Ask Alienware's General Manager, Frank Azor, Anything on AWA!

(1x) Audio Out 1/8" Ports (Compatible with inline mic headset)
(1x) Line In Microphone 1/8" Port (retaskable for 5.1 analog audio output)

How does one get 5,1 "Analog" from the 15, 17'' laptops. They ea. have only two of these 1/8" holes. Do we not need 3 of them to get 5.1 ? Does DELL provide a way to do it with 2 ? I ordered a laptop. I told the guy it is conditional that I can get 5.1 from that plug, but the sales rep did not know how and was rather silent. If I can not get it, I will raise an issue, and return it, after having fun using the laptop for free for a month. Otherwise, if it works I will enjoy a new portable folding tablettop.

Do we get a HDMI LPCM splitter or something... USB soundcard...what/how do we get the 5.1 using the 1/8'' plugs, i.e "analog" as Dell/US spells it.

 

I read through the whole thread on the AMA... did anybody else hear the innumerable "can we get the Alpha console with the light-up Steam logo" questions in the same tone of voice as Patton Oswalt uses when he is mocking the dumb? MAKE THE THING I SAW IN THE MAGAZINE BE HERE, NOW!

That was pretty disheartening.

 

His reply came up. His responses to my questions are in bold.

Aside from the error that dual 980m beats a 980 (unless he has some in-the-knows about Nvidia and AMD's next highest-end GPU), yeah nothing new about the PSU question. Again, he's only half right. Clevo laptops with the 180w charger are fine, but Alienware laptops aren't. So my guess is that either the power draw the 15 and 17 R2 is greater than the Clevo counterparts or that the charger is weaker. But either way, it just means that a better PSU is needed.
The answer to my 13's CPU question is interesting. I wasn't expecting it to be an all-rounder notebook. So pretty much, the 14 got shafted because they wanted to make an all-round laptop.
I do remember seeing a benchmark where the i7-5500U was close to the performance as the i7-4558U, but that doesn't mean that the extra power would be unnecessary.
The dual GPU response strikes a nerve, though. They don't seem to have any plans for a dual GPU laptop in the near future.

 

Hi Guys,
First of all thank you for the passion and support you have for Alienware and our products. I helped start Alienware nearly 17 years ago when I was still in high school and I have been a PC gamer since Links 386 (my first PC game, I don't play golf but it had great graphics at the time ). Throughout my entire time at AW I've done many things here but the one thing I've always been responsible for has been our products and their planning and development. I've been the guy leading the team that has been bringing you all of our products both good and bad since 1998.
We hear you loud and clear on the concerns and complaints you've shared with us and we are going to do our best to make it right. We are testing the power supply concerns raised to ensure we didn't miss something. If we did miss something and a 240W does in fact help performance then we will make it right, you have my commitment on that. Regarding the 18" notebook, nobody, especially not my team and I wanted to see it disappear but we have had a very hard time getting LCDs and our supply line dried up. We have very strict performance and quality requirements as most of you know and if we can't get panels, or any components for that matter, that meet these requirements we will not use them. We are going to go back to our suppliers with all of your feedback and try and get more panels to try and respawn the 18" with 980s. I can't commit to anything yet as we are working this real-time based on your feedback but I thank you for being so passionate about the products you love and even giving us this opportunity. It's thanks to your passion and feedback that we are looking at this and I want you to know you that we hear you loud and clear.
If possible, I ask that you please give the new products a chance. We worked hard to design and develop them for you and they are pretty awesome. I understand they are different than some products in the past and change is often hard to accept but please don't completely dismiss the benefits we introduced. They are thinner, lighter, have better battery life and have some awesome performance. I know you're tired of hearing it but the Amplifier is amazing and it saves you from having to buy a new notebook or struggle with an unofficial MXM upgrade every year or so. The long term value of that invention is badass. We hear you that it's expensive and we are looking at ways to reduce the price.
The bottom line I'd like you to leave you with is that we aren't perfect and if we screwed up we will do the best we can to make it right. Our customers are our business and without you we won't survive, please know that we know and live by this daily.

I sincerely thank you. We will be in touch soon.
-Frank

 

Wow! Really you and not a media service? O_O Incredible.

You just made my day.

 

Frank,

It's nice of you to take the time to post here.

Please do not give upon the social media team. They help us a lot and their presence among this community is important. As of late, we only have one very active member, Luis. Having them hear allows us to more easily share our feedback, get support, and build relationships or connections with Alienware (directly). Customer service is one of the main reasons I chose Alienware 3+ years ago, and have been around ever since. The Social Media team was much more involved back then.

 

Why do you feel we've given up on them?

 

I edited my above post, but I feel like their presence has diminished here on NBR and moved elsewhere. Perhaps they were assigned to other media outlets or channels, but I feel NBR has been moved down the list.

A while ago there were several members actively providing support to the community, and now it's like 1 or 2 people every week or so.

 

Obee left for a new and amazing opportunity and we are all very happy for him for taking this next step in his career. He left on great terms and I miss having him on the team as he is great. We are working on hiring someone to replace him. There has been no decision to scale back our SM efforts, on the contrary, this experience has taught us that we need to assign more resources to our forums which we are working on a plan for now. I'm sorry you guys feel we have scaled back, I assure you that's not the case and you will see improvements soon when we hire Obee's backfill and put more resources onto the forum (this forum).

 

Nice to see some responses. Luckily I had an extra 240W adapter and I have seen some differences between the 180W and 240W. As I stated in another thread I went down to the 15 since it offered me the best GPU/CPU and size combo. Hopefully the issues about socket CPU's work their way out in the future.

 

Frank, please consider a 17" dual gpu alternative if 18" displays are not to be allocated for whatever reasons.

I am one of the last purchasers of the AW18 (Deployed in 2015) as I bought it fully knowing I could have chosen an MSI GT80 or Clevo SLI 980M alternative. There is no quality like Alienware.

If I am not mistaken the GT80 uses the same 18.4" display as the AW18. Surely it cannot be hard to order?

 

While I'm sure everybody appreciates your response, what makes you think people wanted a thinner and lighter laptop? True enthusiasts don't care how big or heavy a performance laptop is. They care about performance. You seem to keep pushing the thinner and lighter angle. People who typically buy big, bulky laptops (past AW, ASUS ROG line, etc.) know that they're buying big, bulky laptops. And they love it. They love the cooling, the quiet operation, and upgrade possibilities. If they didn't they wouldn't buy these laptops - these are the folks who buy thin laptops like the Razer Blade or some Gigabyte models.

Also, we've all linked threads demonstrating, beyond any doubt, that other laptops with the same specs (such as the ASUS ROG G751) perform better. We have also shown (rather conclusively, I would think) that the same AW17 machine, when plugged into a 240w PSU, performs better than when it is plugged into its default 180w PSU.

Making an inferior product, when compared to past products, is a forgivable sin (assuming it gets rectified in the future).

Denying a product is inferior and has issues, when faced with compelling (maybe even irrefutable?) evidence, is not.

We respect people who own up to their mistakes and strive to improve. We give them leeway, and will give them a second chance. But people who keeping denying, while hiding behind corporate-like chatter and quasi-marketing lingo? They're dead before they hit the ground.

 

I can agree with most of what Ramzay said. My laptop is an Alienware 17 R1 and I feel the R2 is a downgrade in almost every aspect except the IPS panel, extra macro keys, and AlienHead power button (bringing back the good old days).

When your past products are better than your new products, it's pretty clear there's something wrong. I'm sure the Alienware 17 R2 stands fine with "most" of the competition, but it's not the Alienware we once knew and have come to love... It seems like a step backward, or at least, the wrong direction.

The M17x R4 to Alienware 17 R1 was not a huge leap forward, but it definitely wasn't a step backward. I actually appreciate certain aspects of the Alienware 17 more so than the M17x R4 - having owned both.

 

That IPS panel is HUGE. Very few manufacturers offer 17", quality IPS panels.

And Dre, you forgot to mention the downgrade to 2 RAM slots, one 2.5" HDD slot, the lack of optical drive...

 

They could easily make an argument that SSDs are the way of the future, and it would be a VALID argument, but I do not see a double HDD caddy in the future without the notebook getting thicker than it is.

If this prediction is right then I believe Alienware did not make a totally awful choice: http://www.tweaktown.com/news/43139/256gb-ssds-cost-less-70-2h-2015-according-apacer/index.html

 

Nice to see you posting here, Frank. Takes guts. LOL!

Social media rocks - there are several people missed....Mark, Bill B and others.....still, the presence of AW folk here is awesome. I take my hat of to you for the comments you made above. I'm not gonna bang on about bringing back dual gpu etc - you already know how many feel about this and about upgrade-ability. We are gonna miss that aspect of Alienware. Whist you might say the GA will keep a new machine up to date, it will only do so by chaining it to a desk, and that makes having a gaming laptop a rather moot point.

See where we are coming from, fella?

 

Its pretty clear the direction and future AW is taking.

 

Just glad I got my 880m sli 18 while I did

 

+1 for alienware, very impressive of Frank to take time and interface with us.

 

A good change of pace. I like where this is going.

 

We have a lot of very smart and enthusiastic members here on NBR loyal to Alienware, and I do agree with Steve - it's great to see the General Manager on this forum listening to customers. That is very, very much appreciated and not at all what I anticipated.

 

The Clevo P650SE has a double HDD caddy and room for 2 M.2 drives. It is also quite a bit thinner than the AW.

 

Glad to see Frank was here and really hope he can see the passion the enthusiast have for great Alienware products that are expandable and upgradeable.

 

And the size of the battery is?

 

A quick glance at the notebook and it doesn't look like its a true 2 HDD caddy. It only supports 2 x 7mm SSDs and not 2 full 9.5mm HDDs.

The 17 R2 would have to be redesigned for even a 9.5/7 caddy, but I'm not sure what all the thickness is being used for vs. the Clevo.

 

Frank replied to my PM on Alienware Arena also. It's nice to see him care and want to investigate things for us, makes me a bit more comfortable ordering alienware for my first time.
Frank's reply was:

Once again Frank, your responses are greatly appreciated and HUGE respect to you for coming on here to post for us.

 

60wh battery I believe.

 

AW 15 and 17 R2 have a 92 wHr battery.

 

@Alienware-Frank,

I forgot to mention one thing that is deeply concerning: the ease of transferring ownership of Alienware laptops. These days it is very easy to acquire all of the "required" information on the Dell form to transfer ownership of a system from one owner to another. As a matter of fact, I recently encountered an individual posing as an interested party in purchasing my system, and I provided him with my Service Tag. He found the rest of my information on the internet through various websites (having known my name and phone number) and initiated the ownership transfer of my system to him. Perhaps I shouldn't have spoken with him via text messaging, but I especially did not anticipate such events taking place. It would be nice if you could do something about that.

Luckily, I checked my email in time and was notified about the ownership "about to change" within a day or so... Can't believe I'm saying this, but people are attempting to "steal" our systems without us even knowing, and end up reporting them stolen to ultimately cost you (Alienware) money for a replacement. There definitely needs to be something in place, like a confirmation phone call or something by a representative when the change is submitted. And having the ability to go online and check the ownership status of your laptop would also be very nice. Right now we can check the main things about the system, like warranty status and stuff.

We want to protect our expensive systems as much as possible. A complementary phone call, I believe, is not much to ask to prevent such issues from occurring, especially if we pay top dollar for Complete Care Warranty. I, and I'm sure many others, would be extremely grateful if you would look into this. It's ridiculous the length at which some people are willing to go to betray others' trust.

 

i would be 99% less annoyed at the new alienwares if at least the gpu was user removable by mxm interface, if msi can do it why cant alienware :/. They are basically forcing you to buy the graphics amplifier in the long run or you have to keep coming back for more after a few years when your 970m or 980m becomes outdated.
The standard 180w powersupply for a 980m is quite abominable too.

 

This is true, the Clevo has room for one 9.5mm or 2x 7mm.

Still, the Clevo has 4 RAM slots, 2 M.2 slots, 2 (sorta) HDD slots. It omits an optical drive because of how thin it is.

Point is this: if you're going to be thicker, be thicker. Cram RAM slots, HDD slots, an optical drive...put something in there to justify the thickness/weight.

Do you honestly believe that a bigger battery makes up for the lack of storage and RAM slots?

Not to mention the Clevo still manages to get 3-4 hours of battery run time on that 60wh battery - which seems to be about the same amount of run time the AW gets on the 92wh battery, no?

See NBR's own review here

http://www.notebookreview.com/notebookreview/eurocom-m5-pro-review-clevo-p650se/2/

It would appear that the bigger battery is needed to maintain a decent run time, as opposed to being a "plus".

 

The AW 17 R1 has an 86wHr battery, if I remember correctly.

 

Hey there J Dre and all of you really,

My name is Umar, I'm part of Alienware's Technical Marketing Team. You may remember me from such films as our Alienware Alpha Game Performance videos. Nice to begin conversations with you all.

I understand your concern with the ease of transferring ownership of your Alienware notebook and I can bring this topic up and drive for a change. Maybe your suggestions are sound but maybe there's something to the reasoning for the ownership policy being the way it is that you or I don't see right now. Let me bring it up and educate myself and perhaps we can see where those conversations take us.

 

It's been common knowledge to not give out the tag since 2009 or so, maybe even before then.

Once a transfer has been completed they e-mail the original owner with the NEW owner's information including their address.

Another quick glance, this time at the GT80, it only has 1HDD and 4 M.2 SSD slots like the 17 R2.

This is most likely a bandwidth issue, and we will never see more than 1HDD slot with 4 x m2.

 

I'd like to know your opinions on this current bomb I'm going to throw at you.

You guys do not care for thin notebooks or battery life. You want something big and beefy with a disregard to its life unplugged.

Do you game mobile? When you do, are you hooked up against a wall with the AC Adapter? Or does your Notebook stay at your battle station and on occasion, get moved once in awhile to actually game in a different setting?

Is it a desktop replacement? The graphics amp adds so much longevity to your notebook. Next Gen graphics card will work on it. You won't have to get a new unit every year. You can just pop in a new card and keep on trucking.

I'm not trying to push products on you guys. I just want to know, do you agree with my assessment? Do you see how people could use it as such? It may not work for you but do you see people who would use it in such a fashion?

 

I personally like the mobility of a laptop when I want to take it with me. I can pack it into my bag and take it with me. With a desktop I'd have to disconnect all these cables etc.
Mine is a desktop replacement. My concern for the BGA being soldered to the board is, yes we can upgrade the GPU, but what happens when the CPU is what's limiting the computer? Are you guys gonna come up with a Processing Amplifier too (that's just a joke).

But ultimately the alienware community thrived on being able to upgrade whichever parts they wanted inside the laptop so they didn't have to carry an extra peripheral. That's why the graphics amplifier is not a good solution for most of us.

 

I own both the AW18 and the Area 51 R2.

Both systems cost around $5000 and I bought both within a 40 day period.

I don't care about the cost of MXM upgrades. The amplifier is silly.

When I travel from Canada to USA, I want my notebook to have that same performance as it does from place to place, while just carrying the notebook. When I go back home and want unmatched performance, where no notebook in the world can compete, I use the Area 51.

Why would I want the amplifier when I own two products from Alienware that complement each other in a way that one is portable and one is a powerhouse?

 

@AW Khan,

1. Yes, gaming on breaks and on-the-go is nice. However, we are required to be hooked up to the A/C adapter, anyway. The dedicated graphics cards offered by NVIDIA (until now with NVIDIA Battery Boost) required more power than what the battery was capable of putting out to play most games at acceptable frame rates. Even with Battery Boost, it's not nearly as good as with the adapter. And it cuts your battery life nearly in half, so you may only gave for limited amounts of time "on-the-go," resulting in the need for the adapter no matter what.

2. If someone purchases a "Flagship" system, it most likely is expected to perform like a "desktop replacement." We don't want to be forced into purchasing an eGPU in order to game at higher frame-rates. The Graphics Amplifier should be an "accessory" and not a necessity, particularly for 4k gaming. 980M SLI would be fine for 4k, too. I believe you guys have put too much faith into the eGPU and are pushing people too hard toward it. SLI graphics in a laptop was perfect. You're also giving up an entire market of people looking for SLI graphics on-the-go. Why spend thousands on a laptop to be tied down to your desk? You may as well just purchase a gaming desktop.

3. The Graphics Amplifier is pushing products onto us. Whether intentional or not, that's exactly what it does, especially now that 4k gaming is becoming "a thing." As I mentioned above (#2), an SLI laptop with 970M SLI or 980M SLI would be sufficient enough to game at 4k, and the "Graphics Amplifier" should be an accessory to further add to that performance, if one wishes. Added note: The Graphics Amplifier, supporting desktop GPU's, is bottlenecked by the "weak" CPU's offered in the new Alienware systems. How does that even seem right to Alienware? An i5 dual-core CPU cannot adequately support a desktop GTX 980. This is a bit misleading when it comes to advertising the Graphics Amplifier. We have seen the 4710HQ (quad-core) just barely push out enough performance for a single 980 M, while struggling in some intensive games.

Closing notes:

Others may feel differently about it, but I am not a fan of what has happened with 2015's lineup. Not at all. You've gone from having the most upgradeable and powerful laptops on the market for a justifiable premium price, to non-upgradeable systems offering less than before with a now unjustifiable premium price. In my opinion, having owned several Alienware products, Alienware has exchanged leadership in the industry of all form factors with leadership in the eGPU market, sacrificing the rest of the systems' features for the Amplifier. In other words, you put too much into the Amplifier and actually subtracted from the laptops, putting things like "thinner and lighter" before performance. I'm a business major, I know about the bottom line, and I'm sure this is great for that. It's just disappointing to those of us whom have grown loyal to Alienware to see such changes all of a sudden - changes one would expect to see in small form factors, like the 13" market. Not the 17" (Flagship) model. And what happened with 3D/120Hz? You guys should work with the design team or NVIDIA about that. I remember Apple managed to get a special GPU from NVIDIA to throw in their Mac's (680MX). Bring it back! That was an epic feature for the 17" model.

Maybe it's just me, but this just doesn't feel like "Alienware" anymore.

 

I personally value battery life a lot. But it's not battery life while gaming, I couldn't care less that I can't game more than two hours on battery. It's battery life when doing non demanding tasks like coding or browsing or watching videos. I don't know how many people buy PCs just to game but they're nowhere near the majority. Maybe this shouldn't apply to the 17 inch model because well it's more of a desktop replacement size and battery life isn't needed then. The 17 can be this massive uncompromising behemoth with MX processors and SLI graphics. But battery life is definitely useful on the 15.

 

@Alienware-Frank, @AW Khan, @Alienware-Wasserman, @Alienware-L_Porras:

There may be some harsh stuff in here, as most of us were pretty shocked, but this may be beneficial to you, if you're really interested in seeing what most people think about the new lineup: Cast your vote or opinion about the new Alienware lineup. I'd say the majority of us definitely feel left out, or at least disappointed.

 

1. The MSi GT80 proves that Alienware is lying with the shortage of 18" screen
2. Outright lie. The 97/80M MXM can support up to double the vRAM compard to the crap soldered version - the AGA is useless at x4 PCI-e mode since it bottlenecks the graphics card - the current systems are gimped by a 180w PSU (limits power draw for long time gaming), and the HQ series BGA CPU DOES NOT HOLD THEIR BOOST CLOCKS 24/7 like the superior XM/QM socketed CPUs, lastly you deleted 16GB off the maximum supported RAM by having only 2 RAM slots plus the new Alienware laptops do not support 7.1 sound output like their older socketed+mxm versions.

Now you may argue that the HQ offers similar passmark (before throttling itself to lower TDP) compared to their XM/QM version. Sorry to tell you, but passmark is irrelevant since the turbo time window doesn't allow the CPU to operate at full potential when gaming.


/end rant

 

Awesome! Thank you so much for responding here. We really do appreciate it. Even where we have differences of opinion, this says a ton of great things about you and the Alienware brand. We don't see this kind of engagement from Executive-level leadership with any of your competitors.

Yes, please do. And, give it all the AC adapter power it needs to run wild and free without shutting itself off from lack of juice. If the 4940MX is available, please use it instead of a BGA GPU. It appears to be, since it is available from your competitors. 18" is awesome, but 17" will do in a pinch for a chassis large enough for big heat sinks and dual MXM GPUs. The Graphics Amplifier is a nice add on for a single GPU laptop, but it's not a substitute for dual MXM GPU. We have plenty of benchmarks that show dual MXM outperforms the closest desktop equivalent with a single GPU.

I understand the point you are trying to make. Please understand that performance enthusiasts view the GPUs as being about 50% of what makes a machine awesome. The other 50% is an unlocked BIOS and a CPU that can run all day at 4.5GHz or higher without missing a beat. Remove either one from the picture and the result is a failure from our perspective. These low-TDP BGA wonders that struggle to hold 4.0GHz and the concept of single core overclocking is boring and unimpressive. Those of us that are more than gamers get just as many goosebumps (maybe even more) over amazing physics scores as we do amazing graphics scores. I bench the M18xR1, M18xR2 and Alienware 18 at 4.6-4.9GHz. I use a dual AC adapter on the R1 and R2, and I would on the 18 if it did not have a low power handling threshold that makes it of no benefit to be connected to a dual 330W Adapter setup. Because of the manner in which the 18 was crippled in terms of power handling, it may as well have only one GPU because that is all a 330W AC adapter can manage with a substantial CPU and GPU overclock. The M18xR1 and M18xR2 machines handle this with grace having a dual AC adapter at their disposal.

I am not trying to be difficult or disrespectful by saying this, just wanting to be sure you are aware that some of your fans are real extreme performance enthusiasts and having fun being a gamer on the side is just a fringe benefit that is coincidental to owning a beast machine. We are the ones that feel abandoned most of all. I also understand that we are a limited client base and may be viewed as expendable. I cannot hold that against a big company that needs to make a profit in a fierce market, but it still doesn't feel good, LOL.

This is my invention. It works perfectly. You guys can a lot better job of this than I can. Clevo already has. You'll need this to support a true dual GPU performance enthusiast beast machine with a respectable mobile Extreme, K or X CPU pushing it to exciting performance levels. The 4930MX with a nice overclock draw over 130W all by itself.

 

Yes please bring back SLI, I do not mind if you bring it back in a 17 inch form factor, the graphics amplifier is a good concept but does not replace having everything you need inside the unit. Above all else, I use the system for gaming but if I wanted to have a graphics amplifier attached to the unit every time I play a game a desktop would probably be a better option to go with.

 

"You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time."- Abraham Lincoln

 

Defnegar we heard you the first time you don't need repeat yourself.

 

Please give us an SLI monster. It needs to have a socketed CPU and MXM GPU.
If it needs to be plugged into a wall, that's fine. Most gaming machines do anyway to game properly. So also, the option for dual PSUs would be fantastic.
It doesn't matter if it's heavy and big. Lots of us a yearning for uncompromised performance that we can move around/redeploy.
A fully unlocked bios is also something us enthusiasts value.
There are still socketed mobile/desktop CPU solutions for AW to use.
Give us overkill my friend!

 

I would love to see the same style bios that the Alienware Area-51 R2 has on the mobile alienwares as well, although it looks like it's made by MSI for the MSI motherboard. =/

 

Harsh stuff doesn't hurt. You can only learn from it and see what truth there is in it. I totally understand your disappointment and I want to work towards addressing them with a solution and not just words.

Saw this once in a really long fortune cookie. Also, I'm not trying to fool you, if that's what you're implying. I'm not a PR guy and I'm not trying to sell you products. I'm not trying to sway you. Tell your concerns in a constructive manner and lets move forward from there.

Mr. Fox, that adapter is absolutely insane. It's wonderful. As you know, I value your feedback immensely. Your opinion is greatly appreciated because you certainly can back it. I know saying that I gather your feedback sounds like a tale but when I say I'm gathering your feedback, it means I'm dropping it into the right ears.

 

Sure, why not? I'll fire away.

1) More customizable build options would be great. I'm willing to have longer build times in order to get the system that really fits my needs, as opposed to a pre-configured system with little wiggle room.

2) Thank God you haven't ditched Windows 7; please do not cut that product loose. I'm fine with paying the extra $70 so I do not have to have 8.

3) Bring back optical drives. It makes a lot of software installs after a hard drive refresh/replacement a lot faster. With data caps, it's not always feasible to download large files on a regular basis. Not all of us have access to Google Fiber; a lot of us have to make do with AT&T or, God help you poor souls, Comcast.

4) Get fun with design. Bring back the custom colors that we used to be able to get. Why is it all so serious?

Also most of what has already been mentioned in this thread, but these are my extra concerns. I'd like to be able to go back to wholeheartedly endorsing Alienware's products, but I'm not able to do this right now. We don't mind paying a premium, but the product needs to be premium as well.

 

The Area51 motherboard is cheapo, low quality and doesn't hold up really well against high overclocks (small mosfet and cap, small heatsink). Just chiming in.