*OFFICIAL* "All Powerful" M17x-R2 Edition Owners Lounge!

Yes, had it show up in Mass Effect 2, WoW, and COD-MW2. It's not as drastic as some have mentioned but it does happen. I haven't tried disabling Turbo Mode yet, but I'll do that tonight and post my results.

 

Far too expensive to buy from Dell, and you can get better quality drives elsewhere. Also, this was just the Australian site, doesn't mean other countries have stopped offering them.

 

Have you played around with drivers at all? Because this would be a first for a 720, and now has me worried again Are all your game patches up-to-date?

 

Yeah, I'm in Australia. Lol.

Dont worry too much about it. Simply Turn off one card till the new BIOS are out.

 

Yeah, all games are up to date, I tried playing around with the drivers using the info on the forums and the Modded ATI 9.12 drivers but it totally tanked my FPS but stopped the flickering, so I'm not sure it was done properly on my end. I wound up reinstalling the DELL drivers which brought my FPS back up to where it should be but the flickering started again.

 

Well actually I'm only getting the single 4870, my SLI has hardly been used, so I'm saving $1000 on what I spent for my M1730.

What difference do you get with xfire on or off?

 

On the 820 that I just returned I was able to play ME2, fallout 3 and mw2 pretty much all maxed out without any flickering. I'm pretty sure this bios that every one keeps talking about will solve the flickering issues and any power supply related problems.

 

In a nutshell, what are all these problems that ive been reading about. Im very close to purchasing an m17x r2, just trying to decide whether to wait for the 5870's or not. However im not interested in spilling 3k+ in a defective machine that I have to tinker with to make work. I simply dont have time(or the money) for that kind of PROBLEM. How serious are these problems ? is it something that should make me hold off for a fix ?

 

I guess that part is really up to you. The issue isn't serious enough to me to stop me from gaming, but for 3K I would have expected it not to happen at all. At least we know Dell is working on a BIOS release and that Joker got it early and posted that all seems to be well with it. I would anticipate a release soon to avoid any further unwanted press about the issues. You can't have the "Ultimate Gaming Laptop" if it has issues that have a high visibility.

Despite the issue I stand behind my decision to purchase this laptop, it's a beast.

 

thanks for the response, but i still dont quite understand the issue. Are they debilitating for the experience/gaming. This bios fix, is it something that will be part of a system update or is it something that a really tech savvy person has to set up. Im fine working with windows and can do more complicated settings if I have instructions(although i find that extremely unappealing for a purchase like this) I would be willing to do it if its a one time thing. When i see the word BIOS it indicates to me that someone who has alot of know how needs to be doing it.

 

A BIOS Update is a executable release by Dell which you can simply download and run. You do not have to be a 'tech savvy' person to run it.

BIOS updates are released periodically by all manufactures.

 

I see well thats good to know. Do you have any idea when a general fix will be available ?

 

BIOS updates are usually really easy, but it tends to scare some people away because it's not something they are used to having to do. Honestly with an update coming shortly I would just wait it out, once it releases it should be installed on any new M17X by default.

UPDATE: Disabling Turbo mode in BIOS has solved my flickering issues. Been playing for almost an hour with not one flicker. To me this does indicate an AC power ramp issue that the BIOS fix should resolve as indicated earlier. Also, disabling Turbo mode has had no visible effect on overall FPS either.

 

yea this seems like the wisest course of action. I was pondering waiting for the 5870's anyway. im really excited about this machine and want to get one just dont want to be disappointed with it. appreciate the input thanks.

 

Hi guys, been reading this post for ahwile while I decided to purchase a m17x-R2. One thing i was wondering, I dont to a LOT of PC gaming, and was wondering if the dual 4870's would be necessary for me, Im guessing a game has to be made to use 2 video cards, what are some of the popular games that i would NEED dual 4870's for, im thinking of getting into iRacing.com and i doubt the extra video horsepower would be needed to do it. what are the pro's and cons of 1 4870 vs dual 4870's. Thanks alot.

 

My guess would be that if you are not going to play graphic intensive games like Crysis, L4D2, Mass Effect, etc. then you will not need two graphics cards. Spend the money on other upgrades that would be useful to you like the i7, RGB LED, and an SSD drive.

Also, for those that wondered about the wi-fi options:

My Studio 17 laptop had the 1510 card in it and just about everynight I would get disconnected momentarily from my wireless network in my house a couple times each night. It was very annoying while playing WoW, so I ended up running an ethernet cable to my laptop across the floor.

Well, I got the 6300 in my R2 and I have to tell you...I love it! I've had it a week now and have not been disconnected from my wireless network once. It stays connected and I have never had to use the ethernet cable while playing. Makes my wife happy too since she doesn't have to worry about tripping over that cable.

 

If indeed your flickering is not game specific you would be the first one with a 720 and the issue, leading me to believe there might be something else to it in your machine.

I am part of the 720 owners without a single issue. Stressed the cards, played games, nothing.

Friendly advice: make sure it is the flickering everyone is talking about and not a faulty machine before the 21 days are up.

 

is this a common thing that happens to all? or is it just an isolated case.

 

Yeah i ran Furmark Multi GPU and Prime95 at the same time and have 0 flicker...

With the 920 in there though its a different story .. Flicker city...

 

seems the 920 is a god like cpu.

 

It sure is man... Night and day compared to the 720 when its not flickering that is ..... ...

 

What is the difference between the Alienware M17x and the M17x-R2 ?

Thanks

 

Too bad it's crazy expensive

 

Has anyone disassembled the R1 or R2? I wanted to see if I could take out the optical Drive and get my copy of crisis back. I still have yet to hear from the tech dispatch to come and replace the drive and wireless card

I am starting to get miffed again.

 

i'm happy that it's better then the qx9300 in terms of speed because looking at the clock speeds the qx9300 at first seems the way to go. but looking at the scores is a different story.

 

If you buy a QS version of the 920 it isn't "Crazy" but you just gotta pray you don't get a dodgey one.

 

Hey War who is this directed too? I just today started having issues with some white lines flickering across my screen while playing a game. Also have been seeing a huge jump in my fps in game. Now I know for a fact WoW does not push these graphics cards very hard even if your playing on max settings and my fps has been jumping from btw 20-60. I also am having issues playing Borderlands.

 

Hang on, so does this mean we now have 2 720 owners with flickering screens? Where are you guys both from? Wagglytree & m3pheston? We need to sort out of it is the ACTUAL flickering problem or just drive or game problems.

 

BIOS problem. Its getting fixed.

 

Yes I know that. But that was when the problem was only thought to affect 920's. What if this 720 problem is something different?

 

Im in Lubbock, Texas.

 

It was effecting the 920 and 820. So it possibly could effect the 720. If at all it isnt that then its probably a Driver related problem.

 

Is there a way to check if its driver related? I have updated all drivers with links posted by joker in original post.

 

its not driver related

 

Really? People said Modded drivers caused Flickering..

 

Hello 5150Joker. I have been reading these posts for some time. I have seen that you have received a fix for your machine and thats great news. Unfortunetly I have already shipped my M17X-R2 back to dell for a full refund since I had more problems than the flickering + I didn't want to depend on Dell whether they wanted to fix the issues or not.
The thing is , I am currently thinking of reordering the same machine I have ordered before but I really want my new one to arrive with the fix already installed. My question therefore is when would be a good time to make my new order so I can recieve it with no flickering issues. Also a lot of people are speculating about directX 11 video cards which an AMD rep told me that I should go for since I am willing to spend so much money ( because windows seven where made specifically to work with directx 11, thats what he told me anw). So are you suggesting that they would be available next month and therefore I can get them with the fix?
Appreciate all the help man and thanks for all your postings

 

Once an Official BIOSupdate is released the laptops built after that point will have them.

The 58xx series GPU with DX11 Support is a rumour at this point, nothing Official. But the rumours do seem to point to a March/April time frame

 

That would suck if Dell decided to change the motherboard slightly with, say, USB 3.0 and the BIOS won't flash on the current R2 motherboard preventing any R2 owners form upgrading to 5870's.

Just food for though

 

Highly doubt that would happen.

 

If 'they' did that i'd rage.

 

and if you guys keep having power issues....that change might be more evident than you think....more food for thought.

 

Right but why would he be having flickering with the 720? Like his machine is pulling more power then everyone else with a 720 or something? Just weird.

 

No More ATI Driver Modding From Next Month Onward.....

What's New: AMD's Catalyst 10.3

1. Catalyst Mobility – AMD will once again be releasing Catalyst drivers for most Mobility GPUs.
2. Eyefinity Bezel Correction – Eyefinity setups can finally be adjusted to compensate for the space occupied by monitor bezels.
3. Eyefinity Per Display Controls – Per display color correction, particularly useful for mismatched monitors.
4. Eyefinity Multiple Groups
5. Eyefinity Display Configuration Switching
6. 3D Stereo driver hooks – AMD is implementing some low-level hooks to help 3rd-party 3D displays work with Radeon cards.

Read More Here

 

I've been lurking on this forum for awhile now, and got a question about R2 I've not seen discussed yet. (I've read most of the 350+ pages)

How's the noise level?

I presume it's noisy when gaming, but how is it when using just a web browser or Visual Studio.
Difference in noise level between single a xfire configuration when idling/surfing?

I'll likely wait for 5870 (BC2 Directx11 anyone?), and the noise levels for a single vs xfire is more important than the performance gain.

 

ask quadzilla...he said it's like a mini spaceship taking off and crossing the planet........about 200 feet off the ground...lol

j/k quad!

 

amen...i really wish there were more CPU, storage, etc. benchmarks for programmers out there.

 

does anyone know if the lappy supports a single nvidia gpu at least?

 

I've found that with just regular use and browsing it is not bad at all and it won't matter if it's in crossfire or not. The only time it will get noisy is when you are playing something that tasks the GPUs. Obviously if you are in crossfire and both cards are being used then the noise level will go up. I play WoW and use a cooling pad. The cooling pad has been louder than the laptop, but then again WoW is more CPU intensive than it is GPU.

 

Agree with above replies, near silent while doing most stuff, but while gaming it does get loud, not a high pitch fan sound but rather the sound of air being rushed out of the back vents, don't bother me with internal speakers maxed...