*OFFICIAL* Alienware 15 R1/R2 Owner's Lounge

Aw man...did you update the drivers? A high end laptop not working right out of the box...:O
Check your drivers, someone had the same problem in Alienware Arena and he said it was a driver issue...

 

How would I go about getting the best price on an Alienware 15? I missed out on the mystery/EPP coupons and none of the sales agents I reach budge even an inch on the price. (US buyer)

 

Some Alienware buyers get a discount code for their next Dell purchase, if you can request someone from this forum or anywhere else for one they might be able to give you. I found some youtube reviewers giving a discount coupon on their channels for around 20%. I got 400$ off talking with an Australian agent. Best part was on top of this he gave me a free upgrade from a 256GB SSD to a 512GB SSD. I think it all depends on luck

 

I am glad the 970m is a beast, may i ask you if by any chance you tried gaming with the 4k resolution with just the 970m?

 

Alright. I'm completely new to Windows 8.1. I am trying to move on to it...

Is this something to do with Win 8.1? When I plug in the USB for external HDDs, it gives the sound that it recognizes but I cannot open it... the devices don't even show in the list. What the hell is going on? Do I have to do something in Win 8.1? This is same with any USB drive.

 

Does this happen with all USB ports?

 

Question about the m.2 ssd

I ordered the alienware 15 with the standard 1tb drive, I plan on swapping it out with an EVO 850 500gb,
can I run the m.2 as the primary and the 500 as a slave, or would it be better to by 2 m.2 sata drives along with running the 500gb and have all three drives installed and possibly run raid only on the m.2 drives

 

Well RAID functionality isn't available right now (it's a planned feature... from what I hear).
Either method you said works. The M.2 can be either storage or the slave, and same goes for the 2.5" drive.

 

Yeah, keyboard and mouse work fine, though.

 

Alright, it seems like it's the Win8.1 problem.

I can't move onto 8.1 if one of the first things I do on it gives me a headache. Going back to Win7.

 

Got an AW15, FHD, 970m. Just noticed obvious banding issues (gradient is not smooth). This led me to the testpage http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/gradient.php

When I scroll on this page, or navigate to this page from a page which is mainly white (such as this) it appears that the top test field is moving for about a second before it settles. Additionally it's easy to spot the vertical stripes. My 8 year old laptop displays this just fine.

Have checked that the color depth is set to 32-bit. Anyone else have this?

 

Any ghosting going on with your display Sabricaze? I ordered my AW 15 and hope its not ridden with defects like everyone is reporting.

 

Hey guys still cannot wait especially now I'm without a laptop.

Wanted to quickly ask, what are the different statuses of the laptop till it's shipped? I paid with bank transfer. So they received the payment yesterday. When payment received it said something along "work in action" now it says "in production" what are the next satuses and how long does each take roughly?

And I live in belgium. Anyone near living me who has received his laptop could post the shipment checkpoints please? Thanks.

 

I don't know if The Netherlands is close enough. The status can change pretty quickly. I ordered mine on the 5th and and showed the "work in action for 3 days", skipped to shipped on the 9th. Do note that they ship from China, or at least where my laptop is shipping from. And there seems to be a delay in the UPS status. Mine showed the same status for 2 days. It should arrive today, so it took about a week. I hope that I get home in time.

 

Mine took a total of 8 days.

Day 1 (Mon) - Payment done. Order received.
Day 2 to 5 (Fri) - In Production. (from China)
Day 6 to 8 (Weds) - In transit. Received on Wednesday afternoon. (Malaysia)

 

Thanks for the info guys. I see that the production part doesn't take that much time after all,despite the expexted arrival date of 3 March. Hope my system won't face any delays

 

After I dropped my order, DELL prompt me a ETA - 23 Feb. Until the status changed to 'In tansit', the ETA changed to - 16 Feb. On the next working day, they sent me a sms stated that my item will received on - 11 Feb. Pretty quick. Now I could enjoy my AW15 during Chinese New Year.

 

My 15 was due on the 19th, but it is on the Fedex truck, for today. You should beat the deadline, by at least several days. The wait is murder...........

 

Ordered mine on Jan 28 and got an EDD of Feb 13. It was dispatched on Feb 3 but the tracking status was not updated until Feb 9 and it was delivered yesterday (so 14 days from order to delivery). I'm pretty sure all EU customers have to put up with delivery by Walsh Western International. A shame as they used to use UPS which delivered in half the time and updated the tracking info daily.

 

I don't mean to be rude, but could I suggest a separate thread for "shipping updates"...? Even though the waiting period might be thrilling (for a short period of time), this is not strictly an owner-topic, and also not just relevant for that specific Alienware-model. Also, when browsing through the various owner's lounges in a couple of months, the shipping updates/building times are probably not relevant or interesting anymore.
As I said, I don't say this to be rude, and this is just a suggestion to keep the posts more relevant and interesting for the owners of the specific models.

 

That's actually a really good idea qdos. I've gone and created a thread for that purpose, so let's try to move the ordering and shipping updates to there if possible.

 

I don't seem to have any ghosting issues on mine.

 

You ran the Blur tester? Glad to hear there is hope for my laptop to arrive without defects

 

I just Google searched Dell EPP, went to their EPP page, verified my affiliation and they emailed me a 10% coupon that stacked with the default 2% EPP coupon that auto-applies when you go through the EPP site. With the $50 presidents day discount and adding the OS USB stick, i7 4710HQ, and 970m, the final price came to about $1290 before taxes with free shipping.

Purchased two days ago. Had to remove the 'free' Dell Venue tablet to get the 10% EPP coupon to stick tho.

 

Alright, my 15 arrived and I've been installing all of my programs. The case is amazing, and really shows up the 14 and 18 models. I was surprised by the weight, which feels lighter than my Alienware 14. This may be due to the weight being dispersed over a larger area. The only case negative is the service door, underneath. I literally thought that I was going to break the plastic panel due to the grip of several tabs. Be very careful with this section, and buy a plastic cell phone tool to aid in its removal. There is also 3 ribbon cables that lie across the hard drive. Their fragility kinda freaked me out, a tad, when putting in the evo 850. I love the lack of a number pad, which gives you a centered keyboard experience.

Now the puzzling details, which I really need help with:

1. Why do I get a "you currently don't have a display attached to the nvidia gpu?? I have never experienced this on the 14 or 18. I use that control panel to adjust the two clocks, as well as designate the discreet card for games. This is especially troubling as my games are only running with the integrated, weak card. How do I access that helpful control panel?

2. I also usually have an intel control panel, which gives one the ability to change color settings/ power options. How can I access this feature that was stock on the 14 and 18.

3. When downloading a game from steam, my computer completely bogs down. The mouse stutters and the operating system feels as if stuck in quicksand. Everything returns to normal, upon download completion.

4. When view youtube videos, from both internet explorer and chrome, I get these horizontal "lines/bars" which makes playback really distracting.

Please help

 

Hey, can a owner of the WA 15 say something about fan profiles.
I read a test ( link in German, i7, GTX 970M), and the tester reported noisy fans with low GPU temps. Is it possible to change the fan profile such that the fans are less noisy and the GPU gets a bit warmer?

The reported noise is a no-go for me, even the Clevo P751ZM has a lower noise level than the AW 15, even with more powerful hardware.

 

About your 2nd issue, you have to separately download the intel HD graphics driver whith whoch tje intel graphics control panel comes with.

About your 3rd issue. The games you are talking about should br large games. You have an EVO SSD. Those are slower hense cheaper. Slower as in they jave a very fast cache of few GB. But when downloading very large files. Your pc struggles very hard when allocating that memory on your drive if the cache of your EVO SSD is overflowing. This issue will not occur with the 850 pro ssd of samsung.

About your 1st and 4th issue. Could be many things that causes it, so not sure what causes those.

 

I use a samsung 840 evo in my Alienware 14 and 18 and have never received any slow down during steam downloads.......

 

Is there any actual Dell technical support reps that use and are familiar with the issues that I listed above? The guy in Costa Rica said he couldn't even afford a personal laptop and basically just used those generic scripted directions. He uninstalled and reinstalled the 980m driver, with no luck. The only other "method" was to use the alien respawn to basically start from scratch. Of course, Dell is too cheap to send a usb boot drive and respawn required one. There has to be someone that is a tech/PC enthusiast at Dell?Alienware who can help with this, or is this the best that one can hope for? Is there a 3rd party tech company that I could pay extra for knowledgeable support?

 

1. The iGPU is controlling the display, not the dGPU. So the Nvidia Control Panel is limited in what it can do.
This isn't an issue, but rather, a change of features from your previous laptops. I would set everything to high performance and make sure the GTX 980m is running.
3. If I may ask, where is your OS installed?
4. This might be a driver issue. Go grab the Intel Graphics driver from Intel and install DDU. From uninstall to install: NV -> Intel -> Intel -> NV.
I would also test with another video player to see if you get the same results.

 

1. What do you mean by setting everything to high performance? I can't open the nvidia control and the intel control panel is also missing from the desktop right click (and the icon tab, near the clock), so where is this high performance setting? I certainly have it on my puny xps 13

3. factory OS location on the single drive

 

I would follow what I said for #4.

 

Alienware doesn't even list that intel gpu's driver on their support page, only the gtx driver..................

 

I downloaded and installed the newest intel gpu driver. I now have the intel control panel on my desktop, but does nothing when opened?

 

I going to say something inside the software part of the laptop screwed up.
Were you able to install the Dell Nvidia driver?

 

Yea, Alienware has the Nvidia driver on their page yet no intel representation (how amateur; rep said "well it just came out"). I cannot open either cards control panel after using multiple uninstall/reinstall efforts. The rep then wanted to do an alien respawn, but it was a no go without a usb boot drive. they acted as if this wasn't usually needed. The real mind melting question is why aren't usb boot drives included with the laptop, as it no longer has a disk drive. That is either ineptitude or simply them being cheap as f**k. I can use the laptop for everything, but its primary benefit of gaming. What a disappointment,................................

 

I would love an explanation from our resident Alienware rep........................

 

Can you not reset windows?

 

not without a boot drive (refresh nor system restore. This disaster became even more maddening. While switching hard drives (back to oem) for further troubleshooting, the cheap plastic service door broke in one of the corners. Will Dell just overnight me a replacement if I lean on them? This has been a horrible day...............

 

You should be able to create a usb backup of your system through the alienware software

 

Wow, so after 10 hours of scripted dialog trees I fixed the issue myself. I had to wipe the drive, and do a clean install (something I've never had to do). I fixed this manufacturer failure, without the help of 3 tech reps. After fixing Dell's screw up, I called to inform them of the broken piece of plastic. Two techs had the audacity to remark, "well that is user error, so deal with it" (paraphrasing). That level of customer service is disturbing, as I would have never had a need to be messing with the internals if I had received a properly functioning product. I eventually, after being transferred 4 times in the span of 45 minutes, got my situation "escalated for tomorrow." I told the supervisor "what is more important to you a five cent piece of plastic or a 2400 returned laptop." Crazy to think that I have spent roughly 8,500 dollars in the last year, only to be treated like a common Wal-Mart customer (A14 - $1500, A18 - $3,000, xps 13 - $1500, A15 - $2400). That's not even mentioning the fact that the laptop wasn't even secured in its box (probably banged around in the Fedex truck; small scratch on the bottom). I haven't even dug into the graphics amp, which has its own series of pitfalls.................

 

sometimes that's the best way is to just do a clean install

 

Zach, I had the same issue of the plastic piece going broke during hdd swap.

Lesson here - don't tell them everything that happened. If you told them that the piece was broken in the first place, they can't say anything but to replace immediately. Called, problem solved in 5 minutes.

 

Yea, I guess honesty isn't always the best policy Sabricaze: any pointers on how to correctly take that panel off, for the future?

 

Reading all these complaints is making me cringe, while hoping my laptop won't arrive with a bajillion issues. I would also like some pointers on correct panel removal. I plan to install a Samsung 850 pro.

 

Relax... the forums has this uncanny way of bringing out peoples frustration in products, services, etc. People who have the AW 15 and don't have problems with it just stay quietly in corner. So there is a tendency for you to read more of the negatives than on the positive.

Well, it has been generally positive for me. I was in the same situation as you when my order was in process. The complaints/issues I see mounting up on this forum led me to ask myself if I made the right choice.

 

I'm in the same range as xxp. I didn't mention the piece breaking because it was, I guess, partly my fault. The computer is very nice and I am not regretting it.

I was in a hurry when I tried to remove the back piece. Instead of the method that I used for AW13 before, I tried somewhat of a brute way, which resulted breakage. The best way I found is using the credit card. Open the screws first (do not unscrew too much! it's VERY weak inside) and use the credit card in the opening (just a little of it inside) and slide it open. Do it slowly.

All issues I have with this is really the stupid Win 8.1 and the back piece, which are all fixable easily. I did not find any other problem... yet. Don't worry about it - you have enough days to test and return if necessary.

 

HOLY BRICKS, my laptop is dispatched today, curretly in china!

Ordered the 9th, payment through bank transfer.
Payment was received the 11th
Yesterday (the 12th) it went into production
Today dispatched. Goddamn I'm so happy for once I get lucky.
Now gotta hope the transport (by ups) goes as smooth.
Does UPS also work during weekends? It has a long way to go. From china to Belgium

 

AW 15 owners, I have a request for you. I would like to ask if someone is willing to weigh his AW 15 (FHD) and giving me the exact numbers ?

I ask this because I dont know why but the numbers of the weight of the AW 15 are so unclear.
one review(notebookcheck) states that is 3kg, dell states even 3.2kg and now I heard from a AW15 owner that his unit weights 2.7kg. Strange.

Thanks in advance because the weight factor is quite important to me.

 

My Alienware 15 just got delivered !!!!

The weight is 3.2 kilos for the FHD version and 3.4 for the 4k version. The power brick weights a bit over 600 grams.