M17x Refresh Discussion

Anyone notice in the Alienware UK site the 4870 CF option is actually CHEAPER than the GTX 280M SLi option? Matter of fact, it lists a single 4870 option as the same price as a single GTX 260M option (and yes, they specified that the 4870s are using GDDR5)...

lucky blokes...

 

I know. Oddly in europe rather than uk the sites say 4850 not 4870, but still specify GDDR5, which I reckon is likely a typo, with a desktop card there were no GDDR5 4850s, the GDDR5 and slightly higher clocks made them 4870s. l would doubt Dell would order higher clock speed cards for US/UK and not Europe, would also make stocking more confusing.
We will have to check clocks and ensure GDDR5 once they are out there.

Also it looks like at the moment the upgrade is about the conversion rate, however our base price and upgrades are much more expensive. Its the equivalent of about $1000 dollars here for 280SLI!

 

I'll be interested to see how alienware combats battery life with no igp and dual discrete cards.

 

there is still an IGP, you just have to shutdown to switch to it and have both sets of drivers installed I think. Should not be much different than the Area 51 m15x was with the Intel IGP and Nvidia Discrete GPU

 

Originally post in a wrong thread, oh well I'll try again...

"I think most of us agree that in the near future, probably before the end of the year, the M17x or the name will change to M17x2 or something will have the i7 CPU. I hope it will come with a Intel chipset rather than nVidia. Does anyone here know for sure yet? We have seen potential problems with the nVidia chipset."

 

it will absolutely be an Intel chipset

As has already been said, Nvidia does not have the rights from Intel to make ANY chipsets for ANY CPU using an integrated memory controller from Intel (this includes nehalem as well as the new atom processors)

 

Apparently I missed that. That being true I think Alienware/Dell is vigorously working on getting the Intel PM55 chipset into the m17x design, I bet BEFORE Christmas!

 

If they do you can kiss the IGP and battery life good bye

 

I think to keep the title "ALL POWERFUL" they will do what it takes. I for one keep plugged in most all the time anyway and I know many among us do the same.

 

but it is always nice to have the OPTION to have a battery life. One of the pros of the M17x vs the M15x afterall

 

Since it looks like Alienware/Dell want to use both nVidia and ATI cards it seems to me this is reason alone to go with the Intel PM55.

 

for PM55 to support SLI they will have to use an nforce 200 chip, which causes heat and higher cost

 

Alienware continued to sell the first generation m17x with a Santa Rosa CPU until June 2009 and just released a refreshed M15x (also an upgrade from Santa Rosa) that fell short of being "All Powerful" compared to other companies offerings.


Expecting a refresh on the M17x to i7 within 6 months of it's release so they can maintain some "All Powerful" sales pitch is not just optimistic it's bordering on naive.

 

Christmas...no way. Q1 still way too early IMO. Clevo based on rumors won't refresh its M980nu until Q2/Q3 and thus I'm assuming DELL would release a refresh to parrallel Clevo's refresh, VIA what happened with the M17x being released only a week or so before the M980nu. I mean if theres no pressure to squeeze out something MONTHS before your direct competition will and why not milk the money you'll get from stacks of old tech waiting to be sold. THat said theres always the xfactor of other companies like Asus or MSI releasing SLI i7 notebooks before both AW and Clevo and the angry consumer pitchfork mob might force something out sooner then we all expected

 

I would not worry about anyone else making SLI notebooks besides Clevo and whoever AW is working with (unless Asus gets bored again )

 

I figuring Dell will have an M17x refresh at least by 12 months after the first release of their model. By then, there should be enough tech improvements to justify it.

But....if not, then my M17x will still be good enough....

 

Would this really be a problem? The PM55 was made with SLI in mind all the way. I still think we will hear something concrete by Christmas!

"SLI and CrossFire Support: For those seeking the ultimate gaming experience, Core i7 laptops can support dual graphics chipsets using Nvidia's SLI or ATI's CrossFire technology at the processor die, something the previous generation of Intel mobile CPUs couldn't do."

http://technologyreviewed.info/2009/09/intel-mobile-core-i7s/

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2353188,00.asp

 

Man if they had an M17x with dual 4870's gddr5 + RGB LED + mobile i7 I would be all over that like white on rice.

 

What about the next gen mobile graphics? (fermi/cypress)

or are those MXM 3.0b as well? I don't think it's been stated yet..if they are, then definitely, upgradeable.

 

I'm hoping an Intel PM55 using a Lucid Hydra chip like the MSi Big Bang board. But that's just wishful thinking.

 

Has there been any talk about Hydra on a mobile system yet?

 

None that I have seen yet - and I been keeping my eyes open...

I would have to actually see the RGB LED screen before I can decided if there is such a radical improvement in visual quality....I mean, its not like my display sucks or anything....

 

That is a good point about pm55 and sli support, I completely forgot about that haha, hopefully it will support both SLI and CF natively! (that would make SO many more possibilities)

 

This certainly is the " dreamland" thread aint it....

 

In the desktop world all of the nehalem chipsets (x58 and P55) support both SLI and CF natively. So I would not call this dreaming at all

I think Intel realized they have to pay for SLI support in their chipsets since they would not let Nvidia make chipsets so that they do not lose a huge segment of gamers.

 

yeah, I don't see why that is such a fantasy. Sure, don't expect an nVidia chipset to support crossfire, but there's no reason a notebook with an Intel chipset should not support SLI and CF....

 

^^Well that makes sense I suppose.

 

Ya these nehalem cpus and chipsets are a dream come true for us gamers. True platform indepedence and choice for graphics now!

My x58 desktop has already been CF and then SLI (same motherboard!)

 

I can't believe no one else has suggested this. Say you're at the airport, on your laptop doing things, and you bought a meal. Why should you have to carry a drink and the laptop in two different hands? I would like to see a built in side cupholder, preferably on the right, that could hold a regular sized drink.

 

^^Isn't that was a side loaded cd-rom tray is for?

 

The PM55 already supports both SLI and CF.


Give me Hydra in a notebook when they develop a connection with enough bandwidth so that I can run my notebook's high end mobile GPU with an external desktop GPU in Crossfire.....I'll also take a desktop CPU in that notebook so that the setup doesn't bottleneck.

 

LOL I am too clumsy - I would spill drink on laptop hahaha

 

sadly i have abused my laptop so much that i come very close to that. When im carrying too much stuff around the house, i use my laptop as a tray. i just close the lid, put the can of soda, the mouse, my phone, and what ever am carrying on top and carry it.
i even, use the armrest area as a cup holder/coaster when using the laptop on a small table and there is no room.
i think i have to forget that when if i get a new alienware.

i dont think alienware will wait too long before releasing the new i7 m17x. they have already released the ATI4870. i think they want to get rid of the stock. they have done that before (M17). If they wait past this Christmas season that will be just stupid, i think they sell alot that time of year. dont they?
i really hope the new chipset is intel.. but i doubt i.
as for new features and card i dont think we will see anything diffrent.

 

...now that's extreme xD

Interesting concept though..being able to have the mobility of a laptop, with quite the amount of power, needless to say overkill for any normal user...where as when you're at your desk at home, you can connect your laptop to a device [similar dimensions as an external HDD would have] supporting several GPU/CPU options for the combined performance that gives overkill a new meaning.

 

Sounds like my old Dell Inspiron....that beastie has been through hell being owned by me, but surprisingly, though it is 8 years old and been through more abuse than a hen-pecked husband, it still runs well.

 

Similar ideas have been around for years; unfortunately its taken some time for it to be come a chance of reality, nowadays mobility I7 and the core 2 desktop line mean laptop CPU power is not that far behind desktop provision (excluding the likes of hexi-core/I7[overclocked to the 4Ghz region]) which deals with one of the surrogate issues of a laptop.
Actually, with a gaming laptop; this sort of provision would make perfect sense, if it came as part of the design and package...you get a moderate MXM card inside the laptop which powers you on the move; but you're also provided with an external chassis which is connected via custom addon connection, directly to the PCIE bus (rather than the limited expresscard connection); the external chassis has a 200-300W PSU of its own and a PCI-E 2.0 16x slot, with 2 PCIE power connectors. When you're at home you can connect the external card, to get desktop graphical power, with the improvements in power supply and noise afforded by a laptop over a desktop system, and the freedom to disconnect the external card/chassis when you're on the move, and fall back to the reasonable MXM mobile card.

Could be controlled in a similar way to the M17x' dual system, aka press a switch and the system will look for the external box, and disable the internal card if found on reset.

I dont know about you guys, but I'd be willing to pay a couple of hundred quid premium for that sort of thing, it'd suit my uses perfectly, especially with the option to replace the external card. It wouldnt hugely hurt the gaming laptop market either, as most of us want a current CPU/RAM as well as GPU and will still upgrade every couple of years to keep up, the external box would just allow us flexibility while we keep the machine.

There are already a few external boxes on the market; which usually connect via expresscard, but unfortunately thats a pretty slow connection, and limits most decent cards above a 4670/9800GT

 

And again....the chipset will 100% be an Intel chipset...Nvidia cannot make any chipsets for an Intel CPU that has an integrated memory controller

This is actually a good thing, expcept for the loss of integrated graphics. Since Intel chipsets tend to have better RAID and OC much better.

 

Agreed mate; I think an Intel board would be better all round. Intel boards also tends to be pretty rock solid (which is one of the reasons they used to be excessively expensive). I wonder if there is an IGP variant available to Intel laptop ODMs upcoming for the I7 processor (with something like the X4500 built in).

 

well first off, the x4500 HD is still a miserable IGP lol

But no, so far there is NOTHING (in the desktop or laptop world) that indicates an IGP for nehalem chipsets any time soon. I can tell you this though, if it ever happens it will be called G(M)55 lol

 

Hahaha. Yeah, I know its bloody miserable; still enough to run HD video/lower power consumption heavily though, its not like we need the IGP to be a good performer, its never going to be heavily utilised (even if a lucidlogix Hydra board is introduced), and quite frankly an IGP doesnt touch my 3d gaming.

I suppose it will depend on Intels perspective, I would imagine they will release an IGP chipset at some point, whether its til the lower end I5 (or even I2/3 which IIRC is pretty much C2D) etc are released is another thing.

Intel might not always tell us what they've got up to, but one thing I do respect about them is thier R&D and thier capabilities as a manufacturer are absolutely immense.

 

They are indeed a great company, there really is nothing I can fault them on business wise...they are already demoing 22 nm stuff lol - R&D=AWESOME

 

Exactly, hell there's talk of the future mobile I7s actually having an IGP incorporated once they're happy with Larrabee, so we shall see. Whether they have anything close enough for the first I7 refresh of the M17x is another thing.

Intel's marketing and some of the shady stuff they've got up to hasn't helped the market, not to mention netburst architecture being a complete nightmare and making it nowhere near the 10Ghz originally anticipated; but thier R&D efforts are pretty strong.

 

Ah, but when I select a high-end notebook, I am not concerned if it has integrated graphics, I look strictly for discrete GPU(s)....

 

so if (and when) i7 support comes to the m17x, do you guys believe that mobo will include usb 3.0 ports?

 

what happened to this thread?

 

Yeah I would certainly hope....and no clue what happened. It's kinda fun to speculate lol....

 

Larrabee is a GPGPU..which I know is the future of graphics processing..but Larrabee itself is supposed to be integrated, right? I was reading about it, and it has a projected TDP of over 300W..Which I assume would be fine for normal users, having a decent graphics solution included with the chipset...but it wouldn't be much use to gamers since our purpose of integrated cards are for less power, longer battery life, etc..

Are the next gen Nvidia/ATI also GPGPU? I didn't think they were..but I'm unsure

 

the main reason for the integrated is the longer battery life. the M17x beats the M15x in battery life due to the 9400m

 

Exactly, which is why i thought having a power hungry larrabee would not be ideal..at all, when we also have 2 discrete GPUs

 

Again, you guys have valid points, and it is good the designers thought about this. Still, for me, its a moot point. I bought this thing to take along with me, with the expectation of using it plugged in whereever I go (even Kuwait's airport has outlets - and free wifi).

For times I need a computer and I cannot plug in for extended periods, I got a netbook for that purpose, and according to nearly all professional and customer reviews, it gets damn good battery life - way above and beyond the longest the M17x can hope for under the very best power management options.

Different machines for different purposes, and a vigorous workout plan to keep me in top shape so I can carry all of them lol....