I am an onwer of M11X now! Disable AlienFX?

It's a really admirable laptop computer. It has all the functions other laptops have yet it is totally differnet from the others. It has its own style. Other laptops having SU7300 and GMA 4500HDM are not uncommon and they are priced at around $650. I paid more than doubled of that price but I love it!!

Just now I am trying to use up the battery so that I can charge it to full capacity. Just a quick question, there must be a way for your to turn off the illuminated keyboard and other illuminated parts I suppose, howyou do that? Well during day time I really don't need to have that unless I switch off all the lights in the room at night time and play games. Try to save more battery energy by turning them off in day time.

 

the key fn+ the key that says alien fx (I have a m17x so I don't know if it's the same key, but it should say alien fx)

 

Look at the top keys ... Third from the right i believe.. I used this picture to reference it.
Should be able to do FN+that key to turn them off.


http://mygadgetnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/Alienware_M11X_2.png

 

At the M15x it's Fn + F11

 

Right! I"ve found it, it is under Prt Scrn on the same key.

Recharging it now, shall try it out when charging is completed, many thanks!!

 

To save battery.

 

The battery life is a concern. While I am typing this the machine is up for 1 and a half hours now. Only 71% of battery is left. I switched off Bluetooth, Wireless in BIOS and using only 1 USB stick for broadband wireless access...the 8 hours battery life as advertised on the official webpage is not correct...

 

Approximately 8 hours will be got when your screen brightness is down, your CPU is not overclocked, your 335M is not draining power and everything set to powersaver mode and Command center options on max battery settings. When you switch GPU's from 335M to integrated, you need to restart or put the laptop to sleep in order to completely shut off the 33gM GPU.

 

You Also need to quit the AlienFX aplication as this uses CPU power even while its doing nothing ~5%

Ive got near 8:30 out of mine before.

 

Day 1 has gone by. I have tried out the battery life, in my case it's only a little less than 6 hours, it doesn't reach 6 hours! I have turned Wireless off, AlienFX off, BlueTooth off, brightness to the minimum, only 1 USB stick for wireless broadband.

But my configuration is slightly different from the standard one, I've got Windows 7 Ultimate. Is that a problem? Is the ultimate version taking up more memory and CPU resources than the Home Premium? What services can be shutdown? I only use it for surfing net and MS Office 2003.

In fact I tried some old games and to my greatest amazement, these games don't need the machine to switch to the Geforce GT 335M chip! One of these games is a flight simulator known as Strike Fighter Project 1. I ran it raw on the GMA 4500HDM and still managed to get 19 ~ 21 FPS ! This little friend really impresses me!! I wouldn't worry to put The East India Company and Sim Societies on to it later after I have got an external DVD-ROM.

My priority now is to cut off as many services from Windows 7 Ultimate as possible, I would appreciate if you could provide me with your recommendations.

Also, may I ask how many of you have got the McAfee(R) Security Center(TM) 30-day trail OEM installed? I really do not need it, I suspect it takes up some of the CPU resources when it scans in the background! Also is the Alien facial recognition program a resource hog too? What is it for?

I see a lots of potential of this small build yet with great capabilities. Just want to use it to the fullest potential! Thanks in advance.

 

I heard from Dell's product promoter before I placed the order that there is a key that upon pressing, it will restore the factory installation from a hidden partition on the hard drive. Is it the F11 key? Anyone has tried it before and how long does it take?

 

1. you have to actually CLOSE the AlienFX tray program or it will use CPU cycles and therefore battery life

2. Mobile broadband sticks are actually ~very~ power hungry, you will never get max battery life with this running

3. The only service that will really effect battery life and indexing and super fetch as these both cause the HDD to run actively for longer

Check out the optimization thread it pretty much covers all the details of these

 

Agreed with Siris. Check out the optimization thread, at least the first few pages. You need to disable FASerivce as it is the alien sense and it will keep CPU usage higer then it needs to be sucking power. And yea, the broadband sticks do seem to use a lot of power.

 

Thanks folks, I listened toy your advices and it oes save some power. I have also disabled some services and also uninstalled McAfee. The hard drive sounds quieter. Maybe due to less processes after services shutdown, the CPU usage is lesser now. Yesterday I have had a little more than 6 hours operation which is better than the day before.