[SUCCESSFUL] Alienware 18 + MSI GTX 1070 MXM

DISCLAIMER: This mod is NOT officially supported on the Alienware 18 R1 laptop, and YOU assume all the risk and liability by attempting this on your own laptop. This thread was created merely to show how I completed the MOD on my own laptop successfully.

Also remember: The graphics mod only works with the MSI GTX 1070 8GB MXM card as of now.

The .INF modded driver has been included!

What you will need:
A screwdriver lol.
Unlocked A12 Alienware 18 Bios see here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/release-alienware-18-bios-a12-unlocked.802249/
REV 1.0 OR HIGHER MSI GTX 1070 8GB MXM card (non-gsync variant is preferable)
Good thermal paste (I recommend Arctic Silver 5)
Pliers, preferably small ones to cut heatsink and mxm slot sides
AMD 100W GPU Heatsink, this will NOT work with the nvidia 75w or 100w one, explained later.

Go through ALL sections below otherwise your card might not boot!

LAPTOP PREPARATION:​

Spoiler

First you will need to go into your bios and turn on 'SG mode' this will allow the GPU to be used through the iGPU. As everyone knows, the 10 series cards do not support LVDS signal (which is what the Alienware 18 is ONLY compatible with as of now) and only output eDP signal, essentially we are enabling optimus, the igpu is being used as the main video card to allow signal to the screen:

THE GPU UPGRADE:​

Spoiler

Here is the MSI GTX 1070 I bought, yours should look very similar to this:


The card will not fit in the laptop MXM 1 slot as of now:


We need to make adjustments to the MXM slot like so, so that the card can actually fit in properly:


As you can see now the card fits in perfectly! It's now time to look at the heatsink:


The heatsink does not fit in the slot due to the 'tab' on the end of the graphics card:



We now need to make adjustments to the heatsink as shown below, this is where the pliers come in handy:
You will need to make more space in the heatsink than shown in the picture below, otherwise you will damage your cards tab!


Your card should now fit into the heatsink like so:




Now that the card fits in the heatsink we need to cover the tab in some electric tape, I had none so I used normal tape which works the same way:


Now for the difficult part, fitting in the gpu into the slot with the heatsink in place:
This took quite some time, you will need to unscrew the heatsink from the gpu and try to push in the gpu into the mxm slot at a high enough angle so it 'slots' into place, this has to be done WITH the tab in the heatsink otherwise it is impossible to put the heatsink on! Therefore both heatsink and gpu fit into place perfectly.
You can screw in the mxm card and heatsink screws. Do the top two screws first otherwise you risk bending the card!


The heatsink comes of the mxm card at a slight angle towards the end, this causes the palmrest to stay slightly up which disappears when the screen is put down. DO NOT WORRY THE CARD IS NOT FLEXING UNDER THE STRESS THE KEYBOARD IS, THIS IS ONE REASON WHY WE USED THE STURDY AMD 100W HEATSINK!!

I WILL BE SORTING OUT THIS PALMREST ISSUE SOON, WATCH THE THREAD FOR MORE DETAILS!

Now it's finally time to boot the laptop! Will it work?:


SUCCESS THE BEAST IS ALIVE!

Check next section for more details on using this heatsink.

WHY THE AMD HEATSINK?​

Spoiler

Well this is because of the ' EXTREME' flex you get when you install the Nvidia 100w or 75w heatsink on the card, this will eventually kill the card, especially the ram chips when heat will crack the solder balls overtime:

Spoiler

The reason the flex happens on the Nvidia heatsink:

The selected part is MUCH smaller on the AMD 100w heatsink which allows the card to sit 'snugly' with the heatsink which allows the MOFSETS to be cooled. With the Nvidia heatsink the mofsets will not be adequately cooled and will result in a burnt out card overtime.

THE DRIVER (.INF) MOD:​

Spoiler

So now that we have the hard work out the way the driver mod is all we have to do, if you try installing Nvidia drivers right now you will be greeted with this:
This is due to the graphics card being incompatible with the Alienware 18, there is NO way Nvidia would allow this installation to happen.

Spoiler

So, to bypass this we need to do an .inf mod you can read more about that here: http://null-bin.blogspot.com/2015/08/how-to-modify-nvidia-notebook-driver.html

I will show a picture of it being done: USE SECTION 18, IT IS THE MOST STABLE FOR DELL OPTIMUS!


Now we need to disable driver signature enforcement, like so:



Now just install the modded inf driver, you will be greeted with this message, click install anyway:


Hopefully you should have a fully functional graphics card at the end of the installation, like so:


Here is a link to the inf modded driver: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1XYen-xsxbGGeq59UK2BfY83WY_MJ67le/view?usp=sharing

THAT'S IT FOR THE DRIVER MOD! BENCHMARKS NEXT!!!

BENCHMARKS:​

Spoiler

So now that the GPU is installed AND the drivers are working fine it's time to test what this GPU can handle, first in 3DMark:


Next is UserBenchMark:


Next is GeekBench 4: ( Does better than an Alienware 17 R4 a stock WOW!)

TEMPS + POWER CONSUMPTION:​

Spoiler

It finally comes down to this, after everything that has been done does the card overheat?
Surprisingly it runs *VERY* cool, much cooler than my expectations at least only reaching a low 66c!:

Power consumption is decent too, it only pulls 112w when benchmarking on userbenchmark and on 3DMark, this will DEFINATELY go up when gaming, I will post more power consumption results soon...

@sicily428 here it is!
@Mr. Fox FYI
@Papusan would probably like this!

Please consider donating as I have literally worked on this project for at least a month now, I am a student and need the funds from somewhere to continue the mods I do!
Here is my paypal link: http://paypal.me/ZeeshanAkhlaq

 

very good job, proud of ya

 

Nice job on the GPU mod. +5 Rep

I also did not know the AW18 BIOS had been unlocked a year ago. That is good news as well.

How hard is it to find AMD heat sinks for the AW18? I've hardly ever seen one (maybe two) with AMD video cards. Are they still available new from Dell Spare Parts?

 

Congrats on this one! But please consider using at least Kryonaut or GC Extreme instead of the hundred years old AS5!

Gesendet von meinem ONEPLUS A5010 mit Tapatalk

 

Basically you can buy the heatsink off eBay, I did and was surprised to find out how well it was compatible with the gtx 1070

 

Power consumption + Temps section are being added right now...

 

Good job. First was the R2 and now the AW 18.

 

Who use AS5 nowadays?

@DaMafiaGamer +rep. And you need your soldering skills with the Alienware At least you can replace your graphics and cpu on this AW without needing this tool Worse with today’s thin and flimsy AW’s.

 

@Papusan Added Geekbench 4 scores, you will be amazed by the stock performance offered by this BEAST of a laptop, destroys BGA throttling crapbooks instantly!

 

Of course. It had a real CPU. Viking 18 and Ranger 17 were the last systems Alienware produced that were worthy of any respect. They were not perfect, but way better than the broken trash they sell now.

 

Congrats! I went through something similar in getting my 1060 to work in my 18, but I had my nvidia heatsink ground down a decent amount so not to crush anything.

@Mr. Fox , im very certain the AW18 fits the same as M18X r1/r2 heatsinks, so you could just use the 100W amd sinks from those I believe?

 

Thanks for sharing!

 

I forgot to mentioned that you should use a dremel to notch out the heat sink where the tab of the card stick out. It looks cleaner. That’s what I did when I had the MSI 1070 installed on my Alienware m18x R2.

 

Would this work with SLI? And if so, would this (SLI or no SLI) be worth it over a P870DM3? I've found one locally with dual M290x's, so heatsinks wouldn't be an issue

 

No

 

I won't be worth it over the p870dm3 but a gtx 1070 sli should be possible in this laptop as power consumption is lower than I expected. It shouldn't even trip the 330w adapter!
If the laptop is cheap enough go for it, if it's only 200-300$ or £ difference save the hassle and go with the clevo.
I'm doing a 4k mod aswell if you are interested.

 

Single card would ~800 for the laptop, ~500 for the card, ~400 for upgrades, Dual cards would be ~1000+ for the cards, and the DM3 would be ~1500 for barebones 1440p 120hz GTX 1080 (1) 780W adapter, 325 for a 6700k delided, and 140 for RAM (all USD) so its a tough decision for me.
Either 1700/2200 for the 18 i7 4930MX 16GB RAM 330W adapter 1070 (sli) or roughly the same for a single 1080 and delided 6700k

 

It's a 6700k well that changes things, can the laptop sli? If it can get the clevo it will last you longer.

 

Plus there is potential for 8700k in that laptop as well if Prema's and Fox's work is made public (dont know if it was or not)

 

Not currently, no.

It can, but I am asking which do you think I should go for?

 

I would lean towards the clevo as you don't need to go through several mods and overclocks to achieve the same performance. Also the clevo will have superior cooling to the alienware.
The alienware looks nice and is solidly built.
I chose the alienware due to its looks and mods I could do on it.

 

Huh, well that stumped me. I think I'm going to lean towards the Clevo then

 

That's good this alienware 'honestly' is one of the best alienwares with the most flaws I have ever seen from Dell. It needs a bios mod before using, needs metal paste and needs better gpu's. Surprisingly power consumption is not an issue as some users mentioned but I will see when I get the two gtx 1070s

 

I might get both, but keep the AW 18 for later, as I managed to find one for 350, but unknown specs

 

Coming from someone that has first hand knowledge, the P870 will stomp it to death. The Viking (18) is very solidly built, but it has performance limitations, power handling restrictions and is not a very reliable product. LVDS is undesirable. 6700K also annihilates the 4930MX and 4940MX processors. M.2/NVMe support is also a no-brainer. If given a choice between the two, P870 would be first choice without any hesitation whatsoever.

 

Believe it or not I don't have a dremel never bought one as we never needed it. I will buy it for future mods though.

 

@DaMafiaGamer , quick question. Can the laptop run in peg mode if you hook up an external monitor using display port output?

I never tried it on the R2 because I never had a external display port screen.

 

Good job! +5rep

 

I got some bad news the alienware beeps 8 times. Obviously this is due to edp and lvds signal mismatch. I would have expected the computer to boot. Damn I guess sli won't work in this machine then. Although the edp mod can still be done.

Does anyone know how to bypass this 8 beep thing and get the computer to boot in PEG? Will removing the lvds connector somehow disable it and allow the signal to go directly to display port?

 

why no SLI?

 

I physically don't think that optimus can support sli, it would consume too much bandwidth and the igpu would not be able to give out that much. If only the igpu was skylake there might have been a possibility.

 

@Rengsey R. H. Jr. I noticed there were more options in the bios such as pci express, igpu etc..

Will one of these 'somehow' allow the alienware to boot with just the dedicated gpu?

If sli doesn't work with this laptop at all I have wasted my time and should have bought the clevo p870dmg. Hopefully I am wrong but it seems to be heading that way.

 

Well, you could try

 

I will have to as I have ordered the two gpu's already...

I just hope that it is possible but realistically I don't know the outcome, I have a feeling it might beep 8 times again lol.

You can hold off on purchasing the alienware until then, your decision though.

 

8 beep means missing internal display on AWs iirc

SLI is incompatible with optimus/igpu. You will need to turn igpu off to run SLI.

There must be some signal in the lvds port wiring that is detected by EC but ignored in igpu mode.

Do you have a schematic?

 

Yes I do, is there a way I can cut that detection wire?
I can link you the schematic, I would have no idea on where to look...

 

Nah, i've decided to buy it because its worth it at that price to keep, and test upgrades

 

Well rip gtx 1070, it was a good run...



Card has no noticeable damage on it either so I'm surprised it's not being detected. One of the mofsets probably blew. Oh well.

Time to get another one I guess.

Edit: the gtx 1070 has been tested in three different laptops, eurocom tornado f5, gt72vr and my other alienware 18. I get the same 'undetected' result, its toast lol.

 

Oven trick?

 

You HAVE to have a heatpipe for the VRMs, I dont know if you had seen loafer's upgrade in the Ranger but his died for EXACTLY the same reason. They have to be actively cooled or the card WILL die.

 

Vrms are fine, I inspected the GPU die closely and found that it was chipped quite badly from one side. I have no idea how that happened, maybe the laptop fell down.

Its certainly not the Vrms that are fried as I personally monitored those temps and I put a FAT thermal strip on all those Vrms which made direct contact with the heatsink keeping the vrms at at least 85c no higher.

The GPU processor is dead. GPU still heats up like it works, hopefully my technician can do a bga die replacement.

Edit: the GPU was always kept under 85c even under extreme loads, there's a reason I picked the 100w amd heatsink. To make sure I didn't have to learn from those experiences.

 

He felt they were fine and his were sitting at 75C, GPU temps were quite good for the duration of the first card. Even with that said it seemed to be consensus in that thread among owners that the VRM temps were quite inaccurate or just untrustworthy. I cant cite why though.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...1-ranger-success.797893/page-19#post-10477590

He hasnt mentioned a dead card since using his altered heatsink design, and didnt mention physical changes of the dead card (like a blown mosfet for ex.) when he sent it for replacement.

 

So did some further investigation on thw GPU, the GPU die is actually chipped and cracked!

As you can see here:



On the bottom left of the die you can see the reflection is slightly different meaning that part of the die has moved and cracked.

 

A new GPU die is about £75 which is worth soldering if you ask me, I know this will be very difficult but it's worth a shot. What do you think @TheReciever?

 

I'd ask @Khenglish instead. I've never used a soldering gun

 

Also another thing, as you know 2 gtx 1070's would not work in this laptop due to lvds. So I was thinking can 2 msi gtx 980 cards work, NOT 'm' variant, the ones that look identical to the gtx 1070 mxm?

Slightly overclocked the gtx 980 will come close to gtx 1070 mxm speeds which is good enough for me.

My question is, does the msi gtx 980 have native support for lvds or is it eDP only like pascal cards? @Khenglish can you give some insight?

 

I remember somebody got the 980DT working in the 17 R1, but I don't know anything else
EDIT: IMHO I believe it would be too much effort to get to running in a 18, you don't have that much headroom, about 110w per card if you OC the CPU

 

They must have put the laptop into sg mode with an unlocked bios. The thing is that the msi gtx 980 doesn't work in the clevo p7xxZM series. The 'zm' series are all lvds and not eDP which makes me think that the gtx 980 only has native support for eDP only. If this is true then I can't do much else expect for putting in a gtx 1080 mxm instead of a 1070 with a customized heatsink mentioned in the p870dm-g fourm.

Therefore, the alienware 18 would only utilize one mxm slot and run of optimus. The only benefit of having an 18'' alienware would be the screen size and literally nothing else.

If anyone knows anything about lvds support with the msi gtx 980 let me know.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...owners-gpu-upgrade-discussion.795236/page-439
https://forum-en.msi.com/index.php?topic=279782.0

The GT80s, where 980DT's could be found, I believe only supports eDP, cannot confirm
but as well,

https://www.ebay.com/itm/122498233515?ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT&fromMakeTrack=true

this, no SLI connector, and needs a custom heatsink, but close in size to reference MSI 1070 MXM and no external power required

 

So it seems just buying a single gtx 1080 module, fitting it in and making a custom heatsink for it is an easier option. Also I am pretty sure the gtx 1080 would be faster in every game and benchmark. Some games have sli scaling issues too, getting the gtx 1080 is the safe bet.