M11XR2 Bios A03 available... Discuss here

On the dell ftp site..

Link

A03 System BIOS Release Notes:
1. Updated the scan codes for FN+F8 and FN+F9 to show OSD volume images (you
need latest OSD to show the images).
2. Fixed issue where FFS protection would not enable after changing hard drive
mode in the BIOS.
3. Fixed K-0 CPU stepping issue where the adapter warning message would not
show if the wrong AC adapter was put on the system.
4. Enhanced fan table for better performance.

Lets start with the battery life/fan table discussions !!!

Edit: Release notes here

Edit2: OSD application A04 here

Not sure why but this OSD is 3 times bigger than A03.. :O

 

Schhhweet.

 

Gonna have to try this out soon

 

Awesome, thanks for that

 

Thanks, updated without any issue/problem.

 

The fan still turns on when the CPU reaches 55 C and off at 45C, so the change is either how it ramps up/down at higher temperatures or something specific to the GPU.

 

I just tested fans too.

Fan is off until:
Core0/1 = 53/56 (same as A01 and A02)

Fan ramps to high speed at:
Core0/1 = 63/66 (I didn't see or test this with A01 or A02)

Fan drops back to normal speed at:
Core0/1 = 61/63

Fan turns off at:
Core0/1 = 43/46 (same as A01 and A02)

Normal speed = 3700rpm
High speed = 4200rpm

So...

I'm not sure I had enough info with previous BIOS versions to tell what has changed. Anyone care to test with A02 to see how it compares?

Could be that they made changes to the fan speed. None of the hw monitors I have are pulling that data. Maybe the new betas of HWiNFO32 has made some progress on that front. ( Yes, HWiNFO32 captures fan speed.)

EDIT: Added RPM and data on high to normal drop in italics

 

awesome finally, downloading!

 

can only find A02 in the dell support site(US) :-/

 

Direct FTP link.

 

well volume interface works great!

 

Sorry for the newbe question, but is the OSD Application A04 posted in post #1 for the R2? If so is it an already updated A03? I installed A03 without problem, was previously on A01 (shipped that way).

Other than A03, I haven't really updated anything else, what else is there that would be beneficial?

Thanks!

 

I wonder if my fan even works, all these questions about fans on the R2. I have always FELT it, but NEVER heard it.
You guys must be hyper hyper sensitive.

 

I generally never notice fan noise on mine. I'm either in an environment where the AC or background noise is such that it masks it, I'm wearing my Shure E5c earphones, or gaming/watching vids/listening to music.

I've also got a slight case of tinitus in my left ear earned from a misspent youth and waaaay too many concerts and live shows.

 

That would be the OSD graphics.

 

Thanks again Slickie, I went ahead and installed it.

 

OSD A04 works on both the M11xR1 and the R2.

 

I have it in both ears due to the same reasons. Ahhh the waste and want of youth. I sleep with an air cleaner to avoid the ring. So, I rarely notice the noise of the fans.
Honestly I am used to the fans of the M17X, which in comparison is like a jet engine starting up when you get both gpu's fans running.
Fans are barely noticable on the M11X R2 unless you really listen for it and push it with a benchmark or game.
On topic - I will be installing A03 tomorrow if all goes well. Will try to test out the temps vs fan rpm's before the upgrade and after A03.

 

Ahh okay thanks for the feedback guys!
I always hear talk of the fan and I can never hear it lol

 

Oh, I hear ya...

If you could test it before flashing that would be great! I see you already know about the HWiNFO32 beta work that Mumak has been doing for us AW folks. Let us know how it goes.

Sure would like to know what "Enhanced fan table for better performance" means...

 

If the changes they've made are to the speed of the fan then it might be that it will be a little louder than before. I'll let the rest of you golden ears gauge whether or not that's the case.

 

battery still at 6hrs to me. no a full test just base on what i see on battery meter. other stuffs need further use to find out

 

fans a little louder and constant

 

Since we know that the upper and lower limits of the hysteresis loop that controls the fan are the same in A03 as they were for previous BIOS versions then the only thing that would be causing fans to stay on longer would be a change in the speeds or the ambient room temperature.

Staying on longer, if it in fact is doing so due to a change in speed, would indicate that they've slowed it down, which would also mean that it should be quieter or at most as loud as it was before. Louder would mean faster which would translate into quicker cooling.

So...

We need someone who is still on A02 or A01 to use the beta of HWiNFO32 and record the rpm values of normal and high speed fan activity.

 

give me the version # and i can im running A01

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/win...s-suggestions-discussions-13.html#post6605594

I think that's the latest version he's released - I was using an older beta from a few weeks ago. Prime95 is what I used for generating some heat. When the fan first actuates the reading might spike a bit at first, but it will settle in on its fixed speed pretty quickly. In order to quickly force the fan to high speed you might want to use your hand to obstruct the exhaust port a bit.

Thanks!

 

Can anyone else confirm that the latest A03 Bios for the R2 indeed makes the fan louder and constant? If true, I would be hesitant to update the bios as I would prefer my laptop not to be any louder. I like that fact that when the GPU is not under load, it's pretty silent...

 

where in the program can i find the fan speed i see the cpu ram and gpu but what is the title for the fan
never used this program before

 

Okay, I tinkered most of the day on this. And the results were a bit inconsistent in the fan rpm to cpu core 0/1 temp ratio. I will list what I have found on the A02 BIOS testing with HWInfo32 Beta. I used Slickie's format to be as consistent as possible:

Fan off state until temps reach:
Core0/1: = 54/56, 52/55, 51/56, 55/55, 52/56

Fan high speed temp:
Core0/1 = 59/59(4300rpm), 58,57 (4000rpm), 61/57(4200rpm)

Fan Drops to normal speed:
Core0/1 = 47/51, 47/49, 47/51, 54/54, 52/53

Fan Turns off when reaching temp:
Core 0/1 = 43/44, 42/44, 43/43, 42/43, 42/43 ---->most consistent #'s

Normal Fan speed = 3700rpm
High Fan speed = 4000-4300rpm

The anomolies: Core0/1 temps 64/64 fan speed 3700rpm
Core0/1 temps 63/64 fan speed 3700rpm
Core0/1 temps 64/65 fan speed 3700rpm

I tried shutting off HWInfo32 Beta and re-opening to make sure that fan speed reading wasn't stuck. But even with my bad ears; I didn't hear it spin up. It makes little sense that the highest temps brought about no higher fan speeds. None of the numbers are terribly off base but only a few were consistent enough to make a good average.
One other thing to note was that my highest rpm was 6300rpm. It was obtained when temps sharply increased using a benchmark. It fell back down to 4300rpm within a second. Hope I helped.

It is listed underneath M11x EC. There will be Temp 1 - Temp4 then CPU with a tiny pic of a fan in front of it, the values have rpm after them.

 

Have done the A03 bios upgrade, mainly to correct the issue with no OSD for volume changes. It also corrected an issue I was having with Media Player Classic where the volume hotkeys controlled its internal volume control instead of system volume but now there is a whole new issue where if MPC is full screen it will restore to window if i change the volume, boo! Also, does anyone if it is possible to change the position of the OSD instead of slap bang in the middle of the screen?

EDIT: Just booted CoH, old game i know, whenever i change the volume and the OSD comes up the game pauses , arggh! Going to try something newer now...

EDIT 2: BF Bad Company 2, volume OSD switches window by bringing OSD to front, drops out of full screen and goes to windowed view, pretty awful.

EDIT 3: Call of Duty MW 2, osd minimises full screen, doesn't appear to pause and you're dead by the time you can restore, OSD update rating revised to utterly worthless. Is there something wrong with my laptop here?

 

Until it's fixed, you could try 3rvx. Here's a little blurb about it 3RVX Brings a Mac-Like On Screen Volume Indicator to Windows. It is very lightweight, has different skins available, and has very nice configuration options, the most important one for you being that you can have it not show when anything is fullscreen (so that it doesn't show up while playing a game), as shown in here: http://www.addictivetips.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/3RVXDisplaySettings.png. From that picture, you can also see that you can choose where it displays on the screen (and which screen, if you use multiple displays). It picks up the fn-f# shortcuts without the Alienware programs installed, so there's no setup necessary, though it does have a page in the config to set up hotkeys if you'd like to change them.

 

That's not good news. MPC-HC is my video player of choice. I refuse to use anything else. Guess I'll be joining you in trying to find a way to fix this starting tonight.

On another note, I've already started preliminary work on creating new OSD graphics for the M11x. The ones that AW have provided are embarrassingly horrid.

 

Thanks, infernia.

I think it's safe to say that some amount of variance is going to be seen due to the sensors being polled at an interval rather than real-time. Also the beta is rather quirky when sensor data is being displayed. At least the earlier beta I used is.

It does appear that high speed was somewhat wonky on A02/01. Those anomalies you recorded would indicate that the system wasn't consistently ramping up the fan when it should have. If that's true then I think it's very likely that heat build-up and throttling might be what they were aiming to fix.

The threshold for dropping back down to normal speed also looks strange. When you tested for that were you dropping the CPU load completely? When I tested A03 I tired dropping off 1 worker process at a time to see if temps would drop in a more controlled manner. That didn't seem to work very well as one core would always remain above the threshold and the fan would stay at high speed. The precipitous drop in CPU load has a corresponding dive in temps which could cause HWiNFO32 to miss actual temperature reading as it plummets.

Anyway, it would be nice is someone else did tests with A02/1 to see if there really was something consistently squirrely going on with the normal to high threshold. I'll run a more thorough round of tests tomorrow on A03 to see if it's as consistent as the preliminary tests indicate.

EDIT: FYI, I was visually watching the fan go from off to on with the notebook standing on its side. For tracking the normal to high transition I used my GF's stethoscope. Otherwise my 39 year old ears might have missed it.

 

How does 3rvx effect the dell osd I have just installed? Do I have to uninstall the dell osd first? I used to have a thinkpad x31, '05 vintage, and that could overlay the volume level over full screen rocking a 16mb ATI Mobility Radeon without too much trouble (and made a handy beep too). I don't mind it showing it should just not interfere, is that too much to ask?

 

Now that you mention it, I wasn't 'watching' as closely as you as far as the jump from normal to high speed. I could try this again tomorrow night when I get home and see if I can be even more accurate by visually detecting the change.
As you mentioned the drop from high to normal was a bit odd, but there was a noticable decibel change and keeping a close eye on the numbers helped. I didn't drop the worker processes all at once either. I was thinking it may be the polling rate of the monitoring software. I also kept my hand near the vent and could feel the increase or decrease. Weird but effective. Still not as accurate as your method with the stethoscope. I may have one of those somewhere in the first aid kit. Hmmm
I was very worried about those high temps and no fan acceleration so I quit testing to cool it off for a bit. I even tried a reboot but it would seem that for some reason the acceleration of the fan wasn't consistent.
To be absolutely consistent, let me know exactly what software you are testing with and I'll try again tomorrow. I'm in no hurry to flash the BIOS to A03.
Need more numbers from other users to make any real determinations. Glad to be of help.

 

I have no idea, as I don't have the Alienware programs installed, sorry. I figured somewhere in the Alienware programs you could turn off the sound display and then use 3rvx.

 

temps taken with HWMonitor. Stress test: Folding@home SMP client and GPU client.

AO1/AO2:

CPU: 79/80 C
GPU: 65 C

AO3:

CPU: 75/76 C
GPU: 65 C

 

WRU settings to change memory speed & latencies.=)

 

I'm not having any problems with Media Player Classic - Homecinema. The volume hotkeys (up arrow/down arrow) work without causing the window to restore down from full screen. Are you running v1.3.1249.0 or newer? I'm running v1.3.1264.0.

 

Running A03 now and also switched to MSI Afterburner for OCing the GPU.
I am finding my M11x is much more stable and I have been able to up the OC from 160 to 164 (166 still BSODs).

CPU @164
GPU @550/1320, 875
258.96 nvidia drivers

 

hmm, just to say, I restarted my laptop and the OCD volume level issue is fixed. I had restarted after installation then I had a stack of issues, today the issue is gone, OSD appears in windowed mode and does not appear in full screen mode, so I revise this part of the update to moderately useful.

 

noticing better battery life while watching divX movies... use to only get 3 hours now im getting close to 3.5 hours. the machine is a bit hotter but the fan is less annoying while trying to watch a movie.

 

Just updated but still don't have an on screen display for volume..

 

gotta update both

 

Go here : Drivers & Downloads

And get the OSD Alienware Apllication driver dated 8/19/2010 and then the on screen volume should work.

 

Does anyone have an opinion whether the Alienware A03 / OSD is better, or whether the 3RVX app is better for on-screen volume?

 

Since updating to A03 from A02 my machine freezes everytime I wake it up from sleep!!! sometimes crashing out all together so I have to hard resart
Anyone else getting this? Anyone know of a fix please?

 

had to reinstall the bluetooth driver any one had the same prob?

 

Sleep is working for me with A03.

Bluetooth still works.

 

Must be something else, bugger.