M15x & 6970M / 6990M - What you need to know - upgrading, problems, solutions

Hey slv7, I've been reading your posts about modding the m25x with the 6970m and they've been really helpful. I recently ordered a 940xm and ATI 6970m for my stock m15x with a 5730m and i3 370 at 2.4ghz. Is there anything I need for the upgrade processs besides thermal paste? Should I get pads? Does my 5730 come with a heatsink? Will my current processor heatsink work with the 940xm? Thanks

 

You've got pretty much all you need. Some stuff for cleaning the CPU and GPU heatsink will come in handy, but some cheap rubbing alcohol will do.
Your pads should still be fine and your current heatsinks are ok as well, there aren't different heatsink for the M15x.

 

Thanks a bunch man! What do you recommend for a program to monitor heat production for the 6970m and do you recommend some external fans to keep my m15x cool? I have a cooling pad and separate fan blowing on the back of my laptop.

 

I don't have a cooling pad, I just slightly lift the back of my system to improve the airflow.
HWiNFO64 will do for monitoring the temps.

 

Ok thanks! one last question, will this setup run skyrim on ultra and bf 3 high to ultra? I have 6gbs of ram

 

BF3 will work fine on high to ultra @1080p (just take it easy with AA), no idea about skyrim.

 

Ok thanks man you really helped!!!

 

hello svl7 i saw all of your post and you currently using m15x with amd 6990m i am just asking if is it really working perfectly with m15x and i want to know if i pair up with my m15x i7 740q it will work well with 6990m please answer thanks men

 

For me it's working perfectly. If I start with crazy overclocks it gets too hot after a while, but stock clocks is fine. Should work as well with the 740QM, don't know whether it will bottleneck some games...

 

so here is something weird that happens even after modding my retention bracket. my idle temp goes up over time. it will start up at 45 and now its been about an hour later and my temp is at 53. this happening to anyone else?

 

Is this link real and what are your temps with a 6990m. To me the card looks really good and I am considering getting the card. New Alienware Dell RDRGR 2GB ATI AMD 6990M BACKPLATE INCLUDED, M18X, M17x, M15x | eBay
Does that one work and would a gtx 580m work in the 15x

 

thanks svl7 another question? ATI Mobility Radeon? HD 6990m GPU MXM 3.0 Type B | eBay is this the one that i have to buy?? is easy to remove the backplate?? and what is the best can i use that backplate or the old plate with my gtx 260m? thanks in advance

 

That card has been up on eBay for sale for about 4 months. Nobody has bought it because the guy is asking crazy money!

 

could a first-timer be able to upgrade the laptop to the new video card

 

thanks svl7 another question? ATI Mobility Radeon? HD 6990m GPU MXM 3.0 Type B | eBay is this the one that i have to buy?? is easy to remove the backplate?? and what is the best can i use that backplate or the old plate with my gtx 260m? thanks in advance

 

@kaitokid1412
sounds like the right one, not sure what brand so fans may need hwinfo to work. As for the backplate, it is a little annoying to pry off. Mine was stuck with some strong double sided tape. in fact it was so strong i bent the original xplate.
I recommend using a plastic chisel if you can find one, they're usually part of a cheap electronics repair kit and they're perfect for jobs like this.

@ultimatebeast
check out the service manual, it's quite handy.
best thing about the m15x is that there's no tricks to get stuff out. no secret clamps and catches which will break like most laptops have.
the only problem i foresee is the front panel with the touch sensitive. once that is off, it's just a matter of unscrewing stuff.

 

How do I get the front clamp off of the M15x

 

thanks xeroxide godbless

 

hello hel20eS it seems your alienware m15x with 6670m its working perfectly i have alienware m15x i7 740qm and we're look the same processor and can you help me about? that you are already an experience about upgrading your m15x im going to get 6990m i hope im not gonna get some problems do you think ati 6990m will work perfectly on my m15x? i am just wanna make sure please help

 

Ok I need help big time. I installed my i7 940xm processor tonight, put thermal paste on it, and some on the backplate of the heatsink and my computer turns on for a splitsecond, then turns off. I can hear the fan start and then turn off, even the keyboard lights turn on for a split second then go off. Something is wrong, my computer won't even start even though I can hear the power starting and stopping. I switched my original i3 370 to my new i7 940xm, is it a different chipset or something? What is wrong? Thanks.

 

Nevermind, fixed my processor issue. Now just having one more minor issue. Trying to run skyrim and it detected low settings even though I ran it at medium with my old processor. Is my 940xm too fast for my puny ATI mobility 5730m GPU? I have a 6970m coming in the mail so if that is the case, that is ok but if someone could help me that would be great.

 

I haven't try 6990m in my system, but i guess it should be the same. with my combo, 720 and 6970, i have experience shutdowns during gaming so as the others in the past comments. One of the best ways to stop, or at least play longer is to undervolt the card. i've been using 1v in my card for quite some time, and haven't get any shutdowns in bf3 multiplayer yet (touch wood).

what worries me is that even 6970m i experience some shutdowns, 6990m with a hotter performance will make the laptop shuts down faster.

i'm not going to say don't buy the card, because even with rare occasions of shutdowns, the performance with this card is so much that i forget about the issues. All ultra with aa off, what more can i ask for. (BF3)

to summarise, it will work, will little issues that should be able to be solved later.

 

please do tell, what was the cause of the cpu issue?
to answer your question, your gpu is holding the rest of the system back. in essence a bottleneck. since 3d is heavily dependent upon the gpu, this will suffer the most.

if you could run skyrim on medium before, you can definitely run it on medium now. depending on what is required for higher settings (cpu or gpu power) you may be able to run it higher, but i doubt it. the gpu is the largest factor in game (3d) performace. cpu and ram are obviously still important, but the gpu is prime.

 

Does anyone know if there is a way to change the temperature that the card will shutdown at? I'm currently getting shutdowns are around 80, which seems a bit low..surely I could push the card a bit hotter than that.

 

check your other sensors.
i bet the memio is much higher than 80

 

MemIO is cooler than the Shader sensor.

Here is a log:

Date Time GPU Thermal Diode GPU TS0 (DispIO) GPU TS1 (MemIO) GPU TS2 (Shader) GPU Fan GPU Clock GPU Memory Clock GPU Utilization

17.11.2011 19:34:14 68.0 °C 68.0 °C 69.0 °C 72.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 77.80%
17.11.2011 19:34:17 68.0 °C 68.5 °C 68.5 °C 72.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 77.60%
17.11.2011 19:34:19 69.0 °C 68.5 °C 68.5 °C 73.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 74.80%
17.11.2011 19:34:22 68.0 °C 69.0 °C 69.0 °C 73.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 75.20%
17.11.2011 19:34:25 68.0 °C 68.5 °C 68.0 °C 72.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 72.70%
17.11.2011 19:34:27 68.0 °C 68.5 °C 68.5 °C 72.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 67.90%
17.11.2011 19:34:30 68.0 °C 68.5 °C 68.5 °C 72.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 66.20%
17.11.2011 19:34:33 68.0 °C 69.0 °C 68.5 °C 72.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 65.90%
17.11.2011 19:34:35 68.0 °C 69.0 °C 68.5 °C 72.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 65.70%
17.11.2011 19:34:38 69.0 °C 69.0 °C 69.0 °C 73.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 66.60%
17.11.2011 19:34:40 69.0 °C 69.0 °C 69.0 °C 73.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 67.90%
17.11.2011 19:34:43 69.0 °C 69.5 °C 69.0 °C 73.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 68.00%
17.11.2011 19:34:46 69.0 °C 69.5 °C 69.5 °C 73.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 68.80%
17.11.2011 19:34:48 69.0 °C 69.5 °C 69.0 °C 73.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 71.20%
17.11.2011 19:34:51 69.0 °C 69.5 °C 69.5 °C 73.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 70.80%
17.11.2011 19:34:54 70.0 °C 69.5 °C 69.5 °C 73.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 69.70%
17.11.2011 19:34:56 70.0 °C 69.5 °C 70.0 °C 73.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 69.70%
17.11.2011 19:34:59 69.0 °C 69.5 °C 69.5 °C 73.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 69.40%
17.11.2011 19:35:01 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 74.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 68.60%
17.11.2011 19:35:04 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 69.5 °C 74.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 67.40%
17.11.2011 19:35:07 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 74.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 68.60%
17.11.2011 19:35:09 70.0 °C 70.5 °C 70.0 °C 74.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 69.20%
17.11.2011 19:35:12 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 74.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 67.70%
17.11.2011 19:35:14 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 69.5 °C 74.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 64.90%
17.11.2011 19:35:17 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 74.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 63.20%
17.11.2011 19:35:20 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 73.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 63.50%
17.11.2011 19:35:22 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 70.0 °C 74.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 62.70%
17.11.2011 19:35:25 70.0 °C 70.5 °C 70.5 °C 74.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 62.80%
17.11.2011 19:35:27 70.0 °C 70.5 °C 70.5 °C 74.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 65.60%
17.11.2011 19:35:30 70.0 °C 71.0 °C 71.0 °C 74.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 68.50%
17.11.2011 19:35:33 71.0 °C 71.0 °C 71.0 °C 75.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 68.90%
17.11.2011 19:35:35 71.0 °C 71.0 °C 71.0 °C 74.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 68.00%
17.11.2011 19:35:38 71.0 °C 71.0 °C 71.0 °C 75.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 67.20%
17.11.2011 19:35:40 71.0 °C 71.5 °C 71.5 °C 75.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 68.10%
17.11.2011 19:35:43 71.0 °C 71.0 °C 71.5 °C 75.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 71.80%
17.11.2011 19:35:46 71.0 °C 71.5 °C 71.5 °C 76.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 75.10%
17.11.2011 19:35:48 71.0 °C 71.5 °C 71.5 °C 75.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 74.40%
17.11.2011 19:35:51 72.0 °C 72.0 °C 71.5 °C 75.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 71.70%
17.11.2011 19:35:54 72.0 °C 72.0 °C 72.0 °C 76.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 72.20%
17.11.2011 19:35:56 72.0 °C 72.5 °C 72.5 °C 77.0 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 75.40%
17.11.2011 19:35:59 72.0 °C 71.5 °C 72.5 °C 76.5 °C 54 RPM 680.0 MHz 900.0 MHz 75.40%

That is running BF3 for about 5 minutes before shutdown...highest temp in there is 77 =\

 

try padding other areas yet? i pad the back of the GPU, even the ram hahaha.
well if it works then it's not hurt to try right?

 

Yeah I've got some fujipoly pads on the way, i'll slap em all over once I get them!

Still frustrated by the shutdowns in the high 70s though. Is there actually somewhere you can set the temperature it shutsdown at?

 

don't think there is any,

oh well do you have any double sided tape in your house? the one with foam in between the sticky part. i use it for the rams and for the back of the gpu haha, well temporary till i get my pads shipped.

76 maxed temp when playing bf3. not too bad

 

i'm curious about the gpu utilization, maxing only at around 78%?
mine's hitting 100% a lot of the time. different settings perhaps?

 

Hmm I can't remember what settings that was at, I think it was medium though, hence low utilization.

Repaste and tighten I did last night is helping a bit it seems, still getting shutdowns sometimes though =_=

 

Are the shutdowns bluescreens or does it immediately shut off the system (like *zap* - black screen, no lights)?

 

It is an immediate shutdown. *zap....burrrr* black screen. Then restarts after a second.

 

Ok... weird, and you say the temps look ok when this happens?

Seems like overheating... also check your CPU temps!

Do you happen to have another PSU, just for testing?

 

Yeah the other temps look fine:

Time CPU#0 Core0 CPU#0 Core1 CPU#0 Core2 CPU#0 Core3 Temp 0 Temp 1 Temp 2 Temp 3 Temp 4 Temp 5 GPU Thermal Diode GPU TS0 (DispIO) GPU TS1 (MemIO) GPU TS2 (Shader) GPU Utilization
20:55:55 63.0 °C 61.0 °C 60.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 50.0 °C 51.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 78.0 °C 78.5 °C 81.5 °C 83.5 °C 100.00%
20:55:58 64.0 °C 61.0 °C 58.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 50.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 78.0 °C 78.5 °C 81.0 °C 83.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:00 63.0 °C 62.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 50.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 78.5 °C 81.5 °C 83.5 °C 99.30%
20:56:03 63.0 °C 62.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 50.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 78.0 °C 78.5 °C 82.0 °C 83.5 °C 99.30%
20:56:05 64.0 °C 62.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 50.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 78.5 °C 81.5 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:08 63.0 °C 61.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 50.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 78.0 °C 79.0 °C 81.5 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:10 63.0 °C 62.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 81.5 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:12 63.0 °C 61.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.5 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:15 63.0 °C 62.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 81.5 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:17 64.0 °C 61.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.5 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 99.90%
20:56:20 63.0 °C 61.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 50.0 °C 52.0 °C 56.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 81.5 °C 83.5 °C 99.90%
20:56:22 63.0 °C 61.0 °C 60.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 50.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 99.90%
20:56:25 63.0 °C 61.0 °C 60.0 °C 62.0 °C 77.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 81.5 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:27 63.0 °C 61.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:30 64.0 °C 61.0 °C 59.0 °C 63.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 81.5 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:32 64.0 °C 61.0 °C 60.0 °C 63.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:35 64.0 °C 62.0 °C 59.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.5 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:37 62.0 °C 63.0 °C 60.0 °C 63.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 81.5 °C 84.0 °C 100.00%
20:56:40 64.0 °C 62.0 °C 61.0 °C 63.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.5 °C 81.5 °C 84.0 °C 99.80%
20:56:42 64.0 °C 62.0 °C 58.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 99.80%
20:56:45 64.0 °C 62.0 °C 60.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 44.0 °C 61.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.5 °C 81.5 °C 84.5 °C 100.00%
20:56:47 65.0 °C 62.0 °C 61.0 °C 63.0 °C 77.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 45.0 °C 62.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.0 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 99.30%
20:56:49 64.0 °C 62.0 °C 60.0 °C 62.0 °C 76.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 45.0 °C 62.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.5 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 99.30%
20:56:52 63.0 °C 62.0 °C 60.0 °C 62.0 °C 77.0 °C 51.0 °C 52.0 °C 57.0 °C 45.0 °C 62.0 °C 79.0 °C 79.5 °C 82.0 °C 84.0 °C 99.30%

That is the last minute of the log before the shutdown, BF3 on ultra.

Highest there is 62 for CPU. 77 for Temp 0, I'm not sure what that is though!

84 for GPU is one of the highest temps I've had before shutdown so far, so making some progress I suppose. This was after a repaste and grinding down the stands on the backplate to make the heatsink tighter...maybe I should grind a bit more off to get it even tighter.

I got some fujipoly pads today so I'll try sticking them all over the card and see if it makes and difference.

Also I suppose I might as well repaste the CPU while I'm in there next.

Unfortunately I don't have another PSU on hand I can test. I know another guy at work has a new XPS laptop, I'll check with him next time I see him and see what kind of PSU he has (I do remember it being of similar size to the m15x one)

 

been having an issue lately with my 6990m. every once in awhile from playing bf 3 or saints row 3 the game will just freeze and make a loud noise then ill get the bsod that says something like a clock interrupt not being received on a secondary processor.

any ideas??

 

Do you happen to have your powerplan on "balanced"?

 

naw i got it on performance right now

 

I had this all the time on balanced mode recently, but never on "high performance".

Error ID 2055?

 

no idea bro. it happens quite often so next time it occurs ill get it for sure

 

so the bsod happened again today and this time i got pictures

 

@svl7: No more shutdown since I put the thermal pads on MOFSETS and my powerplan on balanced. Do you think the powerplan "high performance" could be the shutdown's culprit?

 

The powerplan settings are windows settings or some gpu setting?

 

Windows settings

 

What did it say after rebooting? (Error ID?)

No, I don't think so, I always use "high performance", I actually had some serious BSOD issues when I was on "balanced" recently.

 

i cant recall what it said. ill be sure to get it next time tho.

i was playing last night tho and right before i started playing i changed my power plan to balanced and i never got the BSOD. ill check it out right now on high performance and if i get the BSOD ill let you know the error id

 

What are the chances of shutdowns being a PSU issue? I notice the blue ring on my adaptor doesn't go out when I get the shutdowns.

I can get a replacement on relatively cheaply ($50 NZD) but it is a bit to spend on a "maybe"

 

Ok somehow I fixed my resolution errors, but I'm still getting default settings of medium when I ask Skyrim what to default my game on. With my old 5730m I was getting High, and with my new 6970m It's dropping it?!?!?! Get this part: When I set it on ultra I run the game great, so what on earth is going on?

 

I'm getting roughly 15-20 FPS on ultra, at 1080p. Something must be up? I ran it at high with some AA and got roughly the same FPS and with my 6970m, I'm going down? My card is showing up as a 6900M series, not a 6970M, maybe that could be the problem?

 

Mine shows up as 6900 series as well, so I don't think you need to worry about that.

But you should be getting better FPS than that is Skyrim.

High performance power plan?
Powerplay enabled?
Stealth mode?
Latest drivers? 11.11