link3rd

Woah! what are some of the perks that the R4 motherboard have over the R3's... besides the 3rd gen and the mSATA? Is it worth it?

hey, I saw that your gpu is "DellnVidia GTX 780M 4GB with unlocked vbios @1006/3000Mhz" so the core runs at 1006MHz and they have 3000Mhz of memory right? Mine is 797Mhz for core and 1250Mhz for memory.... is 3000 really that safe? I have not flashed the bios yet. I using nvidia inspector for only the limited allowable overclock. If i switch between stock clocks and oc clocks depending on what im doing on my laptop, will this damage my card or do i need to leave it at the overclocked clocks? Do you leave yours overclocked all the time of do you have profiles set up? I read a thread for overclocking the 2920xm, and it looks pretty straight forward enough. I just haven't gotten the courage to mess with my gpu bios to unlock it. I assume that an overclocked cpu wouldn't remain hot right? only when its under full load. So i assume that the gpu will be the same concept. Also. for HWiNFO64... can you recommend some fan speeds i can set it at. thanks I look forward to your reply... and sorry for all the questions

woah! nice =)

OK, soooooooooo...I posted a comment on a thread totally unrelated to this, so i decided to start a new thread about it. i pasted in the one reply that i got and he said it worked for him. I just wana share what worked for me and hopefully will for others with the same problem. SOMEONE REPLIED:

U got this also? I noticed that the limit drops to zero while gaming. Is this something similar to turbo boost for CPUs? But opposite. I.e. It downclocks when not at load then goes back to normal when in game?

general... for the best gaming results i should use the 327.23.......... and bf4 ONLY, i should use the 331.40? sooooooo, i installed the 331.40 drivers right... and i switch on gpuz to see what's up and i see this: any idea what that is? my guess is that its just saying that the card's not running at full or something and doesnt limit the card when i play a game because when i play a game, the bar drops to nothing.

should i use this or the 327.23?

Ok, so basically, same as before... Just that I need to use this display driver uninstaller in safe mode. then the 327.23 driver modded with your inf file like before? J95, I don't know if you saw my other post on another thread, but I was saying that I got my IDT sound card working again with the 780m GTX installed in my M17x R3 without the use of an external USB sound card. Another person tried what I did and it worked for him. Hopefully this will save some people the money from upgrading to the R4 mobo just to get another sound card. - - - Updated - - - I wanted to make a separate thread to discuss this, but idk how to do that. Is that sound issue still the same or am i really late?

Thank you! =)

Will this work with the 780m gtx on m17xr3? what are the significant updates tho?

No, although it works, I guarantee that if u pull the card out to do something like a repaste or something like that without disabling the sound card first. When u reinstall ur card again with the sound card still enabled, it gona beep and not start. To remove the card for whatever reason, u first need to disable the sound card. That's the only way it will work. Then just re-enable the card after. Trust me, I learned that the hard way. It'll beep like crazy! Just read what happened to me. I'm happy that someone else was able to confirm that method for the sound card to work without that big USB drive always plugged in. do you know how I can start a thread with that as the main topic?

Hey, I just put in an order for a 2920xm on eBay. Do you thing I will be able to do any overclocking with the 2920xm and leave the 780m stock with a 240W psu? Or will I need a 330W psu?

GUYS GUYS GUYS, I have an M17x R3 and I managed to get my on board sound card working again with the 780m installed. J95, correct me if I'm wrong ok. This is what happened to me: I was messing around with my laptop and I decided to buy an NVIDIA heatsink and replace the AMD heatsink I got installed, because I'm frightened to JB Weld the copper shim to the heatsink, because the gap is too small. Anyways, I decided to test out what would happen if i was to remove the card and re-seat it. i.e. imitate me putting back in the card as practice for when I get the other heatsink. So I took out the card, put it back in and there was like 6 beeps/ 5 beeps/ 8 beeps WHATEVER...... I was frustrated... WTF DID I DO!?!! So I decided to stick back in my old AMD 6990m to see if that would help... STILL 6 beeps. I re-seated the card like 5 times!!! STILL NOTHING! I decided to pull out the mobo battery to reset the bios: I pulled out the 6990m, pulled out the battery, waited 30 secs, put in the card, put in the battery, screw it back up, powered on and still beeping. Nooooooooooo! So i decided that i will take out the 6990m card again! Take out the battery, put in the battery first, so it would get power without the card being in there, put in the card and screwed back everything and booted... It worked!!!! I loaded the bios (F2) and disabled sound card, integrated graphics, set monitor thingy to peg, set workaround to always. etc... F10... On the reboot, I force powered down and swapped back in my 780m gtx. Powered it on and it worked! I was relieved. It booted up normal and into windows. NO SOUND!.................... Mind u, my sound was working before. I shutdown, booted back up. Went into bios and re-enable the integrated sound card. Hit F10 and restarted... It booted up into windows with sound and everything. (This is what I did the first time round) So my theory: 1/ beeping like crazy???: Pullout mobo battery, pull out card. Put back in card then battery (I think this will only happen with the A12 bios, because it never happened with the A08 bios before) 2/ With old card still in the system, disable whatever u need to , i.e. sound card, integrated graphics, whatever. 3/ Replace card with 780m gtx (mind you, my drivers were installed all the time, but first time, no drivers were installed) 4/ Let it boot up like normal... shut down... 5/ Boot into bios and re-enable the sound card and it should work. (NOTE: This worked for me. I HOPE, but I can't say for sure, that it will work for everyone) My theory is that for the first time the 780m is installed, i.e. no card in the system -> 780m in the system, the sound card needs to be disabled (along with everything else) and once it boots up like normal (and NVIDIA drivers are installed) then the sound card can be re-enabled. I think if u going to take out the card again, u need to disable the sound card FIRST then take it out after shutdown. Like I said, this is just a theory based on what happened to me just now. J95 or someone, please correct me if I'm wrong. Also, I read that it will not work for a fresh install of windows. I re-installed windows fresh from the windows 7 disc I got with my pc when I bought it. I downloaded all the drivers from Dell's site to get everything working. Please tell me if I'm right or not. I really want to make a contribution to this community. I REALLY WANT SOMEONE TO CONFIRM IF THIS METHOD WORKS. SO PLEASE... ANYONE?

Thanks, I had a feeling i would have had to do that... sigh... more headache... Btw, i bought the usb sound card go pro u mentioned earlier, however, I got my on-board sound card working. I read alot of forums where people didn't get it working so i was very confused yesterday. I have the m17x r3 model and i upgraded my hdd to a ssd so i had to reinstall windows as a result.

ok, so i got the 780m and installed it. My amd heatsink worked fine like J95 said it would, but, i have ONE VERY IMPORTANT QUESTION... in this pic on page one, there's an "X" and a circle in it. the 2 chips that are circled to the right, the AMD heatsink doesn't fit over both. only over the upper one. so what i did was just put the thermal pads over both and put the heatsink on the upper half, but the lower half is still exposed, but with a thermal pad over it. ALSO: I understand that the thermal ad placement is important, which is y im so concernet for this. Please, I would really like your help on this. I'm so confused...... The differences in the heatsinks can be noted in the pics below: you can clearly see the difference in the length of the metal plate to the left end circled in both pics. Thank you in advance

Fyi: I got an answer from someone; thanks for the help with my previous questions The difference between the AMD X-bracket and the NVIDIA X-bracket is that the chips on the back of AMD and NVIDIA cards are different and are therefore laid out differently. If you put am AMD X-bracket on the back of an NVIDIA card, the spreader will not lay flat as chips will be in the way. The differences in the spreaders can be seen below: AMD: NVIDIA: The screw locations are the same, however the spreaders have different dimensions to accommodate the card they are going onto. NVIDIA manufacturers know not to put any diodes/ chips in the areas reserved for the spreader and AMD manufacturers do the same. You cannot put an AMD spreaders on an NVIDIA card and vice versa. The screw holes would line up as you can tell from the pictures, but the spreader would not lie flat as chips would be in the way. I swear I never knew that.

Thank you. You're the first person that actually gave me a definite answer. Not to bother you with one more question, but I just want to be certain. For the 780m gtx, do i need to get the X-bracket for it, or can the AMD 6990m x-bracket work? there's this without the bracket: Alienware M17x M18x New NVIDIA GTX 780M 4GB DDR5 MXM 3 0B | eBay and there's the bracket only: Video Card Upgrade KIT FOR MXM 3 0B Nvidia GTX AND Quadro VGA Modules | eBay Thanks in advance

Really? Ok. Thanks Soo, all the other forums where people say AMD heatsinks will not work with nvidia cards is incorrect then? Btw, I have a AMD 6870m as well, and the stock heatsink to go with that. Do you think I should use the heatsink from the 6870m or the heatsink from the 6990m? Another question is... it's 100% confirmed that once i go with this upgrade, I will have to buy: USB Sound Card NC89 6 Channel 5 1 Optical Audio s PDIF External New Useful | eBay because I will need to disable the integrated soundcard?

Ok, so i formulated all my thoughts and hear it is. I am currently in the process of organizing the money to upgrade my laptop gpu from a 6990m to a 780m. I have looked on ebay.com and have read forum after forum on instructions to complete a sucessful upgrade. This is the card I'm looking at: Alienware M17x M18x VGA Upgrade Kit New NVIDIA GTX 780M 4GB DDR5 MXM 3 0B | eBay Now, I've read that AMD heatsinks aren't compatible with nvidia cards. Is this true? if so, i will have to purchase an nvidia heatsink to complete the upgrade. I am looking at this one on ebay.com: Dell Alienware M17x R3 R4 GeForce NV13E GS1 GTX675M GPU Heatsink MT1DN | eBay This is gona be an expensive upgrade... ... well at least for me. Anyways, I'd really like someone to tell me if I'm heading in the right direction. Do i even need a new heatsink? Please, any replies will be greatly appreciated. I have already flashed my bios to version A12 (unlocked i believe), i downloaded the nvidia beta drivers along with the modded inf file. I really really really want to get this

j95, if i have to disable sound in the bios, how will it get it back working again. this is my reasearch im doing before i pay for the card. thanks. i have an m17xr3 (non3d btw)

another question. would i need another heatsink for the 780m gtx, because i currently have a 6990m installed. i SO want this card in my laptop!

i am currently in the process of getting a 780m gtx for my r3. i made up my mind, because i wana play ghosts and bf4. XD do you think the power/ price ratio is better than the 8970m?