*OFFICIAL* Alienware 15 R1/R2 Benchmark Thread

Bought a 980m 15 off of Ebay which arrived yesterday. Fire strike score of 5900-6000. Tomb raider bogs down hard at high settings after about a minute. Same with Ultra. HWmonitor says the GPU is hitting 85c so I am thinking it is throttling hard due to a bad paste job. Time to call Dell


Update: Alienware tech says that the 180w adapter is causing the GPU to hit 90c and then throttle. Doesn't sound plausible to me. Could this somehow be the case?

 

No that seems about right for the 970M.

The GPU temperature is fine, the CPU temp can be cooler. Now there are a couple of reasons for this:

1. Dell doesn't use the best thermal paste and they really apply too much of it (this is a problem with like every OEM for w/e reason). So you can buy your own paste, and repaste it yourself (there are guides on how to open up your laptop). Or just call Dell tech support up and tell them that your temperatures are higher than you're comfortable with. They might send out a tech and then you can make the tech use the thermal paste that you bought. Good thermal pastes: Prolimatech PK-3, Gelid Extreme

2. I think you're running the AO2 bios. The AO2 bios does run hotter than the AOO / AO1 ones and that seems to be a problem that Dell is aware of. AO3 might fix it.

3. You can undervolt your CPU. There are numerous guides on how to do this, and generally its safe. The worst that can happen is Windows will crash and then you have to restart. This will knock off about 8-10C right off the bat.

 

Thanks for your prompt reply again cookies981

i have a artic silver 5 with me and i think ill call up dell support like you say and ask them to send a tech over.

Regarding the cpu temperature, i just run a firestrike test again but i monitor the cpu temperature using intel xtu and the highest temperature recorded was only 80 degree celsius (oppose to the 91 degree celsius i got from msi afterburner). I also did a intel xtu benchmarking test and the highest cpu temperature is only 87 degree celsius. So i guess most probably the temp reading from msi afterburner is wrong ? and yes i'm running AO2 bios, hopefully AO3 fixes it.

 

Hm. Try using something like HWInfo or HWMonitor and see.

MSI Afterburner used to have an issue with falsely reporting GPU temps and clocks but I haven't heard anything about the CPU side of it. But if XTU benchmarking test is only giving you 87 then afterburner is definitely wrong hahaha. The XTU benchmark is much much more CPU demanding than firestrike.

 

Here is my score on my brand new 980M/i7/8gb

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/9674546

Graphics: 12720
Physics: 6566
Combined Score: 6752

Does my physics score seem to be a little low? I thought the i7-4710HQ should be scoring in the 8000's

 

This is the score you should get: http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/6593016 for firestrike. (Don't mind the incorrect time measurement, It's because I skip the Demo in the beginning by alt-tab)
more or less at least. Your CPU is throttling just like mine used to do.

What BIOS are you on? Do you have the 240Watt Power adapter? Is Graphics amplifier CPU overclocking enabled in the bios (you should disable that)?

 

I'm running A02 and I did have overclocking turned on in the Bios. I turned it off and reran the test and this is what I got:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/6595781

Fire Strike 1.1
Score: 8066
Graphics: 9563
Physics: 8729
Combined: 3527

My score is definitely a bit higher but not as high as yours. Is it because I'm using the 180 watt power supply? I did just receive the laptop yesterday and I emailed Dell about sending it out last night.

*edit: Here's my second run http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/6595944

 

Yeah I think the issue might be the lack of a better power supply. I didn't test that much when I had my 180watt one (which I don't have anymore). So yeah.
Definitely try get a 240 watt power supply.
They did some difficulties when I tried to get it here in belgium.

However after 4 calls, showing them this official dell link: http://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/SLN295814

And I told them A02 was a slight improvement but not quite enough, and luckily they send me one eventually.

 

Thanks for the advice. So far I've just emailed them but I haven't received a response back yet. If I don't hear anything by Tuesday, I'll give them a call. Hopefully it won't be too hard to get.

 

It's in Chinese, but someone reviewed the Alienware 15 with the m295x. Of course, this is done with the 180w PSU and not the 240w PSU.

 

AW15 firestrike with 970M and 180W, overclocked to 135+ core and 500+ memory, drivers 347.88

Stock no overclocking at all = 6527

GPU overclocked with 180W PSU= 7439

CPU/GPU overclocked with 180W PSU= 7474

CPU/GPU overclocked with 240W PSU= 7480

Bottom line is only worth overclocking the GPU.
CPU overclock makes minimum difference.
Changing the PSU to a larger unit with the 970M make almost zero difference.

Physics score rises from 9221 stock to 9539 with overclocked CPU.

My desktop setup in comparison http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/6668410

 

Cheers for all that. How easy is it to OC the CPU?

I haven't got my AW15 yet!

 

Very easy. Download Intel XTU, move all 4 core sliders to max, apply. Move the cache slider to max x37, apply. Done.

Computer will then stay overclocked, even when you shutdown and start backup again without going near or having to open XTU.

200MHz for free. The AW15 can handle the heat and will not throttle, so no worries there.

 

Oi! Pulled the trigger on one of these with a 980m in it. Hope its good lol.

 

I just received my AW15 . I've only done a test 3dmark and I have a horrible cpu temperatures .
( Bios A02 and 180W )

 

Whoa, you need to re-paste that sucker, lol.

 

Awesome thanks!

 

A02 does have some issues. Heat mainly

T2050 - You need to increase both TDP sliders to 58w, other wise you will get some power throttling rather than thermal also you can take off about -60mv on dynamic voltage to bring down the heat

 

Ran Firestrike and got this. WTF is going on here.

http://www.3dmark.com/fs/4663772

 

Your turbo clock is 900mhz which definitely isn't right. Have you messed with any the CPU settings in the bios?

 

I was wondering about that. I have not changed a single thing in the BIOS at all. I havent even been in the BIOS yet lol. I will look at it now.

 

Ok so I looked in the BIOS and didnt really see anything that would affect this. Am I missing something? Could you direct me in the right direction. This is slightly frustrating.

 

I would enable the overclock option in the GA section then test, and disable the overclock option after the test and test again.

 

I will try but it stated that those settings only apply when a GA is hooked up.

 

Believe when I say this, but... that option may mess with the laptop without the GA. May be bad coding or something.

 

I agree with Game7a1. Although my CPU scores have never been as low as yours, they did get substantially better once I turned off the GA overclocking in the Bios.

 

Didn't realize these suckers were this fast.. people are getting 8200-8900(oc) scores.. and a desktop Cpu with a GTX Titan is scoring 9100.. insane! who'da thunk 2 years ago these mobile cards would be so close to they're desktop brothers and in a 15" chassis!

 

hi everyone

I have tried the Valley Benchmark, with 240W PSU and 180W.
The results are amazing !
Spec : BIOS A03, Nvidia 980m

Cold machine (condition) : about 2060 points with 240W and only 1750points with 180W
Hot machine (benchmark loop) : about 1800 points with 240W and only 1356 points with 180W

So, even with the hybrid bios (A02/03), take the 240W psu at all cost (free in US)...
In 3Dmark i didn't see any difference between 240W and 180W PSU, that's why it's so strange also. Just test the Ungine Valley Benchmark

 

I've been trying to overclock my 970m with no success.... I can't get the 345.20 driver to install on my AW 15 , keeps saying it's not compatible. I've tried installing it over the 350.12, Ive tried to install after a DDU clean. I've even tried to install Mr. Fox's 345.20 desktop driver and my pc ends up blue screening about 3/4 of the way through installation. I've followed his instructions on how to restart with disabling digital driver signing and it still blue screens.

I tried installing Mr. Fox's modified 344.75 but it also tells me the driver isn't compatible. I finally did get the stock 344.75 driver to install but it still won't let me overclock. I move the slider in MSI afterburner and it resets to zero as soon as I apply it. I've tried using EVGA Precision X but it justs crashes and nVidia Inspector won't work either (sliders wont move).

Any idea what Im doing wrong?

 

Hi guys!

I've been doing some testing on my new alienware 15.

Very excited last night with excellent results, but today the laptop is performing much much worse.
I don't know what happened I didn't change a thing over night.
3dmark last night:
http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/7128673
3dmark today:
http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/7135065

tested 2 times last night with the same score,
today its circling around 7900.

What do you guys think?
running bios A001
tried ga oc on and off in the bios

thanks in advance

 

my aw 15 config
i7 4710hq
980m
BIOS A01
driver 353.06
http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/7232651

my temp in celcius
for CPU
58/56/71
57/57/68
55/55/66
57/56/66
58/57/71

for GPU
56

 

9124 in Fire Strike by overclocking the i7-4710HQ and GTX 980M. Using the 180 W adapter.

i7-4710HQ - Turbo Boost clocks to maximum (37x, 36x, 35x, 35x) plus increase in Turbo Boost Power Max (58 W) and Processor Cache Ratio to maximum (37x)

GTX 980M - +135 Base Clock Offset, + 274 Memory Clock.

A higher combined score should result from using the 240 W adapter, as both the overclocked CPU and GPU push the power requirements even higher than at stock.

Even overclocked, the system still fails to play either GTA V or The Witcher 3 at maximum settings at 1920x1080.

 

Would anyone be kind enough to point me in the right direction as to how to OC the 980m? Ive been out the game for 3 years. last cards I OCed were a mobile 6970 and 7970. Cant locate anything on google.

 

Use NvidiaInspector.

Overclock Base and Memory Clocks on Performance Level 3. I list the values I used in my previous post.

 

i made an undervolt ... i reduce the heat and increase my battery life. .... is just perfect

 

Thanks, works like a charm, I was thinking text modifications were required to oc this card like in the past, never thought they would allow OCing so easily. running. The OC puts my GPU at 71c which is great, my CPU on the other hand is insane! 93c Max. What in the world is alienware doing with their fan profiles!?

 

CPUZ Validator
http://valid.x86.fr/58cexe
all in stock and 180w adapter

 

IC diamond...

 

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/9936018

 

This is a very poorly 3Dmark11 result from gtx970m. Should score much much better than old gtx780m with a medium Overclock... http://www.3dmark.com/compare/3dm11/9936018/3dm11/9860543

 

That's very low for your spec. I hit 11464 on mine.

Maybe your adapter is holding it back.

 

my score for firestrike seems normal yet three times P3dm11 with ~9700ish result
will you suggest me to buy additional 240w or 330w brick?

and what did orange screen of death mean?
i recently had that osdth after tryimg to get sensor temps through hwinfo64 program
never had it before
and zero bsod so far
weird
@.@

 

My Firestrike scores (too bad my laptop throttles like crazy during long gaming sessions)

3DMark Score 9231
Graphic Score 10951
Physics Score 9361
Combined Score 4200

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/7393441

 

What OC are you running in XTU if you don't mind my asking? I see your CPU turbo is OC'd. your physics score seems higher than many that I have seen with the 4710 processor. As well as your combined.

 

i realized updating driver through geforce experience causing my osod
so i did clean install
another benchmark same unit with 180 watt supply
anyone want to compare? i need to know whether its normal or not
if i get normal unigine scores i wont buy adapter

 

and now ? http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/7444760

 

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/7444760

 

Hi here is my system
AW 15 i7 4710HQ , 980M , 16 GB RAM , M.2 Sandisk 240 GB , 1 TB HDD
PSU 180W
Bios A00
CPU OC to max 3.6 Ghz
GPU OC Core Clock +135 Mhz , Memory Clock 300 Mhz , running games stable for 3 h (didnt play longer)
3d mark results
http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/9968910
firestrike results
http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/7468584
CPU OC to max 3.6 Ghz
GPU OC Core Clock +135 Mhz , Memory Clock 200 Mhz

I can get in firestrike about 9200 overall but only when cpu is stock

Same OC settings but Bios A04
http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/9969425

are those results are good?

 

The 980m is stout. My Benchmark results are very nice with a very minor overclock on the GPU:

3dmark 11: 12,112
Graphics: 14022
Physics: 8719
Combined: 8427

Firestrike: 8984
Graphics Score: 10689
Physics: 9218
Combined: 4021

I have some Ballistix memory that I added into the system this morning, 16GB PC 14900 1866Mhz, and the system picked it up just fine and just blazes right now.

 

is mine normal? i just got this yesterday.stock bios a02. Should i go back to Aoo?