6990m with 920/920xm 740qm 840qm battery life

I am curious, best way to maximize battery life on our laptop with the 6990m and the listed processors?

Also most interested in knowing your battery life with both an xm processor and a 6990m. With the specs on my sig, I run at 1 hour max. Do XM processors drain battery faster?

Thanks

 

I dont think it will be different with some tweaking on the max cpu state
Else u game on battery then....

 

even though I've only considered it but not actually done it as I require storage space over portability you can buy a extra battery to replace the rom device, in your case I know Bele you are running a extra 1TB hdd in place of your rom device. but I think that will be your only realistic option, if you require extra portability.

Genuine Battery Dell Alienware M15X SQU-723 MOBL-M15X6CSECBAT M15X9CEXIBATLK | eBay

 

?! I didn't know you could do that with the rom device. Interesting. Wouldn't do it though. And I see it won't make much difference even on a different processor. Thanks!

 

That is interesting. I get more than 1 hour. Maybe 1.5 hours and the battery has a good 30% wear.
If you want to boost battery life then get an SSD and a more modern GPU.

The 6990M isn't old by any measure. However having also used this card at idle the 7970M is MUCH more power efficient.

I believe with a brand new 9 cell and the roughly 4 cell battery the rom option offers we could already squeeze a good 2.5 hours or longer out of our machines

 

As long as MXM 3 is used by developers then new GPU cards will the only way to increase battery life in the M15x as they become increasingly efficient.

 

Force the 6990m to lowest clock can help(disable powerplay), otherwise it jumps between idle and 2d clock if you have any hardware accelerated software.

 

1. Use Ati Tray Tools to undervolt to 250/100 @ 0.8v. (0.8 is the lowest the driver will go, but the driver defaults to 0.9)

2. Use Throttlestop to lock the CPU at the lowest multi when on battery.

3. Use flashblock in your browser.


My rig gets 3 hours for normal internet usage.

 

Copy that. do you also watch movies with that setup jhonnyflash?

 

Not really, usually use my netbook for that. But I do start/stop the UDK editor a lot to test code, and that maybe shaves 15 min off total.

If you use VLC, undervolting the GPU should have a large effect on battery because most video is directx accelerated.

 

Giving this a shot and see how it plays out. if the results are great, I might flash my bios. just to be perfectly sure, those are 250 core and 100 memory clocks respectively, right?

 

Flashing doesn't work with these cards, the driver just overrides.

 

is this not the same as OCing and undervolting? I flashed mine to undervolt and adjust clock rates to default. they were originally 715/900 core/mem and I was getting shut downs. I then flashed to 680/900 + under volted to 1v from 1.1v.

Different thing?

 

The vBIOS doesn't allow 0.8v as a setting, it just bumps it up to 0.9v. It can only be done manually.

 

Little help. So I got throttle stop and so far, my lowest cpu multiplier is 7 on my 740qm.

re: ATT

I can't seem to get it to work without giving me massive flickers/display issues/distortions. it happens as soon as I install ATT it happens whenever I do anything at all from movies/surfing. I didn't even try gaming because of how distorted it gets. Like.. I move mouse to an area, that area gets torn/distorted/something visually WRONG. I don't know how else to put it. I've tried: reinstalling drivers and using older drivers. Nada.

if it helps: it's a clevo card with a dell bios. currently running 13.1.


any ideas on this? Google has given me only those two solutions. reinstall/use older drivers.

 

I think this has something to do with the catalyst control centre and powerplay. Try removing CCC without removing the graphics drivers.

 

Good suggestion, let us know how that works.

 

Is this even compatible with the m15x ? Or is it only a smart bay option for the area 51 models ?
Alienware m15x SmartBay Walkthrough - YouTube

But would be cool if you could stick this in an m15x. Maybe you can, correct me if i'm wrong.

 

no thats for predell

 

no dice. still flickers after removing CCC and installing ATT. welp?

 

What voltage are you running at, have you modified the BIOS? Are you able to make any changes to ATT before it goes crazy?
If so what voltage are you setting?

 

I'm running at .95 with stock clocks on a bios mod. I've read around the net about modded bioses and that their setups work with a modded bios too.

Simply installing ATT makes the whole distortion/flicker/tear/visually bad/disturbing stuff happen. that being said, I do nothing and try nothing with ATT until just having it makes the screen/display go bad.

 

I had the exact same issue as you with my 6990m and removing CCC fixed it completely. Not sure what else to suggest other than trying stock BIOS with stock voltage?
Despite the screen flickering are you able to go on the overclock tab and set a voltage on ATT?

 

I think I get it.

So far: I am able to set clocks and the flickers/bad display stop as soon as I made various profiles. That's fine and dandy. profiles for battery/2d/3d have been made as well.

Now, about voltages. Do I have to set these manually on each profile switch?

on auto overclocking profiles: say I run sony vegas and render, does that count as a 3d application? I honestly don't know.

Thanks~!



Follow up: yeah max battery I get is 1:30 with either .9 100/150 or .8 100/150. Throttle stop is on of course.

I suppose I won't be using ATT any further as that was all the reason I had for using it in the first place.

Much thanks to all the help and suggestions in here.