Avocent Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 (edited) So I ordered the M17x R3, but my ship date isn't until the 28th because the Nvidia 580 is delaying the order. I have 0 patience.. I mean so littlle patience I have left Dates at restaraunts/bars/beaches because they were to slow to get back to the car when I was ready to leave! So now to have to wait weeks for my new computer is damn near driving me crazy. To kill the time so far I have ordered upgrades and done reasearch. Upgrades a) Crucial M4 256GB SSD Corsair Vengeance 8GB 204 DIMM 1600 giving me a total of 12GB for the time being. Dell rapes you on memory price so I kept the stock order at 4 instead of 8 and will eventually get to 16GB if needed. I would prefer 32GB but so far I haven't found any 1600speed memory in 8GB sticks. 16 or even 12 should be sufficient I think. C) Searched my house and found my Windows 7 64 Ultimate CD and key for easy upgrading when it comes. Researched what to do when the machine arrives. A)So far I have gathered you should downgrade the bios to A08 from A09 as it appears to work better with SSD drives. When the machine gets here before installing or changing anything make your System Disks for recovery in case of an oops C) Make sure your Crucial M4 SSD firmware is up to date or catastrophic events and slowdown can happen. D) Install the SSD drive and Memory first - Make sure memory says 12 and make any bios changes needed to recognize the SSD drive. E) Install Windows 7 Ultimate and Activate on the new SSD drive. F) Install the essential Alienware software and NOT the Alienware Bloatware. G) Update all Drives and software and normally the bios (See. A) H) Benchmark and Stress test the whole thing. I like to find out about problems during the return period not 6 months out of the return period. I) Install my software - Office - SWTOR (Star Wars the Old republic) - Skyrim - Antivirus. See how all the games run, if they run good Great if they run like crap take a day or 2 of troubleshooting and visiting forums and tech support. If issues can't be resolved quickly back it goes. J) I am not sure if I should keep the AW thermal paste or replace it with the IC Diamond??????? This is really the point of this post am I missing any steps, or should I approach the initial setup differently?? Aside from that 1) Trying to find a laptop bag that this thing will fit into and look professional going into an office building. Hypocritical i know. The lighted keyboard and alienheaded wallpaper I can deal with but the Alienheaded book bag bothers me go figure. It's not ugly but I don't want to walk into a board room with it. 2) Installed SWTOR onto my old E6400 and admire how choppy and terribly laggy it is even with all the settings turned to low. Graphics quality Looks so bad after seing them on there highest quality. Early on I ventured to set graphice to medium and it was unplayable. At the very least I am glad I can still level my toons a little. 3)Watching the Mailbox like a 6 year old watches a Christmas tree on Christmas Eve. (So sad a Grown man is waiting this anxiously for a computer but I am happy I still have some juvenile in me). Anyone want to rent me there M17-M18 for a few weeks? HAHA Edited February 13, 2012 by Avocent Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
unreal25 Posted February 14, 2012 Share Posted February 14, 2012 Grats! AW Thermal Paste = shitty thermal pads (small "sponges"). I didn't have any actual paste on chips. My answer is yes -- replace it. As far as the bag goes, I use Slappa Velocity Matrix, but they might not be as business looking either (at least there is no Alien head). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Founder StamatisX Posted February 14, 2012 Founder Share Posted February 14, 2012 Nice system!About the Alien FX and the "unprofessional" lights you can easily disable them so no big deal.Also when you receive it and before the clean installation don't rush to install 3d party software or the upgrades, just benchmark it to see if everything is fine out of the box. When you find nothing out of the ordinary then proceed with the upgrades and the clean Windows installation. This way, if any of the upgrades is not working you will be certain that it is not the laptop. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Avocent Posted February 14, 2012 Author Share Posted February 14, 2012 Nice system!About the Alien FX and the "unprofessional" lights you can easily disable them so no big deal.Also when you receive it and before the clean installation don't rush to install 3d party software or the upgrades, just benchmark it to see if everything is fine out of the box. When you find nothing out of the ordinary then proceed with the upgrades and the clean Windows installation. This way, if any of the upgrades is not working you will be certain that it is not the laptop. You have a great point about testing it before blowing everything away it will definitely be better to discover a potential problem before I take hours of my time installing the hardware and reinstalling the software. +1The lights I love and unless I go into a law firm they can stay on, it's the alien head book bag that to me doesn't project the air of professionalism when walking into a clients door. The laptop you can explain away as the Ferrari of laptops haha.Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mw86 Posted February 14, 2012 Share Posted February 14, 2012 i did same thing tested my system before installing 3rd party SSD and ram... My advice test the ram dimms even unused ones i have on getting motherboard replaced because of a bad ram slot... would be good to know before past 21 day return. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Founder Brian Posted February 15, 2012 Founder Share Posted February 15, 2012 Congrats on the purchase. As for what to do while waiting, I found sleeping helps pass the time faster Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mw86 Posted February 15, 2012 Share Posted February 15, 2012 haha right Brian you dont sleep mr red bull at 3-4am lol just pickin bro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Avocent Posted February 22, 2012 Author Share Posted February 22, 2012 (edited) Ok I am not really feeling buy.com right now as they lost part of my order with an "ooops do you want a refund" I ordered 8gb additional memory for the baby and it was supposed to be here over a week ago. So I canceled the order and reordered the exact same modules from Amazon. Buy.com price was 61.99 for 8gb and Amazons price had dropped to $48.99 per 8GB plus I forgot I still had a $20 credit at amazon so I ended up picking up 16GB total memory.My Estimated ship date is the 28th next week, does anyone know if Dell usually runs ahead of there estimates or behind? Edited February 22, 2012 by Avocent Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robby001 Posted February 22, 2012 Share Posted February 22, 2012 Mine was ahead by a few days when I first bought it. But when it went into the depo they were behind. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mw86 Posted February 22, 2012 Share Posted February 22, 2012 Yeah its hit or miss. My first came quick. Depot was slow. Exchange was fast 2nd one first Exchange was nearly 2 months (not at all the norm) Congrats Avocent i bought 16gb from Amazon when i got mine too. Looks like you got a great price on them Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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