Alienware M17 *OFFICIAL* Owner's Lounge

am i correct in saying that the correct drivers for my 3870 on my M17 are in the My Hive support area on AW's website under the listing of M17 3870 Master Rev such and such?

 

basically, yes. however, if you want the good drivers, run a search for E-wrecked's modded 8.12 drivers.

 

Driver Comparisson

E-wrecked 8.12

Greetings
Julian

 

sweet I didn't know this was so upgradeable! (I got the lowest CPU) good news
I think its kind of cool that AW has an exclusive cause it'd kinda suck to have someone else have the same machine as me (other than styling)

 

That looks like a question, but I think you were making a statement. If this is true, and Acronis works for you; Please for the love of 'Mankind', tell me... your hd configuration you used with a successfull restore.
ie.
Do you have Alien Respawn on the drive still?
Did you have to do something special to get it to work?
Did you restore C:/ only or whole disk?
Did you have to use CD or were you able to set the windows option to reboot then restore?

Cheers

 

working on the answer now..

nope

nope

i did both. resotred the whole c drive and restored missing files and folders as well.

did both. made the f11 boot option and also booted from cd.


sorry ping...i have been running around for he last two days and your problem seems to be a thinkable able one...so now i have time to think.


when you booted up in safe mode (acronis) what happen? did it show you your drive options and what you could do?
did you use automatic or manual?
did it say your drive had errors or not?
this respawn thing...is it a partition on the drive as well? this would have it's own partition on there. and may be the active boot drive.(speculation)

 

remember i have the ocz not the m17 though i do not have respawn. i have dual 500gb wd in raid 0. i use acronis 11 home edition. i did a full backup and a restore it works fine. i tried it again today just to make sure and it works perfect. nothing special done.

 

hey guys i tried out raid 0 on my m17 and was wondering if these results look accurate for what i should be getting in hdtune?

 

Sorry to be a pain, but nothing was said definetly. They admitted that it will be sold for a while. The rest is just a speculation and merry wishes.

Cheers

Luke

 

do this test again, but this time use accurate/8 meg

also under:
device manager
disk drive
policies
enable write caching on the disk
enable advanced performance

then run your test.

 

what is accurate/ 8 meg

 

HaloGod2007 - I ran HD tune on my m17 but my primary hd is a 60 gig 7200 rpm I got out of a dell and my transfer rates were so low like 27 - 48 .. so um yes, your transfer rates are very spectacular. Looks like I'll be getting a new HD

johnksss
&
zfactor -
Perhaps It may just be I need to upgrade to version 11 from 10 of Acronis.
When I booted up using the Acronis CD I could boot Acronis Full or Safe.
Loading Full results the same as scheduling a restore in windows; The laptop reboots, It shows Acronis Loading then waits and waits (~45 sec) then skips to restarting windows... no restore progress.
I select Acronis safe mode and I see the program as if I started it in windows. It shows all partitions EISA ect. (But places EISA as last partition, Which I still don't know if it's space is allocated in the front or rear of the drive)
Automatic or Manual - I'm not sure Automatic I guess, Full restore, that may or may not be something in version 11 not in 10.
Acronis reported a successful Restore. Nothing about errors. To add, Scandisk reported no bad sectors either.
this respawn thing...is a partition. This is what was originally leading me to a problem. Perhaps the EISA "Alien Respawn" partition is being read differently in windows than it is in Acronis. This is believable. Drive letters could ultimately be changing between them both.
I'll probably take another crack at it this weekend. I'll let you know how it goes.

 

ok im doing the test with accurate on, and 8mb...also i enabled write caching and advanced performance...ill show the results soon

 

I just did the HD tune test on my m17 250G single HD and It's reporting
46 min
91 max
73 avg
16.5 ms
166 burst
19.2 cpu usage

that's with advanced performance

 

i would go raid 0 pingfreak...ur 250gb is fast even now lol...
here is the test with accurate and 8mb...what u guys think?..the burst rate is crazy high after i enabled advanced hard drive performance in vista? also should i keep the advanced performance for hard drives option on for everyday use like games or no?

 

To touch back on the Acronis issue - It seems all I had to do was upgrade to version 11. I just restored my first vista backup! Thanks for the help guys. I may have never considered a newer version would have made the difference. Version 10 just didn't work out.

 

glad that all worked out for ya buddy!

 

Whew that was a long read... 187 Pages. Thanks all for your feedback as it has helped me to decide to go with the M17 and not the M17x. My main use for this rig is as a software developer and will require 8GB of memory which the M17x can currently be configured with whereas the M17 cannot.

I read posts indicating 8GB was possible but think I have realised why no one has reported running it yet as I cannot find a manufacturer that makes individual 4GB DDR3 SO-DIMM modules yet. The best I can find is 2x2GB modules. If anyone has suggestions of where I can purchase the 4GB modules I would really appreciate you posting a link.

The 8GB will allow me to run 4 virtual pcs at the same time which is necessary for my work. I have decided to wait for the Dual 4870 config also as it seems so close to arriving. I am a gamer at heart but really only on my 360 these days. Having this rig means I can get a gaming fix while I am on the road with my job (which makes up 1/3rd of my year).

It looks totally awesome and I am so envious of you all for having one but I have to go with common sense and wait for the best options for me to appear before I purchase one.

 

You had to read all 187 pages to learn the the M17 is better then the M17x!

I would've picked the M17 based off of the price and AW's own rating on their website. But nice pick indeed.

 

Its a big purchase and a lot of thought should go towards it, I tend to update every 2.5-3 years and go the whole hog, get the best I can get at the time. At the top end of the market you never get everything in the one package, so you have to work out what you will be happy with.

When two products are a close choice then to me other peoples experience certainly comes into play. The M17 does have its drawbacks, huge power adapter (hard to escape from with quad core systems), no blu ray burner (I have a 1080 video camera and blu ray burner would be ideal for me), no smartbay, ATI over NVidia (not a real issue but nvidia has better driver support).

I'm not big on buying cheaper and upgrading as that is the expensive way of doing things. If you buy a 3870 video card and upgrade to 4780 when it becomes cheaper then you have a video card that cost money that you no longer use. So to me timing as when to buy is just as important as what to buy, if I wait till the right time then I can avoid having to update. I have been looking now for around 6 months and am confident I have found what I want.

I realise the i7 platform is around the corner along with USB 3, better SSD hard drives, possibly OLED displays and so on. This system I am looking at buying now should suffice until 2.5-3 years time when I decide to upgrade again. Then the new platforms should be well settled in with Windows 7 solidly established and so on. This is the approach I take to purchasing a new system and thats why I read all 188 pages thus far

 

there will allways be a better system and a new technology around the corner. you should start to worry, if there isnt one.
so, if you wait for the new technology to arrive, you will wait forever.

 

Wait till till it has the 4870 card & get
if u will wait for all the things you mentioned
you will be waiting a long time

 

yup always new stuff just DO IT lol

 

he is right ... do it now or wait for the end of time^^

in the end of 2008 they said to me I should wait for the 4870 ... now they still say it ... I am happy I didn't^^

Greetings
Julian

 

The difference is that since december CES 09 has happened and the 4870 has been officially announced and is appearing in other laptops. I expect in the next month or two it will appear in alienwares laptops. I am also in no hurry to purchase as I can make do with what I have for a while longer yet.

 

well its your choice and i am sure when you do choose you will no regret it.

i gotta be careful how i post i got a infraction for my post makeing no sense and them being poorly written. Also what is the point system with infractions, the infraction i got was worth one point, how does that work

sorry to be off topic

 

Quiet night...

 

a little to quiet .....

 

Not really, I mean my M17 fans are always on xD.

 

mine is pretty quiet .... never can hear it

 

Depends on what you are doing ... surfing makes the m17 *ssssssss* ... gaming makes it *bbbrrrrrrr*

I hope you understand what I mean

Mine is never as silent as Mr.Moo's^^

Greetings
Julian

 

my fans are always on because i always have it on high performance....next time u scroll down a website..check ur cpu usage during it..it uses alot lol

 

You mean swtiching to "high performance" turns the fans on every time? Is there a option to have them every time on "max"?

Greetings
Julian

Edit: you 3DMark06 score is it 1280x720 or 1280x1024? thx

 

lol mine is on high performance and unless its silent in the room i dont hear it but when my temps go over 80c its like lift off lol

 

Now that's a feature I'd love to have-- a floating notebook.

 

No need for a notebook cooler!

 

ok im not happy now i can get a quad core for 50 more then i paid for my t9400 and yea

 

Meh, 2.0 GHz, I rather get dual-core then.

 

way more cores to play with though it spreads out

my internet is down to 3kbps this sucks it takes 25 sec to load NBR

(cause i downloaded 400mb )

 

my first benchmark.
is it good. i'll get better but ati is different then nvidia.

crysis
NEXT BENCH RUN- 2/15/2009 11:43:48 PM - Vista 64
Beginning Run #1 on Map-island, Demo-benchmark_gpu
DX10 1900x1200, AA=No AA, Vsync=Disabled, 64 bit test, FullScreen
Demo Loops=3, Time Of Day= 9
Global Game Quality: Custom
Custom Quality Values:
VolumetricEffects=VeryHigh
Texture=VeryHigh
ObjectDetail=VeryHigh
Sound=VeryHigh
Shadows=VeryHigh
Water=VeryHigh
Physics=VeryHigh
Particles=VeryHigh
Shading=VeryHigh
PostProcessing=VeryHigh
GameEffects=VeryHigh
==============================================================
TimeDemo Play Started , (Total Frames: 2000, Recorded Time: 111.86s)
!TimeDemo Run 0 Finished.
Play Time: 200.97s, Average FPS: 9.95
Min FPS: 2.32 at frame 274, Max FPS: 19.17 at frame 990
Average Tri/Sec: -3512048, Tri/Frame: -352904
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: -2.60
!TimeDemo Run 1 Finished.
Play Time: 134.69s, Average FPS: 14.85
Min FPS: 2.32 at frame 274, Max FPS: 19.17 at frame 990
Average Tri/Sec: -5045745, Tri/Frame: -339799
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: -2.70
!TimeDemo Run 2 Finished.
Play Time: 134.25s, Average FPS: 14.90
Min FPS: 2.32 at frame 274, Max FPS: 19.17 at frame 990
Average Tri/Sec: -5062480, Tri/Frame: -339811
Recorded/Played Tris ratio: -2.70
TimeDemo Play Ended, (3 Runs Performed)
==============================================================

Completed All Tests

<><><><><><><><><><><><><>>--SUMMARY--<<><><><><><><><><><><><><>



NEXT BENCH RUN- 2/15/2009 11:43:48 PM - Vista 64


Run #1- DX10 1900x1200 AA=No AA, 64 bit test, Quality: Custom ~~ Overall Average FPS: 14.875

 

My friend, IT IS TIME FOR DSL OR FIOS!

 

whats goin on to play the last level in crysis warhead i had to turn everything down to minimum and then to 1280 resolution just to get it playable. like 15 fps i really think my laptop hates crysis

 

yea well nearest dsl is 15 miles so dont remind me lol i wish so bad we could get it

i have a 1mb download (average is 122kbps) its hughes net

 

Isn't Hughes Net that satellite internet?

 

yes i live in the middle of no where ok ? lol it sucks its louisiana .... population 2

 

If you're ever in New Jersey, first thing you gotta do is come by my house and try DSL or better try out my friends FIOS.

 

i've used dsl ...called war driving backtrack 3 ohhh yea but there is dsl but its 15 miles away. i wish i had it ...it really only sucks when i dont watch what i down load ... 249 mb wow patch

 

Does anyone here know how to setup a lan tournament?

 

post flyers and get a bunch of hubs then pass out the flyers and then when they get to the place plug every one to the hub

 

I am a noob at networking. Hub = Router?