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

If I could continuously click the "Like" button for an hour, and have it show up that many times under your post, I would.

 

That's a hefty request. I'll see if my back is strong enough to carry it. This kind of feedback is something I'll be bringing to my meetings for open discussion.

 

Hopefully Alienwares meetings are like most it/technology companies and has a few meetibgs a day

 

It's always good for everyone to sync up and brainstorm as often as possible.

 

I'm pretty sure you'll be immortalised amongst the enthusiasts here.
Heck, I'll order a new nameplate and call it "the beast - Sir Khan edition"


If I and the others can do anything to help make it happen just ask.

 

Do not forget Alienware 17r5 Ranger. Should have the ability to work with Maxwell 970m / 980m cards in the same way as Alienware M18x 1/2, AW18 series ..

 

Seconded, great to see Alienware getting involved in the community. I'd also like to say that I'd think it would be great if Alienware could create a BIOS update for the M17xR3 to use 970M/980M too!

 

Hopefully it's a 1 size fits all sort of approach. For whatever reason the old m15x can host these cards in Legacy mode...
@AW Khan perhaps that's a good go to point for some insight as to what's necessary.

 

I would also like to join others in the request for updating the M18x R2/M17x R4 system BIOS to support whatever protocols the maxwell generation of nvidia cards employs. The M15x supports the 970M just fine as TBoneSan stated, which is why the M17x/M18x users are frustrated as to how we are unable to use those cards in legacy mode instead of being forced into windows 8.1 with UEFI booting only. The Alienware M18x R2 is the greatest laptop to grace the surface of the Earth, and I couldn't fathom being forced into an inferior quality Clevo system to use MXM 3.0 cards due to a simple BIOS incompatibility.

 

Don't get too excited just yet. You are what you do, not what you say you'll do.

New BIOS and fan profiles for ALL of the systems are needed.

 

So, you've been testing with the new bios that actually works in combination with the battery? If not then your statement is spurious.

For sure and that was the way I was going, already purchased the 330W PSU, too late now, the 'fix' may well work but the deception is not something I can live with.

 

Awesome communication and commitment at finding solutions to potential issues with the new machines Frank and AW Khan. This is what you guys should do on every single launch from Alienware. Have some engineers who knows and have the power to test, to answer questions and concerns raised about new hardware. It will calm us and put an end to an "lingering buzz" that only puts a damper on the excitement on your products.
The rumors about Alienware 18 being discontinued have been a ongoing discussion for many months ever since the rumors started to appear on the chinese forums. And they were right as they usually are. The way you guys dealt with this was not stellar to put it light. The reps on this subforum disappeared completely, nobody from Alienware could say anything, and a sudden panic got a hold of us. On top of this rumors about soldered CPUs started appearing, then the news about soldered GPUs. A complete mess.
My point here is that you guys could have avoided a TON of bad critisism and downtalking on the Alienware brand if you had someone from tech/engineer department to answer questions as they came, like you did in your AMA. That Intel is the one forcing you more or less to use BGA CPUs. That desktop CPUs are a no go because...That Alienware 18 could disappear or will disappear, that its under consideration etc. That the graphic amplifier is a move to give users better performance and choice, not a cash grab from our side.
God knows how many people you have lost to Clevo, naturally because they still use MXM GPUs, but also because people abandoned ship because of the rumors. Everything was Alienware`s fault, although it wasnt like you have explained earlier. But the lack of communication worked against you.

Communication is everything!


I have a few questions at the same time:
- Have Alienware any interest in getting G-sync to work on Alienware machines? Any potential to incorporate G-sync module in the machines?

- Is Alienware interested in getting PCIe M2 SSDs supported with the upcoming machines? 9 series chipset from Intel (ie HM97) will finally add support for bootable PCIe SSDs use NVMi instead of SATA to get vastly better latency, accesstime and we get 1.0GB speeds instead of 600MB limit with SATA3.
There is also possibilities to reroute some of the PCIe lanes from the CPU to the M2 slot to get 2GB/s+ speeds.
Surely this must be something Alienware is interested in?

 

I'm aware,but I don't know if Alienware want to have fans in their PSU like Microsoft had since these (Alienware PSUs) are transported regularly.

 

Thank you for the feedback and I assure you we are going to be much more engaged moving forward, we've learned.

G-Sync - Yes we are looking at it and we like it but I don't have a timeline to share yet.
PCIe SSDs are on the roadmap and you will see them in future products. When we do launch them they will operate at max speed.

 

Will there be a point and time when Alienware will go back to MXM? I understand BGA CPUs are mainly Intel's fault, but other high end rigs are still using MXM graphics.

 

If AW brings back the 18 with 980Ms, it will HAVE to be MXM.

 

Why? They can just solder two 980M to the board and sell not-upgradable notebook for same price lol

 

There aren't any SLI connectors with soldered cards. I'm not even sure if they can be added that easily either.

 

Count me as one of those people. I've had the M17x R3, M18x R1, and the M18xR2 that is currently in my signature. Those machines were the best of the best. Period. Nothing else came close. For me, there was a feeling of eliteness to them that I have never felt before with respect to owning a computer. I never had buyers remorse, or any regrets about purchasing any of them. Because for each machine, I knew there was nothing better. Build quality, asthetics, perfomance, cooling, etc.. Case closed.

The current state of events is why I now have a Clevo in my signature. If Alienware offered a system that was like those before it (Socketed Dual MXM GPU & Socketed CPU, build quality, asthetics, perfomance, cooling, etc.) I would have purchased the Alienware in a heartbeat. Even though I know it would have cost me more to go with the Alienware most likely.

 

They order the gpus so they can add or remove connectors if they want, that's not a problem.

 

Welcome to the disapointed Ex-Alienware club .

How's that Clevo working out for you? message me rather than clutter up the thread if you have any comments on it.

 

@Alienware-Frank
I'm not sure if you would be able to answer this or not, but I have been doing some very extensive testing with my new AW17R2 since I received it about a week ago and it seems like the ability to overclock the 970m has been completely locked off at the hardware level.
I have tried numerous different drivers and overclocking softwares and in all cases the core clock/boost clock on the 970m cannot be adjusted (memory clock can) other users with the 980m in the new 17 are able to mildly overclock their gpu's; but using the same software and drivers the 970m on the new 17 simply cannot be overclocked at all which makes it seem like it is being blocked at the hardware/bios level.
If if could get confirmation one way or another as to if Overclocking is indeed block the 970m at the bios/hardware level and if so why I and alot of other users with the 970m would really appreciate it.

 

I believe some nVIDIA partners do not want people overclocking their GPUs for warranty/cost purposes. In turn the only way to do that is through drivers since BIOS' can always be modded. Obviously there are more extreme ways around this.

Alienware has nothing to do with it.

 

No zero this is not the driver OC block I already know about that Used older drivers (lots of different older drivers) and still cannot OC users with the 980m can OC using the same drivers/software but not users with the 970m so far the only seemingly possible explanation is a bios/hardware level block.

additionally no one has gotten any official word whether the block on mobile overclocking in nvidia drivers was actually intentional.

 

If they want, they can. Aorus X7 Pro. Thats why.
But they may need new Motherboard to do that. And change supply chain to solder the GPUs for them. But since the new AW15/17 already use soldered, that wont be difficult. But yeah, MXM for the win

Have you tried 344.75? Nvidia locked down overclocking after they moved to the 347.xx
Previous series allow overclocking. It could be that Dell use 347.xx driver.

 

The drivers 344.73, 344.88, and 347.25 (obviously) didn't let me overclock my GTX 860m on Win7 or Win8.1.

 

Thats weird. Allright, could be that there is some blockage on the vbios/BIOS then.
Have you tried reflashing to a different vbios?

I just know that my 970Ms overclock with previous series in my AW18

 

I wish. The problem is that I, like other Broadwell 13 owners, have a GTX 960m in disguise of the GTX 860m. SO I rather not risk causing damage to my laptop unless I were remove this disguise Alienware put on. Look at the GPU ID. And the new driver didn't affect anything else in this screenshot other than driver version.

 

All they succeed in doing with this model is making their products undesirable. A product that can only be used as intended and configured by the manufacturer is absolutely worthless to me. Might as well save a huge wad of cash and buy a console to play games. No point in wasting money on something that cannot be configured to work the way I want it to work. I realize not everyone shares my passion for overclocking and tweaking performance, but even some of those that don't will find being blocked from doing whatever they feel like doing is unacceptable.

While it is true to some extent that Alienware and other ODMs have nothing to do with it, the big guys do have influence. If they "go along with the program" they contribute to the problem. They don't have to go along with the program... this is something they choose to do. The ODMs need to start working together, conspiring or whatever you want to call it, and then NVIDIA and Intel would be more accountable than they are. The way things are now, we have the tail (NVIDIA and Intel) wagging the dog (the ODMs that sell their technology).

 

Its just a name. If the 960M is identical with 860M, included the VRAM amount, you should be able to flash with both 860M and 960M vbios.

Problem is however that you risk getting the same issue as us 18" users, no boot/detection errors.
So yes, its a risk.
You could try Dell 860M Maxwell vbios if they offered soldered one with 2GB VRAM earlier. That have the best odds of working I think.

You could also try to dump the 960M vbios at techinferno and have svl look at it

 

I agree but my main suspect for this overclocking block is ASUS... who is much bigger than Alienware.

 

BTW Zero just wanted to say sorry if my response to you seemed at all curt I know everyone here on the boards is just trying to help. om just getting very frustrated as I have put a lot of work into trying to get to the bottom of the Overclocking issues with the 970m and I am really starting to feel like OEM (Nvidia dell and many others) are really making lots of moves that are completely pushing enthusiast out of the notebook space with is both sad and frustrating.

 

Hmm, that's Alienware blocking it then. Well that is interesting.

 

Literally, biting the hand that feeds them. Let's just make sure what they draw back is a bloody stump. Putting up with it will only make matters worse. That's why end users "accepting" BGA simply because that is what they are being offered is tantamount to being a traitor in my opinion. If new machines don't sell because Intel served up a platter of filth, they will change. Same goes for NVIDIA and their bovine manure drivers blocking overclocking.

 

I'd rather not download a vBIOS, but how do I upload a vBIOS?

 

Try dumping it using GPU-Z

 

Tried that before asking or even replying to Cloudfire. GPU-Z froze and crashed. And then, I got a BSOD.
Ask someone else. I'm not risking it, sorry.

 

Well, did u do this in Optimus mode? I guess there is no way to use dedicated GPU only like in older Alienwares?

 

@Game7a1 - With Maxwell you must temporarily disable the GPU in Device Manager before flashing or dumping the vBIOS to avoid issues with crashing. The NVIDIA driver cannot be active or it will block the operation. That is probably what made your system act goofy. If your system is running in UEFI mode, GPU-Z will not dump it and neither will NVFLASH. There is no risk in dumping the vBIOS. All NVFLASH or GPU-Z would be doing is reading information and saving it to a file.

@TomJGX - unfortunately, none of the new Alienware systems can have Optimus disabled. In fact, I am not even sure they are using NVIDIA Optimus. They may be using a Windows-based flavor of hybrid graphics.

 

Wow uefi is horrible. I wish I could go back to 2011 and enjoy the m18x again.

 

I have Legacy mode on (have to enable it in order to boot into Win7), but on both OSes, the dump wouldn't work.
I'm going to guess that even having legacy mode on isn't considered BIOS and not UEFI?
I don't know if someone on here has an i7 13 with Windows 7 Pro from the get go as opposed to Win8.1 (if that would make a difference).

 

@Zero989 - UEFI itself is not horrible, but in practice it often is because has potential to be used in evil ways. It has potential to be awesome when it doesn't get in the way or be abused. The beauty of Legacy mode is it limits the amount of control the OEM or ODM can have.

@Game7a1 - OK, that's good. No reason to downgrade to Windows 8.1 unless you just prefer the newer OS. Doing so won't help anything. You would still have to temporarily disable the NVIDIA GPU in Device Manager with a Maxwell GPU even using Legacy mode. The NVIDIA driver cannot be active. Right-click disable, dump or flash, right-click enable then reboot and everything will be normal.

 

Is it normal for it to have to not respond? Because that's what I keep getting.

 

If the GPU is enabled in Device Manager it will stop responding and never recover until it crashes.

If you temporarily disable the GPU in Windows Device Manager, it may momentarily stop responding, but will then (when it has finished reading) prompt you for a file name and location where you want to save the ROM file. If that still does not work, then Alienware may have implemented something with the newer systems that blocks reading or flashing. In any case, attempting to dump the firmware to a file cannot cause any damage because nothing is being written to the hardware.

 

On my 5th, 6th (I lost count) try. Already have gotten 3 BSODs (0x0124).
And nvflash is using up 50% of my CPU. Fun.
EDIT: Ended on the same BSOD. I don't think getting the vBIOS info is possible. I did try running nvflash by itself at one point, but it either crashed or gave my laptop a BSOD.

 

This is exactly what happens to me when I try to dump my vBIOS.. I have to terminate the nvflash program to stop this.. I don't get BSOD's though..

 

0x124 BSOD means the CPU voltage is too low. That's what is causing the BSOD, not the flash operation itself. The CPU voltage settings needs to be increased. It is surfacing as a problem because the flash operation is taxing the CPU a bit and the instability shows up. If you ran something like wPrime you would likely get the same BSOD.

 

Try mnvflash from techinferno (same tool as nvflash but it works in windows (cmd). It seem to work better with Maxwell (960M)
http://forum.techinferno.com/genera...-series-overclocking-versions.html#post116825

Use the dump function to extract the vbios
mnvflash --list
mnvflash --save whatyouwanttocallthevbios.rom
exit

 

Yeah, it's not allowing me to do that.

 

Allowing? What do you mean?
Did you run cmd as administrator? disabled 960M in device manager before running mnvflash?