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

8800 series is extremely close to 9xxx for video, think rebadge. if price is a big deciding factor take that into account and don't pay more for a 9xxx cos they are so close you wont notice a difference. video is far more impt than cpu.

in terms of cpu t8xxx is pretty much the most power you need (assuming this is for gaming) so the cpu decision is no biggie.

 

It's not a hard job. Just take your time and plenty of space at the table. Take the phone from the hook and turn off the doorbell.

I use always a small paint-brush and use my vacuum-cleaner at a small distance for cleaning.

 

@72hundred

do a proper shut down before ifti pulls out battery then are ya going to press power button about 30 seconds(to ground system board)like in Ripfire's Disassembly Guide? lol ifti taking risk on carpet an also couldve pulled out hdrives to protect.
Have ya considered what if find dust on mobo, how to get it off(this is why may need to ground system board) maybe yours find clean, mine wasnt ,tried canned pressure gas on mobo didnt get all dust off , so used soft Anti-Static brush wiping very gently then used canned gas.
Hard using Canned Gas on mobo because got to keep Can still an upright otherwise moisture comes out of Can.

watch dont loose screws> bag em or put in seperate small containers marked were they go lol very easy to blow screws off into wilderness or worse suck em up into vac

make sure all wiring (under keyboard)flush in tracks, otherwise may get slight bump in keyboard after finish

Goodluck

 

thats some real proper english dude

 

Thanks Psyloid. lol dont know if can do again?

theres a easy way to pull out hdrives leaving both in hdrive caddy with sata cable connected to hdrives. simply lever up 90 degrees black long clip with finger nail very carefully(its hinged). heres with hdrive sata cable connected an black long clip finished position

heres with black long clip levered up(without hdrive sata cable)

 

Rep spread for that!

Many cheers guys, Ripfire's guide is very good.

Took me about an hour and found absolutely loads and loads dust between the fan and the heatsinks! It was incredible, it was matted like a rug! No wonder the temps were going up!!!

Many thanks for the info.

Here's a pic attached just to show how bad they were!







BTW temps can't get high now!! I've tried running Furmark and wPrime.exe and they're all very respectable (low 80's and mid 40's)


BTW Something very weird happened. After I reassembled, I booted up and all the fans didn't come on at ALL! They were all at 0 RPM. Ran Furmark and the temps rised very fast. But did a reboot and now running normal - thankfully.

 

WOOW! you collected more dust than mine, bag that dust an sell it on ebay , well done saved ya rig. strange about fans? 1hour hey.. maaan took me 7, did waste half hour looking for a gpu fan screw> canned gas fault(lol gpu screws were the only ones didnt bag)

 

Yea loads of screws to mess about with. If I do it next time I'm getting a magnetic headed screw driver.

A few hours later temps are way lower, 10C on the CPU and 20C on the GPU's. I guess it was needed a bit sooner. Might set a reminder in future to get a clean out ever 12 months or so! (with a screen capture of furmark as a reference of temps when its clean).



EDIT: I've heard too that canned air blown into the fan well works. TBH after disassembling today, I'm sure if I blew air in there it would have made things a lot worse. Personally I think people are better off taking the fan off and getting to the area between the heat sinks. That's where all the dust I found was.

 

Hi there,

I'm now looking at a M1730 with T8300 and 9800MGTX SLI and 1 year warranty for $1444. Is this price too much?


Thank you

 

better make that 2 months, or do like me, use canned air every 14 days, never get carpets like that, did the disassembly last month (after 12 months) to do the cooling paste mod, there was no dust at all inside

 

What are the other spec's?

Personally that strikes me as a high price for a M1730.

 

Wow I've never seen dust bunnies like yours. I clean my fans at a regular basis every 2 months. I have to, cause I've 2 cats who like the heat coming out of the fans.
I'm getting experienced this way. I almost can do this job with closed eyes.

 

Hi all .... just stumbled across this forum while looking for answers on the 8800m GTX problem and / or Nvidia driver issue .

Anyway here is my story ....
Got my new XPS M1730 in December 2008 and all was well for the first few months till the graphic issues started and the Nvidia driver stopped working and has recovered problem.
So three new cards and after a long battle they eventually agreed to swap me out with an Alieware M17X R2.

I have two questions ..... what happens if i still have the old XPS in a box upstairs waiting to be collected and they have not collected it after 3 months and will they even want it back now...they did say they wanted it back... but im not going to phone them and ask them to come get it ....and also what can i do to get the machine back to working properly ... ie how can i find out if it definitly is the graphic card and what are my options .... are the 9800 cards plauged with the same problems .
As for the Alienware im not convinced i like it as much as i did the XPS ... fan noise during gaming is almost embarrasing ...
Please be gentle with the noobie questions , i have flicked through the 200 plus pages of this thread but may have missed something .

Thanks

 

The other specs are nothing special

T8300
2GB DDR2
320GB 5400rpmw
9800MGTX SLI

On top of $1444, I will have to update the memory and put a 7200rpm drive as primary.

My other choice is a

T9300
2GB DDR2
320GB 7200rpm
8700M GTS
Blu-ray

For $1204 but this laptop has no wireless. I would need to get an external wireless adapter or buy an internal one and put it in.

I'm not getting the M1730 for gaming but rather as a nice laptop with a great screen and audio that still supports XP but the ability to game would be a very nice bonus. I thought $1200 for 8700M GTS was still high.


Thank you

 

what warranty are they offering? they are both expensive imo, are they new or refurb?

 

They are not new. They have around 1 year warranty left. Nothing special. These are the only ones with any sort of warranty I could find. There are cheaper ones out there but I thought it's better to get something with warranty.

Thank you

 

I really think they're over priced.

I'd say wait, don't buy now at those prices, and see what comes along in time.

 

hey all, just wanted to pass and say hello.
i have just bought a m1730 with a t9500 and 8700 SLI (i have a 8800m gtx lying around at home so i'll upgrade when it arrives) for 810$..
That's my second m1730, first one was sold and replaced for the laptop in my signature. This one is going to get a 8gb + ssd upgrade and is becoming my wife's main comp for photoshop and other graphical work.

 

agreed !!!
i'd pay max $1200 for the 9800gtx one, and $700 for the other one

 

I'd say $1100 is a more decent price for the 9800M GTX and maybe $1300 if it had the X9000 in it.
The T8300 is holding the 9800M GTX back.

 

You must love your wife really much to give her your superior notebook and buy yourself a M1730.
Welcome back to the club.

 

i love my wife more than anything but the m17x-r2 stays with me
the m1730 is going to her

 

Ahh, dat makes more sence...
I was afraid that Alienware thing made you lost your mind.

 

Have any other M1730 owners her gone through the Dell-hell that I'm experiencing with poor-quality LG panels that they're trying to foist off onto me? I'm hoping that someone who has gone through the same thing has found a way to get a non-LG panel out of Dell.

Thread here in case noone has seen it: http://forum.notebookreview.com/del...-m1730-lower-quality-defective-lcd-panel.html

 

Wow, those LG panels look lame. Hope the one I bought will come with a better one. What exactly is Dells position on this? They probably just say that they only have to match the 1920x1200 resolution, and there's not much you can do about it as f'ed up as it is..

 

Just wanted to give an update on my 8800M gtx problems;
Just to sumup, one of my gfx cards seemed to have died. Having tried all remedies listed on various sites on the web, I contacted Dell since the laptop seemed to be still under warranty. Important note: I had bought the laptop secondhand from ebay.

Dell support tells me that they cannot see me as "registered" owner and they are correct; when checking the laptop's warranty thru service tag, it did not occur to me -and it was not pointed out anywhere on the website- that i needed to register the laptop.

I contacted the previous owner for help but he said he had lost all the invoices.. making me conclude, that he also was not the original owner... and Dell's website requires the name of original owner for Ownership transfer..
Nevertheless, i tried to change the ownership thru filling in the online form twice (explaining in detail my situation and including the invoice details from paypal).... two weeks had passed. The other day, I receive an email from Dell late in the night confirming successful change of ownership (!!!!!)
Next morning I contact the Dell support; and the day after they replace my gfx card!!!!!

The only problem is when the technician came, the laptop started up properly!!!!!!!
He replaced the gfx cards anyway

 

Great stuff.

Nice to see Dell are doing their thing.

 

I'm in the same situation, great info. +1!!
Thanks

 

Mmmm .... no one can offer any advice

 

Well they seem to forget you m1730 to get back. I'm new with dell, but don't should they pick your m1730 on the Alienware delivery? For the 9800m the problem I see is its price. Three cards badworking are so many, could it be due an other derivated problem? Did you update the BIOS.

If I was you I'll keep that m1730 at least for three months more(if you are thinking to sell, instead keep it)

cheers!

 

Thanks for the reply .... i got my new Alienware in the begining of March 2010....they said they would arrange collection of the XPS in February but have never got back to me .... i didnt think i would get the new one before the other one went back ... the Xps was always updated with any updates on the Dell site ...IF they dont collect it soon i would like to try and get it working again but is it really the graphic card or could it be the motherboard and how do i find out ?? The bios was updated with the one on the Dell site ..A10 if i remember correctly .

Thanks

 

Hey man best of luck getting your problem sorted.

Just a small point, if you're looking for answers in a forum, make it easy for other people to read and break up each question into a paragraph each instead of "..." every so often. Its hard to read that way!

 

normally with a replacement they give you one month to transfer your files from the old machine to the new one, after that they come to pick it up.
If you fail to do so, they will put the new laptop on your dell account, now in your case it IS their fault, but if I was you, and you want to stay in good standing with Dell for support on your m17x and for future purchases I would contact them and remind them to do it. It might be that they never notice and you'd be home free, but it could also give you trouble....

the choise is yours, but honesty goes a long way, and they were fair enough to give you a great alienware machine, so... I'd do the right thing

 

Well, I need a little advice.

Circumstances are dropping hard on me and money's really tight. As a result, I'm thinking of selling the M1730 listed in my sig. Right now I'm using my Thinkpad almost exclusively, and most of the games(especially the older ones like Oblivion and Doom 3) I play run fine on it. I also now have all the current-gen consoles and just don't use the Beast anymore.

So, what should I put it up for, minus the hard drives, which I still need?

 

ahh man, what a timing, i was looking for a system like your and just picked one off ebay two days ago...

 

Aaah, nuts, haha. I forgot to mention in the post above that if I sold it the M1730 would come with a Zalman NC2000 cooler as well as the M1730 backpack carrying case.

I'm about 90% sold on selling it, but I'd need it gone within the next two months or so. What'd you pay for your new one, may I ask?

 

What program do ye guys use for temp monitoring.

I used to use Everest Ultimate but I uninstalled it today, I just don't trust its numbers and HWMonitor (free edition) seems to do everything I want, bar one thing.

Is it possible to port the data from HWMonitor to the logitech lcd. I know the Pro version does this but I don't want to have to pay for that.

 

I use two... HWMonitor so I could look at max temps and everything, and I also used Speedfan(to monitor temps ONLY; not using it for 'fan control') because there was a third-party app for the G15 that would read out your temps to the LCD. I'll break the beast out and take a look once I get home.

 

It wasn't new, it was slightly used (remains to be seen, i didn't get it yet) and i payed 810$ + 30$ shipping for it.
It was a T7700 + 8700SLI + 4GIGS + 9 months warranty.

HWiNFO32 is excellent, it has a windows gadget and it's free.
If you want to display temps on the LCD panel use Everest, it supports it.

 

For exact temperature monitoring I use HWMonitor. I trust this one the most.
With Everest I get a temp deviation of my GPU's. The 2nd core is about 10°C higher than the 1st one. While in HWMonitor there´s almost no difference. I just use Everest for indication of my temps on my LCD panel while gaming.

 

Yea I got that difference too. Weird reading. For ages I believed it, but in retrospect it couldn't have been accurate.

Yea, but Everest is highly inaccurate on temps.


EDIT: Had a look at that HWiNFO32. It reports the same temps as HWMonitor (plus extra temps for each card) but the reading it gives is higher that the HWMonitor for the CPU temps. I think I'm going to run a few benchmarks and check to see they both rise. After all that's all I'm after so that in game I can see if things are getting very hot or not.

 

Everest is pretty accurate if you ask me plus it puts the temps right at your LCD. There is a slight difference between the monitoring programs due to the way they poll the readings but we are talking 1-2 degrees max.

 

I'm afraid I disagree, with reference to the points that I and others alluded to earlier.

EDIT: And this interesting article seems to shed more light.

 

Hmm, ok, thanks for pointing that out. I guess it's m1730 specific as I haven't seen it with other dual gpu laptops. We could ask Martin, the author of HWiNFO32 to add G15 LCD support, he is very attentive and I am sure would be happy to help if it's not too much work. There is a official thread in my sig for that.

 

He's actually already put in that functionality.




I like that program and I think I'll use it in future. I just need to see if I can get it to start with out the splash screen (start minimised).

EDIT: Posted up to his thread looking for that extra functionality. Hopefully will come along shortly.

 

Nice, i can't see this on my AW since i don't have the LCD

 

Hi guys,
I've bought Dell XPS M1730 with 2x9800m GT but prior to buying had no idea about overheating issues. I bought it from ebay as a refurbished and now I'm worried it's going to die soon . Is it normal behaviour that temps go up to a certain temperature then the fan kicks in, cools it down a bit, stops and the process repeats.
I've tried most if not all programs to control the fan speed (my goal was to keep it on on low all the time). riva tuner, i8kfan, speedfan, nvidia system tools and nothing works. I can't get control the speed of the GPU fans. What do I do wrong? Is it impossible?? How do you guys handle this issue. I appreciate any help. thx
sad owner

 

It's completely normal and all M1730 behave like that. The only remedy is to overclock the CPU thus keeping the fans always on. Problem is - only the X9000 and X7900 (Not sure about the models) are overclockable. Which one do you have ?
BTW - this is arguably the main reason for the high failure rates of the video cards, those heat-cool cycles are not healthy.

Not going to find one, there are no programs that can control the fans.

 

Double post - ignore.

 

Indeed.

You could hear that I8kufan (or some name like that) that claims to control fans. BUT DO NOT USE THAT PROGRAM, it made years ago for old Dell laptops that only had one or two fans. If you run it on your laptop, it will TURN OFF the second GPU fan and fry your laptop!