Leaderboard

OK, people have been asking for this for a while so I thought since I can tear this down in about 10min, I should do a quick write-up. Like the title said, I did this quick so pictures wont be the best but you will get a better understanding on how to teardown the system enough to at least repaste etc.. Here we go 1 - Shot of the underside 2 - Remove battery and the 4 screws in red to remove bottom cover 3 - Bottom Cover Off: Remove Screws Labeled I (5 of them in Red), P ( 5 in Blue), and HD Bay screws (4 in Green) 4 - Remove Hard Drives 5 - Remove Screws In Empty Hard Drive Bay (4 in blue) 6 - Remove the LCD Hinge Screws ( 4 in Red) and disconnect the wireless antennae (circled and traced in Red) 7 - Flip System over and open screen 8 - Pop off the media control panel by lifting the back right and left corners until it "pops" off. I find using my guitar pick helps with this 9 - Once the back corners have popped loose, run the guitar pick around the edges to loosen the rest (around the keyboard) 10 - Picture of the media panel loose but still connected with the ribbon cable (disconnect this now) 11 - Remove the Keyboard and macro keyboard screws ( 6 in Red) 12 - Disconnect all cables from the motherboard and graphic cards ( 11 in total) and 2 more lcd screws ( 2 in blue) This includes: 2 ribbon cables for the macro keyboard 2 ribbon cables for the keyboard 3 for the handrest/trackpad (2 on bottom, 1 near the right crossfire cable connector) 2 for the screen (one toward the bottom left, one at the top left) 2 for the crossfire cable (labeled L and R on the cable) 13 - Remove 3 more screws securing the cover ( 3 in Red). You will need to pop off this cover starting at the back... just lift until it pops off. If it is being difficult, make sure all screws labeled "P" on both the top and bottom are removed. 14 - Once the cover is off, remove the screws (going from #1-4) on your heatsinks.... clean and repaste. If anyone wants pics of the heatsinks removed just let me know (I took a couple but not really necessary for this guide). Once again, I did this all very fast so I know it is not as polished as it could have been.... but I wanted this out sooner than later for everyone to use. Let me know if anything is unclear etc... D.

HDR pics of the M3.

BIC Venturi Realta they house my subwoofers... i have a pair and each speaker has two ten inch woofers. a review from a few people (not much out there about them) B.I.C. America REALTA Floorstanding Speakers Reviews These are my mains: Polk Monitor CS70 Monitor 70 Specs Page : Floorstanding loudspeaker : Polk Audio I plan to add these to my set when I can save up enough... http://www.polkaudio.com/homeaudio/rtia/index.php?s=rtia9

I've recreated the OSD Icons for the R1/R2/R3/R4 and R5 aka 17 as the standard ones are a bit dated. It should also work with the M15x though as my old M15x had the same setup for the OSD app. Regarding the R3 OSD, it seems its the same install for the M18x as well so it should work for you M18x owners too. I've also added the AW 17 OSD to the list. This exe is also compatible with the 14 and 18 as Dell uses the same OSD for all the new machines. There's also a set for you Area-51 m17 R1 owners. I've tried to give it a simular feel to the Invader Icon pack by Alienware. Hope you guys like it Install Instructions for R1 1. You need to end the OSD process in Task Manager since it may be using some of these icon files. Ctrl+Shift+Esc then find the OSD process and end it. 2. Backup your current icons if you want to revert to the originals (You can also uninstall and re-install the OSD application if you want to go back to the original icons) 3. Extract the attached "M17X R1-R2 & M15X.zip" contents to C:\Program Files (x86)\OSD\picture\. Overwrite if prompted. 4. Restart the OSD application. It is located in C:\Program Files (x86)\OSD\Launch.exe 5. Done! Install Instructions for R2 /M15x 1. You need to end the OSD.exe process in Task Manager since it may be using some of these icon files. Ctrl+Shift+Esc then find "OSD.exe" and end the process. 2. Backup your current icons if you want to revert to the originals (You can also uninstall and re-install the OSD application if you want to go back to the original icons) 3. Extract the attached "M17X R1-R2 & M15X.zip" contents to C:\Program Files (x86)\OSD\ICONs\. Overwrite if prompted. 4. Restart the OSD application. It is located in C:\Program Files (x86)\OSD\Launch_OSD.exe 5. Done! Install instructions for R3 / R4 / M18x 1. You need to end the OSD process in Task Manager since it may be using some of these icon files. Ctrl+Shift+Esc then find the AlienwareOn-ScreenDisplay.exe process and end it. 2. Backup the existing AlienwareOn-ScreenDisplay.exe by renaming it to "AlienwareOn-ScreenDisplay.exe.BAK" for example. Its in C:\Program Files (x86)\Alienware On-Screen Display\ 3. Extract the AlienwareOn-ScreenDisplay.exe from the appropriately named file depending on your OS and model to the C:\Program Files (x86)\Alienware On-Screen Display\ folder. 4. Restart the OSD application by double-clicking the file. 5. Done! Install instructions for 14 / 17 / 18 ** 1. You need to end the OSD process in Task Manager since it may be using some of these icon files. Ctrl+Shift+Esc then find the AlienwareOn-ScreenDisplay.exe process and end it. 2. Backup the existing AlienwareOn-ScreenDisplay.exe by renaming it to "AlienwareOn-ScreenDisplay.exe.BAK" for example. Its in C:\Program Files (x86)\Alienware On-Screen Display\ 3. Extract the AlienwareOn-ScreenDisplay.exe from the "AW 14-17-18 (Windows 8).zip" file to the C:\Program Files (x86)\Alienware On-Screen Display\ folder. 4. Restart the OSD application by double-clicking the file. 5. Done! The Area-51 m17-R1 install should be similar to the steps for the other laptop revisions above. They all basically follow the same process anyway, apart from filenames/paths. @robby_hd was kind enough to make a red version of these icons for the M17x R3 / M18x R1 which can be downloaded from his post here. **There seems to be a security issue with Windows 8/8.1 at this point in time since it doesn't allow modified exe's. I will update this post with a solution once it has been found. Also a few Alienware owners are having an issue with the unmodified OSD and Windows 8. Only the default Windows 8 OSD displays and not the Alienware version. Try the solution posted by Dell here and then attempt installing the mod. The below screenprint is a workaround by editing the security policies to allow the unsigned exe to run in Windows 8. If you are not aware of what these settings do and the repercussions of changing them, please do not attempt it. - Open the Group Policy Editor by typing "gpedit.msc" in the search or run text box. - Duplicate the settings below. Area-51 m17-R1.zip M17X R1-R2 & M15X.zip M17X R3-R4 & M18X R1-R2 (Windows 7).zip M17x R4 & M18X R2 (Windows 8).zip AW 14-17-18 (Windows 8).zip M17X R4 & M18X R2 (Windows 8.1).zip

Official 11.8 drivers got released, get them here: ATI Catalyst Or direct link here: http://www2.ati.com/DriVeRs/mobile/11-8_mobility_vista_win7_64_dd_ccc_ocl.exe <s> The official 11.7 AMD GPU driver got released, here you go: ATI Catalyst Also the 11.8 preview is available for download at guru3d: AMD Catalyst 11.8 Preview Driver download from Guru3D.com</s> Thanks goes to The @Revelator , I wouldn't even know if he hadn't brought the news about this. <s>EDIT: @Pursuit posted a link to the new 11.7 CAP for all CF users, see his post here. EDIT 2: Pursuit provided the links to 11.7 CAP2, check here.</s> EDIT 4: Pursuit again, provided links to 11.8 CAP ...he never misses one Thanks!

These are Hivi and i just got them in the mail today, playing them and wow just wow they sound amazing!! IDT audio just sucks really bad with these type of speakers so before getting these i have been using the creative XFi 5.1 soundcard going to get me a dac preamp etc.. all in due time. Man as soon as hooking the MkII up to the soundcard boy my god they sounded completely different i immediately heard music playing songs like rehab and f me pumps by amy winehouse and then some rock and metal, 40s, 60s music my god music i have been listening to for years sounded completely different it's like hearing Denon headphones all over again!! Pictures will be added later on. I also bought these Swan M50W. I will be hooking up the speakers to the sub of the M20W as also the H2's. There really small speakers. Here is a quick overview of the M200MkII inally here is the Swan loudspeaker desktop computer multimedia speakers from the audio insiderSwan Active Desktop Sound

Not sure if you guys know of this app that ejohnson from the NBR forums found on some russian site. It changes the AlienFX lights colour to match whatever is on your screen. It calculates the average colour that is shown on your screen and sends that colour to the alienFX controller to display. I've tried it and it works on my M17x R2 except for the power button and alienhead on the lid. Very interesting especially if you have alternating wallpapers with different colours Its a bit too distracting if you're watching a movie or playing a game though. Although it will should work well with say a fullscreen visualisation on your fave music player theHelios also from NBR set it up for us Alienware users and can be downloaded from his private dropbox below. http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1089880/Lightpack AlienFX.zip To see it in action check it on youtube The original thread can be found here.

AMD 11.7 CAP1 is here Hydrophobia Prophecy - Resolves image quality issues with CrossFire enabled Rise of Flight: Improves CrossFire performance

2920XM + 6990Ms you can guess what I want to see right?

Best phone call prank ever...

3dm11 score for you to beat - P13728 You should at least get close. I get around P10500 at stock clocks on cpu/gpu.

LMAO that kinda reminds me of that

here is some stock 6990 numbers:

Kidnap their children. It's amazing how quickly that will speed things up. Works every time. -Ash

Ok, since I repasted both GPUs and CPU didn't have the chance to run some overclocked benchmarks Vantage 3DMark 11 If only this damned PSU didn't trip in the middle of the benchmarks...

Trust me, it's worth the waiting... I run Vantage, CPU tests only, just to check how the temperatures are holding since I applied ICD and I am hitting 21K with the laptop just sitting on the cryo lx and my temps maxed out at 96C when before I was hitting 100 C (OCed at 3.6GHz 96/94 TDP/TDC).