Dell XPS M1730 Owner's Lounge, *Part 3*

Sound crackling/popping on the M1730 is a long-standing hardware problem and there is no simple "cure" for it. The problem is with the hardware, not the driver.

If you do some searching, you'll find that some people can get around it with tweaks like disabling the onboard wireless, but most people just have to live with it. In my case I could never find a way to fix it, despite reinstalling different OSes and trying every driver revision you can possibly think of.

To answer your question, these are the only drivers you should install from Dell's support site, as Sigmatel/IDT doesn't put out their own public drivers. Use the Vista x64 ones.

 

If I remember correctly, I don't get much crackling out of my M1730. I remember reading a while back that disabling the LED illumination all over the notebook helps that issue. When you're doing the LightFX in time with the music, that will start the crackling pretty badly. As has been explained, this is a hardware issue and there have been no driver releases that explicitly fix this problem. It sucks, but there's nothing that can be done about it, doubly so now that the M1730 is out of production.

Actually, I've been using my M1730 mostly for music, too. Especially after I was messing around on my ThinkPad T400 and found out that it will in fact run Crysis on a mix of medium/low settings. I feel bad that the Beast has been relegated to the corner as a media player, but I still break it out for the heavier apps.

 

I never had the sound problem again when i disabled the leds on my speakers and de-installed the light FX thing

NB: The light stuff is pretty geeky anyway , but for all you boys and girls i will make a page with all the drivers, since every body asks for it

 

I don't have that much of a crackling problem with sound. Then again, I use external sound card. Anyways, here are all the latest drivers for the beast for Win 7 x64.

 

AAA man, i just spend half a day to make a page with the drivers.

Anyway here is a webpage with all Windows 7 32 & 64 bit drivers for the M1730 + instructions and tips

http://www.psilo.be

dont tell me it looks ugly, i just did this for all the people that are having difficulties and I dont have the time to make it look fancy (maybe in the future)

 

What tweaking are U thinking about? I have 20-30 fps on medium (textures max), 1920x1200, when sth explodes etc. - much less. I'm thinking about upgrade my T9300 to X9000 (+oc) but changing it for only one application is little too expensive.

 

Great page. Looks don't matter as much as long as content is good

 

Great Job!
Thank you

 

cool ! thanx a lot
one suggestion. put the driver version behind the downloads and maybe the date. this would help to compare. perfekt anyway

 

Kade Storm, I think graphically Bad Company 2 beats Killzone 2, definitely the PC version at least. That sound of the Bad Company series destroys all other games, the sound effects are just plain amazing.

Actually sound effects use lots of CPU in the Bad Company 2 Demo. So set the sound to earphones and it should free up CPU cycles, unless you are on an X9000 CPU of course, then set it to wartapes and enjoy

I am testing different SLI profiles for the beta of Bad Company 2, I´ll post here soon again with results.

 

I agree with you 100%, Mr. Magnus.

 

Has anyone else noticed "banding" in color gradients? I noticed them the day i turned on my xps but I shrugged them off as something with the software i was running. After an OS install and many games and video having the same problem its really starting to annoy me. I have 2 9800gt running in sli.

Heres a a wikipedia article that might clarify
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colour_banding

They only appear in backgrounds, such as the skybox in games, and videos, where they become really obnoxious.

Is this common or do i need to contact dell about this?

 

You shouldn't be able to notice that with your human eyes. Either the colors aren't set to 32bit in the control panel or you have a bad display (not the display cards)
make sure you check that colour depth is set to 32 bit though before calling Dell

 

I recorded a video of how Bad Company 2 Beta ran on my XPS M1730 at 1920x1200 DX9, mostly medium settings except Shadows set to High and Terrain set to High. I can´t see any huge difference between medium and high settings, I heard that the high settings weren´t unlocked or something, not sure.

Anyway it runs pretty good as can be seen and this is the multiplayer too and recorded before the last update which yielded even better performance

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1DVYoDjNtk

 

Called dell today about the color banding and high idle temps...spent an hour being annoyed with stupid solutions like "clean your start up tasks". Long story short nothing was accomplished and I was told to call nvidia... Apparently they don't believe me that I'm experiencing these issues.

Anyone have any tips on how I can explain this to their technicians when I can't exactly pull up a videogame and show them?

 

Tell them to replace your video cards.

 

Be more firm, assertive, but don't be rude or you won't accomplish anything, and don't let them toy with you (like clean up startup tasks etc). They never had me do anything when I had issues, thats because I prepare my talks with tech support, so I have an answer to anything they might say to me. Besides they shouldn't push you to contact nvidia, you didn't buy an nvidia laptop, you bought a dell, it is THEIR problem!

 

Hey Magnus,

Which graphics card driver are you using these days? I've pre-ordered my copy of BC2 on Steam and am desperately trying to update everything on my XPS M1730 before it's out next week! (Also have Windows 7 on the way, but not sure if it's worth installing yet...)

Any tips for profile settings would also be eternally appreciated!

 

Yes it is ! especially if you run vista now
+ you can easily grab all the drivers now on my site (see sig)

 

Actually, yes. He can see them. As can I.
The LG screen is one of the finest of screens one can get blessed with, but not everyone will agree to that.
One notable "flaw" is that there is indeed colour banding, because the colours "pop" out so vividly on the LG panel. So perhaps a little too much.
This is also evident as it will actually pop out artifacts during video playback way more then on traditional LCD panels.
Secretguy01 will need to have his panel replaced if he wants to get rid of his issue.
Personally, I learned to live with it since the incredible contrast and colour totally make up for it.

 

Diskeeper? Really?
I would seriously suggest users to go for PerfectDisk myself.

 

sirkumi I am using Tweakforce 180.84 driver for both Vista 64 and Win XP PRO SP3.

 

oh really? I also have an LG screen, but i took it out of my M1710 and put it in the M1730 replacement i got for it , because the samsung screen that came with the M1730 was EXTREMELY horrible, anywayz, i dont see any banding on my screen

Been using it for 5 years now and i really love it, from the looks of the perfectdisk webpage its kinda similar (idle cpu defrag, defrag based on usage,etc..) Diskeeper also has a special setting for SSD drives, dunno if perfectdisk has it. Anyway looks like a good alternative to diskeeper

 

Okay, I've got the LG LCD.

Now in the M17x forum, everyone's busting their eyes over how 'vivid' and 'vibrant' the colours look in the new RGB LED screesn for the R2. When they compare these to the R1 M17x, they often refer to the older screen as bland and 'washed out'.

Right now, comparing my M1730 screen to the M17x, I can confidentally say the M1730 screen looks richer than that of the M17x. No complaint or favouring here. I am just stating. Why? Because quite a few M1730 users disliked he 'oversaturated' colouring of the LG screens as opposed to the more domesticated look of the Samsung LCD.

So question: Now that it's the 'cool thing' to have rich vibrant colours because people are hyped up about RGB LED, can we start boasting about the M1730's so-called 'crapier' LG LCD?

 

I can't wait for my m17x coming tomorrow, yes with the CCFL dual Lamp, I have RGB LED on my dell precision m6400, its great gama wise, and color wise, and great to watch hd movies, etc... but the problem is that it has to be set correctly, looks great for games, but at many times rgb led is very over saturated and doesn't have great contrast levels, even not that bright enough, i am also just sick of ccfl but hey 2 lamps are better than one, kade storm aren't you getting a m17x replacement? The m17x rgb led screen is the same one as my precision.

 

So, my m1730 mobo died out of warranty... Yay me :/

How much would you guys think it'd cost to get fixed?

Or am I better off scrapping it for parts?

 

don't have dell fix it, find one on ebay

 

RES5 DX10 Av=60.5fps (195.62)500/799/1250 @3.2ghz High vsyncOff MotionBlurOff frameRateunlocked 1920x1200 AA2x

RES5 DX10Av=68.8fps (195.62)656/1004/1640 @3.2ghz High vsyncOff MotionBlurOff frameRateunlocked 1920x1200 AA2x

set jobthread=2 & SLI=ON
whats the go with AREA4 fps! not good, tested with SLI=OFF & SLI=ON an no difference? (can i blame VISTA64 ).
Tried 185.81 and av score is about 45FPS but get higher fps score in area4 than with 195.62... wth

im going to take her apart soon an apply some Noctuna NT-H1 pro-grade thermal paste, not happy with core 1 high random temp spikes

kade had this one side by side to a Qosmio X300(ddr3) with single 9800mgtx a while back. we tested with crysis warhead and xps ruled in quality of screen, the qosmio has like a dull greyish tinge through
whole screen (we tried lots of settings in NCP to fix but greyish tinge still
there)

 

Any one else getting BSOD with VLC in W7 (ulti) x64? Or heard of it?

 

Used VLC to see T4 (family wanted to, not me) and later i saw Star Trek on my 1730 on W7 Ulti, no probs as of yet experienced.

 

Yea its weird. I'm getting a reproducible hard crash (screen complete freeze, ctrl alt del doesn't work) each time I open a file with VLC, I think it might be Comodo stepping in a little quick to block...

 

hmm.....never used comodo so don't know, Kaspersky on my end...Lemme see if i can DL a trial of comodo and see if it's that. Gonna be a while tho be4 i get back (@ work).

 

Ah don't worry about it... a newer release of vlc might fix it and they're fairly quick about version releases.

 

A few points:

- No I am not receiving an M17x as an exchance. I already have one, as well as a fully funcitonal M1730. If either of them dies out, we know what I'll be aiming at for a replacement.

- Yes, the CCFL screen. I don't get the contraption. I understand that it is about dual lamps and what not else, but I don't see the difference between this screen and that of my M1730, side-by-side. Same brightness, same refresh rate. M1730's LG screen has richer colours, which people didn't like. Now that RGB LED is the hot-stuff, which has everyone downplaying the M17x R1 screen for looking too dull and bland. I find this ironic from a retrospective point of view, since the M1730 LG LCD was 'uncool' for being. . . rich and saturated. The whole drama is very hilarious.

And he's back!

Welcome back, mate.

Listen, your performance is fine for RE5. Very good, in fact, with the exception of area 4. Try a run with motionblur active.

Turning SLI on and off in the configuration file does nothing for you because your driver is already forcing the system to run in SLi. On the newer drivers, SLi for RE5 doesn't run properly. The first two scenes are fine, but the 3rd area shows a massive drop in frame rates. This is why I recommend that you always keep 'SLI = ON' in the configuration, because it will impact performance in a good way during later points of the game. Area 3 and 4 ran like crap for me as well, but then I had to tweak the driver setup. I recommend using 186.82, and keeping SLI = ON in the configuration - all your areas will run great!

Anyway, nice results even with the low performance in area 4. My M1730 scored similar at stocks using the 9800m GTX SLi. My M17x--with everyting at stock--scored 70 average (Area 1 -73.5; Area 2 - 72.6; Area 3 - 65.0; Area 4 - 72.1).

Note: Resident Evil 5 doesn't benefit from overclocking the CPU core. However, it does benefit greatly from more cores altogether. BatBoy did his testing with his M17x and his average was 85 - all stock using a QX9300. Overclocking the CPU didn't make even a single FPS difference.

 

Kadestorm, i just got the m17x today, i find the colors to very very vibrant for a cffl, just wow, not that bright but oh well, what were the things with the audio stuttering, it doesn't seem to be that bad. So how much was your m17x? Did you buy it from someone on the site like i did? Yeah its sad how they are downplaying a really good ccfl, i don't know why they would want to make fun of the m1730's lg virbant colors, i thought this screen was going to be horrible but man its good, a nice LED would be great to have though.

 

What parts of my m1730 can I sell? Do I just sell them on ebay?

 

You can sell the gpu, the palm rest, lcd inventer, the lcd 1200p screen, logetich 315 lcd thing, keyboard, hard drives, the whole bloody thing, motherboard.

 

No, not the motherboard, his mobo is broken

 

It is bad enough to cause an interrupt in audio. More pronounced in W7 than Vista but still very much alive in both OS's. It happens when the GPUs downclock from 3DMax to default - so 3 actual steps each with an audio interrupt. You can observe this behavior by playing back an mp3 in WMP --->Now Playing Tab ---> Right click, Visualizations ---> Alchemy ---> Random and Maximize WMP. Revert to previous window size, right click and select No Visualizations and then listen for the downclocks. This happens with the NV GPUs.

Dell is all over it and working on a fix.

Sorry for the OT folks - didn't mean to make that so long but I wanted to answer the question. Please resume XPS M1730 discussion.

BTW, hello thread... I miss stopping by here.

------------------------------

@Psyloid: How's W7 working out for you on 'The Beast'?

 

Man, I am thinking more and more about getting an X9000. Anybody wanna sell one dirt cheap?
Thing is, I don`t mind the full fan noise, I have my speakers on all the time playing music, movies or some game, and the temps(although never over 80C for the GPU) are not to my liking.
This makes me miss my former Clevo M57RU sometimes

 

. . .I would consider selling you mine, which I got from NickBarbs. It's an excellent unit with a very good stable performance at 3.4 GHz. However, I have to consider my long-term situation with the M17x before I offer this CPU to someone else.

And yes, loud fans are always welcomed. (Ref. my signature.)

 

Haha, nice sig.

But incase non-M1730 think its loud - it certainly ain't! Only when >3.0Ghz with the x7900 or x9000.

 

@ batboy

W7 is running great on the M1730 (btw; currently installing L4D 2 )

 

Thanks Kade,
So ya have 9800mGTX's....wth..did i miss somthing

RES5=70.1fps (186.81)500/799/1250 @3.2ghz 1920x1200 High vsyncOff MotionBlurOff frameRateunlocked AA2x
hey....now the graph is more consistent
coudnt download 186.82. doesnt make sense why Nvidia removed (WHQL?) 186.82. did it have issues?
tried motionblur-ON, with 195.62 got lower scores

kade,have ya noticed(with ya eyes) any difference in "game play" with xps stock gpu's @ 3.2 or 3.4 compared to stock m17x ?
also be nice (if possible) have same gpu driver in both for a "Better" comparison.
BatBoys great score of 85 going to be mighty hard to beat, may just have to do so more tinkering

 

hey guys I'm at a dilema, I've been currently baking my 8800m GTX card like every other week as its dead and on it's last leg. And I'm at a loss as to what I should really do next. I'm tempted to take the M17x Alienware root, however if I'm going to spend over a grand here I'd like to hold off for DX 11 material, I find that going to a 9800m GTX or 9800m GT should be suffice for me. I'd go with another 8800 as long as I can be assured it won't break again. What are your suggestions thanks.. I don't find myself to be an Extreme Hardcore gamer but I use my computer all the time, and I suppose windows is killing the card as well even at 60 degrees.

Another option would be to downgrade to a 8700, but that's so sad.. I played like 30 seconds of Bad COmpany Beta, and the poooof Card Fizzled out... Call me Crazy but I really like my m1730, I like the LCD keyboard display and the overall looks of it and i know the insides and outs of it, and I find it to be a good machine, just the videocards are horrid....

 

^ I'd say go for it. While the fan noise definitely is bothersome if you're doing work in a more quiet area, if you're playing music or games on the external speakers you don't really notice it. Temps(especially at idle) are wonderful.

 

Do you have warranty?

 

No I don't have a warranty, I bought the notebook used, and I believe it came from Dell Outlet, however I can't be sure. It wasn't the sellers fault, it worked flawlessly for like 5 months then Bad Company just kills it, .

So you're saying go with a m17x and just sell my m1730 for parts? My other notebook is a m15x with a 260 and that does quite well so I'm able to balance what I do well, and I don't feel that it is currently really necessary for me to move a m17x quite yet. If.... the 5870 was on the m17x I'd be on that like white on rice, but I don't believe the video cards currently out are sufficient for me to currently jump in head first, quite yet.

 

Well Loki, I'll be honest. I had an m7130, and I have a 17x R1, and the cooling of the m1730 was crap compared to this. The 8800's WILL fail. There are a few exceptions in this thread, but the general trend seems to be that the chip used in those cards are susceptible to failure and/or the heat cycles just ruin them over time. There's a reason Dell was out of 8800 cards for four months [trying to replace failing 8800 cards not ironically].

As for what you should do from a fiscal standpoint, find a used 8800, and bake it. I baked my 8800's back to health 12 times before I ended up getting the whole system replaced with an m17x. After the first 5 or 6 bakings, the cards would not last more than a week without going dead/BSODing.

It's a poor position you're in. I'd be surprised if you get more than $500-$600 for the parts in your 1730.

 

I told you already. I've had a 9800m GTX for a few weeks, which is why I hounded you for the BIOS. I might get another pair in the near future. Hikkoo, can you run the test with motionblur active. BatBoy's run was with motionblur, which does cost him a few frame rates.

Anyway, beating 85 is a bit too much. You'd need quadcore. I didn't notice any visual difference going from 2.8 GHz to 3.4 GHz. So 3.2 GHz to 3.4GHz didn't do much either.

Also, Hankaaron, welcome back, dude.