please help, questions for my new 18

[Jtravapd]

I received my new laptop today and i have a few quesitons im hoping someone here can help.
i h
Firstly, (system is i7 4930xm with 780M SLI, 32gigs of ram)

I was under the impression, and nvidia's website says the 780M supports Boost which i believe is the new overclocking software for newer nvidia cards. I can't find the software installed on my laptop, can't find it to download on nvidias website, and its not on any of the alienware system discs. Does anyone know where Im supposed to get it? I would like to overclock my GPU's. I guess i could download afterburner, but from what i read the boost software keeps the cards running at their fastest according to how I set temps and fan speed. I really wouild like to get that installed and up and running.

I am getting serious, serious screen tearing. I had two gtx 580's in SLI and while they did have tearing , it was nothing to what i have seen in some game cut scenes on this laptop. Anyone have any ideas?



I have also had a few crashes here and there which surprised me. After installing two old games, (lord of the rings battle for middle earth 1 and 2) when i try to run them they crash immediately. not really sure whats going on with that.

 

[MattyB]

You can also try EVGA Precision X. That is very easy to use with simple fan control.

I haven't heard of this Boost software. I think it may just mean the standard boost that the cards have inbuilt.
Older games may have compatibility issues with your OS. Are you running Windows 7 or 8? I have heard that Win8 doesn't work well with some older games.

 

[Falcon]

I received my new laptop today and i have a few quesitons im hoping someone here can help.
i h
Firstly, (system is i7 4930xm with 780M SLI, 32gigs of ram)

I was under the impression, and nvidia's website says the 780M supports Boost which i believe is the new overclocking software for newer nvidia cards. I can't find the software installed on my laptop, can't find it to download on nvidias website, and its not on any of the alienware system discs. Does anyone know where Im supposed to get it? I would like to overclock my GPU's. I guess i could download afterburner, but from what i read the boost software keeps the cards running at their fastest according to how I set temps and fan speed. I really wouild like to get that installed and up and running.

I am getting serious, serious screen tearing. I had two gtx 580's in SLI and while they did have tearing , it was nothing to what i have seen in some game cut scenes on this laptop. Anyone have any ideas?



I have also had a few crashes here and there which surprised me. After installing two old games, (lord of the rings battle for middle earth 1 and 2) when i try to run them they crash immediately. not really sure whats going on with that.

what MattyB says might be correct. Dude why dont try using "geforce experience" software so that nvidia can directly check for newer updates and even install them right away.

Think of it if havent yet.

 

[MattyB]

You definitely should not be getting screen tearing on this with 2 780m's. Have you run Fraps to get your FPS. I have a small feeling that you could be running on the Intel graphics. That may be why you are having those troubles installing your drivers as per your PM to me.
The inbuilt graphics these days will actually do a pretty good job but no where near what your 780's can do.

 

[Jtravapd]

i downloaded the ge force experience and have it running. GeForce 320.49 Driver is the newest one available. this is from nvidias webpage for the 780M

Experience extra performance with NVIDIA GPU Boost 2.0
This brand new technology allows gamers to push PC performance to the maximum with precise controls. GPU Boost 2.0 intelligently monitors work with even more advanced controls like GPU temperature target, overclocking, and overvoltage to ensure the GPU works at the ultimate performance.

http://www.geforce.com/hardware/notebook-gpus/geforce-gtx-780m/description


i checked in my hardware and it lists the two 780M's as my two graphics cards. the intel GPU that comes with Haswell isn't even in the device manager. also i have SLI enabled and it is running when i run games.


I did manage to fix the game crashes I was having by editing a couple of option.ini files for each of the games.

 

[MattyB]

By the looks of that, there is no software for the Boost 2.0. It is all done intelligently by the card itself. It will just notice any overclocking you do and the temps it's running at and work around it.

 

[Jtravapd]

By the looks of that, there is no software for the Boost 2.0. It is all done intelligently by the card itself. It will just notice any overclocking you do and the temps it's running at and work around it.

maybe. the first time i saw it was when they were showing off a new titan card. you were able to set the fan speed and temp curve on a graph and everything. So you could set your GPU Boost software to 92 degrees. Once your card got to that temp , the fans would kick it up a notch and your GPU would underclock itself until it got back to the temp you got. ALso you could basically set your voltage to maxium because your gpu would never burn itself out because it would shut down by the temp you set before it ever got that hot. it really is a cool piece of software. there are a bunch of videos on youtube if you guys have a min to check it out. I think I can't access it because i am not running nvidias driver package from their website. Im running the driver package that alienware sent with the laptop. After doing some research on google it has to do with nvidias driver package not identiying the cards alienware is using in the 18 yet. They even show you how you can edit some of the files yourself , but im not gonna attempt to go that far.

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ok so i think i figured it out wih the help of you guys. It is a built in feature, however here is what i did. I installed afterburner and went to overclock as usual however some options are greyed out, there is a new link that i can click on that lets me prioritize temp limit and core clock overclock. I just checked my gpu clock and its now at 906mhz ..woohoo...now i have to test it to make sure the fans kick in once i start pushing the cards .

I still want to get the nvidia drivers working on my system as they always are releasing new ones. alienware prob won't update there drivers all year.

 

[MattyB]

They won't for a while but Nvidia will release more and I'm sure they will be compatible soon if they aren't now

 

[Jtravapd]

i ran 3dmark to get a baseline for what my system is doing. I figure ill post it here and someone here can check it to see if its close to peoples scores who have the same type of hardware as I do. Then atleast ill know everything is working well.

here is the link to my results page..bare with me if i mess up posting the link correctly. lol.

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/908647

 

[MattyB]

That looks pretty good at a glance. Once you do some overclocking it will pick the score up nicely. Remember they are comparing that score to desktop machines too so you're doing pretty good

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Do you have your full 3DMark11 score?

 

[sway]

Use precision x its better, afterburner blows. Totally clean it from your comp and install PX if you go that way otherwise it'll cause issues. Download heaven and valley benchmark, same site, oc your gpu through precision x with voltage all the way up, it's not raising voltage just making sure it stays at that voltage while gpu is in high use, save it. Start with raising the gpu clock to +100, run heaven and if it crashes or gets artifacts, lower it by increments of -5 until stable, for example mines at 64, I got mine to be exact though. Put gpu clock back down to 0. Then go to memory clock and start at +500, go down in increments of -10 until stable. This is the fastest and most accurate way to oc a gpu to get the most out of it.

Once you find a stable oc try putting power target at 150 percent and work your way down however you want, mines at 120. Google heaven benchmark and go to that site to download that and valley, heaven is more demanding so use that to oc and test, valley is to test afterwards just in case. If your stable in heaven and valley, your stable in 99 percent of games. Put settings to extreme, 8xaa, 1080p, in heaven and valley also. That's a crash course in oc'ing basically, you can gain 20 to 25 percent in games if you have really good gpus. Also rem if you run through those benchmarks and get almost done or if there's tiny issues, go down 1 or 2 on the gpu clock or memory clock to get it precise.

tappin from the Nexus 10

 

[MattyB]

Yeah I stopped using Afterburner. Precision X is way better. Remember that cooling is a lot different in laptops compared to desktops so keep a good eye on your temps. I'm not sure how the throttling goes on the 780M's.

 

[sway]

Forget the first pic

tappin from the N e x u s 4

 

[Jtravapd]

Forget the first pic

tappin from the N e x u s 4

ok thank you guys for your replies..Actually the video i saw they were using Precision X with the titan card to overclock, i thought that was software for boost. lol. I always used afterburner so i wasn't aware what precision looked like. im downloading that right now. Ill overclock and bench later on. I have to work a double today so the fun will have to wait, while i make money to pay for the laptop. lol.

I am disappointed i can't use nvidias drivers though from their website. im hoping in the future that changes. maybe because the 780M is so new there are bugs to work out.

next i have to start to mess with the CPU. anyone have any programs or anything to overclock it? i have the 4930XM cpu but in the bios its not really that clear like it is on a desktop on what to change to overclock.

 

[MattyB]

I think Throttle Stop and Intel Extreme tuning utility are the ones to go for. You usually need an unlocked BIOS to get the most out of it and it may take a little while for someone to come out with one. PM Mr Fox if you like. He's the guru around here for overclocking. There won't be much around yet for overclocking the new CPU's.

 

[Sleepy]

Yes , I agree with mattyb , pm mr fox , what he doesn't know about overclocking m18x is not worth knowing , but the setting you Are looking to adjust in the bios to start overclocking is " core multipliers " and " flex ratio" all these are normally under advanced>performance .. Then you should see the core multipliers one on top of another , and directly under them is the " flex ratio " ( I think ) hope this helps

 

[Falcon]

scores look great.

 

[Jtravapd]

Yes , I agree with mattyb , pm mr fox , what he doesn't know about overclocking m18x is not worth knowing , but the setting you Are looking to adjust in the bios to start overclocking is " core multipliers " and " flex ratio" all these are normally under advanced>performance .. Then you should see the core multipliers one on top of another , and directly under them is the " flex ratio " ( I think ) hope this helps

(head spinning) lol i looked in the bios and saw those two things but didn't understand what to change them to. its so much easier on the desktop. lol.


SO far im loving the laptop..its seriously is a sick machine. what im most surprised with is the build quality of it. its hard to explain to people who haven't used it, but it just feels like its built extremely well. not to mention i can type on it and it doesn't feel awkward or different. it probablly helps that its a 18inch screen so there is room for a full keyboard, but the keys feel responsive and have just enough give in them to where i can type fast and am not missing many keys. (doesn't help with my shitty spelling though. lol)

I have had a couple crashes here and there but that is probablly from a combo of things. Im not sure what the rules of this message board are so i wont get into it too much, but the whole point of having alaptop is so everything is portable, so carrying around a case of 100 dvd's for all my games just isn't worth it in my opinion so i have all my games cracked so i can run them straight off the hard drive. ill explain more in pm's if anyone wants to know. lots of message boards frown upon talking about hacking ect. anyway sometimes this can cause crashes.

I think though crashes have come from the video driver side of things. I'm not exactly sure why. maybe because of running precision. im not entirely sure, but i really hope i eventually will be able to download and install the drivers directly from nvidias website.

 

[Jtravapd]

Thank you guys for all your help

thanks to everyone who has helped me out getting my 18 up and running. today i took everyone advice and with the help of mr fox made just three changes to my bios and with those few mouse clicks i scored a 25691 http://www.3dmark.com/cg/608772
on 3dmark and that is with running my video cards at stock speed.


i actually heard the cpu fan kick on for the first time. lol. thank you again for your help. will keep you guys posted with further updates.

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http://www.3dmark.com/is/683714

168534 running ice storm!!! i may have just orgasmed in my pants. lol. we should get a benchmark thread going so we can all see what people with similar hardware is getting. one setting here or there make a huge difference.

 

[MattyB]

Looking pretty good! Can't wait to get my 3920XM and 780M's! Won't get the CPU for another 2 1/2 weeks though

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Scratch that! It just rocked up today along with the 3 pipe heatsink!

Knew it would be a good day today when I woke up!