Alienware m15x forgoten????!!!

Hi guys i am here because i am unable to play modern games in my 2 year old 3000$ m15x, the reason is because i cannot update my drivers past 186.81 and certain new games require updated drivers. Alienware has to make a costume version of the drivers so they can work on this laptop. I remeber when i bought my m15x It said on the sales page that alienware would keep updating this laptop trough myhive, but from the looks of it nothing has been done for almost a year now on the my hive page the only support i had was some bios updates of a bad bios in the first place. Just for comparison my girlfriends 200$ netbook gets updated drivers regularly. I am very disapointed with this situation you would think that a enthusiat gaming company would a least give you updated grafics drivers
What do you guys think we can do about this???

 

check out the legacy thread maybe some of the owners there have newer drivers.

 

JUST download the latest nvidia drivers from the website, they have a interface where you input your GFX card and it will tell you the newest driver that is compatible with it. that is easier than relying on AW to update a system that is not being supported anymore.

 

Azuriak, what games are you having problems with?

I'm currently using 186.82, and haven't had any problems with any modern games.

You are right though, the m15x will not accept driver versions 190 and up because of compatibility issues with switchable graphics.

I don't think Alienware will be updating drivers and such for this model since this was released before Dell took over AW.

 

nothing more than a overpriced dell!

 

That was one of the last pre-Dell engineered Alienware models, genius. Congratulations on the ban.


Back on topic:
I checked Dell's support site, just in case they had changed things around & had added drivers for "area 51" models. No luck. It looks like the myhive page, the nvidia site or someone here are your only options. Sorry.

 

If you need drivers and such, here is a list by Oceanus

http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware/342331-m15x-mini-myhive.html

 

so im getting prompted at the beginning of metro 2033 that i have outdated drivers and should update, but ok i press entre continue loading and the usualy freezes on me.

 

yeah cha all thoes drivers are listed on myhive but thanks anyway. what i realy would like to see is alienware modding a recente nvidia driver so i can work on the m15x

 

Personally, I think if you want to install the 190's Nvidia drivers, you should anyways. You can always boot up into integrated graphics mode with the right click button.
This is what I'm doing with my ATI card since the newest drivers 10.6 Catalyst don't support Fn+F7.

 

Yeah and what good does it make having the latest driveres but staying on integrated grafics. any way i tried installing the 190´s months ago and would not boot up i woul get blue screen and after 2 bad boot ups it would automaticly switch to intergrated, then i had to unistall the drivers so i could actually use my 8800 gtx. every time i would stay stuck to the integrated could not switch so as a last hope i bashed buttons until a was able to switch back to dedicated. so i am only updating drivers if alienware does a m15x compatible version....

 

I never had this problem of being stuck on integrated graphics. If you want to revert to your dedicated card, then you have to shutdown the laptop fully. Just restarting it will not bring it back.

 

Azuriak, I am so in agreement with you.

This is total crap that we payed mega dollars for a laptp and Alienware can't even update the drivers as promised for their number one client, which is gamers. The only saving grace is our company was set to buy 1000 replacement Dells for our tracking centers, and I talked the IT department into going with Lennovo's becasue of Dell's horrible support, so in the end I got some small justice for the crap I have had to endure for the past two years with this laptop.

My laptop also does not always switch as its supposed to when I power down and press the right mouse key between graphic cards so I am reluctant to try using the 190+series drivers. They also don't all work properly with our HDMI out.

 

Couldn't agree more. Not just drivers either, but parts as well. Mine is only 18 months old, but shipped with that crappy 9800m GT which just died (didn't know it at the time how problematic these cards are). Called Alienware/Dell and they had absolutely no replacement video cards to purchase (they told me to go try Ebay). Previously, I had a Dell Inspiron 8100 which ran well for over six years. After this experience (broken promises, lack of any real support), I would be hard pressed to purchase anything from Alienware/Dell in the future.

 

For everyone who's GPUs have crapped up on them, try and get a 3870 as a replacement. Some forum members have done so successfully here.

I have to agree though that the build quality of the area 51 m15x is less than desirable. It's actually my only issue with the machine

I've had my m15x with 8800m gtx for over 2 years now, and still haven't had any issues with it whatsoever.

Oh and dhoang, I don't think installing the latest Nvidia drivers would work with the 8800m gtx/ 9800m gt. Believe me, I've tried Currently using 186.82, and it hasn't given me any problems with the games I play. ( Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Fallout, Oblivion, L4D etc )

 

Cha, where did you find your 186.82 driver? I downloaded one and after installation all I got was BSOD. I am back to the 186.03 off the Alienware site.

Thanks.

 

I regret buying my m15x. It seemed like a badly-designed laptop made by a teenager fresh from CAD design class. For a gaming laptop, it had a really crappy BIOS, and too many gimmicky but faulty features. Alienware also dropped the ball on supporting it as evidenced by a lack of drivers for the video cards, or how crappy the Windows 7 support is. What made it worse was that there were a lot of positive reviews on sites like this at the time that didn't even mention the finicky touch controls or the bad build quality. By comparison, I had an older Dell XPS M170 from 2005 that worked flawlessly until the day I sold it. It was a lot better-designed and I never had to fight with it in order to get it to work.

 

I got 186.82 from NVIDIA & Laptop News | Latest NVIDIA drivers and related news | laptopvideo2go.com ,it gives the same performance as 186.81, but with proper downclocking on idle.

If you have problems getting it, you can always try 186.81 from Nvidia's site.

I've been running mine on Vista 32 Bit since the day I bought it. I've tried all three different BIOS's and can recommend BIOS x32. Only get x36 if you have the extreme processor or a 9800m gt instead of the 8800m gtx.

 

The 186.82 was my driver of choice for quite some time with the M17x (280M GTX SLI). Its a very solid driver considering it originated from Microsoft's Win Update site the one positive to the win update nature of this driver is the huge list of compatible cards listed in the INFs (that is, unless you go with the modded INF from LV2Go).

In addition to grabbing it from LV2Go, you can also find it here:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/gam...notebooks-supported-geforce-300m-support.html

 

The design changes happening with aw started to take shape even before dell took them over. If I remember correctly the m9750 is the last true aw that didnt have anyones hands on it. As far as video drivers go its not aw fault or dells but lies with nvidia. For the most part there are no significant differences between the desktop and mobile gpu's as is evident by being able to use the desktop drivers on a mobile system. They seem tweaked to handle alternate power modes but that is about it. Nvidia has really dropped the ball. The latest drivers as of me writing this are 258.69 I believe and am running them no problem with my 7950gtx sli and interesting to note is the fact that 6xxx series gpu and above on the desktop are fully supported but the mobile gpus have taken a back seat for support. SO if you gotta blame anyone blame nvidia.

 

Is there any way to update drivers past 186.82 at all?

I rarely use the integrated graphics, and would not mind losing said functionality with a driver update.

My Area 51 m15x runs most current games very well, but I fear for what will happen in the future.

 

if you must upgrade you can do it thru laptopvideo2go.com If you go into device manager in windows and then your video card you will need the device id that is listed. the part your interested in is a 4 digit code PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_0297&SUBSYS_2052161F&REV_A1 the code is the 0297. you will have to right click in device manager on your card then click on properties. go to the details tab. There will be a drop down menu. click it and select the second option down. It should have hardware id. You can post it up hear and have us take a look or check out laptopvideo2go for the latest driver for your card. Be aware that some cards just by design will not be listed in the list but will be compatible with the most recent drivers but may not work well as they me lack older optimizations that were removed.

 

Hello Nelson,

i tried what you said my DEV: 060C and SUBSYS: 0770152D

what from what laptop2go the 258.96, 258.69, 197.44, ... Should work.

But every-time i try one of that i get a BSOD on the login screen ( Windows 7 64bits).

The problem is the integrated intel card (Alienware m15x 8800m Gtx + integrated intel).

Do you know any solution for this? Disable integrated?

Thanks.

 

Hi,

I have exactly the same problem.

It seems it is not possible to install any driver past the 186.81, otherwise one gets a BSOD during Win7-64 start up.

A working driver update would be welcome ! Has anybody found a way to update it ?

 

All Area 51 m15x have this problem it would be nice if we could disable the intel graphics and just use the dedicated card as i never use use the intel card anyone have an idea as to how to do this

 

Yeah, same problem here...I really wish I could upgrade...it's my only hope of maybe being able to get metro 2033 running...really a shame $3K and it's already a dinosaur...

 

Well first the video card dies after only 18 months and then the display craps out. In the immortal words of Bill Parcells, there is no use throwing good money after bad. This m15x machine is by far the worst money I have ever spent in my life. I am now the happy owner of a just as capable and significantly cheaper ASUS G51JX-X5 and I am not looking back. Best of luck folks, I'm giving up on this terrible laptop.