Can we have stock M17X benchmark scores posted w/ OC'ed scores?

[unreal25]

Hm, I haven't tried that so I don't know. You can always try it out and see whether there any problems. The VBIOS flash should be pretty straightforward with Dell's tools though.

[hidz7]

Thanks for your answer unreal25.

I would like to ask from you guys about crossfire support in games, would it still be widely supported in most future games?

Or maybe single most powerful card is more favourable nowadays?

If the crossfire will always be supported, I want to pull the trigger on the R2, sorry I still cannot made up my based on the previous discussion,

the crossfire problem sometimes scares me.

But if anyone can say that it will be perfectly comfortable to play games at least for another 2 years with HD5870 CF, then that's it, Im going to order in no time.

[unreal25]

Hah, well I can't predict it... but it would surprise me if game manufacturers decide not to support SLI/CF in games, especially since these dual card setups are not that uncommon on desktop systems as well. As it is right now, I don't remember I played any game last year that didn't support crossfire - apart from the games 3-4 years old. On the other hand I'm not really that hardcore gamer (I do other stuff in my life ). Maybe someone else, who is more into gaming, has different information?

[hidz7]

Thanks unreal25 for your honest opinion, yeah I hope the game manufacturers would always consider CF/SLi support in every game.

And yes, I would probably be using this mainly for gaming, but sometimes when I heard about flickering, microstuttering, and underperforming when using crossfire setup scares me.

This is because I have found a very sweet deal for an R2, and it is brand new!

So to fork out another RM1800+ (which is about USD600+) to go to R3 which has more or less similar gaming performance, makes me think that the R3 is not worth it, plus with R2 I could get RGBLED and aluminium casing.

I hope you or any other people can clarify to me about this. Sorry I think I have been asking the same question in another subforum, but yeah Im not rich, and Im still a student, buying a laptop, especially AW, is a really big thing for me.

Thanks in advance!

[Jimbo]

Hi mate, no problems asking questions, that's what forums are for!

SLI and Crossfire are getting MORE popular, not less, so the chance of any new games not supporting it is practically 0.

[hidz7]

Thanks Jimbo.Good to hear that.

If crossfire/SLI are getting more popular, then I'm guessing HD5870M CF in R2 will be a bit better in most games in the future compared to the R3 with HD6970M right?

[unreal25]

I think based on Brian's experience (he had both R2 and R3) they are about the same? He still didn't put up that R3 review, we should poke him what's up with that. I think he actually has game benchmarks for both R2 and R3 - that will be the best indicator.

[hidz7]

Yeah unreal25. Looking forward for the review as well, I guess that will clear any confusion that I had, because if they just perform about the same,

then I'm going for the R2 no doubt although it is quite old already.

[Michael]

We debated it quite a bit and decided that in this point in time it makes sense to hold off on the review because we got a m18x inbound. So the updated review will span the M17x-R3, M17x-R2 AND the M18x with direct game and performance comparisons of the three.

Having said that, I think that if we ask Brian nicely he might drop some performance screenshots as a teaser

Right Brian?

[Brian]

I've dropped a few here and there but didn't want to give too much away. Initially we were going to do a full blown R3 (plus some R2) review but once I sold the R3, I wasn't able to fully complete it to my liking and thus decided to take what I had and incorporate it with the M18x review. Plus it wouldn't make sense to release two reviews since people would flip back and forth between them to compare results. Instead, the M18x review will encompass the R2/R3/M18x results. It won't be an apples-to-apples comparison as far as specs go because that's impossible to do because of the architectural changes between the old i7 and the new SB.

Plus the R3 had a 2630qm processor and the M18x has a 2720qm. Michael's new R3 will have a 2720qm processor so we could have him run some to fill in potential gaps. Finally, the T|I intro for videos was not ready until recently and we still had to do some background tweaks to the CMS to get it ready for the review. We expect the M18x review to be a lengthy and detailed one so we want to make sure our first major review is a decent one.

[hidz7]

I've dropped a few here and there but didn't want to give too much away. Initially we were going to do a full blown R3 (plus some R2) review but once I sold the R3, I wasn't able to fully complete it to my liking and thus decided to take what I had and incorporate it with the M18x review. Plus it wouldn't make sense to release two reviews since people would flip back and forth between them to compare results. Instead, the M18x review will encompass the R2/R3/M18x results. It won't be an apples-to-apples comparison as far as specs go because that's impossible to do because of the architectural changes between the old i7 and the new SB.

Plus the R3 had a 2630qm processor and the M18x has a 2720qm. Michael's new R3 will have a 2720qm processor so we could have him run some to fill in potential gaps. Finally, the T|I intro for videos was not ready until recently and we still had to do some background tweaks to the CMS to get it ready for the review. We expect the M18x review to be a lengthy and detailed one so we want to make sure our first major review is a decent one.

Wow, this is going to an awesome review. +rep for you.

[unreal25]

Oh, cool. Can't wait.