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    Upgrade Time!

    Discussion in 'Alienware M15x' started by Juason, Jul 29, 2011.

  1. Juason

    Juason Notebook Consultant

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    It is amusing how the day I check in on things, the M15X goes EOL :p

    Anyways, I'm looking to get a bit more life out of my Alienware M15X. Right now I have the 820QM CPU and Geforce 260M GPU. Works pretty good, just wanna get DragonAge2 and MassEffect2 running at a bit higher res.

    Calling Dell, they are no longer selling AMD 5850s, and only have refurbished 460Ms for 400$. The price is OK, just want to make sure if I order it that the heatsink, clips, drivers and whatnot will all match up without me having to fab something special. The discussions on this forum haven't clarified that enough for me and the dude on the phone was not competant.

    Otherwise, is it worth pursuing any other options? They did mention having some AMD 5870s still, but I suspect those have some issues with the fan and power control.

    Also, would one of the newer CPUs work in this w/o special modifications (such as the 2720QM)? They seem to have some incredibly benchmark gains.

    Thanks for clueing me in :p
     
    Juason, Jul 29, 2011
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  2. svl7

    svl7 T|I

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    I can sell you an almost new Dell 5850m for definitely less than $400 if you're interested, PM me. The 5850 is pretty sick performance wise, check out the benchmark thread.

    The AMD 6970m is an option as well, check out the link in my signature. Your heatsink will work with any of the cards mentioned here.

    About the CPU: The best you can put in the M15x is a 920xm/940xm, they're highly overclockable and perform very well. The sandy bridge processors aren't compatible with the PM55 chipset, so they won't work.
     
    svl7, Jul 29, 2011
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  3. widezu69

    widezu69 Goodbye Alienware

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    In a few weeks, if I manage to flog away my M15x to a buyer who doesn't want the 6990m, then it may be on the market... This GPU will run like a dream with your 820QM as they won't bottleneck each other in terms of power. With the XM as well, I run into throttling at high clocks.
     
    widezu69, Jul 29, 2011
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  4. svl7

    svl7 T|I

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    You really want to part with your mighty system? An r3 won't give that much more power... or what are you planning to do?
    Well, in the end it's up to you...
     
    svl7, Jul 29, 2011
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  5. widezu69

    widezu69 Goodbye Alienware

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    Yeah well I've always been an nvidia guy. I've always liked bleeding edge tech and I've been getting a lot of stick from the GF so I'm getting the 580m with 3D and settling down for a few months. 3D has always been an unfulfilled itch for me so now that I can have it with a top GPU is great. So yeah, gonna stop the whole pushing the system to the limit thing for a bit. Not before I overvolt the thing and take it to 560 Ti clocks though :D
    PS You've always had the mightier system for sure.
     
    widezu69, Jul 29, 2011
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  6. svl7

    svl7 T|I

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    Hehe, well, your card is definitely more powerful, but my CPU is pretty fast (at least with the pinmod and a lot of help with the cooling, hahaha).
    I don't think you'll be able to stop pushing your hardware, it's nothing you can abandon easily ;)

    580m and 3d is definitely very nice... I'm not going 3d before next year, then we will see the Alienwares with glasses-free 3d screen, worth the wait imo :D
     
    svl7, Jul 29, 2011
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  7. logan801

    logan801 Notebook Consultant

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    You'll love 3d my desktop is built for it I have sli570's acer h5360 and 135" screen 4x vision glasses. Movies and games are sweeeeeeeet I played fableIII and crisis all the way through in 3d + when my friends come over we geek out on 3d bluray
     
    logan801, Jul 30, 2011
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