850 became available in April or so (for the M15x), but babyhemi was selling the card in January already.

    Since the performance is virtually the same, but the clevo card does not output sound over HDMI nor works with powerplay, the 5850 is the better choice. I hope that explains why some people have an ATI 5870
     
  4. N20D5OH

    N20D5OH Notebook Evangelist

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    It does, thank you. Typically the higher the number, the better the card so it was a bit confusing.
     
  5. inap

    inap .........................

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    true the 5870 has higher stock clocks, but the 5850 can easily be flash to stock 5870 clocks. and also have very similar oc limits. making the difference between the 2 cards little to none.
     
  6. danyune

    danyune Notebook Evangelist

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    M11x did feel almost exactly the same as the M15x aside from size. I think they're both made of the same material. The keyboard on the M11x is slightly less defined? I dunno how to describe it but the keys were more rubbery and were much closer. They didn't have the slant that goes down the sides of the keys, but was more of a flat surface

    The nice thing about the 11 is that it remains cool all the time, and the fan is not very loud when playing games. My asus I had was a heat machine and the 11 was much better cooled. My problem was I wanted more graphics and I don't mind carrying extra weight the short distance I travel.

    The 11 had a really glossy screen, even moreso than the 15. I put on a screen protector to try and reduce that and it was good. Most 11's though have a screen touching the keyboard problem, mainly due to the hinge issue that arises in over 2/3 of the builds.

    All in all, it's a great machine if you don't mind wiping the screen every so often from keyboard marks (if you're unlucky) and if you can tolerate less than normal FPS. Very portable and very long lasting. I watched videos for over 4 hours on a battery charge no problem. Optimus right now is pretty buggy but that will clear up


    But ty, I'm liking the M15x so far. Build feels solid and it packs more power than the 11. I can tolerate the few extra pounds of weight
     
  7. JWest

    JWest Master of Notebookery

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    The M11x is made entirely of plastic on a metal frame. The M15x is made with a magnesium shell that also acts as the frame for the remainder of the plastic parts to be attached to. So, the M15x is metal, the M11x is plastic ;)
     
  8. danyune

    danyune Notebook Evangelist

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    heh I didn't read the manuals I just go by what my palms felt

    The lid feels different but the wrist area felt the same, that sort of plastic-y feel
     
  9. inap

    inap .........................

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    thanks for this, yeah the hinge issue is really the only thing keeping me away from the m11x. geez 2/3 of the builds have issues. guess i have to wait.
     
  10. Jstarnino

    Jstarnino Notebook Deity

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    Why can't alienware Ever get it right the first time??? Pretty annoying that they release products that aren't "perfect". Ok ok I know nothing is perfect but common... Throttling, hinge problems, whats next? Faulty motherboards? LOL then wer all doomed :D
     
  11. cubankid17

    cubankid17 Notebook Consultant

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    nothing is perfect...but AW will get it right but iam convinced that iam now a life long customer i love this m15x it plays everything i put on it perfectly....its amazing and with me it has to play perfect at high settings and this does a very good job now if we could get ride of those danm reps....if support was as good as their machines maybe people would not complain so much..but i officially love my M15X
     
  12. electrosoft

    electrosoft Perpetualist Matrixist

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    The M15x is a slick machine. One thing I like about it and the M17x (and other gaming notebook makers could take note), are the slightly larger than average function keys. I've yet to play a PC game where function keys aren't involved in some way, shape or how. I'd LOVE to see a notebook with function keys the same size as the rest of the keys with the slightly oversized keyboard size the M15x/17x rock.
     
  13. JWest

    JWest Master of Notebookery

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    Just thought I'd throw in a tip for everyone. Remove those little rubber protectors on the palmrest that keep the screen from hitting against the keyboard when the latop is closed. Remove the little adhesive strip from the back of them, then put a *thin* strip of Gorilla glue on 'em and re-set them back into the palmrest.

    Just throwing that out there, since mine kept falling out and I almost lost them on multiple occasions. Again, make sure it's a thin strip of glue though, since Gorilla glue expands as it cures.
     
  14. N20D5OH

    N20D5OH Notebook Evangelist

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    I know Crysis is an old game but a lot of people have used it in the past to benchmark machines. I bought the original SXPS 16 when it came out a year and a half ago or so and it wouldn't even think about getting through the intro screen, hell the menu's were laggy. Loaded it up on the M15x last night and played the demo for a good hour at full resolution with zero issues. I've also been playing GTA IV on full res as well and it plays with zero issues too. I can't get over what a beast this thing is for a 15" laptop. I was actually upset after I ordered mine that I didn't spring for the M17x, now I'm glad I didn't, I think it would have been way too big.
     
  15. cubankid17

    cubankid17 Notebook Consultant

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    yea im glad inap and brian talked me into reordering along with the other memebers or i wouldnt be happy right now....but now i have a powerful lappy that plays everything...also great news..(DOESNT REFER TO TOPIC) ok so i know ive said this a million times and nobody cares but TODAY WAAS MY LAST DAY OF HIGHSCHOOL!!!!!!! yay for being a grad
     
  16. danyune

    danyune Notebook Evangelist

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    Yeah I installed WOW on my 15x with a 5870 and I had to set a max fps setting so my video card wouldn't unnecessarily overwork itself

    SC2 was flawless, big change from my 11x
     
  17. cubankid17

    cubankid17 Notebook Consultant

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    i want to buy the 920 would that be an easy install?? just like a desktop CPU??? no BIOS moding or flashing right??
     
  18. inap

    inap .........................

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    yup just plug in and play. very easy.
     
  19. Jstarnino

    Jstarnino Notebook Deity

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    Hey everyone!

    Ok so the Dell tech just left my house. Sure enough, another *BEEEEEEEP* idiot. Didn't know his (rdy for my clean version?) buttox to his elbow. I COMPLETELY forgot to dismantle my laptop last night and so as soon as i got home the tech came 2mins after.

    Anyways the first thing i asked him was if he ever worked on an ALienware. He said no. He told me he watched the video last night on what to do. My blood started to boil, but i kept my cool. I said ok well lucky for him i know what to do, and have done it many times before. So we went about dismantling and replacing the parts TOGETHER since he kept insisting to do things, so i figured, why not, i'll just jump in if he's doing something wrong. Turns out i ended up doing most of it AGAIN, cuz he was doin't evything wrong. His Modo= "i only consult the manual as the very last resort. Usually i wing it and improvise a little and i get by just fine". Trying to keep my cool, we went about changing the LCD ( which i had to keep reminding him to be careful and not scratch, becuz in a split second he ripped off the plastic film BEFORE installing it.) Again i don't know how i didn't grab him by the back of the head, and smash his face into the table. I honestly don't. Moving on...

    After getting everything done, and thinking "phew!!, nothings damaged" I offered him something to drink. ALLLLLL he had to do was snap the palm rest back into place and screw in those two screws ( oh yea, he was also about to unscrew the hdd to get to those two "P" screws. Thank god i stopped him.) So i bring him the glass, he drinks it, screws in the two screws, i put back the back plate and battery, and hes already halfway out the door because he was "late" for something, and was trying to hurry throughout the whole procedure. I get back to my laptop after he left. Perfect. No dead pixels, no scratches, boots right up to the desktop as it should.

    ONE problem. HE FORGOT THE WIRE DANGLING ON THE OLD PALMREST THAT CONNECTS THE TRACKPAD TO THE MAIN BOARD . So now my trackpad doesn't work or light up. Furious, i call him back. He tells me theres too much traffic and he won't be able to come back, he has something hes already late for. I snapped, an dlet him REALLY have it. Finally, he said hes going to come by first thing tomorrow morning, and drop off the little wire, and that hopefully he'll never ave to see me again. I said I'll make sure of it.

    Lesson learned: DO NOT TRUST A DELL TECHNICIAN FOR EVEN 1 SECOND ON HIS OWN.

    This was the last straw for me. NO DELL TECH will EVER touch my latop again.

    The end. :)
     
  20. Wattos

    Wattos Notebook Deity

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    Sorry to hear about that, Jstarnino.

    im glad that (almost) everything worked out for you. At least he didnt break anything.
     
  21. danyune

    danyune Notebook Evangelist

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    nice rant lol

    I want to get my LCD swapped cause there is a dust particle stuck behind the cover that bugs me when I look at it
     
  22. Jstarnino

    Jstarnino Notebook Deity

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    yea your right.. couldve been alot worse....

    I think i lost about 5 pounds throughout the whole procedure LOLLL

    and Danyune, good luck with that. lol
     
  23. danyune

    danyune Notebook Evangelist

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    how long did your procedure take? man lol sucks that you had to stress the entire time with some guy whos never touched an alienware

    I'm hoping I can talk to dell and have them give me an upgraded screen somehow
     
  24. SacredDreams

    SacredDreams Notebook Evangelist

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    Thanks inap.. Get my M15x and upgrade Cpu myself :)
    I was thinking I might need softwares or changed bios setting too.
     
  25. Jstarnino

    Jstarnino Notebook Deity

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    took an hour and 30 mins. Probably could've gotten it done in 30-40mins. Alot of time was wasted because he was clueless and wud try to figure it out on his own before givcing up and letting me show him.
     
  26. inap

    inap .........................

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    wow, sorry to hear about your experience bro. geez thats why nobody touches my baby.
     
  27. Jstarnino

    Jstarnino Notebook Deity

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    yea well you know what they say.... well actually i forgot the exact saying but... basically... those who worry the most about things have things happen to them...

    like the man who is afraid of getting struck by lightening, sure enough, will get struct by lightening lol...

    You know what i mean :)... anyways for some reason i always give in to giving them a chance and workign on my laptop... and they keep proving me wrong. Ohwell now i know forsure. No1's touching my baby with a 10ft pole from now on. :)
     
  28. inap

    inap .........................

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    its so strange that your techs wanted to do the work, all my tech were more then happy to let me do it myself. oh well at least everything is working and your baby is unharmed.

    dang it, need to call dell and check on my replacement.
     
  29. Wattos

    Wattos Notebook Deity

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    lol, you complain about the techs. But check this out

    3 days ago I spoke to a manager about the nvidia throttling and he offered me the following 3 options:

    a) send the laptop in for repairs
    b) have another tech come over and try to fix the problem
    c) pay for the upgrade (a small sum of $450)

    obviously a is out of the question since I have the NBD warranty. And obviously Im not going to pay for something I deserve for free (i deserve the system to be fixed, ATI card or somehow differently).

    So I chose b since he said they get another chance at repairing. I know that whatever they are going to do, its not going to work but I agree anyway. Today I get a call from a tech to schedule a repair.

    Now guess what the technical support ordered him to exchange? The RAM. They are actually swapping the ram to fix the throttling issue. And that replacement was issued by the manager >_>. Well, I guess Ill have to call Dell again
     
  30. electrosoft

    electrosoft Perpetualist Matrixist

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    @ Wattos, that is beyond hilarious....
     
  31. cubankid17

    cubankid17 Notebook Consultant

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    i have a question....does anyone elses palm rest creak a bit?? mine is on the left side
     
  32. N20D5OH

    N20D5OH Notebook Evangelist

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    Not at all, so far.
     
  33. cubankid17

    cubankid17 Notebook Consultant

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    well what should i do then ..if i put my fingers on the bottom then the top and press it creaks and i know its gonna me off..so can i call dell??....besides they owe me for the crap laptop the sold me last time
     
  34. Avengement

    Avengement Notebook Consultant

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    mine does if i press down above the speaker grills. not some much creak as theres a mm of flex.

    Solution? Stop pressing down intentionally on the touchpad in that area :)
     
  35. inap

    inap .........................

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    the creaking comes and goes for me, because i'm constantly taking it apart. but try reseating the palmrest.
     
  36. cubankid17

    cubankid17 Notebook Consultant

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    guess i will have to....i need to take it apart anyway... mx 3
     
  37. inap

    inap .........................

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    its pretty easy just 4 screws to remove the palm rest, 2 for the cover and 2 next to the hdd.
     
  38. Jstarnino

    Jstarnino Notebook Deity

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    Makes sense... Dell for sun reason always thinks it's a faulty ram chip or ram chip slot causing a bottleneck while gaming, which causes the slow downs. They made me individually test each n every ram chip in both ram slots, each time doing a power drain, and each time firing up a game to c it the slowdowns would still happen. As he tech was telling me to do this over he fone, with no way of telling if I was actually doing it, I obviously just "staged" the whole procedure lolll, each time saying " I hope it works this time!, followed by a " ohhh no dammit. It didn't work!" . Still took about 45mins though, but saved me the trouble of trying something I knew wouldn't work. :)
     
  39. inap

    inap .........................

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    hahah went through that myself, but everytime they bring up something, i just said i tried that already, and they be ok. hahahhah

    i swear they are reading from a script or something.
     
  40. inap

    inap .........................

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    *cough* *cough*

    notice anything different in my sig, hehehehe
     
  41. Jstarnino

    Jstarnino Notebook Deity

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    CAMMANNNN!!! Are you serious?? Friggin guy :p Dibs on your 920! lolll


    Let me guess, you got a replacement system, so that they'd put in a 940? :p slick move there
     
  42. inap

    inap .........................

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    hahhah, you guessed it.

    yeah the replacement, came. they told me it would be the same setup i have now, so the 940 was really a big surprise. but they did fail on the gpu, they sent me a 260m, but no problem just gonna swap it out. throught the whole process dell never gave me a call or nothing confirming my specs or tell me when its gonna be delivered. but oh well they hooked me up, so i can't say much.

    all of this because the touch controls died, and after replacing mobo and 4 touch controls, they gave me a replacement. gonna gave them a call tomorrow since they didn't send a return shipment label for the old one.


    your not the only who can get hooked up my friend, hehehhe
     
  43. Jstarnino

    Jstarnino Notebook Deity

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    Lol hahahahaha... didn't think i was! But i was thinking about how to get the 740 as well! (I never stop :p)

    Well listen to this, the tech gave my the cable he forgot to attach back on the palmrest/toucpad...and when i connected it, the touchpad colors wer all messed up, not displaying the right colors ( all the colors wer a couple shades off when selecte dthe same color as everything else). So they're going to send me a new touchpad.

    This was my third call to tech support, and third problem they resolve. A couple more and i'm sure i can get a replacement system with a 740. Oh crappp wait... an 840...ahh notw orth it since my buddy has it now :( Nvm scratch everything i said lol...

    I wonder if they'd notice you returning your system with a 720 instead of a 940 :p... I think i'd try it... but like you all know by now, i don't got any morals hahahaa :D
     
  44. inap

    inap .........................

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    Hahah j, your like a little devil on my shoulders, whispering in my ears to do something bad. Hahaha
     
  45. caduceusnz

    caduceusnz Notebook Consultant

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    Hi have returned to learn from the wise. Just noticed in the WEI my primary hard disk is now only 5.9 having been around 6.8 previously.

    It's a Samsung SSD PM800 with VBM24D1Q firmware. Besides installing and uninstalling a few programs within Windows I've not knowingly done anything too serious to the system i.e. no change to hardware, firmware for any part of the entire system.

    I know I shouldn't take WEI too seriously in terms of the actual value, but I think a change in WEI may be important. Any thoughts on why it's dropped so much and how to investigate/fix it? Thanks.
     
  46. inap

    inap .........................

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    it has happened too me too, but i tested with crystal disk mark and all seems fine, seems to be some kind of glitch, many people are reporting the same issue. been to lazy to look into it, since performance is still good.
     
  47. caduceusnz

    caduceusnz Notebook Consultant

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    Good point. I get the following, which doesn't seem too shabby to me, although feel free to offer other thoughts!

    -----------------------------------------------------------------------
    CrystalDiskMark 3.0 x64 (C) 2007-2010 hiyohiyo
    Crystal Dew World : Crystal Dew World
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------
    * MB/s = 1,000,000 byte/s [SATA/300 = 300,000,000 byte/s]

    Sequential Read : 205.704 MB/s
    Sequential Write : 142.276 MB/s
    Random Read 512KB : 156.245 MB/s
    Random Write 512KB : 102.784 MB/s
    Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 12.339 MB/s [ 3012.3 IOPS]
    Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 4.298 MB/s [ 1049.4 IOPS]
    Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 24.488 MB/s [ 5978.5 IOPS]
    Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 5.449 MB/s [ 1330.3 IOPS]

    Test : 100 MB [C: 64.3% (76.7/119.2 GB)] (x5)
    Date : 2010/08/28 14:31:07
    OS : Windows 7 [6.1 Build 7600] (x64)
     
  48. danyune

    danyune Notebook Evangelist

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    well today I'm officially making the M15x my desktop replacement!

    Selling off my old parts via craigslist and hardforum. Served me well over the last few months but this beast is just too good to not use all the time (the 15x!)

    Should I just make it a direct desktop replacement and plug my keyboard/mouse/monitor into it or just use the laptop keyboard and screen?
     
  49. Avengement

    Avengement Notebook Consultant

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    Quick Question:

    I ordered my system with Word 2007 (student) and upon switching to my SSD I don't have word anymore. I do have the key. Would the resource disc have Word on it? Should I just call up Alienware tomorrow morning?

    EDIT: Another question. What is the best method of secure erasing a hard drive?
     
  50. Tenspeed33

    Tenspeed33 Notebook Evangelist

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    I found the best way to totally erase everything on your hard drive by deleting the partition/ re-allocating the space to a new partition. I accidentally did this when I hadn't transferred my coursework folder for school (cry.) Even the police computer forensic analysts a my dads university couldn't recover the file!
     
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