Alienware

The Alienware m15x was one of the fastest systems to ever cruise through our offices, and although it had some heat issues, we were pleased with what the fastest 15-inch system we’d ever laid eyes on had to offer. Now enter the 17-inch version, appropriately named the m17x.

For those who are worried about overheating: I ran the ATI Tool and GPU-Z for 20 minutes and found that the graphics cards had a peak temperature of 77-degrees Celsius. Hopefully the BIOS in the m17x maintains better control of the system’s fans than the m15x did.  Get this though: the power brick was 114.5 degrees Fahrenheit when we shot it with our temperature gun. So far, no signs of cracking, at least.

Check out the video below to see more.

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If you were among the group of people experiencing GPU downclocking issues with the Alienware Area-51 m15x, then good news has arrived. A new BIOS update, version X29b P3A30 is available. The update allegedly allows your GPU fans to increase up to 5400 rpm to better cool the processor.

Unfortunately, we were sent the wrong update link. But if you e-mailed the m15x support line (Area51_m15x@alienware.com), then you should have received an update that will provide you a link to a .zip file. Once you download the small file, you simply need to open Nero Ultra Edition, click Backup, and then click “Burn Image to Disc.” Next, select the file “m15x_x29b.iso from the unzipped folder.

Once you’ve burned your disk, Alienware suggests you take the following precautions:

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Alienware just released a statement in regards to a fix for the Alienware m15’s GPU overheating issues. Here’s what Alienware’s product group vice president had to say:

At the present time, we have replicated the m15x issue related to overheating when the system is running at high-resolutions during gameplay. We have determined that the system’s software-controlled thermal profiles are not performing as originally designed. We are continuing to test this over the weekend and hope to provide an updated software build for our customers as soon as possible.

Alienware suggested that the update will likely be a BIOS one, that it will be available on its Web site, and that the original issue included an error with the fan speeds at higher temperatures:

In the meantime, we ask for our customers to continue to send their account information and issues to Area51_m15x@alienware.com so they will be alerted immediately of an update. We apologize for this inconvenience and we are working diligently to resolve this issue.

Here’s the story behind the overheating problem:

Over the past 24 hours I’ve been working with the great crew over at the Notebook Review forums trying to figure out what’s going on with the Alienware Area-51 m15x. As I mentioned in an earlier post, we didn’t see any issues with the graphics overheating in our Crysis and Call of Duty 4 gaming sessions or in 3DMark06 and other performance tests.

However, many of our commenters and some owners of the m15x suggested that we try something we don’t usually test: running programs that strain the GPU as much as possible to boost the temperature past 90 degrees Celsius, the apparent cutoff point.

According to them, our m15x’s original core clock and memory clock speeds, 500MHz and 799MHz respectively, would drop to 275MHz and 301MHz once the graphics processing unit’s temperature hit 90 degrees Celsius. At idle, our core temperature was in the area of 56-61 degrees Celsius. The decrease to such low speeds would make most of todays games unplayable.

In order to test this, we ran the suggested programs, ATITool and GPU-Z. The ATITool basically puts as much stress on the graphics processor (GPU) as it can, slowly raising the temperature, which we monitored using GPU-Z. At about 92-degrees during our first run, the unfortunate happened: our GPU core clock dropped to 275MHz and our GPU memory clock fell to 301MHz. The image (at right) shows the immediate GPU temp drop after the spike.

So what’s this mean? We spoke with Alienware yet again to figure out what’s going on. Over long gaming periods, the system is going to heat up and people are going to see horrible game play.

Even though we didn’t see this when we played for hours, the fact is that strain on the GPU is going to cause issues eventually. Alienware has now acknowledged the issue and has been able to recreate it. Apparently the GPU has a pre-configured thermal high, and when the processor gets too hot, it automatically throttles down to avoid overheating. The cutoff point either needs to be raised, or the heat has to be dissipated in a more effective way.

We recently reviewed the Alienware Area-51 m15x for LAPTOP and awarded it our editor’s choice rating. When we hear reports, like the one this morning on Engadget, that a system is overheating or experiencing physical cracking issues, it becomes our job to figure out what’s going on.

When I reviewed the m15x, it wasn’t just benchmarked; I also took it home to take Crysis for a spin on my own time. The system gets hot, sure, and most do—but I never had any issues with overheating to the point that the system shutoff or became unstable—even during a 4-hour session of Crysis.

On the left side of the unit, just above the Ethernet port, I can see a small opening where people are experiencing cracks. Perhaps excessive force on the lid or directly on this area could cause a crack. One example could be a fist pound around the keyboard, after getting fragged, for example.

My pictures are zoomed up close, but in reality it’s hardly noticeable. In one, my finger is holding down the gap just above the Ethernet port. Perhaps this could have been caused during shipping, and harsh treatment could possibly result in a crack. We called Alienware to get their reaction.

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We just finished our review of the Alienware Area-51 m15x, the first 15.4-inch laptop to offer both Intel’s brand new Core 2 Extreme X9000 and a GeForce 8800M GTX graphics solution. We gave it our Editors’ Choice award because it offered some of the best performance benchmarks we’ve ever seen.

For one, it beat out its older brother, the Alienware Area-51 m9750 in our 3DMark06 test with a score of 9,280. It even cut through Call of Duty 4 and Crysis like a hot knife through butter, where it racked in highs of 111 frames per second and 31 frames per second, respectively.

Find out what else we thought about the m15x by reading our full review.