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Alienware Area-51 m7700 supported replacement GPU, CPU, and RAM

post #1 of 18
9/23/08 at 11:34pm
Thread Starter 
Hello,

I have an Alienware Area-51 m7700 that I bought in 2006. It has the Geforce 6800 Go Ultra. I don't have my utility CD for it, and after installing windows and using the provided driver disk for nVidia, nothing happens (install runs, but card is still unrecognized) In device manager, the card shows up as generic VGA. Using the 6x series driver from nVidia's site fails as it says that it can't find nVidia hardware. The Go/Ultra sections have no 6800 drivers.

I have been able to get the GPU recognized by using the Xtreme-G drivers but they tend to make my system extremely unstable. In addition, my Audigy 2 ZS doesn't get recognized by the install program off the CD (but does, when I download the file off the internet and run the driver install that way).

I've tried numerous things - installing the chipset drivers, testing RAM (for system instability), but there don't seem to be any problems. Anyway, since it's been over two years, I figured I would put in a new GPU and at least that way it would recognize the GPU since I would have the right drivers. I'm also looking to replace the CPU and RAM.

So I was curious as to the family of supported nVidia GPU's I could use for this machine. I would also like to know what kind of CPU's I can use (not sure of the slot) and what kind of RAM I should look for.

The relevant specs are below:

Area-51® m7700
Processor: Intel® Pentium® 4 650 Desktop Processor w/ HT Technology 3.4GHz 800MHz FSB 2MB
Motherboard: Intel® 915P PCI-Express Chipset
Memory: 1GB Dual Channel DDR2 SO-DIMM at 533MHz - 2 x 512MB
Video Card: 256MB NVidia® GeForce™ Go 6800 Ultra

I appreciate the help!
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post #2 of 18
9/24/08 at 9:43am
Alienware provides drivers for all their systems on their download page. All of these drivers have been certified by Alienware to work with your computer and component.
http://support.alienware.com/Support...nu=29&item=535

All video cards for these systems are pricey if you can manage to get your hands on them. If you have no real reason to upgrade you component (performance wise), I wouldn't bother. Depending on when you bought your system, if your motherboard revision is < 6.1, you might not be compatible with some newer gpus.

But to answer your question, the highest i've seen in the 7700 is:
GPU: 7950 GTX 512MB (not sure which socket we are using)
CPU: (intel): 3.8GHz Pentium 4 (using a LGA 775 socket)
RAM: any mobile ram running at 533MHz should work.
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post #3 of 18
9/24/08 at 9:44am
Here is the driver you need. Its directly from Alienware.
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post #4 of 18
9/24/08 at 2:39pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tokamak7700 View Post
Alienware provides drivers for all their systems on their download page. All of these drivers have been certified by Alienware to work with your computer and component.
http://support.alienware.com/Support...nu=29&item=535

All video cards for these systems are pricey if you can manage to get your hands on them. If you have no real reason to upgrade you component (performance wise), I wouldn't bother. Depending on when you bought your system, if your motherboard revision is < 6.1, you might not be compatible with some newer gpus.

But to answer your question, the highest i've seen in the 7700 is:
GPU: 7950 GTX 512MB (not sure which socket we are using)
CPU: (intel): 3.8GHz Pentium 4 (using a LGA 775 socket)
RAM: any mobile ram running at 533MHz should work.
Awesome! Thanks for the help. Another question. How do I find what revision my motherboard is?
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post #5 of 18
9/24/08 at 2:40pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by marker01 View Post
Here is the driver you need. Its directly from Alienware.
Thanks a lot! I was able to get a driver from laptopvideo2go. Would you recommend that over the official driver?
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post #6 of 18
9/24/08 at 5:26pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by vivin View Post
Awesome! Thanks for the help. Another question. How do I find what revision my motherboard is?
There's a sticker on the memory slot that will show your mobo revision.

There was a revision to the original mobo to raise the power required for the 6800 ultra, so you probably don't have the first revision, but I think they revised it again to provide more power for the 7800go. Depending on the revision you have, you may already be at the max vid card for the mobo.

They aren't making new motherboards anymore, so if you want to move up you'll be looking at refurbs or used mobos, IMO it's not worth the risk with the failure rate of these mobos to put a lot of money into this system. If you can get it running correctly with your current hardware, it may be best just to use it the way it is.
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post #7 of 18
9/24/08 at 7:04pm
Unless you have a specific game that requires a newer driver, I would stick with Alienware's latest verified drivers. Last year I had to live with a memory leak occurring from the newer nvidia drivers that weren't written with my specific card in mind (but my games required it). I have since then found a solid driver. Sorry, I can't give any recommendations as I have the 7900gtx.
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post #8 of 18
9/24/08 at 8:52pm
I agree with Tokamak7700 about using AW certified drivers if you can... Unfortunately, when combining desktop and laptop hardware, driver issues can be a nightmare. With the m7700 you've got a desktop processor and chipset with mobile vid card and other hardware. AW runs the crap out of the drivers they certify, so you shouldn't have any problems with their drivers. They're dated, so finding newer drivers can cause problems depending on the source.

My m9700 has a mobile cpu and mobile vid cards, but the SLI chipset is from a desktop mobo, so things are a bit screwy with it also regarding standard drivers. I've had great luck though with video drivers from laptopvideo2go.com, and using their modified INF file for laptops. Just download the driver package and the modified INF file, unzip the driver folder and insert the mod. INF file. It'll ask you if you want to replace the orig INF file with the new one, say yes, or if you're worried make a backup of the original first. Then install the drivers.
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post #9 of 18
9/25/08 at 2:15pm
Thread Starter 
I really appreciate all the help guys!

The Alienware is the only windows machine I own and I keep it around for games. My other machines either run Linux of FreeBSD. The only games I'm going to be looking into for the near future are Spore, Starcraft II and Red Alert 3. I'm thinking what I have should be good enough for that?

I have the laptopvideo2go driver installed right now and I'm going to see how it does. If it gives me issues I'll go back the official Alienware drivers. Yeah, I had a major memory-leak issue with the Xtreme-G drivers.

I'll take a look at my mobo revision and see what it is and if it can support a newer card. If not, I'll just stick with what I have.
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post #10 of 18
10/4/08 at 5:57pm
Thread Starter 
I checked out my revision and it was 6.1N - what GPUs are supported by this rev?
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post #11 of 18
10/4/08 at 5:59pm
Thread Starter 
Never mind. Found this - hope it is helpful to you all!
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post #12 of 18
10/4/08 at 6:25pm
Thread Starter 
I tried looking for the replacement cards, but the leads on it don't seem to match the one I have. For the card I have (6800 Ultra), the leads come out from the underside of the card, whereas in the pictures I have seen of the 7xxx series, the leads come out of the side?

This is what I have (not exact, but similar):

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post #13 of 18
10/4/08 at 6:38pm
Thread Starter 
And the mobo has connectors like these:
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post #14 of 18
10/4/08 at 9:52pm
Not sure what you mean by leads. Both the card and the mobo look exactly like mine. I know Alienware upgraded the heatsink when I upgraded from my 6800 to the 7900gtx. But the 6800 ultra's heatsink looks very similar to mine.
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post #15 of 18
10/7/08 at 12:47am
Thread Starter 
I guess what I mean is that my card doesn't have pins at the bottom like this one:

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post #16 of 18
10/7/08 at 1:04am
You can try here.

This guy sells compatible upgrades for various brands of computers. Not sure if there are or if he has any in stock.

And sometimes it could take some time before he can get the upgrade, but it´s worth checking it out.
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post #17 of 18
10/8/08 at 10:33pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks for the link! I will check it out.

Do you have any idea what the 6800 Go Ultra would not have those pins? I thought it was an MXM?
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post #18 of 18
10/8/08 at 11:13pm
the maximum VGA you can have is
7950GTX512
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