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Marker01’s m15x Skullcap Review

Here she is.








Specs
Area-51® m15x System
Design & Display: Silver Skullcap Design
Display: 15.4" WideUXGA 1920 x 1200 LCD (1200p)
System Lighting: Alienware® AlienFX® System Lighting - Blue [SVC-ELCBLUEM~0.00]
Video/Graphics Card: 512MB NVIDIA® GeForce® 8800M GTX
Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T9300 2.5GHz (6MB Cache 800MHz FSB)
Operating System (Office software not included): Windows Vista® Home Premium with Service Pack 1
Memory: 2GB Dual Channel DDR2 SO-DIMM at 667MHz - 2 x 1024MB
Turbo Cache Memory: Intel® Turbo Memory (1GB)
- Accelerate Data Transfer Speed Available on Windows Vista Only!
System Drive: 160GB 5,400RPM Hybrid Drive w/ 256MB flash memory
Optical Drive: 8x Dual Layer Burner
Wireless: Internal Intel® Wireless 4965 a/b/g/Draft-N Mini-Card
Sound Card: Internal High-Definition Audio with surround sound
Note: On the first things I did was load XP. Vista was not working out.

Benchmarks
- straight to the good stuff

Right out of the box: 3dmark06 9054


A bit of Overclocking: 9770


And a bit more: 10043


The system can go further; AW has done fine job with cooling. But I’m good @ 10k 3dmark06 on a 15” notebook for now.

Burn-in benchmarks (FRAPS)
Tests are at “medium” game settings
Full WUXGA (1920x1200) AA is off


Min:17 Max:51 Avg:39.5


Min:46 Max:116 Avg:84.3

CPU Behavior
AC Power:
While plugged in, the CPU will idle at 1/2 speed. The system halves the CPU multiplier. Adjusting Windows power setting will not remedy this. It appears to be BIOS/Hardware run and cannot be changed.
Good news is it dynamically adjusts speeds dependant on CPU demand. With all my testing, the dynamic adjustment has been great. The CPU speed changes from 50-100%. During intensive CPU activates (like gaming) the CPU remains at 100% speed.

Battery:
Running on battery is a whole different story. By default, as soon as you unplug the AC connection your CPU multiplier is halved… So my T9300 (2.5Ghz) multiplier is dropped from 12x to 6x, making it a 1.2Ghz C2D…
The really bad part is that it will not dynamically adjust by demand while running on battery; it’s stuck at 1.2Ghz no matter what you do.
Here's a shot of the system on battery with SP 2004 (CPU Stress Test) running for 5 min. The CPU remains downclocked @ 1/2 speed.




Thankfully you can remedy this. RMClock works great.

Your best bet is to set one of the profiles (Maximal performance).
Under Battery, select Use P-state transitions (PST) and check your default CPU multiplier (FID) index check box (T9300 would be 12x, index 7)


Go up to the main Profiles node and under Battery you can select Maximal performance as the current setting. Now your CPU will adjust all the way to max speed (by demand) even when on battery.

To permanently fix this problem also select Maximum performance as the Startup type. RMClock needs to be running for the startup type to take effect. To have RMClock start when Windows starts go to the Settings node and check “Run at windows startup”.


Here’s the system on battery after setting RMClock, running SP 2004 for 5 min. The CPU multiplier stays at 12x and runs full speed (by demand).

NOTE: even with these setting the CPU will still dynamically adjust from 50%-100% dependant on demand while on battery. This helps keep the system temperature down and improves battery life.

Display

If you sprung for the UXGA screen the first thing you’ll notice is everything is very small. Windows default settings are optimized for XGA screens. In a 15” UXGA screen you’re going to need to change this. Bumping up the DPI to about 130 will help. It looks like this (need to resize the image, click it).

Windows Default DPI


130DPI


Stealth mode / BinaryGFX
Stealth mode is easily enabled or disabled by a dedicated QuickTouch button. The systems CPU and GPU are downlocked and the system fans are reduced.
BinaryGFX allows you to change between the Nvidia and low powered integrated Intel GPU. Function Key + F7 swaps between the two. It requires a reboot for this change to take effect.
Swapping to the integrated Intel GPU and using Stealth mode has drastically improved battery life.

Conclusion:
This is one awesome notebook! I have been desperately looking for a top performance 15” notebook for years now, and it’s finally here!

great review!!!

i've changed the template to work with the LIGHT STYLE.

If you could please change to the light style and edit your review so you can add the ratings per criteria.

and upload the benchmarks?

Oops! thanks Steve. Done.

Awesome. Looks damn great!!!

What a fantastic review! I am impressed with the looks of the skullcap in silver, however, I am still opting for a Ripley.

Way to go Marker!!! VERY NICE INDEED!!!

Hi I\'m interested in a Area M15x and I would like to ask about touchpad. Is that with Scroll Functionality? or maybee is that synaptic???

Thank you for answer.

oops double post.

Yes it has scrolling functionality, but it's not defined by any line or texture. Actually the touchpad resembles the apples touchpads a bit.

Yes, the m15x does use Synaptics technology. Like Steve said, it supports both up/down and left/right scrolling. You can configure where the scroll points are and what size they are using the Synaptics driver software.

The touchpad itself is seamless, it just right on the systems frame. But it has an LED light around the actual touch pad, so you really can’t miss it =)

PS: outside of the touch pad i have to say, i just LOVE the Microsoft Bluetooh Laser Notebook mouse i picked up for the m15x. Its just awesome!

thanks a lot guys, i hope my m15x will be home soon

Good luck Sweet d. And very nice review Marker.

Very late to the game, but just wanted to say thanks for the review marker01!

nice spec and an excellent review!

u guys americans?
cuz that's the biggest prob with alienware
i live in the NL
and dont feel like sendin
my notebook back to the US
if somethin is wrong with it =\