Did anyone pinpoint the reason as to the m15x lack of performance in Crysis?

yep

in the meantime (well, once I send it) I'll be back to the second machine on my list

 

Don't know if I said it before.. Hope everything works out for ya GRB
You're one of the customers they'd appreciate - Not phoning up and blasting them or smashing the laptop on the forums and stuff..

@ Lessaj and newfiejudd - Thanx for all the info about the video drivers and answers on the gpu downclocking issue.. Never knew so much about laptops before I came on this forum since I too haven't had a pc with the power to game for ages

 

Your very welcomed. These forums have been great over the last few years for expanding knowledge of curent hardware. It's a great place tolearn and share a passion we all have. HIGH PERFORMANCE gadgets. lol

 

I would like to add something to that effect - HIGH PERFORMANCE BLING BLING gadgets !!
Gosh I almost thought I wasn't gonna get on the forum today.. Pulled a calf muscle in football and was confined to bed at home.. Luckily mom went out & I hobbled over to my pc... Tadaa !! Lets talk AW

 

LOL. Nice Wraithers.

 

haha, we need more Alienware owners like you.

 

In my opinion we need more people blasting them up. There have been alot of issues with AlienFX lighting and keyboard problems. If people don't call up complaining or making a big deal out of it Alienware will not feel the need to look into such an issue.

 

Every company is the same. They won't know what your problems are until you tell them.

 

definitely... im sick of people going "ZOMGZORS WTFQJWO!@U%@#(*^@!!!! HAX!!!! TEY GAVE ME ZE LIGHTS IN DOO DOO BROWN I ASKED FOOOR PURPLE!#@!%#@%RU(*YEHG >.<"

If you want to complain do it in a reasonable manner.

 

I understand that as owners of 3/4k+ laptops we need to give feedback - but if we just call up the customer service and blast them, they'll surely be sore or lackadaisical in complying with you. Though that should not be the attitude they take - Everyone's human
Kinda like the story: A waiter takes time to get your food, you blast him and end up with a little special something added

IMO we need to sit them down, talk to them slowly and ensure we get as much info from them as they get from us ex. dates, timings, part numbers, serials etc. etc. We learn while they learn.
Oh and try to speak to the same person(s) each time.. Works for everything from ordering a pizza to queuing up your movie rentals.
Sorry if I seem to be rambling

 

there have been heaps of complaints about the m15x dellianware ..

*GFX card drivers (getting stuck on stealth mode)
*Back light and case lights leaking onto each other
*keyboard response time lower than normal (im sorry but like any thing less than 1ms lawl is bad its a keyboard!!)
*paintjob making the touch pad almost unusable with out putting a sticker on the top...
*back lit keyboard not light sensitive like macbookpro..
*battery life on binary FX only adding 40 or so more min.
*mouse pads being broken.
*no overclocking of extream CPU's.. (massive issue to normal tech fans but does not seem to be a big one to AW owners.. who don't know enough).
*touch buttons stop working under heat... inc power button

as soon as another laptop/self installed Optical bay battery comes out im going to have to cross the m15x off my list... the GFX card driver issues and the inability to over clock along with the power button not working under a hot case is just 2 big a issue and screams NO quality control.

 

Why don't you wait till the *in-the-works* firmware update comes out and see how that improves it the m15x problems, as well as let AW support work on the m15x problems instead of pressuring them to release the m17x (not that we have any effect )

Also the Vista SP1 will be out in a few weeks, which should also improve the usabilty of the laptop since that's the only OS currently available
Just a thought..

 

The OS so far for me as been fine. No crashes in Vista at all. My complaints are Driver related, or the lack there of. I am also very dissapointed in the NO OC'able of the CPU.

But mostly the drivers from AW have been the cause of at least 80-% of the issues. I have spoken to AW and all I get are maybe laters and empty promises.

The wecam is absolutly terrible on my system. Unusable.

 

You can't expect every computer to run perfectly without problems. That is unrealistic. Especially with the m15x which just being released. All the other notebooks out there with overclockable CPU's are 17". So heat isn't that much of an issue as with the m15x which is only 15.4".That is the reason why it is wise to wait until they work out all of the kinks. And maybe partly the reason why they don't want to release the basic config yet.


The last thing that Alienware wants is for a load of computers sent back to them because a light a doesn't work..etc.

And the reason why they don't allow overclocking is simply because they haven't tested it on their systems for stability yet. The extreme Penyrn has just been released only recently. But, you can expect it to be released as a BIOS update as soon as they pass all of their stability tests.
That is way better than trying to overclocking the CPU yourself, screwing up your $3k laptop, and on top of that voiding the warranty.

So, before you say that AW owners "don't know enough," make sure you understand truly why AW works like it does and back up your opinions with valid arguments.

 

Actually even with software this system in NOT OVERCLOCKABLE.

 

That's why you would need a bios update, newfiejudd.
It's the same thing for the Sager and the Dell XPS m1730, both 17". And another good reason that Alienware is cautious is because you are running an overclockable CPU in a 15.4" form factor.


Alienware is testing overclocking the CPU at the moment.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=219442&page=2

 

I would of course agree to let AW support do their job, but when they front their service with call centre drones, who simply do not seem to care. Even when selling you the machine to start with. It raises a lot of alarms.

I know people will tell me just go somewhere else, but AW have the monopoly on this machine.

I will see how mine performs if and when I get it, and I will pass judgement on their quality control , because any failures there amount to false advertising.
There are laws against that in the UK!

 

just throwing it in there:

I have a GTS 8800 640mb card for my desktop. I get around 30fps with all the settings set to high. I clicked on optimal setting, so the game itself set all the settings to high.

2gb ram
2.4 quad core.

 

Dang.. Lucky you Ricky
I wrote this nice long question asking you about your settings & then I saw the word "desktop". End of post.

 

I *EDIT* almost cancelled my order on my alienware m15x today. I ordered my notebook 2 weeks ago and it was still in phase 2. They had my order on hold for 2 weeks because they Didn't know how to apply a 5% student discount that should have been applied since day one. First they say the 5% student discount could not be applied. Then they said it could be applied and that it went through and I should see the 5% charge back in 24 hours on my order status page. I call back today because the order change still isn't on there and they say that the 5% discount can't be applied and my order will have to be on hold until monday to figure out why they can't apply the 5% discount. I told them "this should have been applied on day one... why would my order be on hold for almost 2 weeks now because of something that you guys clearly don't know how to do?" She said well why don't you wait until monday and see how it goes? I'm like - nah just cancel my order... this is ridiculous.

Edit: I cancelled my order and a supervisor contacted me shortly after. We got the whole thing sorted out (as far as I know) and everything seems to be on track. I am satisfied at this point, she said the order will be taken care of asap.

 

lol just reading that pissed me off.

 

Order an Alienware desktop if that would make you feel better.

 

That's Exactly What I Want To Do Dohang! A supervisor will be contacting me shortly. If he tells me what I want to hear I'll stick with my purchase. If the answer is... oh we'll just delay your order another 2 weeks trying to figure out how to apply a 5% F*ING discount... then i'll go somewhere else or save my money until another company starts putting 8800gtx's into 15 inch notebooks. I'm sure it wouldn't be much longer.

 

Rebmik, u might wanna re-consider. There is no notebook like this right now and maybe not in the near future. My suggestion is spend that 5% - its about $180 bucks and then get a basic config (dun upgrade your Rams, 7200rm HDD, extra smart bay). Once your m15x arrived use that upgrade and u will get your 5% back .

 

It made him sick because of what Alienware did, not because i cancelled the order. Secondly - it's not about 5% it's about my order being on hold for 3 weeks because they're too stupid to know HOW to run a 5% discount.

Also, I talked to an AW supervisor..... she said the 5% discount will be taken care of and my order will be back on track and WILL be here on the estimated ship date. She wanted me to call her back in 3 hours so i'll see what she has to say in 3.

Edit: I talked to the supervisor. She explained to me as to what happened with the other agent. I guess the other agent had NO clue what she was doing (why she was working there i have no clue), and now they're processing my order as fast as possible and giving me an additional 5% off. Really to me the 5% discount wasn't a big factor..... it's only $180 or something off the total price. The fact that I need the thing for school and that they had the order on hold for 3 weeks without sending me an e-mail or notification is what puts me over the edge. If the order was processed correctly it would have been here on march 7th from what the supervisor said. She then went on to say that it isn't likely that it would arrive on that date, but she will get it here by march 14th.

So - i guess if you want something done over @ AW - talk to a supervisor.

 

Good luck, Rebmik. Let us know how it goes.

 

Hope everything works out for ya Rebmik.
Keep pestering them support staff until you get your response !!

 

I edited my post shamneo, I was a bit angry when I posted it lol.. since I had just gotten off with AW. Anyways.... good luck to all of us! I really hope all the kinks are worked out before we get ours :O

And thanks for the support guys.... I hope everything works out for all of you as well. I guess this is a lesson learned though.... if you need something done go through the supervisors! She was actually very nice and pleasent about the whole thing. I mean - it's not like I called up blasting them.. I just calmly inquired about my order and she told me that it was the original agents fault and yada yada yada.

Anyways... How do you guys think the lappy will run Warhammer online when it comes out ? Anyone in beta?

 

no worries dude.. i'll edit my post too.. never played warhammer before.. hmmm.. i'll look it up. luck is really what we need now.. a lot of screw ups with the silver m15x..

again, sorry for the comment. stay strong! ur m15x is almost there!

 

LoL, it's all good. Warhammer online: Age of Reckoning. It looks very good if you are into MMOs. It looks like it has pretty damn good graphics. I'll most likely be picking it up when it releases in june.

It would be awesome if someone who had an m15x was in the beta.. but that would probably be hard to find.

 

wow. can someone summarize the findings of this thread please. I'm having trouble following it.

 

reb, I had a similar problem when I originally purchased. I talked to a supervisor and I had my order within 2 weeks of my reorder. It was great.

 

yea supervisors really get things taken care of from what a few people have told me

 

Basicaly this thread says..

m15x is stuck with a old GFX Driver(all others do not work)
m15x 8800m GTX can not overclock?... not sure about this one
m15x CPU can not be overclocked even if its extream
m15x GPU may underclock its self by half auto if it reaches a set temp..


all in all i think its sager for me.... at the end of the day the m15x is about the same size as a dell 17inch

 

.....................

 

Mainly I think the issue at hand here is that Alienware seems to suck when it comes to providing up-to-date drivers for their software. If you try using any newer drivers from any other source, you'll be stuck on Stealth Mode.

 

the 8800m GTX can be over clocked in the sager's... and so can the same cpus...

the fact is if alien ware are selling Xtream cpus on a mobo that can not make use of the unlocked cpu... then they are ripping u off big time.

 

agreed. I would have gone for the sager but I would like to have on-site service if anything were to go wrong. The hdmi port is also nice.

Edit: Also, it seems GRB is the only one having an issue with the video card. Daveh got a 10k on 3dmark06 with his m15x and his gpu temp doesn't go past 80 while playing Crysis; his gpu does not underclock.

The main problem I see people having isn't performance at this point, but the alienfx lights randomly turning off and not turning back on.

 

No, user hemlok did say that he also has the problem, but his is also being sent to AW for repairs. He got his in the first batch like me, so there may have been a fault in some of the first laptops.

 

nobody claimed that the extreme CPU can be overclocked on the m15 so I don't see it as a rip-off. I agree that it's an important disadvantage for some people, but that's it.

 

Yes but it never said it wouldn't be OC'able. They should have stated the fact that it wasn't OC'able as it is the only REASON for the Extreme stamp. UNLOCKED MULTIPLIERS..

I think this was very misleading by AW and they should be held accountable for that.

 

maybe a bios update will come out shortly ? ;o

 

Latest info I got from AW, this is not planed (overheating)

 

I won't believe it, until they officially announce that the X9000 will be unclockable.

Too much misinformation has been circulating lately. Same thing happened when the light pipe of the m15x wasn't activated on certain owners' notebooks. Then Alienware came out with an official patch to activate it.

 

I wrote them an email a few days ago, this is the answer I got:


Thank you for contacting Alienware.

While the Intel Core 2 Extreme X9000 processor is able to deal with overclocking the BIOS on the Area-51 m15x, it has this feature disabled. At this time, there are no plans on unlocking this feature.

As you mentioned, this has mostly to do with heating concerns due to the already (crammed) space inside today's mobile systems and the high power components they have inside. Not to mention that if overclocking is not done correctly this could cause stability issues or may cause damage to your system.

I must also mention that Alienware does not support overclocking and any damages caused by this practice are not covered by the warranty.

If you need further information, please do not hesitate to contact us.


Best regards,

Milton Sanchez
Electronic Support – Sales Department

 

this thread is so off topic ... and i wouldn't want to go through it to even find the answer to the original question being posed.

 

There you have it, the BIOS in the m15x does have the overclocking option. You just got to wait until Alienware gives the thumbs up and releases a BIOS update. Just because it isn't officially planned doesn't mean that there would be no plans at all.

Also this guy works in the sales department, so he would have no idea whether the techs are really working on the testing.

Alienware indeed doesn't support overclocking by users, but the m5750 was overclockable from 2.33 Ghz to 2.66 Ghz via through the BIOS.

Keep the hope alive guys

 

Hopefully you are right!

And now back to topic

 

What topic? It's a forum!