jzp-techinferno

Close but no cigar. That front-loading tray in the middle doesn't exist, and the top isn't scalloped [though I can't recall - that may have been an option]. Thanks though! I'll up a pic later today.

...and I'm having trouble finding proper references to disassembly. This past week, my wife's 2009 (April order, delivery was much later in the year likely due to the dell acquisition) m17x R1 keeled over. It had some video strangeness that I chalked it up to old drivers and was planning to give it a good cleaning and tune-up this weekend. Mistimed. :-( I'm not an overclocker or serious hardware hacker, just a generalist geek that can follow instructions and do minor repairs. All the hardware references I can easily find are clearly post-acquisition "R1" with the beveled front and not the original, flat-front like this one... and the latter one clearly is a better design for cleaning and servicability. The main system fan isn't modular in this model, etc. I've slurped the data from the drive, took that+empty drive bay+RAM+GPUs out and cleaned, patched it all back together and no joy. I've clearly screwed the pooch somewhere along the way, and was hoping someone here might have a pointer for a hardware guide for this puppy. Original spec from order: Area-51® m17x Video/Graphics Card: Dual 512MB NVIDIA® GeForce® Go 8700M GT – SLI Enabled Display: 17" WideUXGA 1920 x 1200 LCD (1200p) with Clearview Technology Keyboard Options: AlienFX® Illuminated Keyboard – Exclusive Design AlienFX®: Alienware® AlienFX® System Lighting - Lime Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T9300 2.5GHz (6MB Cache 800MHz FSB) Operating System (Office software not included): Windows Vista® Ultimate (64-bit Edition) with Service Pack 1 Memory: 8GB Dual Channel DDR2 SO-DIMM at 667MHz – 2 x 4096MB Requires Windows Vista 64-bit Edition Notebook Tuners and Remotes: Internal Digital/Analog (ATSC) MiniCard TV Tuner System Drive: Single Drive Configuration - 320GB 7,200RPM (16MB Cache) w/ Free Fall Protection Optical Drives : 8x Dual Layer Burner (DVD±RW, CD-RW) w/ LightScribe Technology Wireless: Internal Intel® Wireless 4965 a/b/g/Draft-N Mini-Card Sound Card : Internal High-Definition Audio with surround sound Warranty: 2-Year AlienCare Onsite Service and 24/7 Toll-Free Phone Support Power: Additional AC Adapter - Alienware® m17x 230 Watt Auto-switch AC Adapter