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Man, today I tried to put in the card. I got all the way to applying the thermal paste to the 7970m when I found out that upgradeyourlaptop: AMD Radeon HD7970M (WimbledonXT) MXM 3.0b 2GB GDDR5 - Upgrade Kit for Alienware | eBay

DID NOT GIVE ME THE X-BRACKETS! They gave me the damn 6 screws, the CD, the graphic card, thermal paste, and even the thermal pads but they FORGOT THE DAMN BRACKETS. I emailed them but I doubt their going to send me the bracket without a whole ton of fuss. Where can I get the specific x bracket for the M15x with 7970m? I tried a random computer shop but they don't have it. I live in Canada.

Thanks.

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Sorry please disregard my above post. It seems that the bracket is already attached to the back of the 7970m as shown here in the picture I took or so I am told:

Image codes: SDC10890

Is it okay to just ground myself by planting my feet on the ground when I touch the graphics card? I don't have an anti-static wrist band and all that stuff. Should I be constantly touching metal to discharge myself or something too?

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Is it okay to just ground myself by planting my feet on the ground when I touch the graphics card? I don't have an anti-static wrist band and all that stuff. Should I be constantly touching metal to discharge myself or something too?

Actually this won't really help, but most people don't use ESD protection anyway... so just go ahead.

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Ok thanks, I am also wondering how do I take off the link washers that are locking the 4 screws on the heat sink that goes with the nvidia 460m so I can replace them with the new 4 screws I was provided that goes with the 7970m? What tools do I use? Do I put the washers onto the new screws after?

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Use tweezers to pull them off the screws. If this doesn't work, then push it off. Just make sure to catch them, they're easy to fly off to space :D Lost some of them myself.

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Okay I got it installed, running it right now. I got to install the latest driver now. Also the fan of my M15x is going at full blast ever since I turned it on after I installed the 7970m. Is that temporarily? If not, how do I fix it? It is very very loud. I ran GPU-Z to try and check my gpu temperature but it doesn't tell me anymore. Thanks.

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Yes, the Clevo card messes up the fan control. Use HWinfo64, it allows you to set up a custom fan profile for automatic fan control, it works flawlessly. Just configure it to automatically start on boot and you're set. You can find more information here: http://forum.techinferno.com/hwinfo32-64-discussion/65-alienware-fan-control.html

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Okay I got everything working, even the fans. Not sure if I should keep posting on this thread, but I bench marked with 3DMark06 and got this: AMD Radeon HD 7970M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-940 Processor,Alienware score: 14176 3DMarks

I looked at other people's scores and they seem to have it higher. Did I do something wrong? What should I do to make it better? I am not an expert, but I am pretty sure the bigger the number, the better. I still can't even play Starcraft at all ultra settings, let alone on extreme settings...

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Hey I think I figured out why my gpu is not running at what its supposed to be running at.

I have the 150W ac adapter that came with the M15x when i bought it from dell. I think I need the 240W ac adapter? Will that be enough even for overclocking? I have i7 940xm. I also have this usb charged fan I got from NCIX that connects to my Alienware M15x.

Dell Alienware M15x 19.5V 12.3A 240W Slim AC Power Adapter Supply Cord/Charger | eBay

Does that look right?

Also do I need to change any parts inside my m15x for the 240W? Or I can just buy that adapter and my computer can use the 240W? I was cruising Google and I saw your name in other forums saying something about M15x can only draw up to 180W????

Thanks for all your help, I know your probably annoyed.

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the PSU has nothing to do with the power consumption. Even if you just have the 150w, it should work fine. It reaches the limits of the power supply and gets pretty hot but still works fine. I've also got the 940xm with the 7970m and no problems at all now since the backplate mod^^

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You can use it just like that

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S3 using Tapatalk 2

Hey thanks for the reply. I was looking at this:

Dell Alienware M15x 19.5V 12.3A 240W Slim AC Power Adapter Supply Cord/Charger | eBay

does that look right? Just plug that bad boy in and my M15x will be able to draw 240W into itself?

Jahnsinn said the PSU has nothing to do with my 7970m not being able to function at 100%. Do you disagree with that? I'm not going to buy the 240W adapter if he is right. No point.

I would however like to figure out what the problem is.

Thanks.

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Hey thanks for the reply. I was looking at this:

Dell Alienware M15x 19.5V 12.3A 240W Slim AC Power Adapter Supply Cord/Charger | eBay

does that look right? Just plug that bad boy in and my M15x will be able to draw 240W into itself?

Jahnsinn said the PSU has nothing to do with my 7970m not being able to function at 100%. Do you disagree with that? I'm not going to buy the 240W adapter if he is right. No point.

I would however like to figure out what the problem is.

Thanks.

Yeah it looks right. The 7970M + XM cpu OCed can draw lots of power, if the PSU is not able to provide that power, then it will crash. A smaller PSU won't prevent the GPU card from working properly, you just won't be able to push GPU and CPU to the max.

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Yeah it looks right. The 7970M + XM cpu OCed can draw lots of power, if the PSU is not able to provide that power, then it will crash. A smaller PSU won't prevent the GPU card from working properly, you just won't be able to push GPU and CPU to the max.

That's right. The system would crash without any BSOD or notice, the laptop would just turn off. Also the system would take the missing power from battery.

So let's assume. He didn't overclock his CPU, it's on stock, his battery is on 100% and most important he doesn't have any shutdowns or BSODs. That means his PSU is still able to deliver all the power it needs. I guess it's coming from the non-overclocked/throttlestopped CPU.

@MerlinNg : I will continue PMing you as soon as you're online to get you into throttlestop. won't be that difficult ;)

also: just in case you wanna buy a more powerful PSU, check amazon. It's about a third cheaper than eBay ;) ~41$

edit: also his card must actually get enough power because he can play BF3 and others on full details.

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ok guys I just got my used m15x from ebay it comes with 4GB RAM, core i7 740qm and AMD 5850m. I am expecting my Core I7 940xm to arrive on friday and my 7970m from Dell by monday. Will this setup work with the 150W? Also I purchased the backplate for the card from Dell will it work or do I need screws for that one too?

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There's a picture in this thread, see "The backplate problem part 2".

Basically you need to slightly shorten the 'posts' with the threads which are holding the screws once the heatsink is mounted.

Thanks, I got a call and I will be getting both the card and CPU today. I ran Unigine Heaven, 3dmark11 and 3dmarkvantage so as soon as I replace the parts I'll be benching again to compare results.

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I have a little bit of a problem.. laptop will shutdown as soon as GPU reaches 84 degrees C. I tried grinding the backplate posts but I see they are still considerably longer than backplate for 5850m. would the backplate for 5850m work or is there somewhere to get a backplate that doesn't need to be modified?

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No, the 5850m backplate won't work, you need the bigger one. Grind them a bit more, a metal file will do. But do it in a different room than in which your system is, cause of the metal dust...

Also you might to slightly mod one of the heatpipes, aka 'hammer mod' :D cause one of the pipes might touch a coil and lead to bad contact on the die... you can easily check with thermal paste whether the contact is good or not.

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I think I was able to fix it I grinded the backplate a little bit more and reapplied thermal paste, I was able to run Unigine Heaven, 3DMARK11 and 3DMARKvantage and the top temperature I got was 78°C in unigine heaven no shutdowns so far I will keep testing a bit and run some games if someone wants to check scores let me know I'd actually like to compare.

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