Alienware M18x R2 - GTX 1070

[MattyB]

I've finally pulled the trigger on an upgrade to my trusty M18x R2. I have a GTX 1070 coming over from the US to make her a beast again! I won't get it till the new year but I'll post some before and after benchmarks once I get it installed. Stay tuned.

 

[MattyB]

Well I can happily report that my GTX 1070 upgrade seems to have been successful. I had installed the card earlier this week but I encountered a few issues but a quick vBIOS flash of the card sorted it out last night. I will run some benchmarks over the weekend to make sure it's getting the right performance.
For anyone looking to upgrade their old M18x this is what you'll need;
- GTX 1070 (MXM 3.0b design)
- A11 Unlocked BIOS
- Modded Nvidia Driver
The Process is;
- Download and Install the unlocked BIOS
- Remove you old card(s)
- In the BIOS set your video setting to SG
- Download or make your own modified graphics driver
- Download DDU and remove your old drivers in safe mode
- Install the 1070
- Start the machine while disabling Driver Signature Enforcement
- Install the modded driver

 

[ziobeppe]

Hi, i have install the same card on my M18X r2. Everythings ok, just one problem. The digital audio from the hdmi and the spdif dosn't work. For you i'ts the same?
Thx.

 

[MattyB]

Hi, i have install the same card on my M18X r2. Everythings ok, just one problem. The digital audio from the hdmi and the spdif dosn't work. For you i'ts the same?
Thx.

Have you tried reinstalling the Creative Labs Audio driver? I had to do this manually after reinstalling windows when I installed the 1070

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/product-support/product/alienware-m18x-r2/drivers

 

[ziobeppe]

Thx. Now i can use the spdif. The hdmi dosn’t work but now i can listen the audio.
Thanks again.

 

[ziobeppe]

Just one question.
Do you have throttling problems?
Gpuz continuously reports to me perfcap of pwr and vrel.
Do you have a modded power supply (two 330W power supplies connected)? Or have you solved in another way?
Thank you.

 

[MattyB]

I just use the original 330W. If you have the 1070 it will power throttle but the way around it is to go into the BIOS and switch your video mode to iGFX reboot and go straight back into the BIOS and switch it back to SG. After you reboot again you will have the full power of the card. Unfortunately it seems to be the only way to solve the problem. It only takes a minute so it's not too much of a hassle. I do this whenever I plan on launching a game, just to make sure it's running properly.

 

[ziobeppe]

Thank you for the suggestion. I gonna try when i came back to my home next week. Thanks again.

 

[NecoIMP]

Hi I Have a m18xR1 and I been having it for bout 1 1/2 years, I bought this laptop not for gaming purposes, I used this laptop mainly for recording vocals and I been bummed out since I been home more I been wanting to play some PC games to kill time I thought it was a good laptop for gaming when I bought it, after research turns out its not that great (at least for the gaming standards now on days)... I started looking for ways on how to make it better and upgrade it and I Know its an old Laptop, I feel like I got scam by my ignorance (exactly what happened.) parts are kind of pricey so my whole rant comes down to if its a worth it to spend money to make a beefy laptop or should i just save that money and purchase something more to the standards of current gaming laptops or desktops. I'm really sorry for going off topic here but I stumbled in this trend here and it was the most recent one lol oh and btw Im not a computer wizard I just want a honest opinion from someone that knows what they talking about. thank you

 

[MattyB]

The M18x was a fantastic machine in its day. Unfortunately the PC world moves very fast and the technology becomes outdated. The M18x R1 is limited to what can be upgraded and the best GPU's you can put in it are the GTX 780M or 880M (I prefer the 780M). The M18x R2 is not limited like the R1 is and much more recent GPU's can be used.
If you had the R2 I would suggest looking into doing some upgrades but if you have the R1 then I would say you could keep it for a general use laptop or sell it. The good thing is that the M18x is still a popular collectors item and you can get some decent money for it considering it's almost 10 years old.
A desktop is better value than a laptop as upgrades are a lot easier so if it doesn't need to be mobile then I would suggest a desktop. The newer laptops of today are very limited with upgrades with the CPU and GPU being soldered to the motherboard in most cases.