*OFFICIAL* M17x R3 Owner's Lounge Thread - Part 3

[suffolkcounty]

Well I took the plunge and ordered my M17X. Evolution computers is overnighting it to me; it's supposed to be here by 10:30AM today. They had one in stock with a 2960,6990.8gb 1600 ram 1920x1080 screen, and an upgraded wireless card.Yesterday I got my Patriot 256gb SSD.Are there any programs out there for overclocking the cpu and gpu? I can't wait for 10:30 to unpack that badboy

[nayilalien]

Yayyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!!

[The Revelator]

Well I took the plunge and ordered my M17X. Evolution computers is overnighting it to me; it's supposed to be here by 10:30AM today. They had one in stock with a 2960,6990.8gb 1600 ram 1920x1080 screen, and an upgraded wireless card.Yesterday I got my Patriot 256gb SSD.Are there any programs out there for overclocking the cpu and gpu? I can't wait for 10:30 to unpack that badboy

You'll want these to start:

Intel Extreme Tuning Utility v2.1 -- http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Deta...&DwnldID=19683

TriXX -- https://www.sapphireselectclub.com/ssc/TriXX/TriXX.aspx

HWINFO64 -- HWiNFO64 Download

Unlocked BIOS A08 -- ALIENWARE 17XR3 UNLOCKED A08 BIOS.rar

[suffolkcounty]

Thanks very much Revelator for all that good info.Well it's 12:30 and no FedEx yet.

I was just wondering,with the modded bios and a moderate overclock on the cpu and gpu what kind of scores can I expect on Vantage and Mark06?

[The Revelator]

You should be able to get somewhere around P17,500 in Vantage, and 25,000 in 3dMark06 with reasonable overclocks. With more aggressive overclocking, you can push it further. That CPU will contribute to both results. That's a very powerful computer; you'll enjoy exploring its limits.

[GeoCake]

First impression of the 580M: easiest driver install. Almost effortless, way more user friendly than AMD (clean install option is ingenious). The newest drivers were also very easy to find, although I had to install the latest Intel driver pack first. Flashed the overvolted vbios thanks to widezu.

Optimus seems pretty cool. I kinda miss disabling the GFX card completely though, as the right part of my lap gets a little warm. Sometimes Firefox starts up a bit slower with the top blank for a tenth of a second - I notice everything and this seems very minor. So far I haven't had to fiddle with it, e.g. what applications use what GPU etc, GTA IV ran on the 580M just fine.

Temperature wise: Played GTA IV for about 1 hour and 30 mins at 750/800 and the highest temperature was 66C. The 6990M would max out at 69C. This is at the exact same in-game graphic settings, same room temperature of ~23C and back elevated with the same book. Stock fan control for both.

The GTA IV benchmark for the 580M was ~66 FPS whereas it was ~64 FPS for the 6990M. Gameplay felt a tiny bit smoother on the nVidia card with none of them jerky/laggy frame moments I got with the 6990M (these moments were very rare with the AMD card anyway).



So far so good, gotta test other games.

Minor issue: GPU-Z crashes after a few seconds when I look at the temps tab...

[SlitGoblin]

Hey all, I have a few question.....

First: I am on alienware.com and I have a m17x configured in my cart, but there is nowhere that shows if its r2 or r3... How do I know which one it is?

Also, when i am ready to place an order, I plan on calling a sales rep and haggling. Does anyone know if Dell price matches?

[LocoKine]

Is it really necessary for a windows 7 clean install and adjusting my graphics card GTX 580 (throttle adjustment)? outta the box seems to be working fine for me so far (no heat issues, no drop in FPS, etc).




---
I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=19.717001,-155.076041

[The Revelator]

@LocoKine -- If it ain't broke, don't fix it. It is rarely necessary to reinstall Windows unless moving to a new SSD or other new primary drive. Glad to hear that the 580M is operating without heat or throttling issues, although in spite of the noise, that is not at all unusual. Congratulations on your new war machine.

First impression of the 580M: easiest driver install. Almost effortless, way more user friendly than AMD (clean install option is ingenious). The newest drivers were also very easy to find, although I had to install the latest Intel driver pack first. Flashed the overvolted vbios thanks to widezu.

Optimus seems pretty cool. I kinda miss disabling the GFX card completely though, as the right part of my lap gets a little warm. Sometimes Firefox starts up a bit slower with the top blank for a tenth of a second - I notice everything and this seems very minor. So far I haven't had to fiddle with it, e.g. what applications use what GPU etc, GTA IV ran on the 580M just fine.

Temperature wise: Played GTA IV for about 1 hour and 30 mins at 750/800 and the highest temperature was 66C. The 6990M would max out at 69C. This is at the exact same in-game graphic settings, same room temperature of ~23C and back elevated with the same book. Stock fan control for both.

The GTA IV benchmark for the 580M was ~66 FPS whereas it was ~64 FPS for the 6990M. Gameplay felt a tiny bit smoother on the nVidia card with none of them jerky/laggy frame moments I got with the 6990M (these moments were very rare with the AMD card anyway).



So far so good, gotta test other games.

Minor issue: GPU-Z crashes after a few seconds when I look at the temps tab...

Glad it's going well and anticipate hearing about your further experiences and judgments. As you're learning, problems with the 580M tend to be greatly exaggerated and, for the most part, emerge mostly with heavy overclocking. And even then, they're manageable. Expecting you to wipe Widezu69 and me off the R3 leaderboard (assuming they're ever updated).

[rooshandark8]

Finally got my replacement system, Screens a bit warmer *looks not temps* than the previous one but except that its running fine, So i am back in the Alienware Elite Squad

Also 2 things How do you guys have 2920XMs (i don't see any option on website)
And what tests should i run to test my system And what kind of results should i expect from them
Here are my specs


Processor: Intel® Core™ i7 2860QM 2.5GHz (3.6GHz with Turbo Boost, 8MB Cache)
RAM(Memory): 8GB Dual Channel DDR3 at 1600MHz (4DIMMS)
Video Card: 2GB GDDR5 NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 580M
Hard Drive: 1.5TB Raid 0 (2x 750GB 7,200RPM)