*Official* NBR Desktop Overclocker's Lounge [laptop owners welcome, too]

I'm confused and I'm not trying to pick any sides here. Let's forget about Prema BIOS for a moment. You outed the Clevo's from the "major" OEM category in another thread post. Now you did it again in this thread post about mainstream gaming laptops. Yet the A51M is not a mainstream laptop at all. It may come from a well-known brand in Alienware but it has no direct competition in the "mainstream" gaming market. Its main competition are Clevo DTR's. Alienware's mainstream gaming laptops are the m15 and m17. You cannot choose its direct competitors because it [Alienware] lacks in the BIOS dept. It is a "socketed" machine in the same vein as the Clevo P870 series and thus they are its closest and direct competition.

 

You know what I wouldn't wanna be part of?

MSI's marketing department for their upcoming DTR...

 

You're heavily confused lol. What part of category and different classes don't you understand? I think that's your problem mate... You only read into what you want to see and ignore the rest.

And yes it is arrogance and ignorance on your part. What baffles me is that you're actually content sitting there padding yourself on the back for barely pulling ahead with a modded system. Wow ... if that's what takes for you to be happy then here's a pat for you...

You out of all people should know about there being different categories so to see that you fail to understand that does indeed make you ignorant to the fact.

Where the A51M wins is in the mainstream gaming laptop category, which you are not a part of. Why don't you grab an A51M and start benching? Then it'd be 1:1 ... until then if you keep thinking that the p870tm with Prema bios and A51M are 1:1 then I'm sorry but you're blind as a bat.

.

 

I'm referring to brands along with the reality that he keeps trying to compare them as 1:1 when they are not for obvious reasons. You can't discount the fact that the A51M has limitations and that the p870tm does not. A lot of people have a hard time understanding this.

 

@iunlock
I give up. You win. I wish i could complain about my computer that much, but I can't...

 

Another funny thought would be if HP pulls something out of nowhere lol... Imagine that.

 

This is the crap "musclebook" BS Intel is pushing, right? Where it wants to compete in the mainstream class because it gets slaughtered in the DTR class, so they wanted a different class because otherwise it just looks, well, yeah.

 

What you in short say... If one brand has more power crippling vs. the other then they aren’t in same categories (Apples vs. Apples). I talk about MSI, HP, AW, Asus, Razor, Gigabyte etc. Even they use same BGA hardware. This is pure BS!

 

All good bro. It's not a competition.. just a discussion. If it wasn't for the wonky-ness of the cpu on this A51M I wouldn't be so eager to explore it... I keep looking over at my desktop that is half disassembled (new cpu water block, tubing and reservoir) next to me wishing that I was working on that right now lol...

At any rate... happy benching... do you have the KP card yet? I think some of us here are waiting for that notification lol.

 

I could not have said that any better. These machines are direct competitors, and it is the first time in many years Alienware has had a horse in this race. And, last time I checked, the only score that matters is the overall score. Having a higher graphics score is something shiny to look at, but it doesn't win where winning matters.

I am super happy that Alienware FINALLY has a horse in this race. Clevo needs competition. It's nice to have a two-horse race for a change. But, Alienware needs to stop treating what they (based upon their own claims) designed to be a beast as if it is just another one of their castrated BGA turdbooks. They need to unlock the BIOS and/or stop blocking others from correcting their areas of firmware engineering incompetence. Clevo has been smart enough to leave a way for someone else ( @Prema) to finish the job for them.

Alienware should be smart enough to do the same and learn from their past mistakes. When they started butting in and interfering with firmware mods is when they started being the tail instead of the head. They tried that with the M18xR2 and SVL7 found a work-around. They stepped up the interference on the Alienware 17 and 18 and forever lost a faithful following because winners don't buy products made for losers. They do the same idiotic castrating nonsense with their desktops, and they have zero respect among overclocking enthusiasts. There are no Alienware desktops occupying the top 10 or top 20 spots because their desktops are castrated, but they continue to behave as legends in their own minds and charge premium prices for inferior products that look nice on the outside.

 

All good!

As to the cpu... Run only the cpu test. Once you get 5.0 ghz to act right and hit the 27K range (As @Prema has shown), then your cpu is in the optimal range to go further. If it's still in the mid 26.5K, then no need to run the whole bench. The combined test also needs to be 13k+ optimal. The gpu holds weight, but the combined test hold more....

Nope, still waiting on a KP card. I wish i had been paying attention before, but was waiting to see if I could get it though different channels.
So I grabbed a bs MSI Seahawk 2080 TI with full water block card to see if it could even touch Brother @Mr. Fox 's gpu scores, but it doesn't even beat the Asus cards I had a while back. And those were stock.

 

I haven't been keeping tabs on what intel is doing, but if it's getting "slaughtered," then ouch...

No no you're taking out of context.

Power crippling is a shame. We can all agree on that. But what is being pointed out is that you can't say something is 1:1 if they have major differences between the two. The variable here is there being an aftermarket bios that gives the p870tm an advantage. That's okay and it sure would be nice to have that on the A51M, but the point is that it doesn't have that aftermarket luxury that can't be had through mainstream means so no... it's not really 1:1, but close... The type of system it is sure it's in the same class, but that's not what we're talking about here.

 

As usual they are going for the deep pockets Quadro Prosumer market...

Yeah, if the 51M doesn't throttle then where are those extra 200Mhz going to? Something isn't working right.

@iunlock Does it actually hold all 8 cores at 5.2Ghz? Did you check with Aida64?

 

Well said and I completely agree... where they screwed up was exactly that... treating it like one of their bga systems. With everything aside with benching to reach the middle of the podium, if the bios gets reworked on this system, it would definitely shine. For the time being, just have to make the best with what we've got. If the rumors are true, we may see the lift on the hideous 2400 ram speed. The bigger question is, why even cap it in the first place? sigh... I know... lame...

 

That's what I've been wondering too... it holds 52x throughout the entire bench.. I've checked it with multiple apps. Something is definitely off... I'm still looking into it and testing...

Yup Aida64, hwinfo, etc.....

 

Maybe downgrade to a the old "19v BIOS/EC"?!

 

RAM maybe. 2400MHz is a killer.

 

It definitely is a contributing factor and one of its limitations. Even for non ram intensive benches the cpu is still way off... on some good runs it does okay, but still not where it should be.

Hope they lift the ram ban lol... rumor has it that it should be soon.

 

All of the the hardware is there, patiently waiting to be used at its fullest potential, but suppressed by control freak cancer firmware that shackles their $4200 flagship. It would appear that they'd prefer to fart around with half-assed UWP app trash (AWCC) designed for kiddos and wannabe overclockers rather than demonstrate genuine technical prowess or excellence in firmware engineering. And, as long as people continue forking out big bucks for broken garbage things are going to remain status quo with their weird fetish for metering the performance of everything they sell.

There is no reasonable excuse for the RAM being artificially capped at 2400 and no excuse for their customers not having full access to all of the BIOS settings that a properly built system designed to run a K-series desktop CPU would normally have. If it is not because they're control freaks, then the only possible alternative explanation is that they really just don't have a clue what they are doing when it comes to building legitimate products for performance PC enthusiasts. Sadly, this scenario applies to everything they sell, including Alienware desktops.

Maybe they have been in bed with NVIDIA for too long and they are starting to believe in their silly overpriced and overhyped gimmicks more than delivering results.

 

UWP needs to vanish from the face of the earth. AWCC is complete rubbish that words can't even describe how horrific it is. It's like if you spray painted rubbish with sparkly paint, it'll draw the obvious crowd. It's also apparent that whoever is in charge in the respected departments have no clue what they are doing. I agree, there is absolutely no excuse to launch such a system capped at 2400. That's just next level full retard mode. - We'll see if the ram lift will become a reality... gosh I hope so...

On the flip side of things, if they did have people that actually know what they are doing with the software, I think we'd face another problem with the gamer sparkly crowd as they would more than likely move all the sliders to max and poof.. This is why they really need to have an opt in disclaimer for warranty etc... Heck even have the option to check the box upon check out to ship the system with the "unlock code," to unleash everything. That way it eliminates the guessing game with warranty related issues right from the get go, as it'd be tagged to the service code in the system.

AW can keep the AWCC for the gamer kids, because having stuff like parental control (like for Netflix etc..) is necessary lol.

However, they can keep it really simple in having an option in the bios where you'd have to enter a code to unlock all the other sub menu's.... fair game right? - Better yet, just have it as a one way street where once it is unlocked, there is no going back...

As for the OC software we'd just use the third party real stuff that's available... so really all the work that needs to be done is in the bios.

Above all...there is no reason why they shouldn't do this...especially on a modular system where things can actually be replaced.

.

 

I look on the physics score from 8086K in your previous test. This is also low for the clock speed. I wonder if Dell have added in some sorts of weird power savings in firmware. Because I can also see the ssd performance done from Area-51m also suffer vs. what it really should perform.


Edit.

Updated | Alienware Area-51m scores 26,435 points in 3DMark Fire Strike and gets immediately outgunned by a couple of Clevos

 

Computex Taipei 2019 before then! Can't wait to see what drops between 5/28 and 6/1!!

 

Epyc on Zen 2 and Ryzen 3000 series should drop. What I'm interested in is whether they will make speed optimized Epyc CPUs, similar to the 7371 Epyc, available around the same time as Threadripper. For single socket Epyc variants, it is $300-600 more than TR, but you get 8 channels of memory and support for 128 to the rumored 162 PCIe lanes.

Also, Intel likely won't have pcie 4.0 until next year (not really needed for consumers anyways), but AMD will have it across their line.

Either way, SU's keynote will be nice to watch.

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

 

@Mr. Fox Kingpin in stock

If you need a code. Sure you have one but just In case.

2HQPSRUF10B6HVR

 

Okay Guys, They have kingpins in!
@Mr. Fox

Mine will be here Monday.

 

I got my two!

 

Nice!

Sweet Jesus. Looking forward to both of your benchmarks.

 

The big question now is when are the GPU blocks coming for these cards. They are going to be severely limited if we go by history.

 

Very jelly of you KingPin owners to be. Should be a very sweet card indeed. 2200+ MHz sustained boost clock beats out a Titan RTX.

 

Yea it's very odd indeed. I'm still looking into it... will keep everyone posted.

 

Finally got them ordered! It wouldn't let me order 2x ... the page kept throwing a error...so I had to order them separately. Is this what you had to do as well @Rage Set ?

@Mr. Fox @Johnksss @Talon @Rage Set

 

Yes, I experienced the same error and I had to order them twice. Both have been shipped already but I won't be getting mine until next Friday according to UPS.

 

I got the email invite to buy one from EVGA. I talked to the wife and she pitched a fit, so I guess I'll sit this round out and watch you guys having all of the fun with a (hopefully) uncrippled 2080 Ti.

 

Nice. Yup ordering them separately did the trick. Congrats mate... I think mine arrives Tuesday or so.... looking forward to it!

I'll be dabbling in the 9900K class, while looking for a solid 7980XE.

 

Congrats to you as well. I'll be in both classes, starting with HEDT. Now I'm truly going to put these other 2080 TI's up for sale.

 

Cheers. As for my 2080Ti FTW card I think I'll keep it for a while since the KP cards will be going on the test bench. Although I wouldn't mind getting rid of it and putting my 1080Ti in the desktop, since that's way more than enough for gaming ... hmm... we'll see.

I have the EVGA Dark Z390 on the test bench that'll accommodate the two KP's. Might pick up the X299 Dark since I got rid of mine a few months ago.

.

 

Anyone interested in a Hell Let Loose beta key for the weekend? WWII Mil Sim type game. Little faster than something like Squad or Post Scriptum. I played this afternoon and had some pretty good fun but am going on vacation and won't be around to enjoy it. I also had 3 keys but used mine, gave one away and that leaves one up for grabs.

 

@Mr. Fox
Ah man, now i'm sad

@Rage Set
Very nice! Congratz.
I wish they would have just let me go pick it up. They are like 15 minutes from me.

@iunlock

Very nice!
And congratz to you as well.

 

Edit:
Seems mine is incoming today. Right after I already bought My tickets for the Avengers End Game.

 

Wow. That's great! I'm going to be watching your results like a hawk.

 

In Deed!

Yeah, I got an email early this morning and was like Damn!!!!!!!!!!! No one will be home and they need a signature. (Because I do not want them leaving anything on the porch)
All good now though, I do see him sort of in the area. If he show up soon, i will grab my tickets back and go see the show.

edit:

 

Sweet! Congrats! Looks awesome... It's always nice getting things earlier than expected. The movie can wait haha... How ironic in that I was binge watching (just having a few selected movies in the series) playing in the back ground while delidding and working on computer stuff... Looking forward to seeing it too... can't believe it's really the end of the series?

Hmm how I wonder if my order or @Rage Set will arrive a day early?

 

I've actually been trying to figure this out as well. My clocks all hold up yet it's scoring lower. Doesn't make any sense. The 2400Mhz memory limit shouldn't affect it this much either.

 

Same for 8086K and I have seen the same for 8700K http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...m-owners-lounge.826831/page-251#post-10869129

Tried without Dell's nasty OC apps and or some of their drivers. Only use of XTU/TS and Win power plan set to High Performance?

 

Also don't think RAM is the issue. Just made a test run @2400Mhz and Physics score was even a couple of points higher than with 3200Mhz:


2400Mhz (14-14-14): https://www.3dmark.com/fs/19180281
3200Mhz (16-16-16): https://www.3dmark.com/fs/19038559

 

Hmm maybe when I have some more time I'll try clean install with no CC installed or XTU. Just TS.

Any other ideas what could be causing this?

Clock speeds don't go down. RAM speed doesn't affect it. I just wonder what else could be going on. There's no current VR limit or power limit issue in TS either at 5Ghz run.

 

Well, there are a lot of things that can happen on firmware level...

e.g. while working on Pascal Mods I found stuff that when adjusted one way let's the GPU run 2100Mhz and 99% utilization and score the same as 1800Mhz when adjusted the other way...things are not always as they seem...

I saw a user in the AW thread that scored a proper 27K+ on 5Ghz, ask him what BIOS/EC firmware version he is running on.

 

I wonder if he can actually replicate it, or if it is one of the random Fire Strike bugs that allows an abnormally high score?

 

Looks awesome. I am looking forward to seeing how high you can increase the core voltage. Congrats, bro.

 

That sounds like the 'bug' where you can run very high GPU clocks stably when at very low voltage, but it provides performance only equivalent to stock rather than overclocked levels? That happens if I lock my GPU at say 0.9V and 2100Mhz.