Jump to content

[Guide] M15x with AMD 6970m / 6990m - everything you need to know


svl7

Recommended Posts

Ok, well you can give it a try with the thermal pads and so on, I didn't cover all the mosfets (that's what he means with "small black boxes"), only the coils and the VRAM modules are covered in my system.

About the PSU: Yes, the original M15x PSU can usually easily provide more than 150W, about 180W seems right, I only used a kill-a-watt for measuring this, so it's not that accurate.

I'd say try to return / exchange it. You can find cheap, new M17x 240W PSUs on ebay (model PA-9E).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So, I moved a pad to some black boxes with a kind of power source label above it. It really helped actually. I can't play at stock volt/clock but it's a start (no reboot in bf3).

I will wait for the psu. I read in an other thread that the 240W psu maybe was not the solution. Actually, it was you talking with @Strigae on the 6970 mxm card thread

BTW, it appears the consumption of the ram is 1.9W for 4Gb dd3. It's not that much. And my dd drains 2.3W when R/W. So, how can it be a power issue?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hey,

As, I don't understand why some people hah problems and others can overclock easily. I have some question to ask about your system.

-what's the bios version of your mb ? I'm currently at A09

-In cpuz, section mb, I have :

Chipset Rev 11

Southbridge Rev 05

-When did you buy your m15x ? I got mine in december 2009

- What was your temps in a game like bf3 at stock? On mine, it's 75 for gpu/shader and 81 for mem

I have also a remark: I usually play through the hdmi on a larger screen. And I have a lot more reboot when I'm in 1920/1080. That's bring me to this :

As your cpu is more powerful than mine, is it relevent to say that yours drains less power when doing the same job ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Been without internet this week, thus the late response...

I have the same revision numbers, bought mine in Novemeber 2009. Gaming temps get up to 80-85°C, depending on the ambient temps. I always play on 1080p. I have no idea why your system is crashing, my CPU drains more power than yours, even at stock settings.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...
  • 2 weeks later...

Hey Slv7, I got my 6970m and am currently attempting to install it but I'm having problems with the screws in the X plate. I read your warning and looked at pictures, but still cannot figure out how to do it exactly. I didn't contact my seller about the X plate, so what should I do?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, just be careful, don't use a metal tool since you're likely to kill some conducting paths when you accidentally scratch the PCB. I'd recommend using a hair dryer or similar to warm up the plate a bit, this will loosen the glue a bit and then you should be able to remove it carefully with your hands or a plastic tool.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, it's weird !

Here is 2 other logs. The first is on Dead Island. You can notice that the gpu load is not at 100% and I had a crash after 15min.

The second is on kombustor again just to see if the sensors was correct. And it is ! And the gpu load is well at 100% with higher temp in 30 sec.

So what's happening?

[ATTACH]2435[/ATTACH]

[ATTACH]2436[/ATTACH]

I tried different voltage from 0.9 to 1.1v(cannot go further). At stock clock, it crashed after 5-20min in games. If I underclock the card (600/800 for example), the system became more stable.

I'm using ATI tray tools to adjust the vcore and the clock.

edit: I'm using the driver from your first post on this thread with the audio driver from the m17x driver and I was unable to install a more recent driver from amd (hardware no detected or something like that)

fully stable here on M18x with 6970m crossfire at 822core 1100mem and 1.051volts via RBE vbios flash... any lower... 1.05 even games wont launch but at 1.051v no issues so far in anything i tried and seeing much better temps! Want pics?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Hi guys!

Well this is a very informative post. I have been looking for a new video card myself for my m15x and am wondering what your advice would be.

The first choice for me is the Dell made 6990m. Only because it sounds like the dell cards work a lot better with the fans and seem more compatible in that respect.

Also, the nvidia cards are always good in my book but I don't seem to see very many people trying to use them so I just sort of wrote that one off. Otherwise the 580m looks cool.

So, I called Dell to ask about ordering a 6990, part number RDRGR They told me it was going to be $614 (US). Is this reasonable? Is this what you guys would do if you had a choice of whatever you wanted today? Finally, the last question is what is going to be most stable and usable? 6970 better?

I don't want to have to carry around a cooling pad and sit in front of an AC, that's silly, I would rather build a tower in that case. Any tips or advice past what is already here would be appreciated, especially if someone knows where to get a good deal on one of these.

Thanks!

Added after 5 minutes:

BTW, i'm running the i7 720qm, so not such a power hungry processor when compared to the 920 or the like. I'm not sure if that will make a difference to your suggestions. PSU is standard m15x issue as is all the other hardware, this will be my first attempt at upgrading anything on this laptop.

Edited by scox
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The 6990m performs better than the 6970m, and when it comes to heat both are similar, though the 6970m runs a bit cooler. I don't use a cooling pad or similar, it works fine.

You say you have a 720QM... Most people who experience shutdown issues with the 69xxm in the M15x have a 720QM or an i5, so it might be a problem. When I have time I put back my 720QM during the weekend and do some testing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

720QM back in my system, played BF3 for a couple of hours, no issues at all... I don't think the CPU would be a problem. Might be a coincidence that a lot of people with this processor had issues.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Founder
720QM back in my system, played BF3 for a couple of hours, no issues at all... I don't think the CPU would be a problem. Might be a coincidence that a lot of people with this processor had issues.

Probably bad paste jobs.

Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk

  • Thumbs Up 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Cool,

Well that's good to know then. I will be ordering the 6990m in the next few days when I get around to calling Dell at a reasonable hour. I will let you all know when I get it in and install it, hopefully all goes well the first time. I'll take pictures etc. too if that would be useful. One other question I had, does this make the battery life go to about 20min or less?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Posting to share the love - haven't found a thread I like this much in a while! Thanks Marco

Hi Marco,

Your posts have been inspirational - i've placed orders for a 920xm and 6970m based on your posts as an alternative to buying a desktop. wish me luck!

just a quick question - is the 6990m exactly the same process and works the same as installing the 6970m? the ebay seller is offering me an upgrade - not sure of $ yet but worth it in your opinion?

thanks in advance for any help - it's greatly appreciated!

Cheers,

Gus

One more! Sorry. The seller also just advised that i need a 240W power supply and the AMD backplate - can you confirm that's the case

and Marco's (excellent) response:

It depends on the card you get... as described in the thread, some of the clevo cards come with the backplate soldered to the card, make sure you don't get such a card. But I guess you won't since you're seller is advising you to get the AMD backplate... but this is easier said than done... no one is really selling them, I'd ask the seller to include one. I guess it's "upgradeyourlaptop" from ebay? He should have the backplates, cause this is actually eurocomm which is selling cards on ebay.

The regular backplate which you have on your current card will work as well, but it's not a perfect fit. I used it for about half a year with my 6970m and it worked fine. It didn't fit as well when I got the 6990m so I did some very slight modding to make it fit a bit better, it's not perfect but it works. (I can post a picture of it if you want).

Currently I'm using the proper backplate, I was lucky to get my hands on one.

To sum it up, the regular backplate works, but the other is preferable since it doesn't touch any capacitors on the back.

About the PSU, I used the 920xm / 6970m combo for about half a year with the 150W PSU, and I never had issues, even during benching. It can run hot when you stress GPU and CPU, but it should work fine, the Dell 150W PSU can be run at 180W all the time without issues, only drawback is that it isn't really efficient, a lot of power gets dissipated as heat.

The 240W will run cooler and leave enough headroom, thus run more energy efficient, but you shouldn't notice any difference in performance, at least I didn't see any differences. Only reason I got the 240W PSU was because I did some crazy stuff with my CPU, which resulted in crazy power draws (>200W) which caused the 150W PSU to trip instantly.

The 6990m is definitely more desirable than the 6970m when it comes to gaming, but the 6970m is an extremely strong card as well, about 2x the performance of a 460m / 5850m in games.

Added after 6 minutes:

Hi Marco,

Thanks - great response! Appreciate the time you put into it. I've put your response on the thread

It's this card: eBay - The UK's Online Marketplace

Seller is Ian (blue32701)

He said he'd include a backplate, so fingers crossed it's the right one.

Sounds like I'll give the PSU a crack and see how I get on - question - would this 240W supply work? (GENUINE Original DELL 240W AC Adapter Charger PA-9E: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics) - has the same part number you posted early but seems to be generic dell.

Pity I ordered it so close to Christmas - will be a while till I can bolt it all in! Will keep you posted on how i get on. Wish me luck!

Cheers,

Gus

Edited by junglegus
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi Marco,

Thanks - great response! Appreciate the time you put into it. I've put your response on the thread

It's this card: eBay - The UK's Online Marketplace

Seller is Ian (blue32701)

He said he'd include a backplate, so fingers crossed it's the right one.

Sounds like I'll give the PSU a crack and see how I get on - question - would this 240W supply work? (GENUINE Original DELL 240W AC Adapter Charger PA-9E: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics) - has the same part number you posted early but seems to be generic dell.

Pity I ordered it so close to Christmas - will be a while till I can bolt it all in! Will keep you posted on how i get on. Wish me luck!

Cheers,

Gus

Sorry for the late response, been quite busy the last couple of days. The PSU will work fine. The card looks good too, let us know when you get it.

With the original backplate you'll simply need to do some slight grinding at the top of the "posts" of the backplate, as you may have seen in the first post.

Then it'll work like a charm.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Couple of questions - hoping you guys can help. I'm still waiting on the 6990m to arrive, should be here this week.

1. I installed the 920xm and 8gb of ram, there's a noticeable increase in speed when gaming, it's a lot smoother - one question i did have is the CPU fan seems to be blowing air that isn't really that hot. HWinfo32 shows temps in the region of 55 degrees C or so, but it just seems a little odd that it's running a lot cooler than before. Could it be that cleaning out the dust and a new thermal paste job is keeping it cooler, or could it be that a bad thermal paste job isn't conducting correctly? Appreciate feedback here.

2. When I use an external monitor, i find after 30-45mins gaming (skyrim right now) I get a substantial slowdown, as in games become unplayable. Temps seem OK - this doesn't happen at all using the usual laptop screen. Any ideas?

Thanks!

Gus

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Cool only other third I can say is Skyrim is not optimized the best walk from one spot to the wrong rock and blamo 40-60fps down to 20 ;-) its worth seeing if you are throttling though as it will cause the same lag.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6990m is in, performing great - temp got up to 84 degrees - is that OK?

super easy installation - great help guide!

still need to update BIOS - can't find a blank CD and exe on the dell site doesnt work.

i ended up getting the 240W PSU just to be on the safe side - seems to work a lot cooler than the 150W which is nice.

my only concern is the backplate - i'm using the 260m one (the vendor didnt include the 6990m one) - is this OK longer term?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Temps are ok, mine is about the same. I used the 260m backplate for about half a year with a 6970m, not optimal, but worked fine. The original 6990m backplate is hard to find separately...

About the BIOS, as far as I remember, the .exe on the Dell site is simply a self-extracting archive. You can put the files on a bootable DOS formatted USB drive, boot from it and flash the BIOS this way instead using a CD.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Question - this might be a dumb one - the 920XM gives a windows experience score of 5.5 and the sysinfo program say's it's running @ 2 ghz. is there any chance that the turbo boost function isn't running? the windows experience isn't necessarily a great guide, but seems low. the CPU does seem to run cool - need to check temps but it's significantly cooler than the GPU

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The 920xm is clocked at 2GHz, that's normal. 3.2GHz is only the max possible turbo frequency (when you don't touch the multiplier) 5.5 WEI is too low, make sure stealth mode isn't active and run the WEI test again. Also go to the BIOS and check whether you have EIST activated, it needs to be active, else the CPU won't speed up.

  • Thumbs Up 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I assume you mean the "speedstep technology" option - it's enabled, and stealth mode disabled (i'm assuming you mean the little RPM icon on the touch panel - games would be unplayable without, right?) - any other ideas?

Added after 6 minutes:

weirdly - retested for the 3rd time and it came back with 7.3 better! still, it's the lowest score on the Index. i feel like getting a desktop at this point is admitting defeat. being able to run crysis 2 in dx11 at extreme settings is pretty sweet though.

thanks!

Edited by junglegus
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.