Squeezing every ouce of performance out of my Dell M1530 and 8600M GT

Hi all,

A number of years ago I purchased a Dell M1530 for as a desktop replacement mostly used for gaming. Five years and a lot of tweaking later and I'm back seeking some more advanced advice for squeezing any more performance out of my laptop.

The specs:

• Dell M1530
• Intel Core2Duo T7700 @ 2.40GHz (2 CPUs) undervolted with RightMark CPU Clock Utility @ 12x FID at 1.21V when on maximal performance
• 4096MB RAM
• All drivers (except display) came from this site: keyliner.blogspot.com: Dell XPS M1530 Windows 7 Drivers
• NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT 256MB with stock 9.18.13.2049 (320.49 - latest available) - no overclocking (see below)
• BIOS is running the latest available - A12
• Page File: 2239MB used, 2108MB available
• ST9250421ASG HDD (7200rpm) with 40GB of free space, defragged/malware, virus and trojan scanned weekly (these are set to be opened and scan manually)
• Battery setting set to Best Performance
• Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1 Customized with all visual fluff/bloat gone and BlackViper's service recommendations
• No background programs running except Steam, RightMark CPU, and the basics.
• Modified startup with (almost) everything disabled
• Wireless/Bluetooth disabled - running directly connected to my DSL modem

The facts:

• I'm way, way out of warranty.
• I do not have money for a new computer in the foreseeable future.
• This is actually my second M1530; my first blew out from a known 8600GT overheating issue. This is the highest performing card available that I am aware of.
• Aside from upgrading RAM from 4GB to 8, I am not aware of any way to realistically upgrade any of my components.
• I have the laptop sitting on a Zalman ZM-MC1000 running at full blast.
• I replaced the CPU about 6 months ago and used Arctic Silver 5 thermal paste
• I have tried using older, recommended versions of drivers for this model without much success
• I have seen modified inf files mentioned, but haven't had much luck finding anything pertaining to my particular situation and model.
• Anti-aliasing is a no-no. Shadows take a heavy toll are are usually set to none/low. AO is hit or miss.

Summary:
I game. A lot. However, the age of the lappy really started to show about a year and a half ago and I've been playing with settings, programs, tweaks, research and what-not to get every extra fps I can get. I believe I've hit the ceiling without approaching hardware failure, but I want to be sure. I have not played much with the NVIDIA control panel settings as it's pretty difficult digging up information relevant to this dinosaur.

I use http://pcgamingwiki.com to tweak every game I install.

Some games I play successfully at 20-30fps (which I consider acceptable at this point) @ 1440x900 (native):
Resident Evil Revelations (Medium settings)
DmC Devil May Cry (Ultra (?!!?))
Outlast (Low - haven't tested much)
The Walking Dead (Low)
Just Cause 2 (Low due to input lag with anything higher)
Star Conflict (Low - same as JC2)
Borderlands 1 (Medium-Low for sniping)
Portal 2 (High)
Torchlight II (Medium-Low)
Games I can get about 10-20 (not well enough for an enjoyable experience) but would like to play in an ideal world:
Borderlands 2
Assassins Creed
Dark Souls: Prepare To Die (so close, but just not enough for twitch-combat)
Darksiders
Tomb Raider (I was surprised I could even run it, but alas, not well enough)
Sanctum 2 (even Sanctum 1 slows to a crawl at low settings when the waves get big enough)
Dishonored (playable on low, but not quite well enough for precision)
Deus Ex: HR (I made it through about 1/3 of the game before I realized I was just pissing myself off in combat)
Metro 2033
PAYDAY (playable, but not well enough for precision combat)
Sniper Elite v2
Kingdoms of Amalur (ugh, this one is right on the edge.. 3-5 more fps and it'd be totally playable)
The Witcher 1
Mass Effect 2 (Low is playable, but not enjoyable)
Dead Island (Another 3-5fps and it'd be consistently playable)
Grand Theft Auto IV (this just makes me sad)
Sleeping Dogs (close, but not quite)
Saints Row The Third (5-10 more fps)
Euro Truck 2 (also bummed about this)
Burnout Paradise (plays, but not well enough for fast reactions...)
Battlefield Bad Company 2 (nope)
Battlefield 3 (wishful thinking)
and a number of other games available on the XBOX 360 and PS3 that just don't quite perform.

I can squeeze a little more performance running at 1280x800, but at the cost of some major blurriness.

Any tips and suggestions aside from, "Buy a new computer" would be greatly appreciated. I'm an advanced user both with software and hardware, so feel free to throw anything at me. Thanks in advance!

 

there is nothing that you can do to get more gaming performance.

you can get a SSD, that won't help in games.

 

Swapping in a faster CPU might give you a couple more FPS on some CPU-bound games. If you're running into thermal issues, you might be able to run a bit cooler (and perhaps more efficiently) by cleaning out every speck of dust and copper-shim-modding your GPU heatsink. Beyond that, if you're not willing to drop resolution, I don't see anything else you can do without overclocking.

 

Why not overclock? I overclocked the heck out of my Vostro 1500 8600m GT and was able to play Crysis and Warhead and Bioshock start to finish. You say "No overclocking (see below)" but don't see any reference to why you don't overclock.

Also I know you don't want "buy a new notebook" but if you sell your M1530, and it still has some value believe it or not, and put it towards something like this: Newegg.com - Acer V5-552-X418 AMD A-Series A10-5757M(2.50GHz) 6GB Memory 500GB HDD 15.6" Notebook Windows 8 64-Bit

And you can actually game with the newest games at 720p medium detail.

 

Thanks for the replies

I guess I could have made it a little clearer to see. There's a known issue with the 8600M GTs in the M1530s becoming thermal nuclear reactors and failing. The one on my first M1530 died this way and took the motherboard with it. I may try pushing the GPU a little - is there any particular program you recommend? I've messed with RivaTuner, GPU-Z and nTune, but as I mentioned, touching any GPU settings makes me nervous.

 

thats why i said theres nothing you can do

 

This is what i did with my old MSI laptop to keep it cool with an extreme and stable OC from 625/1000 to 900/1090 and from 1,73 ghz quad core CPU to a 1,92 ghz quad core. (5850 and qm740)

Step 1: Open up the back panel on the laptop and keep it off than put the laptop on a notepal U3 laptop cooler. Put 1 fan right under the now open CPU and 1 under the opened up GPU. Put the final fan where you want.

Step 2: Buy GELID's GC-Extreme thermal compound and put little bit of it on the CPU and little bit on the GPU, find the perfect balance, too much is not good.

Step 3: OC your CPU in setfsb, this is complicated so google and read into it.

Step 4: OC your GPU but keep an eye on temps, if you really wanna get better performance you can also overvolt your GPU (i did). It should not get very hot if u followed my steps.

When you have done all these steps you should have much better performance and it should run quite cool.

You could also sell it, some ppl would actually pay quite okay money for it. With the money u get for the sale buy a cheap desktop. I just bought a sweet 600 bucks gaming desktop

 

Thanks again. I was debating messing around with the body; I think I'll make a few modifications and see if I can get things a little cooler.

 

aside the usual heat problems with the machine you have, you also have problems regarding the quality of solder done to your gpu I wouldn't waste time and modify one of the best chassis that dell made. its not going to solve your problems or allow you to oc.

aside that clean the fans and repaste

 

Yeah man don't overclock that 8600M GT. I'm pretty sure those were the defective GPU's made by Nvidia which got them into a whole lot of deep sh*t and a lawsuit back in the day, plus a mass recall of the affected notebooks. My Quadro FX 1600M (aka 8700M GT) died a fiery and premature death this way.

 

those were the defective chips that nvidia produced and its very common on that model to need to swap the mobo, since its gone. however its old, there aren't parts for it, the performance is terrible, basically selling it and getting a cheap amd notebook is going to be better all around