Brian

Nice looking forward to it--especially the claim that it puts mamba to shame.

One more teaser, a benchmark run I did of Crysis 2 today but this particular run won't be in the review but you will see similar results:

Working on a slew of benchmarks today. Got Crossfire up and running on my 2nd R2 finally (one of it's cards had become bricked from a bad vbios flash) so now when I amend the review (I can't add it for the review now) I'll add on 720qm + 5870m xfire benchmark results. And yeah that song is awesome.

Review is in progress, benchmarks being done but it's going to take a few days to run through them all on both systems (R2 + R3). After that, write-up completion + editing and we'll publish. Here's a sound test video, not the one that will be published in the review but just one I made for local testing:

Spotted this on another forum: Type in "Alienware" (without the quotes) and you will see the M14x pop up with it's codename "Specter".

I think there may be some truth to it. If Dell did really switch back to 240W (like Eric G mentioned) then this guy might be telling the truth that there will not be a 2920xm offered. They MIGHT allow it with a single GPU (e.g. 6970M) but definitely not with 6970M Xfire. In fact, I don't understand how they plan to pull off 6970M Xfire with just 240W powering the system. I guess that's why they switched to WLED to save on a few watts here and there. The 485M pulls around 170W when combined with a 2920xm (idle usage is lower than 6970M). So a 240W supply should suffice for that but definitely not for a dual card setup.

More M18x rumors: Google Translate Key points: M18x will have a limited PSU (probably 240W) M18x will support 6970M XF M18x will not support 2920xm due to increased TDP requirements which add to their R&D cost. You can add it in yourself but they advise against it since their labs haven't validated it. IPS/OLED: Cost is too high, they eat too much power RGB LED: Not too clear but he said they can't see the difference in color between WLED and RGB LED. They also claim RGB LED damages your eyes (LOL). Starting price will be $500 higher than it was for M17x-R2

The thing is, the bios is universal for all the R3s so I doubt the 3D versions have a unique one unless there's an identifier w/in the bios that adds extra code for 3D enabled ones. I think it has to do with the IGP + 120 hz display and I bet if you switched out the display to a 60 hz one, the 6970M would start working. Ask Dell to send you a 60 hz display.

When I get around to disassembling the R3 I'll get you some photos. I don't think it's a connector issue with 6970M not working with the 120hz R3 though, it's because of the way the IGP is designed on the mainboards and/or bios limitations for those particular R3s.

Congrats silent bob! About the 6970M, it technically works but there are so many issues with it that I don't recommend trying (I'll cover it in the R3 review that's coming soon--I promise). For now the best configuration for an R2 is dual 5870m + 920xm (with throttlestop for OC'ing and hwinfo32 for monitoring). Once you get acclimated with your new toy, let us know how you like the rgb led, gaming performance etc.

Yup $600 is my price range, maybe lower and it will get there soon enough. I plan to get it from PC-Best-Buy again on eBay, he's pretty reliable.

Dude that looks fucking awesome! Did you paint it or apply a sticker? Yellow + black would look even better!

Some teaser pics now in the first post

I've got the 6970M inside the M17x-R2 right now and am typing from it. Unfortunately, the same problems that plagued Ichime are also present with the Dell 6970M, namely the lack of GPU bios fan control (it stays at a single speed) and thus needs hwinfo32 to spin it up. So for now, I'm taking stock benchmark runs (vantage, 3dmark 11, batman arkham asylum, metro2033). After that the GPU is going back in the R3. The results will be made available in the up coming R3 review. I'll post a teaser pic here for you guys in an hour or so.

That mockup looks great, what material is that? If it's plastic, seems you're already halfway done.

Ok I have mentioned that I ran into issues after I uninstalled the Dell AMD 6970M driver and replaced it with the Catalyst 11.4. Specifically, the FN+F7 functionality was lost and I had to resort to manual switching (via control panel) to the IGP. However, even when doing so, I noticed the battery life would not register higher than 2 hours. I brought this up over at NBR and Inap mentioned he got FN+F7 working fine with the 11.4 Catalyst. Batboy then made a post specifying the following: I tried the above except I did not do a reformat but rather uninstalled the Dell AMD driver and went straight to the 11.4 Catalysts. So this brings me to the point of this thread: Please share any tips/tricks you have for successfully reformatting the R3.

I'll make the decision easy for you and keep it short and sweet: Return the R2 and grab the R3. The WLED in the R3 will destroy that sorry excuse for a display in your R2 and the 6970M comes close to matching 5870m xfire in benchmarks while in some games, it plays a lot smoother despite registering lower benchmark scores. The build quality doesn't equal R2 and nobody ever expected it to, however it is still a well built and rounded system. I think you will really like it. Welcome to Tech|Inferno and glad you finally registered.

Hi Unreal, welcome to T|I! I think Aikimox tried something like that with his 8740W but it didn't work out. Don't think anyone has tried a precision yet.

I'll repost what I said in the NBR coat peeling thread: The best way is to vote with your wallets and word of mouth. Let people know that the R3 doesn't have the build quality to match the premium Dell charges and then advise people not to buy it. When Dell sees a backlash against their cheapening the Alienware line, then MAYBE they will wake up and go back to producing high quality built systems like the R1/R2. I've had my R3 now for over a week and while it's a nice system, the build quality falls far short of my R2. It FEELS cheap when I hold it and type on it because I can hear the dvd rattling. I don't hear a thing when I type on my R2. I don't want to give too much away as I'll save this rant for my review but needless to say, don't delude yourselves into thinking the R3 is anything like the R2 in build quality because it isn't--its far below it.

Thanks man, the review work is under way and yeah these decals are sweet!

It seems to have all the right specs but the shape doesn't look as comfortable as a Razer product. I'm looking forward to your review though, pics + dvix appreciated.

Like I said in the NBR thread, I find his comment hilarious considering that one of their most senior engineers left to Apple and the others in Miami were let go. Alienware has now fully been absorbed by the borg collective Dell and is no longer a separate branch.

First of all, a big thank you to Iloveboobs aka Inap for going through the trouble of printing these and sending them to me. These will be featured in the T|I review and they look very professional. Check it out:

This guy likes the candy even more than I do:

ROFL. Ditto.