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Alienware m15x W/ GTX 780m? Compatable?


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Good morning everyone, so I just got a great deal on a fantastic condition m15x for about 400$, I recently read about people sticking crazy cards in these machines, so I was wondering if anyone would have any idea if we could go a bit overboard here...

So I have ordered a 920xm (non es) and a 240w power brick, which I will be getting soon, and I want to know if I should stick with the Dell 680m, or try my hand and see if something like the 780m would work also? The reason I believe it would work is that it's the same Kepler arch. As the gtx 680m and from what I've heard has a lower TDP.

I emailed Eurocom today, so hopefully they will be able to help me as we'll, anyways, if anyone has any idea if it will work I have the wallet and the urge to spend some money on one of these babies :)

Also another question, do you think this could be doable without a vbios mod? I mean just plug and play so to speak? I just hate to mess around with blond flashing on something so trivial.

i appreciate you all taking the time to read this so far, any comments are welcomed!

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Yes, it works well, but I recommend sticking with the 680m, the 780m power draw is just too much. And no, 680m and 780m both require a modified vbios to make the card run at full (stock) speeds.

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Any idea where I could find the Vbios for the 680m if I went that route?

also, when you say the power draw, do you mean a strain on the PSU?

Lastly, when you say to run t full speeds you mean, it works without the bios mod but it just will most likely throttle and will run at a lower speed? Like I mean if I wanted to make my own with Kepler bios editor and nvflash, just remove the throttle temp to higher levels?

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I just got a response from the helpful guys at Eurocom. From what they told me it's not a matter of physical electrical needs, but rather the thermal dissipation needed.. Maybe if I can do some slight mods to the heatsink?

Eurocom Larry:

My understanding is that the system just not have the ability to shed

the heat created when the card is running at its max of 120 watts. When

I asked the tech he told me he thinks it might melt your plastics.

Thanks

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Alright, I'll be buying either I can get a better deal on, I don't think the xbracket from the existing 5850m will fit on nvidia card if I remember so I'll have to get e more expensive upgrade kit.

I'll also buy some of those slim profile VRAM/MOSFET heatsinks to solder onto the heatsink for better thermal dissipation.

I just contacted Upgrade your laptop on ebay, they told me the 780m should work no problem. So far I've gained no clear answer lol. :(

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So you are saying that if we install the gtx 680m just plug & play, mod the inf. file and install the nvidia drivers, we get the card runs, but under the stock clocks, right?.

So we need the modded vbios too, at least for reaching the stock power of the card. But which one? I mean if i have the 2gb dell and the M15x ( because there is not a specific 680m vbios designed for this laptop, isn't there?)

Thanks mates

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I just contacted Upgrade your laptop on ebay, they told me the 780m should work no problem. So far I've gained no clear answer lol. :(

Why are you even bothering to ask if you ignore my reply? I told you the card works, but the 680m will do better as it has a lower power draw.

And no, that vbios tool won't allow you to modify the vbios in a way that allows you to go full speed.

Also the eurocom guys once more seem to be morons and don't have a clue what they're talking about.

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I had no intention of discrediting or ignoring your response, I apologize for giving that impression.

rather I'm just confused because I've gotten so many different answers from so many people.

i'm aware that it will indeed work if I was to install it, but where I'm still unsure about is why some people say that the 780m have too high of a thermal requisite, while others say the electrical wattage is too much.

can someone give me a detailed explanation? The 780m is only about ~80$ more than a 680.

So why exactly is the purpose it is not recommended? I have a 240w PSU, so the physical power draw is clearly not any sort of issue. Then we come too thermal properties, which if a 3.4-3.6ghz overvolted 920xm can run fine I have no doubt that a 780 should run fine at at least stock speeds at least.

last thing, is that their seems to be some sort of a general misunderstanding about the Vbios.

So either of the cards should work as soon as I install them, but they most likely throttle with the stock Vbios without the TDP throttle at such a low number? Is that not correct? Both of the cards should work at stock speeds at least, it seems some people are saying that you HAVE to have it under clock it to work. (Stock bios TDP is too low so you need to raise it to make it not throttle).

if someone could clear up those above I would appreciate it very much.

thank you all for your contributions.

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I had no intention of discrediting or ignoring your response, I apologize for giving that impression.

rather I'm just confused because I've gotten so many different answers from so many people.

i'm aware that it will indeed work if I was to install it, but where I'm still unsure about is why some people say that the 780m have too high of a thermal requisite, while others say the electrical wattage is too much.

can someone give me a detailed explanation? The 780m is only about ~80$ more than a 680.

So why exactly is the purpose it is not recommended? I have a 240w PSU, so the physical power draw is clearly not any sort of issue. Then we come too thermal properties, which if a 3.4-3.6ghz overvolted 920xm can run fine I have no doubt that a 780 should run fine at at least stock speeds at least.

last thing, is that their seems to be some sort of a general misunderstanding about the Vbios.

So either of the cards should work as soon as I install them, but they most likely throttle with the stock Vbios without the TDP throttle at such a low number? Is that not correct? Both of the cards should work at stock speeds at least, it seems some people are saying that you HAVE to have it under clock it to work. (Stock bios TDP is too low so you need to raise it to make it not throttle).

if someone could clear up those above I would appreciate it very much.

thank you all for your contributions.

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I'm sure svl7 can clear most of that up but I can explain the power/temperature limits. The thermal solution on the M15x is pretty good and I have no problem running a 100W card in terms of temperatures but power draw is another thing. When svl7 says the power draw is just too much, he's talking about (I hope) the limitations of the motherboard in the M15x. The 240W adapter won't actually allow the system to draw more than 180W or something due to this limitation. Not sure what that translates as, throttling or poor performance but its not a good thing.

The GTX 680M uses low voltage memory and when used with svl7's custom vBIOS (with tweaked voltages?) it works well in the M15x, better than a 7970M which has a big tendency to throttle when trying to overclock CPU. This is again due to reaching that power limit of the motherboard. Seeing as how svl7 has tried all of these cards in his M15x, if he says the GTX 680M works best then I would listen to the man, screw the extra $80 for a GTX 780M and get the 680M (and load his vbios).

Thank you for that, it was exactly what I was looking for!!

so we boiled it down to the motherboards voltage modules that dictate what I can put in it!!

i guess that means I would need to figure out how much power draw a over locked 920xm (3.2ish ghz).

so If I go with the 680m would overclocking be possible at the slightest?

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Just bought the GTX 780m, new keyboard and a new 240w power brick.

It should all be here around tues, so I will either make a new thread or update this one.

i appreciate all your help guys, hopefully other m1xx owners will benefit from my personal experiences!!!

also, just got a 920xm I plan to overclock, ready for the school year baby!! :)

Come at me silverlight lol...

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And you buy the 780m. So much for listening. Thanks for the input svl7. I'll be purchasing a 680m around next month along with retrofitting in a 1080p IPS monitor. You don't mind creating a 680m/780m write up guide in the m15x section svl7? I see you have done the same for other cards. The info would be much appreciated.

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And you buy the 780m. So much for listening. Thanks for the input svl7. I'll be purchasing a 680m around next month along with retrofitting in a 1080p IPS monitor. You don't mind creating a 680m/780m write up guide in the m15x section svl7? I see you have done the same for other cards. The info would be much appreciated.
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Thanks for that, I forgot it's my money I'm spending and slv7 said they both work fine, but I might run into limitations to overclocking. So the next time I spend 850$ I'll make sure I ask you first pala.

Anyways, FedEx says it will be here thurs. off till then chaps!!

Even if you're power limited so that you can't overclock much, the 780m will still be a slightly better card since you can get the same performance as an overclocked 680m at lower clockspeeds and voltages, and thus at less power. Yes the 780m would be an even better choice if you could overclock both to the max, but even with your power limitation with some tweaking the 780m will be the superior card.

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  • 1 month later...

Time to do some cooling mods. The M15x is actually quite capable in delivering over 100W to the GPU. I run 950/1450mhz on my 7970M and currently get max 73-75C in ambient 22C. I also have the CPU OCed to 3.2ghz on 4 cores (24/25/26/27x) and higher on the other cores. I am pulling towards 300W of power in game and the machine runs stable. I would suggest stock voltage on the 780M is stable and you can OC at this voltage but not much further if at all.

However you won't be able to run stock voltage stably unless you do some work on your cooling. Head to notebookreview and take a look at what I have done to mine for an idea of what is necessary to gain top performance consistently day after day even if ambient temps hit nearly 30C.

Don't forget to pull the center pin out of the 240W brick or if you need to charge the battery from it install a switch into the cable to disable the middle pin when you game. If you don't disable the middle pin if will NOT deliver more than 180-200W and your card will throttle heavily.

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  • 3 months later...
And you buy the 780m. So much for listening. Thanks for the input svl7. I'll be purchasing a 680m around next month along with retrofitting in a 1080p IPS monitor. You don't mind creating a 680m/780m write up guide in the m15x section svl7? I see you have done the same for other cards. The info would be much appreciated.

@MHPALA which IPS screen fits in m15x and where can your purchase it? Thanks

Sent from my One S running 4.4.2

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