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dual channel on new AW??? - Page 4

post #61 of 112
11/5/03 at 5:14am
Quote:
Originally posted by patch
The sales rep did not seem to know anything, but I think they are referring to the rev 2, oh and I got the saucer silver
If our mobos are dual channel, I wonder how we turn it on? but maybe we cant cause they arent! Who knows....damn aliens.
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post #62 of 112
11/5/03 at 5:25am
triton, did u order ur 51m with the pc3200? and also i've reached the point where i'm starting to realize that a company like alienware would lose more than it would gain in making a blatently false statement. All of the tech's say it's a new mother board and that it supports dual channel. Whether Sis made them a customized mobo or not, we are gauranteed on paper that the mobo is duel channel and is not the same mobo as the rev 1. So I'm not gonna stress anymore, i'll leave that up to u Mad
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post #63 of 112
11/5/03 at 5:27am
Quote:
Originally posted by TritonB7
Divine why dont you just call them? Maybe you can get more answers out of them. Still sounds fishy to me, but I do think custom boards wouldnt cost that much more since all they have to do is switch out the parts on the board...I've seen this done before. Besides I'm sure they dont just throw the transistors in, The chips are already made allyou have to do is add the new chip or customized one (aka 655) *shrugs* Hell I dont know anymore I'm going to bed.
I plan on it... but, after a nice long sleep.


And no, you cant just "switch out" parts on the mobo.

OK, here is the thing. To give the AW a DcDDR upgrade, two things would have to happen. You would need a DcDDR capable northbridge, and you would need to redesgin the motherboard.

In the case of the 648, there is NO DcDDR support. There are not some secret stash of a few million extra transistors. Now, given time, and a complete re-design, the 648 COULD be made with DcDDR... but wiat.. it already has..the 655. So, assuming they went with the 655...

The motherboard (and bios) has to be redone. DcDDR actually requires more hardware connections, so, you would have to add ~200-300 more traces for the extra channel, as well as new timing chips, and an overall new motherboard layout. Additionally, since the 648 and 655 are NOT (to the best of my knowledge) pin compatibly, the board would need to be redesigned to match the pins on the new chipset. Keep in mind, these are 6 layer boards, BUT, built VERY compact, and a redesign of this scale, would be costly, since not only is it a completely new model, but the money already invested in V1 just got thrown out the window.
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post #64 of 112
11/5/03 at 5:30am
Quote:
Originally posted by patch
triton, did u order ur 51m with the pc3200? and also i've reached the point where i'm starting to realize that a company like alienware would lose more than it would gain in making a blatently false statement. All of the tech's say it's a new mother board and that it supports dual channel. Whether Sis made them a customized mobo or not, we are gauranteed on paper that the mobo is duel channel and is not the same mobo as the rev 1. So I'm not gonna stress anymore, i'll leave that up to u Mad
Originally I ordered the 2700, but the next day the 3200 was released, so I had my order changed, so yes I ordered the pc3200.

On the 648fx specs it says it can only have 2 ddr pc3200 sticks but 3 of the other sticks....does this meen that the duel channel only works with pc3200? or could it meen that the two pc3200 sticks equals out to 800mhz? err I'm comfused already.
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post #65 of 112
11/5/03 at 5:32am
Quote:
Originally posted by Divine_Madcat
I plan on it... but, after a nice long sleep.


And no, you cant just "switch out" parts on the mobo.

OK, here is the thing. To give the AW a DcDDR upgrade, two things would have to happen. You would need a DcDDR capable northbridge, and you would need to redesgin the motherboard.

In the case of the 648, there is NO DcDDR support. There are not some secret stash of a few million extra transistors. Now, given time, and a complete re-design, the 648 COULD be made with DcDDR... but wiat.. it already has..the 655. So, assuming they went with the 655...

The motherboard (and bios) has to be redone. DcDDR actually requires more hardware connections, so, you would have to add ~200-300 more traces for the extra channel, as well as new timing chips, and an overall new motherboard layout. Additionally, since the 648 and 655 are NOT (to the best of my knowledge) pin compatibly, the board would need to be redesigned to match the pins on the new chipset. Keep in mind, these are 6 layer boards, BUT, built VERY compact, and a redesign of this scale, would be costly, since not only is it a completely new model, but the money already invested in V1 just got thrown out the window.
Yeah I know what you meen by reconfiguring the board but hey it could be possible...but whats the point? Sis may as well call it the 655fx if it supports dual channel...unless the 655fx wasnt out yet, but they were able to implement dual channel into a extremely modified 648fx.

Im going to keep calling alienware till I talk to everyone of their techs...I'll get to the bottom of this lol!
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post #66 of 112
11/5/03 at 11:13am
Whren I ran a Sandra it idn't come up as a FX just a regular 648. It barked alot about stuff being disabled. There is a chance that we have a hybrid board that is inbetween what Sis calls 648 and 655. I mean it is a different style boar with the special AGP slot of the AW cards. We will never know untill someine who ordered a duakchannel laptop gets it back and tests.
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post #67 of 112
11/5/03 at 11:14am
Quote:
Originally posted by Divine_Madcat
My ass...

Im sorry guys, but im calling it as i see it. Sis will not make a 655/648 hybrid for ONE customer. The development costs would be enourmous, and the profits low. You cant just throw on a few extra million transistors for free, because your a low tier OEM customer (and if you think AW is a top tier, you got another thing coming).

I 100% agree with this. Sis made a dual channel chipset the 655fx which is what you buy if you want dual channel. It is very possible to make a new motherboard with this chip which would be required as it is definitely not pin compatible with the 648fx (the 655 has about 200 more pins to support the dual channel functionality).

From a designers view it would not be all that hard to change the design since the North Bridge to South Bridge connection is the same (this assumes that you don't change the southbridge). Then of course you have a whole cycle of laying out the board, debugging, testing, etc... which can take a couple months.

If someone calls them and asks about it simply ask which chipset they are using on the motherboard of the laptops. If they reply that they are using the 648fx then ask them why they are falsely advertising a dual channel memory setup as the chip does not support it.
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post #68 of 112
11/5/03 at 11:18am
just came back from AW forums and one of there guys said that v2 meant dual channel....what the hell is going on....
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post #69 of 112
11/5/03 at 11:27am
Its an Invasion!
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post #70 of 112
11/5/03 at 12:14pm
I just got off the phone with tech people... he contradicted himself a little which is leaving me a bit confused. Said the new ones do support dual channel, and that they are a little different than the older ones. I don’t know if they switched boards and haven’t updated the website, or have a new bios that they are not sharing. For my case he said it does support dual channel but not perform as well as dual channel compared to the new ones… something about bios and the motherboard, and not change the bios if it is working now. Maybe he was actually referring to the fact that I had 2700 not 3200 RAM. So it kinda leads us back to that they might have changed boards within the past week, false advertising, the people with v2 boards just need a bios flash, or I just don’t know. More people need to hound them on this.
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post #71 of 112
11/5/03 at 12:33pm
Maybe I'm a little way off here. Accroding to everything I've read the SiS648FX chipset DOES indeed support PC3200 (DDR400) memory. From the SiS website under the 648FX chipset:

"The memory controller supports DDR only. It can offer bandwidth up to 3.2GB/s under DDR400 in order to sustain the bandwidth demand from host processor, as well as the multi I/O masters and AGP masters."


For the whole article:


http://www.sis.com/products/chipsets...ium4/648fx.htm
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post #72 of 112
11/5/03 at 12:41pm
but we're wondering about dual channel DDR
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post #73 of 112
11/5/03 at 12:53pm
I'm still waiting for my friend who works at AW to respond, but in the meanwhile I spoke to a sales rep who said that we support dual channel and that is why we sell identical memory in 2's. WTF???? Look, I am no tech person but what kind of BS answer is this? So, I called tech support and told that I am in phase 5 and want to know if I will have dual channel. His response was that all new Area-51m's will support dual channel. That was his only response. When I asked about the mobo he once again stated that all new Area-51m's will support dual channel...

Is there anyone there that can give me a straight answer? Personally, I don't even know what dual channel does. But, I want it and want to know if I am getting it! I am one of those poor saps that always has to have the best model of everything...there's one of me born every minute...
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post #74 of 112
11/5/03 at 12:57pm
I was told that dual channel is when both memory cards will be used at the same time, rather than one at a time, which is what is done by single channel. This therefore can have very important results impacting anything that uses ram. that's why the bench marks jump
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post #75 of 112
11/5/03 at 1:57pm
Quote:
Originally posted by patch
I was told that dual channel is when both memory cards will be used at the same time, rather than one at a time, which is what is done by single channel. This therefore can have very important results impacting anything that uses ram. that's why the bench marks jump
The easiest way to explain dual channel, is to think of it like RAID 0 on 2 HDDs. In order to achieve a DcDDR compatible system, you do indeed need two identical sticks (size, speed, etc). The system will then make those 2 sticks, act like one. So, if it has a large memory write to do, it will give half to one stick, and the other half to the other; thus, the large chunck of data is written in about half the time.

Now, DcDDR also comes back to the chipset. The chip must be specifically made to handle two sticks of ram as one, and wrote to both at the same time. This requires about 200 more pins, and MANY more transistors in the memory controller section of the chip. Changing a chip like this is no small tast, and one that wouldnt be done when there is a chip that already meets the requirements (655).

I would LOVE to know what AW is pulling now....
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post #76 of 112
11/5/03 at 2:53pm
did the website used to say SiS648FX ?I dont care what they say...EVERY referance to it on the web says single channel. Just a few searchs off google...

http://www.ocworkbench.com/2003/sis/648fx/648fx-1.htm
http://www.hothardware.com/hh_files/...gb_648fx.shtml
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/chipset...507062025.html

So wtf AW. Either school your techs, change your website, or pull down this charade.
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post #77 of 112
11/5/03 at 6:35pm
Thread Starter 
for those that have an AW, and are in the AW forums --- has this issue been raised? what are the moderators/support folks saying about this issue?

i would be really surprised if it hasn't been brought up.
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post #78 of 112
11/5/03 at 7:39pm
One thing is for sure,

It has brought to light the fact the tech and Sales staff, really really doesn’t know what’s going on.

It seems they just read the script like good little alien robots.

Customer "is the V2 mobo dual channel"
Alien robot "Yes its dual channel"
Customer "what chipset does the V2 mobo use"
Alien Robot "Yes its dual channel"
Customer "is it the SIS655"
Alien Robot "Yes its dual channel"
Customer " Does not compute, does not compute"



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post #79 of 112
11/5/03 at 7:49pm
Quote:
Originally posted by Bernard_Marx
Man the Alienware Marketing people don't learn do they?

mmm Magnesium Alloy Chassis take 2

The statement Features Dual-Channel PC-3200 DDR400 is so misleading and one suspects it is worded that way to be so.

In the UK we have a body called The Office Of Fair Trading

http://www.oft.gov.uk/Consumer/Misle...ts/default.htm

Who basically investigate complaints from consumers on blatantly misleading advertising, as such Alienware would never get away with the dual channel statement in the UK. Do you have a similar body in the USA?
The Uk site today realeased DDR PC-3200 as a option on the configurator.... it doesnt say anywere as far as I can see anything about dual channel memory.


http://www.alienware.co.uk/system_pages/area-51m.aspx

Makes you wonder don't it.
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post #80 of 112
11/5/03 at 8:00pm
i swear, if i wasnt worried about harrasment charges, i would call them and REALLY get into all this... lol
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