Rypac1502

That's pretty cool Gears, nice work.

There's not a huge difference between the i5 and i7, especially when it comes to gaming. You would yield a substantially bigger performance increase by overclocking the GPU than choosing the i7 over the i5. Also for the native screen resolution, you're not going to notice a difference between the 1GB and 2GB GPU memory. If you are connecting to higher resolution external monitors, maybe you could consider it but not if you are just carrying it around for LANs. Stalk that outlet!

Hey mav, I've had my M11xR2 for coming up to 2 years now, so I hope I can help you out. I assume you want to get the M11x for its portability + gaming capability? Because honestly, that is probably the only reason I would suggest getting one. Don't get me wrong, I love my little beast and it has served me well but my R2 is starting to show its age in more recent title (such as BF3 and The Witcher 2). I can see you've already ruled out the R2, which is a good step. There is a performance increase over the R1 (for CPU bound games) but it isn't huge and the R1 definitely wins out in temperatures and battery life. I've also seen some nice mods on the R1 which give it more of an edge. However, I think you'll find that the R3 is quite an improvement over its predecessors. The i7 Sandy is definitely going to win out over the C2D and the GT 540M is quite a step up from the GT 335M. My friend owns an R3 and I can also say that it has much better battery life than the R2 and not too far off the R1, it runs cooler, has a better quality screen, more robust hinges and the nice soft-touch lid like the R2 (purely subjective ). @unreal25 owns (or did own?) an R3 and made a thread regarding some of the improvements he found as a direct replacement of his R1. Give that a read if you have the time: http://forum.techinferno.com/alienware-m11x/1648-m11x-r3-screen-comparisons.html For the time being, it seems the M11x line has been discontinued and there are some upcoming ultrabooks with specs that aren't too far off those of the R3. My personal opinion would be if you found an R3 for the right price and in good condition, grab it. I wouldn't recommend picking up an R1 or R2 unless you found one for dirt cheap. Keep in mind that there are a few new entries into this size category which win out against the M11x in terms of performance or screen quality or weight/dimensions. Just ask if you have any more questions.

@draiken From my (short) experience with the 720QM, those temps are a pretty high. I threw everything I could at mine before my 920XM arrived and I don't think I ever saw it break 75C. A repaste will definitely help your GPUs. Mine hit 110C when I first received my R2 (which I assume is the reason the guy was selling it) but after a repasting I sit around 75C, OC'd and playing BF3. No laptop cooler, just propping up the back of the laptop.

Nice work widezu, can't wait to see your reults. From what I've heard so far, the 7970m packs much more punch than I was expecting. I'm keen as to get one for my R2 but it is a little expensive to get one sent out to Oz at the moment. Sounds like it would be a whole lot easier if the 120Hz screen wasn't exclusive to the Nvidia cards though.

+1 unreal, I loved Xwing VS Tie Fighter! I am a pretty big Star Wars fan and that series were some of the first games I ever played. I remember playing the original Tie Fighter on floppy discs... I also really enjoyed the Witcher 2. I found there was quite a bit of depth to it when you started experimenting with creating traps, bombs and potions.

Thanks svl7, I think I'll wait a while and grab a Clevo card. The 69XX Clevo cards seemed to be less trouble in the R2... and I don't like my chances with a Dell rep.

@widezu69 You've got me excited now... In that case, I think I've got it planned out. I could sell a few things and gather the funds to buy one and maybe in a year or so, add another for XF when the prices have dropped. Now I need to find somewhere to purchase one. Any ideas?

@unreal That was my reaction too. I really hope that the 7970m will play nicely with the R2. It seems just one of them would be quite an upgrade over my 5870ms.

Poor old M11x got cut from the line up. Oh well, it really couldn't compete against those wafer thin ultrabooks. I'm still hoping for a refresh on the screens for the rest of them. Both a quality and resolution bump would be nice.

Haha, perfect meme. I also find it hard to believe that getting a replacement upgrade would be that easy. Dell were more than happy to replace some of my parts but when I asked for a replacement bottom panel on my M11x (some of the screws are a bit stripped) they wouldn't have a bar of it and were going to charge me $160 for the replacement panel! No. Thanks.

I could probably do that but I think it's best we leave him alone for a little while... for a few days at least.

That screen on the R3 looks x10 better unreal. I've always been pretty disappointed with the colours, brightness and viewing angles on my R2, it is my main gripe with the machine and looks alot like your R1. It sounds like a much bigger improvement overall. I'm glad that it finally worked out for you and you got a decent upgrade. As for overclocking the GPU, I use MSI Afterburner on my R2. EVGA Precision is also good but personally I found my clocks to be a little more stable with Afterburner. My R2 can't take much of an OC though, so try them both out. Have fun benching.

Thanks unreal, it went well actually. All it was, was a dying CMOS, which I had told Dell on the phone. They still insisted that I needed a replacement mobo, so I just said whatever and let them have their way. When the tech came out he asked what the problem was and when I told him, he was curious to know why I needed a whole new motherboard. I said that it was the phone support who were so insistent on it and he understood. He didn't seem to impressed with the guys who had organised it as I think he had to make some calls as to why he didn't replace my whole mobo. So in the end, I got a new CMOS battery installed and that was it. Everything is working great and the tech was actually really good. Nothing like the horror stories that I have heard. Also, thanks for letting me know about the replacement. I'm also secretly hoping my R2 dies in about a years time just before warranty runs out so I can gun for an R3 (or R4) replacement.

Nice work unreal, I'm glad it worked out for you. I've got a Dell tech coming out to replace the mobo on my M11x today so I hope they don't botch it up. Looking forward to seeing the benches.

Wow, quite a few changes in this one. Thanks for including the changelog Conkers.

Nice buy Jimbo. The battery life on that sounds intense, great for Uni work.

I think it's got a pretty neat form factor. Makes it relatively portable for a desktop. How is it for temps?

Great idea svl7, you've got my full support! I can't see myself replacing my M17x R2 unless Alienware bring out a new iteration with an equal or greater screen option.

Hey Conkers, this is the first time I've looked at this thread and I have to say, that is a mighty fine beast you have there. Well done! Hope you get your new mobo in and up and running again!

Thanks heaps for your input guys, I really appreciate it. Also thanks @sgt. and @Stevenx for sharing your first hand experience. I'm glad to hear that the M14x has some decent power behind it and can also be scaled back for respectable battery life. The issue with dual SSD sounds a bit off putting. I was planning on putting a SSD in the main and a HDD in place of the optical drive... You guys are probably very right in advising me to wait, I'm in no real rush to grab one right now. Hopefully the R2 Ivy Bridge refresh will correct a few of these issues and maybe bring more to the table... and half the fun will be speculating about it, right?

Hey crew, as the title says I'm considering upgrading to an M14x and I'd really appreciate getting some input from the T|I guys. So the plan is to replace my M11x with an M14x. I got my M11x about 1.5 years ago and during that time it has served me very well. Lately though, I've found it lacking in a few areas which I consider very important, such as the ULV CPU and GPU feeling a bit underpowered and the lower screen res and quality leaving much to be desired -- all of which seem more apparent since my recent M17xR2 purchase. I'd look around for a used M14x either on eBay or some other avenue and sell my M11x to try to make up some of the difference. A new M14x is just not financially viable on the Aussie Dell site. I know that the performance wouldn't be anywhere near the M17x but I suspect it would be a fair bit more powerful than the M11x. A couple of things I'm sure of is I'll be on the look out for the quad core i7 option instead of the dual core i5. The other is that I would only be looking for the 900p screen. I've heard the arguement many times on NBR of "You can just plug it into a monitor" but the way I will be using it, I want the largest amount of screen real-estate available when I am on the go and mobile. That said, I will be using it as the machine I lug around with me most places, especially going to Uni. I am studying engineering at Uni and have found the M11x to struggle a little bit when it comes to some complex MATLAB and 3D AutoCAD stuff. Do you think that I'll find a fair performance increase in this kind of thing? I would also like to know about what sort of battery life I should be expecting. I know that it depends entirely on the usage conditions but I'm wondering what is the max battery life I could expect if I was doing light word processing and note taking with maybe some light web browsing and research. My M11x could make it to about the 5 hour mark with these kind of tasks, maybe a little more. Would I be in dreamland expecting 4+ hours out of the M14x? I'm not worried about game performance. I'm sure the GT555m will trump the 335m in my M11x and keep me more than happy when I'm gaming on the go. I've read alot about the GPU downclocking on battery and was a bit put off at first but came to the conclusion that I never really game without being plugged into an outlet anyway, so that shouldn't be an issue. When I first got my M11x I use to read heaps of great optimisation guides by @Stevenxowens792 (which have sadly they have disappeared) and have seen that he's moved on to an M14x so something like that first hand experience would help greatly. Any input from an M14x owner would also be appreciated. Maybe I should just take off my Alienware glasses and look around for another laptop which satisfies my criteria... but I haven't found one thus far that beats the M14x and I'm not quite sure I'm prepared to do that anyway... Thanks heaps guys!

Yep. Skyrim is running pretty well for me. Much better than 12.1 but still got some pretty crazy flickering in menus. BF3 is also noticeably better.

Just installed these on my R2. A straight install over the 12.1 previews didn't work properly but after a clean install, they are working perfectly. I'll test out a few games to see if there is any noticeable improvements.

Haha, nice work on the lifetime ban. They must have been some strong words to the Batman