List everyone M17x-R2 ETA

Nice same EDD as me only i ordered mine a month ago...

Gl my man hope it comes fast

 

Haven't got my kit yet. Hopefully today or tomorrow (called yesterday afternoon).

 

5 weeks and two days after my order and I'm finally looking at a nice big black carton here at last!.. Congrats to all who've managed to get theirs and best wishes to those still maniacally refreshing the Order Status page.

Thanks for keeping me sane, it was good to know I wasn't on my own.

 

Well, I powered it up and installed Command and Conquer 3 Tiberium Wars Kane Edition.....got the flickers. I can only play the game on one ATI card. It plays well, but I want to have all out war going on in game without slowdown. lol.

I tried the A02 update under my Service Tag and it did not do anything. I also downloaded the 10.3 beta drivers and tried again. Still flickering in game. In fact it crashes the laptop and I have to reboot.

 

I thought the new BIOS fixed the flickering issues?

Some say it has and other say it hasn't. Makes me believe there are other issues with the R2 that haven't been fixed yet

 

I think the only true solution is a higher Watt power supply.

I wish they would admit how much power the system is drawing with a fully overclocked 920xm, 4870's in crossfirex, 1333mhz, and two 7200rpm hard drives.

I bet its at least so close to 240w that its causing these instabilities.

they need to recall the powersupply's and replace everyone's with a 300w supply. Problem solved.

Or, if the 5870 uses less watts (but is still more powerful) replace everyone's graphics cards.

 

This picture turned out really crappy, and then the camera's battery died, but I thought I'd share it until the battery charges.

http://imgur.com/kZEPr.jpg

strange thing is, my touch panel and alienware name are orange, but they came out red. Sony fail.

 

So it seems I will have to report this to Dell support and see what they do about the flickering issue? I dunno

 

Yeah, it did not fix the issue for me. Unless there's a different A02 bios update I should get.

 

Looks orange to me.

 

The strange part is that you have an i7-720 which consumes considerably less power than the 920.

Yet you still have issues.

As far as the PS goes, laptop bricks usually can provide more power than the rating.

I'd say the Dell 240W brick can reliably provide 280W.

 

I think it could just be the game. My new system has been running everything perfectly and so does my old one. So that's 2/2. Some people have had defective video cards shipped with their systems though. If we meet up I'll let you test out my R2, it's a beauty.

 

You probably have a bad gpu

 

So that confirms it. I will call Dell and do whatever troubleshooting steps they need, then have them ship me the part if needed. I can install it myself.

 

When you say it flickers, do you mean the screen is stable for a few seconds and then the entire picture moves vertically? If that's the case, you have a defective GPU. People are confusing bad GPU symptoms with bios flickering which was an entirely different scenario (and fixed with bios A02). True flickering looks like this:

<param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/mPzUSROu5WE&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/mPzUSROu5WE&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width='480' height="385"></embed></object>


A bad GPU on the other hand looks like this:

<param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/vVvCtnNpGhE&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/vVvCtnNpGhE&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width='640' height="385"></embed></object>

 

why should they give out free 300w PSU's for OC'd systems? Thats like me buying a desktop with a 550 W PC and complaining that it can't handle my EE chips and dual 5970's. Dell is only required to offer what will make the PC function...

 

Thx Joker. Well I watched both vids and I am getting more of the bad GPU effects.

In Command and Conquer 3 Tiberium Wars Kane Edition, I am getting a green backround instead of black, a flickering/moving of the screen, and also (interestingly enough) a slow response as though the game is too much for the two GPUS. The mouse moves really slowly at the main menu which isn't right.

I am definitely thinking it's a bad GPU, but I don't know how Dell will be able to tell if it's one or the other.

Also, I downloaded/ran the Furmark MultiGPU test and the same effect occurs. It's so bad I can't even tell what graphic Furmark is trying to put up on the screen.

I will be spending a lot of time with Dell on thurs night or friday (since I have friday off from work).

I knew this was a great forum. Thx again Joker, u are awesome.

 

Call Dell and they will just send two cards and a cable to swap.

I doubt they will troubleshoot each one.

 

It's a shame that your first experience with the M17x had to be this. Hopefully Dell will ship you out both cards + the cable via next day shipping. Good luck.

 

Yeah, def going to ask for next day shipping.....next morning shipping if they have it. Most likely I will call Thursday night to go through the process.

Otherwise, the RTS plays pretty suprisingly well for just one GPU.

 

Dell always sends warranty parts NBD.

 

Yeah, it's my first every Alienware computer....we will see how it goes with Dell support. Really looking forward to enjoying the dual gpus in game.

 

Took some more pictures to share:

http://imgur.com/OwKmP.jpg
http://imgur.com/jS6wm.jpg
http://imgur.com/USbu3.jpg
http://imgur.com/d5I9o.jpg
http://imgur.com/QZdPh.jpg
http://imgur.com/Zb7Ve.jpg
http://imgur.com/MFJTQ.jpg
http://imgur.com/LdsGY.jpg
http://imgur.com/58nDQ.jpg

the last one was supposed to do the screen justice, but it didn't. You really have to see the RGB LED in person.

 

Does the ATI 4870 support DX11?

 

no but the 5870 does

 

it's a matter of changing the white balance on your cam

Nice pix, congrats!

 

Well the status says "Shipped" no info for tracking but it looks like Im' getting it a day early (3/31) we'll see though.

 

Matt

When did you order?

 

I ordered 3/4/10

My new EDD is 3/31/10 (original was 4/1/10) since I wnet with the free standard shipping.

 

So 3 weeks from order date it shipped.

About right although it could have been worse.

 

Got mine in last night! (I didn't get any sleep last night!). Awesome looking machine! Wow the colors really do jump on the LED.

How do I know if my computer is utilizing both GPU's as I am seeing that there are a few issues with connections, driver/BIOS issues, and defective GPU's in past posts?

 

Congrats!!! Hope you enjoy!

 

On the phone with Dell now. Finding out that maybe Command and Conquer 3 Tiberium Wars Kane Edition is not Crossfire Compatible, however the Furmark test I ran proves there is an issue with Crossfire mode. Waiting for the tech to "research" something now.

 

Mine is still 4/21/10 and in pre-production. No movement there. Hopefully it'll be built and shipped soon.

 

STILL on the phone with Dell. Reseated the "exposed" crossfire cable. Still having problems. I am on hold again. lol. I will stop posting this here. Sorry Mods.

 

Well according to Fed Ex, my EDD is Saturday which works nicely as it shipped today.

 

Go in to the Catalyst Control Center, go in to Advanced Mode, then under Options enable the tray icon.

Then right click the tray icon and under your first adapter, under Crossfire Settings, tick the box for display the Crossfire icon where applicable or something like that.

Then launch a game you know is Crossfire enabled and if everything is working you'll see an ATI logo in the top right.

Then go turn it off again.

 

Got my R2 today... all I can say is O...M...F....G

 

R2 Arrival confirmed. The screen just made my regular monitor obsolete. I can't even look at it anymore...

Everything as expected thusfar.

Very happy.

 

Mine is still in pre-production too............

 

When did you order? I was in pre-production only for a few minutes or so, if payment clears it should go straight into production.

 

Dell told me that the video card is on back order.....

 

If dell doesn't have the parts in stock it will usually stay in pre-production or work in progress

 

Really? I just ordered yesterday and I'm in production.

 

Dell probably pairs gpu's so even though crossfire is in stock, a single gpu might not be.

 

But mine is crossfire too..

 

Oh lol I misread your sig. Dell is just strange with these things. I remember when I was waiting for mine people kept saying that the rgb and memory was out of stock and others said the gpu was out of stock. I think these are just excuses they give out when they don't have an answer.

I bought a sxps 16 that actually had parts that were back ordered and that stayed in work in progress until the parts arrived.

 

Totally agree!!

 

Well mfractal I got $75 dollors off due to miss print on the website. But what Need to warn people the Raid 1 is not 7200 rpm also. But when I build my nephew desktop. I will check frys for SSD drives.

 

Hey! So, at leat you got this