Experience of Alienware 17 new owners

Hello all,

Others and I have been sharing experiences on the Benchmark and Moving away from Alienware threads, and although some of the information could be useful, I thought it better to create another thread.

So @0lok , @galaga13 , @orancanoren let's continue the conversation here !

I've been playing Assassin's Creed IV : Black Flag and have finally experienced the throttling. For 2-5 seconds, FPS drops to 18-20 (truly awful). I think it corresponds with when the laptop is taking power from the battery. After the gaming session I noticed the battery was at 94%.

Just a reminder I'm on Bios A05 with the 180W PSU

I've contacted Dell about it, linked them to this : http://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/SLN295814
and asked for the 240W PSU. Told them that should they refuse to provide it I'll have to ask for a refund, I'm now waiting for an answer.

From what I understand once I have the 240W PSU and have the A00 Bios, this problem should be gone. (I hope^^)

All settings were maxed out in game and I had between 40-50 FPS.

 

Thanks for the advice ! I'll be sure to be careful when downgrading then

 

no problem.. experience on the laptop.. hmm.. first thing i noticed was the heating issue which can be solve by changing bios next was the bursting to each fan to max rpm on start up and to fix that was to uninstall dell support assist and dell support agent because i don't use them anyway and its slowing the laptop. lastly, the spike lags on dota 2. the killer wireless card is great but its driver/software was causing the problem. to fix the spike lag and connection problem you must disable all program relating to killer network on startup. mind you all of this was a pain in the bum. looking for all of the answers in various forums. i dont really register in forums but because of this problems it made me. so hope this helps for those who are having this issues.

oh 1 more thing. getting to the cpu and gpu for a repaste in also a pain. have a look. T_T

http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/alienware-15-teardown-repaste-guide.778264/

 

It's good that you've created a new thread for our discussion. I haven't been experiencing large throttling problems since I configured Throttlestop. Max drop I saw was to 3.0 GHz only for a few seconds because my CPU reached 98 deg C (I have 4720hq so I am around 3.4-3.5GHz normally) and I haven't felt that during gameplay. Unclewebb, who I believe is the author of Throttlestop helped me out to set throttlestop. In the rest of this message I will be explaining how to use throttlestop (which is quite easy):

1-You have to download Throttlestop 8.00 which can be downloaded from the link provided from Unclewebb's signature in this forum.
2- When you open the program you will have to check only these: Set Multipler, SpeedStep, TaskBar(optional I guess). There is a multipler value in front of set multipler option. You should set this value to max it can reach.
3- Open the FIVR menu and check "Unlock Adjustable Voltage". Beneath that there are sliders. You should undervolt your processor and find a stable point. I heard this stable point changes from CPU to CPU even if these CPU's are the same model. I currently undervolted the CPU by 59.6 mV's and I never had BSOD's with this setting.
4- Do not forget to click on the "turn on" button on the corner of throttlestop main menu.
5- Enjoy!

Don't forget that I am using 4720hq, there may be different configs for 4980hq.

EDIT: here is a screenshot of HWiNFO sensor page after almost 3 hours of gaming:

What surprises me the most is the max core freq which is 3758.8 MHz on 3 cores and 3869.3 MHz on one core when max turbo boost freq for 4720HQ is 3500 MHz for 4 cores. As I have mentioned earlier minimum freq for CPU is 3.2 GHz and I absolutely don't feel that drop during gameplay.

 

I haven't experienced any internet lag yet, but thanks for sharing, I'm sure it will be the answer to one of my future problems . Yeah I imagine that finding answers to all these issues took time and patience !

Concerning the repasting, wow ! I imagine that the AW 15 and 17 open up the same so ... Yeah, not looking forward to having to do all that

Thanks ! I'll give it a try when i'm back home, it's good to hear that you experience no throttling !

 

Today I tried using the Nvidia Geforce Experience "Optimize" option, and boy am I surprised. I must admit now that I think about it, when I bought this Alienware my mindset was "I paid all that money, I am entitled to just put everything at maximum and have 60 FPS", which, in hindsight quite childish ^^'.

All it did was put ambiant occlusion OFF, Hairworks OFF, and set shadows quality to Medium, and truth is, I can't see any difference. What I can see however, is that I just jumped from 35-45 FPS on Witcher 3 to a stable 55-60 !

Anyway must be old news to everyone, but I am in love. Now I just need Dell to send that 240W PSU !

Edit : I admit I am surprised, all it took was to ask for it, and the PSU is now on its way, even sent me the tracking for UPS. I will do a new 3dmark A05 + 180W PSU followed by A00 + 240W PSU as soon as I have it.

 

Great news. I haven't got witcher 3 yet but I am going to play it. Although I am currently experiencing issues with Wolfenstein: The New Order. People get constant 60 fps on ultra with gtx 780 while I mostly get around 50 fps. Gonna try geforce optimization.

 

Hope it fixes it for you ! One thing to consider is some games are better supported by drivers than others. AC IV (2013) I get 45-55 FPS, TW3 I get 55-60, so there's that to consider, perhaps when the game came out Nvidia released a driver specifically for it ? The "Game ready" drivers, my best guess would be to try that if optimizer still fails.

Now I'd like to commend Dell for their service. Contacted them about the 240W PSU and 2 days later they sent it ! I already received it and did the tests, i'll post them below.

 

Now these results are frankly, well, weird. I can't explain them, and don't understand the why and how, but these are the results ^^'.

180W PSU & A05 Bios : http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/8094370

240W PSU & A05 Bios : http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/8172265

240W PSU & A00 Bios : http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/8172737

These tests have been done without any OC, throttlestop etc... of any kind.

Even with the 240W PSU, once in game the CPU will throttle to 2800 MHz.

Concerning the GPU we have, again the same on all 3 settings :


GPU Core Clock at 1126.4 MHz

GPU Memory Clock at 1252.8 MHz

GPU Temperature 57-58°C

With the A00, the fans slowly gain speed rather than directly kick in at max, and it seems that cooling is as good as with A05. I need more time to really see the improvement.

No difference in AC IV, however in TW3, FPS is now stable between 58-60, rather than 55-60 with the 180W PSU.


Now, as I learned from my previous mistake, I did not expect anything from the 240W other than giving me the option to overclock should I desire it in the future. It arrived very well packed and very fast, gave me an opportunity to test Dell's support, access to a better fan profile and no more hybrid bios. All that for free ^^'.

 

Hmm, 240W + A00 does throttling too then. So there are two benefits of having A00&240W: better fan profiles and better battery life(doesn't use the battery on charge) although there is the after-sleep throttling issue, right? I will wait for the next BIOS update to get 240W, in some thread on this forum I read that there will be a BIOS update this month.

 

Yeah for now those are the benefits of having the 240W that I know of. I didn't know about the plans for a BIOS update, that sounds really exciting ! I will be sure to follow it closely. Thanks for telling me !

Concerning the after-sleep throttling yes I forgot to test it, will do a test right now.

 

Yep I confirm the after-sleep throttling on A00 BIOS.

It's doesen't have a clear pattern, nor does it affect 1 of the 4 cores more than others.

It varies from 900 MHz to 2500 MHz, each time for 1 second or so. I'll be careful to only use Shutdown ^^ With an SSD it's not so much of a bother though.

 

I don't need to use the sleep function oftenly so I don't think that's a big drawback for A00. By the way how is your booting speed? I noticed it was faster on A00. About the BIOS update this month, I didn't set my expectations so high because all the BIOS updates before this one were disappointments but I still have hope for this one. Have you tried using Throttlestop? It's still working like a charm for me. The only thing that bothers with me on this BIOS is the fan settings which I solved manually by using HWiNFO. I'd like to OC the GPU a bit though to eliminate occasional fps drops (60 fps to 52-55fps) but I couldn't manage to do so yet.

 

My booting speed is 45 seconds, same as with A05. About the BIOS update yeah of course we have to keep our expectations low but it's always good to hope for the best^^ There is no denying they have had more than enough time and feedback so they don't have any excuses.

I am going to try to configure Throttlestop, I guess i'll try the same settings as you (I think you posted them in an earlier post I'll search for them), I don't think there should be much difference with the 4980HQ. I think I'll do it when I really start to play TW3, right now I'm enjoying some heavily modded Skyrim ^^.

 

hello guys.. has anyone tried the desktop mode on your laptop? im experiencing drop on fps on dota 2 while i was on desktop mode.. the battery level was 75%. the lowest fps was 30 and the lowest gpu clocked on hwinfo64 was 200+ mhz. is this because a00 is not a hybrid bios and the 180w PSU is not sufficient enough?

 

I don't know if it is the cause of all your issues, but I do know that A00 and PSU 180W do not go together at all according to everybody's opinion. You should try A02 or A05 (You need to upgrade to A02 Before A05 either way so you can test it while you're there).

200MHz I think is the lowest i've seen anyone report here, but the 75% Battery is what I find weird. You are on A00 so you don't have a hybrid bios, are you playing unplugged ? On battery I mean ?

By desktop mode, I imagine you're reffering to Windows 8 / 8.1 feature to boot on the desktop directly ? I'm on Windows 7 so I can't help you with that sorry.

If you are plugged to PSU, are using BIOS A00 and your battery is going down to 75% + experiencing severe throttling of your GPU, I think you really should contact Dell because this looks extremely weird.

Now the first thing Dell will ask you to do is : Restart you computer. Press F12 repeatedly as soon as it powers back up to get into boot menu. Select "Diagnostics".

This will lead you to a page where first your fans will be tested (right and left will power up at full speed for 1seconds each) then your screen will be tested with colored bars (A text will appear asking you "Did you just see colors ?") and finally you will arrive at the testing menu.

There you just select "Run". It will take 20-25 minutes (RAM takes the most time) and will test all of your hardware.

I suggest you update your bios and then run this diagnostic test and let us know if it helped you ! I sure hope so. I had the 180W PSU and Bios A05 5 days ago and it was working perfectly well for me, everything was really fine.

http://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04/product-support/product/alienware-17-r2/drivers

TL;DR : Download BIOS A02 & A05, you just have to run the exe (Close all other program before). Install A02, then restart, Install A05, restart and Press F12, select diagnostic and try to see if your gaming experience has gotten better. Give us feedback .

 

Thanks for the reply. I have tried running dell espa diagnostic on dell using A05 and evrything was ok. I haven't tried On a00 though. Desktop mode is this:

So basically while on desktop mode which means i was running on battery at 75%. Therefore power was not enough and causing the gpu throttling down. Does this mean tHat I need to plug in battery all the time so i wont have throttling issue since im on a00?

 

I've been reading up on Desktop mode and from what I understood it's a Battery mode that forces your battery to discharge (Between 50% and 100%) regularly, and the profit of that is a longer battery life yes ?

If I am right, then the only thing I am afraid of is the 2 software bumping into each other. The A05 Hybrid Technology and the Desktop mode. Both of them use the battery, and I have never read any reviews / feedback about it so I can't help you there.

But I wonder what would happen in this scenario : You are in Dota2 and battery at 50%, then A05 Hybrid kicks in and takes 1-2% percent of battery life to help Dota2, in the long term, are these 2 software helping, or damaging your battery ? I honestly don't know. If I had to choose personally, it would be one or the other, not both. So my best advice for you is : If you want to continue using desktop mode, go back to A00 until you talk to Dell or someone here that knows more than me gives you better advice.

Now concerning that question, well I'm on A00 + 240W PSU and I still experience throttling. So no unless you use throttlestop (Like @orancanoren did) and OC your GPU, you will always have throttling.

Anyone correct me if I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure that's the truth.

 

On another subject, I'm very curious about this : http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/10024877

He's No.1 result (best score) using the 4980HQ, my question is : Is the 32Gb Ram and 2xGtx 980M all the difference between him and me ? Because that's crazy ! I'm under Gaming PC and he tops the 4k Gaming PC !

Edit : I'm sorry I haven't slept.. Of course it's overclocking.

But still, I am astonished by the difference that OC makes ! I even found our dear moderator's score :

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/9349774

Compare that with mine : http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/8172737

Using the same settings as I have right under my fingers right now, He's even giving himself a 4GB of RAM Handicap (He has 12 I have 16).

Knowledge truly is power, isn't it . I feel.. hmm how to decribe it best.. "You know nothing, Jon Snow", yeah, that's how I feel.

 

I guess i have to deal with it until a new bios will come. i tried a05 a few hours ago and it was the same. i think the best solution is using throttle stop which i don't know how to use it and im afraid on using it.. it says it can harm the laptop if not used properly. hopefully by sept a new bios will come. thanks again for your help.

 

Np mate sorry I couldn't be more help. As for the Throttlestop, unfortunately these are not good news, but I thought I'd share it with you. @orancanoren said he found good result with his CPU (47XX I don't remember exactly) with it, but when I posted on the Throttlestop Guide thread here are the answers :

I hope next bios will fix your problems, good luck !

 

Those scores are amazing! I don't have a clue on overclocking the GPU. How do they do it?

 

Just FYI, the Desktop mode I'm on is with the A02 which came with the laptop, and never had any power throttling though (That's including Dota 2, it's always stay locked to 120fps with occasional spike to 100-110fps), also with the A02, if you worry about your laptop heating up, you can always use HWiNFO64 to manually control the fan which I do all the time before launching games.

Though this is on the Alienware 15, so not sure if it's also apply with the 17.

 

I just ordered my alienware17 on august 17 2015 . I have the 980m 256 ssd . will I have these issues as well or has the problem been fixed and if not should I tell them to send me the 250w power

 

Btw the score was done using a GT80

 

What processor did you buy with it ?

 

i7 4710 6m cache , I tried to get the better A17 with the 4980HQ but dell said that it would have been an extended wait ,over 3 months. No way I could have tolerated that long of a wait

 

You are better off with the 4710 trust me. The 4980HQ is a waste of money in this machine. With the 4710 you can have very good results, and an excellent gaming experience.

@orancanoren has one and I think he can give you much better advice than I. Wait for him to appear

 

thanks thurkar