That was one of the better laptop videos I've ever seen. Spectacular how you disassembled that alienware I don't have the guts to do that! It really got me concerned to buy one after seeing the manifecture issue you showed.
Thanks for the feedback! I gotta say don't be too worried about that defect I would be highly surprised if that was a widespread issue. I have owned and bought tons of computers and laptops in the past and can honestly say this is the first time that i've gotten something that was an actual defect like that.
I'm glad you are finding it helpful. My video's on this will probably slow down over the week(I still have a normal day job) but I plan on doing at least one more video next weekend.
Hello! Your disassembly of the laptop is very helpful and with it I’d like to ask a question. Since the fans and heat sink assembled seem to be connected to fix the fan is it required to replace the entire thing or is it possible to replace the fans by themselves? Thanks in advance 😁
I've been needing to repaste mine for a while now, but the task is pretty overwhelming to say the least. Then, about two weeks ago, the fans up and died on me. I guess everything happens for a reason, huh? 🤷♀️😅 Anyway, your video is an absolute lifesaver. I've watched it a couple times, and I'll be using it as a guide to fix mine this weekend. Fan replacement. 🤞 I just wanted to say thank you! This is such a huge help!
Question for you man. I have a m17 r4 and when I opened the back plate to upgrade my ssd and put everything back together my mousepad and clicked stopped responding. I didn’t take any additional wires or mess with anything else besides that. Could you help me?
I have a question about the hinges? I have a M17 R2 version, but it is built the same as this one. It fell the otherday and the hinge connection points that connect to the back of the display broke from the rest of the display. When I looked up what the exact part name was, dell's manual says its a Hinge-Up Display and to fix the hinges the entire thing screen must be replaced. Is this true or am I reading the wrong thing?
I know this is an old video, but thanks anyway. 😄 You helped me a lot especially with the screws, I tend to overlook one or two when I have to disassemble something this complex. Lots of cables and screws... Also I like to see how much force one applies to a part when you have to open it up to make sure I don't break anything. My idle temps dropped 15-20°C, although the peak is still above 80 even when not in game. 💦🙄
Hi, came across your channel very helpful. I added my M.2 SATA to the slot 1 but the laptop keeps booting from slot 2 which is the original 512gb PCIe it came with. Is there any way I can change the boot options in BIOS,it was very confusing
Hey my m15 r3 currently has 1 ssd drive in it. I am planning on buying a second. Am I correct in thinking that the laptop comes with a heat shield for both ssd slots? So all I have to do is buy a drive and stick it in? Thanks in advance?
as a full time dell service technician, not bad at all. i tear these down in 10 minutes. Ive must have taken apart over 10,000 laptops and 1 thing I learned is always refer to the service manuals for screw locations. you had me pulling my hairs out on some parts of this video. not bad though
Hey man. I'm doubtful you'll see this, but is there any way to just replace the fans, or do you have to swap the entire cooling system? I'm only trying to swap the GPU fan.
Dont know if you guys cares but if you're stoned like me during the covid times then you can watch pretty much all of the latest series on instaflixxer. Have been streaming with my gf during the lockdown :)
Hey I was hoping somebody or even you could answer this: I have the M15 R3 and I’m not that great with computers but I’m thinking about upgrading my storage. The storage that I bought the computer with came with 2 PCIe’s. Both are 256 GB. So 512 max. I bought a 1 TB NVME drive and I want to upgrade the storage and replace one of the 256 GB... will I run into any problems and is this possible? Thanks.
What do you call the the layered composite thermal sheet? Possibly copper, graphene and silicone Dell didn't want to tell me. Mine is delaminating. I took it out and replaced it with Gelid ultimate 15W thermal pads. I'm not convinced in my workmanship nor do I have good comparison temps (lack of baseline) While 15W/mK is ok, It's not copper or graphene. Thoughts or suggestions?
2024 and this video made love you! My fans died on me and I was planning on just replacing them until you showed the manufacturing issue. Now I will try to change the paste myself and it will probably feel like a new laptop after 4 years. Thank you so much for allowing me to do this mysefl!!
Great vid... what were your thermals like before this? I also have an m15 r3 and it gets HOT. like 100c sustained while gaming. Thinking I should do what you did.... Thanks
I wish to know what kind of screwdrivers you used. I tried to get the screws out of the battery and have failed. My screwdrivers for that bent. Taking off the back cover was easy.
Nice vid! Keep the good work. I'm a noob in this laptop gaming world, I just bought the Alienware R3 I7 with the RTX 2070 Super ..can you make a video about best settings while playing? Thanks keep the good work.
I just receieved the m17 r3, question in regards to booting it up. When the now lets see whats new from windows screen pops up, how long does that normally take?? This is my first gaming laptop but will be used as a daily driver. Response times from dell/alienware are slow, so hoping you can help me out.
This can take anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes. I'd say if its on that screen longer than 5 minutes try doing a restart by holding down the power button until the machine powers off and then power it back on again.
Advanced Vector thanks for the response, got it finally working!! Another question I have, is internal ssd upgrades, how do I find which ones are compatible and how difficult is the actual install of said ssd. I’d be looking to add 1tb of internal storage. Thanks.
At 39:35, is that masking tape you have used to re-attach the leads to what I believe is your Wi-Fi card? Only part of this project that makes me nervous is the possibility of having to solder.
I followed this and the pins to the left of the display cable werent soldered to the board and just completely ripped off. It still turns on and runs ok but was just wondering if they were important?
I don’t exactly know what that’s for but off the top of my head does the webcam still work now that they are missing? Also I suppose it could have something to do with gsync if you got a gsync display but I’d put my money on the webcam first
Did you return this unit? The bent heat sink on the GPU should have been caught and not allowed to ship. The paste is not meant to take care of vast gaps and in this case, you can see where the paste was not in contact with anything on half the die. You would never have known this if you didn't take it apart. Someone less tech-savvy would be stuck with the back and forth of Dell / Alienware tech support and nothing would be found. Do you have a recommendation on what checks to conduct on new systems to check them out? Thanks again...
I think you'll always be pushing the envelope if sticking with AW provided stock speeds. However if you are willing to undervolt it and reduce the overclock just a bit you get something far more reasonable and manageable.
@@advancedvector6833 I have the M15 R3 as well, i7 10750h though. Using stock profiles in AlienCC I was averaging mid 80's C and spiking to 98C on a couple cores. I created my own profile in Alien CC and went with a very aggressive fan curve and I dropped my Max temps by over 10C and average by 5-8C per core. Dell definitely has the fans set too timid to reduce noise, this laptop needs the fan RPMs to stay cool. This is stock with no repaste or undervolt.
I am actually not sure. I would suspect that to be the case. At least close enough to help but you can always view the maintenance manual provided by dell for these machines. It provides step by step instructions on exactly how to disassemble and reassemble these laptops.
After a few months I’m completely satisfied with the laptop! I undervolted it and it is keeping reasonable temps during gaming, editing, and rendering. All in all it does require a little bit of tinkering but when you get it tuned it really puts.
these videos are great, although a premium laptop should not have this kind of stuff happening to it. Must ask but why did you not use liquid metal on it instead of thermal paste?
I may eventually repaste this to liquid metal. I have not done one in the past but I think I can figure it out. The biggest reason I didn't is because I have a dell tech coming out to replace the mobo so I can get the 2080 i ordered instead of the 2070 they shipped to me. I felt like it would be a waste to put LM on it now when its just gonna be taken apart again in a few days. If i do go the LM route i'll be sure to do an update video on how the thermals are afterwards!
@@advancedvector6833 Thanks a lot for a reply, I have one question and need a little help. I have M17 R3 with 16GB Ram, I wanna upgrade it to 32GB, so what should I do and how can I upgrade it.
Thanks for the teardown! I just received an M15 - i9 2080S. A weird problem is I can’t get the iGPU to be used. It doesn’t show in device manager or for selection in the nvidia control panel. Any chance you could see what the story is with yours? I have the 300hz panel. Thanks!
I noticed the iGPU is disabled in my version as well. I am wondering if its because of the 300hz screen. I know in previous AW's i have owned that in some of the screen options they disable the iGPU as it cannot perform with the screen.
Advanced Vector thanks for that. I checked in with a Razer owner with a 300hz, 2080S as well and he does have the iGPU available. I’m getting about 2 hours of CZcams streaming on mine, which sadly won’t cut it, was hoping to be able to eke our at least 4 hours at 60hz and with battery saver for meetings. I also found that plugging into my thunderbolt dock with power delivery the battery still drained doing productivity tasks (word docs, email)which is a major disappointment. With an external monitor via the dock the dgpu would jump to 75% in task manager just moving the mouse around which was a big surprise! Look forward to the rest of your series, great job so far!
I honestly have no perspective on this. I have heard really great things about the Razer's and want to try them someday but as of right now I have not even seen one in person.
You can't put too much thermal paste unless you end up using a whole tube. The most important thing is to have the correct mounting pressure. Great vid congrats on 100 subs
Yeah I know what you are saying! I can't remember if i edited out the part where i briefly talk about this but as long as you don't put too little you cant screw it up!
Yeah manufacturers were putting those voided if tampered seals on all sorts of things until the FTC remembered to enforce that being illegal. www.techdirt.com/articles/20180410/17590439606/ftc-suddenly-remembers-warranty-void-if-removed-stickers-are-illegal-sends-out-stern-letters-to-manufacturers.shtml
Alien Fx on my m15 r3 keeps malfunctioning you thing is the keyboard or software? I've reinstalled it already and same issue, keyboard even stops working at times
Can’t wait the next chapter “thermal & performance test - how it’s running after repasting”. And what will be your decision regarding switching to i7 .... I still not decided which one should I get i7 or i9 ....
I do think the build quality is very good. The components seam high quality and it was thought out. Still has some heating issues but if you are talking about just fit finish and quality of the actual machine yes its very good. I'm completely satisfied on that front
Hi, nice video and explantation. I got the same model as yours. But recently I have been suffering with Kernel Data Inpage Errors. But I don't know why...
Hey, I have an Alienware 15 R3 (not M15 R3). It easily touches 100 degrees temps no matter what I do, even on playing games on Medium settings. I consistently get frame drops to under 10. For eg, I get 40 fps on Destiny 2 on medium settings. Same for GTA 5. With fps dropping to less than 10 in graphics heavy situations. I've tried repasting the CPU. Also, broke my motherboard doing so, so had to get it replaced by Dell. The CPU and the GPU are soldered on the mobo I guess, so even that has been changed. ( Earlier one also had the same prob). I've seen that it overheats more on power than on battery. Is there something specific I can do to solve this. I'm fed up with this junk.
You can try Undervolting the CPU. I actually have a 15 R4 and have not noticed any heating issues on mine but maybe they changed something with the newer revision that fixed some cooling issue.
@@advancedvector6833 Hey thanks for the reply. I'll try that. Also, my battery lost its capacity to hold charge a long time back but over time it has really swelled up and opened up the front casing quite a bit. Is something wrong with my power adapter? Too much power resulting in overheating the computer? I've been using a US power adapter in India (with socket compatibility adapter) as I bought the machine from the US.
@@advancedvector6833 Ok so tried undervolting the CPU. - 0.125mV using Intel XTU and also undervolted the GPU using MSI Afterburner- 875 mV for 1680 Mhz. CPU stress test shows consisent temps of 95* C + temps. Highest was 100* C. Power throttling consistently + thermal throttling here and there. Didn't stress test GPU but was playing Dota 2 while the system crashed and so I reverted everything back to normal. The plus side- no frame drops (60 FPS) consistently). So I'm gonna try with afterburner more. I'm afraid about the CPU tho. The last time I did try to undervolt using Throttlestop, something happened and system crashed. Won't turn on. Had to turn off Intel speedstep in BIOS to turn it back on but was running 0.8 ghz. To counter that I had to turn off turboboost in BIOS, and CPU was consistently running at 2.8 ghz. Internet said solution is to clear CMOS. Tried to do that+ thought of repasting side by side and broke off the LCD connector on the motherboard. That's a cheeky thing if one doesn't know his way around computers. This is my workstation and the only computer I got, so I'm quite nervous about the undervolting stuff. It's safe, right?
Very nice video, congrats! However, I would have liked if you showed your CPU/GPU results after all the procedure. If the difference is less than 5%, then it's not really worth the time and effort and risk. But if it's >10%... man that's a different story.
Oh and whats going on with Dell? So much engineering talent in designing a state of the art laptop, only to be screwed by a careless production line assembler who has no patience to check his/her work?
@@advancedvector6833 Ahhh that's annoying. I have the m17 R3 so I assume it'll be the same for my model too. I'm glad I specced it out then! Thanks for the reply
Hey! Dell claims that they've included a vapor chamber in the cooling system but I couldn't figure where it was in that teardown. Is it really there? And is it just very very small to the point where it's useless but present for namesake?
I was wondering the same thing. It looks like only Heat Pipes and it doesn't look like it is much improved over the R2 design. What did they change on the R3?
@@advancedvector6833 Ok thanks I thought since it was really expensive I could spec up the gpu and downgrade the ram and storage for future upgrade but that will be impossible. Would 16 gb ram be enough for gaming and video editing maybe occasional streaming or 32 could be a must?
This would greatly depend on your workload however for gaming 16GB should be more than enough for the foreseeable future. Likely the machine would be fairly outdated before we start seeing a need for 32GB as a standard. As far as video editing and whatnot this really just depends on what kind of editing you are doing. If its just light hobby type stuff 16 should be plenty. However if you start talking about wanting to do 2k/4k video and effects etc...it can really start adding up quickly. My current editing desktop has 32 and for the stuff i'm producing on youtube I have not run across an instance where it wasn't enough but a few times I have worked on projects where my RAM jumped up into the mid 20GB's so 16 would have been too little. I was working on 2k gopro footage and tying it together with 2k video from my Mavic Mini drone for an engagement video for my sister. Hope this helps!
at 26:00 you really should use microfiber cloths when you wipe off thermal paste. The small fibers that are left behind can cause negative effects. If you don't want to dirty up a microfiber cloth, then you can use a coffee filter. They are also microfiber, and disposable.
Ah yeah. There is for sure the best way to do things and then there's the way things actually get done. :p all kidding aside I should order in some of those wipes...
The think you keep pointing at and keep going on and on about is actually the GPU. The CPU is the chip to the left of the big chip with badly seated frame guard. Hope this helps you understand better which chip's thermals will be improving once your done with your repair.
Haha. I can honestly say I have never had a problem with that before. I have broken an antenna lead before but it was because I forgot to unplug it before taking the screen off
Hey bro, where is the Ram?? Is it not upgradable? I can't find any videos on where it's located. I would really really appreciate a video or any insight from you. Thanks for the video, you are the first lol I subscribed
@@advancedvector6833 My M15 R3 just came in, and I ordered it with one 1TB SSD instead of the two 512 SSDs in a RAID configuration. The system doesn't come with a heat sink for the empty bay. I had hoped it would. If I had known it did not, I would have selected the two 512 SSDs in a RAID configuration option. A 6 parts PC World series with a Dell Engineer is very good and he speaks to the need for an SSD heat sink because of the heat they generate. I do have an aftermarket one I can install if I decide to add another SSD.
Yeah definitely not for everyone. When i first started I would not have been willing to tear apart a $3000 laptop either. However after you have had it for a few years I highly recommend taking it all apart to blow it out/clean it. By this time it will need a good dusting and its value will have depreciated enough that if you do ruin something you can get spare parts for a lot cheaper. It helps so you can build up the confidence to do it on new machines.
You certainly could but it might take a lot of q-tips to get it off. The best thing is the alcohol wipes but those are also more expensive than paper towels and a jug of alcohol.
Yeah any of the ifixit stuff should work. I bought a kit almost 10 years ago now and am still using it! Other than one bit that I lost everything is still holding up well. I’m likely gonna buy one of their bigger kits this year for my workshop and keep my smaller kit for when I’m on the road.
Next teardown: Alienware M17 R3, GE75 Raider and ROG Strix SCAR-17 with 10980HK & RTX 2080 SUPER. By the way, sir. I think you need to report that manufacture defect to Dell; and peel off the whole thing and realign it nicely.
That was one of the better laptop videos I've ever seen. Spectacular how you disassembled that alienware I don't have the guts to do that!
It really got me concerned to buy one after seeing the manifecture issue you showed.
Thanks for the feedback! I gotta say don't be too worried about that defect I would be highly surprised if that was a widespread issue. I have owned and bought tons of computers and laptops in the past and can honestly say this is the first time that i've gotten something that was an actual defect like that.
Worth teardown and perfectly addressed the issue, Thanks mate
Thank you so much for making this video, please keep uploading more ❤️❤️❤️❤️
I'm glad you are finding it helpful. My video's on this will probably slow down over the week(I still have a normal day job) but I plan on doing at least one more video next weekend.
Thanks this is just what I needed to upgrade to a larger M.2.
Hello! Your disassembly of the laptop is very helpful and with it I’d like to ask a question. Since the fans and heat sink assembled seem to be connected to fix the fan is it required to replace the entire thing or is it possible to replace the fans by themselves? Thanks in advance 😁
would you happen to know if the front top plastic lid comes off? That says M15 behind the screen
I've been needing to repaste mine for a while now, but the task is pretty overwhelming to say the least. Then, about two weeks ago, the fans up and died on me. I guess everything happens for a reason, huh? 🤷♀️😅
Anyway, your video is an absolute lifesaver. I've watched it a couple times, and I'll be using it as a guide to fix mine this weekend. Fan replacement. 🤞 I just wanted to say thank you! This is such a huge help!
Glad it helped!
Question for you man. I have a m17 r4 and when I opened the back plate to upgrade my ssd and put everything back together my mousepad and clicked stopped responding. I didn’t take any additional wires or mess with anything else besides that. Could you help me?
I have a question about the hinges? I have a M17 R2 version, but it is built the same as this one. It fell the otherday and the hinge connection points that connect to the back of the display broke from the rest of the display. When I looked up what the exact part name was, dell's manual says its a Hinge-Up Display and to fix the hinges the entire thing screen must be replaced. Is this true or am I reading the wrong thing?
Those pesky microsapic gops. lol. Thanks so much for all your help with this video. Extremely informative. That manufacturing err tells a story.
how do I clean fans? do I like vaccum it out? or take them out and do deep clean idek I just need help
I know this is an old video, but thanks anyway. 😄 You helped me a lot especially with the screws, I tend to overlook one or two when I have to disassemble something this complex. Lots of cables and screws... Also I like to see how much force one applies to a part when you have to open it up to make sure I don't break anything. My idle temps dropped 15-20°C, although the peak is still above 80 even when not in game. 💦🙄
Wonderful job !!!!! Thank you so very much for all your hard work on this !!!!!! :-)
Hi, came across your channel very helpful. I added my M.2 SATA to the slot 1 but the laptop keeps booting from slot 2 which is the original 512gb PCIe it came with. Is there any way I can change the boot options in BIOS,it was very confusing
Hey my m15 r3 currently has 1 ssd drive in it. I am planning on buying a second. Am I correct in thinking that the laptop comes with a heat shield for both ssd slots? So all I have to do is buy a drive and stick it in? Thanks in advance?
as a full time dell service technician, not bad at all. i tear these down in 10 minutes. Ive must have taken apart over 10,000 laptops and 1 thing I learned is always refer to the service manuals for screw locations. you had me pulling my hairs out on some parts of this video. not bad though
Hey man. I'm doubtful you'll see this, but is there any way to just replace the fans, or do you have to swap the entire cooling system? I'm only trying to swap the GPU fan.
“The thing about alcohol..”
Funny hearing that during a laptop review 😂
Dont know if you guys cares but if you're stoned like me during the covid times then you can watch pretty much all of the latest series on instaflixxer. Have been streaming with my gf during the lockdown :)
Is the USB soldered to the motherboard? How easy would it be to replace a USB port
Hey I was hoping somebody or even you could answer this:
I have the M15 R3 and I’m not that great with computers but I’m thinking about upgrading my storage. The storage that I bought the computer with came with 2 PCIe’s. Both are 256 GB. So 512 max. I bought a 1 TB NVME drive and I want to upgrade the storage and replace one of the 256 GB... will I run into any problems and is this possible? Thanks.
Can you remove the fans from the heatsink or is it a single unit ?
What do you call the the layered composite thermal sheet?
Possibly copper, graphene and silicone
Dell didn't want to tell me.
Mine is delaminating. I took it out and replaced it with Gelid ultimate 15W thermal pads. I'm not convinced in my workmanship nor do I have good comparison temps (lack of baseline) While 15W/mK is ok, It's not copper or graphene. Thoughts or suggestions?
can i add a Dell M.2 PCIe NVMe Class 35 2230 SSd??
2024 and this video made love you! My fans died on me and I was planning on just replacing them until you showed the manufacturing issue. Now I will try to change the paste myself and it will probably feel like a new laptop after 4 years. Thank you so much for allowing me to do this mysefl!!
Thanks for making the tutorial please don't take this down later keep up the great work✌🏽
Hey I appreciate it man. I don't plan on taking it down. A video like this is usually good for a long time.
Great vid... what were your thermals like before this? I also have an m15 r3 and it gets HOT. like 100c sustained while gaming. Thinking I should do what you did.... Thanks
They were pretty bad. This did help overall. You can check out a detailed comparison in one of my other videos. Thanks for watching!
any idea of disassembling the fan from the heat sink? thanks a lot, great video
How do i get to the keyboard ribbon wire?
I wish to know what kind of screwdrivers you used. I tried to get the screws out of the battery and have failed. My screwdrivers for that bent. Taking off the back cover was easy.
Ifixit
what's your temps before and after?
Can’t get the bottom of it off any tips?
Is the maximum nvme slots 2 or 3? I see the two labeled, but there's a mini slot where the wifi card is soldered. What is that for?
it has 2 2280 slots and 1 smaller slot thats a 2230 i think.
@Advanced Vector sir could you please refer a point in the video where we can identify the vapour chamber?
Thanks so much for the awesome videos!!
Good video man.
Is there any way to upgrade the soldered Ram? The way its done in apple mac machines..
Not any reasonable way. Technically i think it is possible but requires equipment and expertise that is far outside the normal range of posibility.
dose anyone knows where is the DDR located?
Hey man, do you know if any m.2 nvme 2280 ssd works? Like the evo 970 plus
Yup. If you have open slots on this laptop or want to upgrade any 2280 m.2 drive will fit.
Great video, gives me some confidence that I'll be able to repaste mine when I need to! Thanks!
You’ll get much better contact to the dye if get rid of the black plastic protective tape on the heat sink. It’s proven to work so much better.
Liked it, man.
Thanks for the support!
Hi! Amazing video, I have the same laptop and i accidentally got water in the LCD screen. Do you know the specifications for a replacement screen?
Nice vid! Keep the good work. I'm a noob in this laptop gaming world, I just bought the Alienware R3 I7 with the RTX 2070 Super ..can you make a video about best settings while playing? Thanks keep the good work.
I'll do a followup as soon as my new motherboard gets in.
I just receieved the m17 r3, question in regards to booting it up. When the now lets see whats new from windows screen pops up, how long does that normally take?? This is my first gaming laptop but will be used as a daily driver. Response times from dell/alienware are slow, so hoping you can help me out.
This can take anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes. I'd say if its on that screen longer than 5 minutes try doing a restart by holding down the power button until the machine powers off and then power it back on again.
Advanced Vector thanks for the response, got it finally working!! Another question I have, is internal ssd upgrades, how do I find which ones are compatible and how difficult is the actual install of said ssd. I’d be looking to add 1tb of internal storage. Thanks.
At 39:35, is that masking tape you have used to re-attach the leads to what I believe is your Wi-Fi card? Only part of this project that makes me nervous is the possibility of having to solder.
No soldering required. I just used a small screwdriver to push the small connectors down.
what's that black paper at the back??
I followed this and the pins to the left of the display cable werent soldered to the board and just completely ripped off. It still turns on and runs ok but was just wondering if they were important?
I don’t exactly know what that’s for but off the top of my head does the webcam still work now that they are missing? Also I suppose it could have something to do with gsync if you got a gsync display but I’d put my money on the webcam first
@@advancedvector6833 webcam and gsync still work. But the color and rgb on the power button and alienware logo on the lid no longer light up.
Did you return this unit? The bent heat sink on the GPU should have been caught and not allowed to ship. The paste is not meant to take care of vast gaps and in this case, you can see where the paste was not in contact with anything on half the die. You would never have known this if you didn't take it apart. Someone less tech-savvy would be stuck with the back and forth of Dell / Alienware tech support and nothing would be found. Do you have a recommendation on what checks to conduct on new systems to check them out? Thanks again...
This one will be returned due to it having a 2070 and not a 2080. I ordered the 2080 and they sent out the 2070.
Thanks. So if my i9 model doesnt have that heatsink defect then it could not have thermal issues?
I think you'll always be pushing the envelope if sticking with AW provided stock speeds. However if you are willing to undervolt it and reduce the overclock just a bit you get something far more reasonable and manageable.
@@advancedvector6833 yeah i dont think i wanna take the risk to repaste so UV is my only hope
@@advancedvector6833 I have the M15 R3 as well, i7 10750h though. Using stock profiles in AlienCC I was averaging mid 80's C and spiking to 98C on a couple cores.
I created my own profile in Alien CC and went with a very aggressive fan curve and I dropped my Max temps by over 10C and average by 5-8C per core. Dell definitely has the fans set too timid to reduce noise, this laptop needs the fan RPMs to stay cool. This is stock with no repaste or undervolt.
Great video! Do you know if the M17 R3 has the same motherboard structure? In other words, could I use your video as a guide for my M17?
I am actually not sure. I would suspect that to be the case. At least close enough to help but you can always view the maintenance manual provided by dell for these machines. It provides step by step instructions on exactly how to disassemble and reassemble these laptops.
wow.. Im a little scared now mine comes in a few days. Should I get this done? how much better are thermals from stock after this?
After a few months I’m completely satisfied with the laptop! I undervolted it and it is keeping reasonable temps during gaming, editing, and rendering. All in all it does require a little bit of tinkering but when you get it tuned it really puts.
@@advancedvector6833 do you use an under pc cooler mat? I find that works a lot and my thermals are much better than even r2 version
these videos are great, although a premium laptop should not have this kind of stuff happening to it.
Must ask but why did you not use liquid metal on it instead of thermal paste?
I may eventually repaste this to liquid metal. I have not done one in the past but I think I can figure it out. The biggest reason I didn't is because I have a dell tech coming out to replace the mobo so I can get the 2080 i ordered instead of the 2070 they shipped to me. I felt like it would be a waste to put LM on it now when its just gonna be taken apart again in a few days. If i do go the LM route i'll be sure to do an update video on how the thermals are afterwards!
Where are the RAM slots?
Is there any ram upgrade slots in Alienware M17 R3 ? Please let me know
No. All the RAM is soldered on so you have to pick what you want up front
@@advancedvector6833 Thanks a lot for a reply, I have one question and need a little help.
I have M17 R3 with 16GB Ram, I wanna upgrade it to 32GB, so what should I do and how can I upgrade it.
Thanks for the teardown! I just received an M15 - i9 2080S. A weird problem is I can’t get the iGPU to be used. It doesn’t show in device manager or for selection in the nvidia control panel. Any chance you could see what the story is with yours?
I have the 300hz panel.
Thanks!
I noticed the iGPU is disabled in my version as well. I am wondering if its because of the 300hz screen. I know in previous AW's i have owned that in some of the screen options they disable the iGPU as it cannot perform with the screen.
Advanced Vector thanks for that. I checked in with a Razer owner with a 300hz, 2080S as well and he does have the iGPU available. I’m getting about 2 hours of CZcams streaming on mine, which sadly won’t cut it, was hoping to be able to eke our at least 4 hours at 60hz and with battery saver for meetings. I also found that plugging into my thunderbolt dock with power delivery the battery still drained doing productivity tasks (word docs, email)which is a major disappointment. With an external monitor via the dock the dgpu would jump to 75% in task manager just moving the mouse around which was a big surprise! Look forward to the rest of your series, great job so far!
How did you get the black version? Can only buy the white one. Like the discrete appearance.
They have the black version here in the US but only for the 300hz screen option.
@@advancedvector6833 thank you
Is it better than the Razer advanced model this time? The thermal issue
I honestly have no perspective on this. I have heard really great things about the Razer's and want to try them someday but as of right now I have not even seen one in person.
is it possible to upgrade your ram on this one to like 32 gb?
No. Everything is Soldered on. You need to get what you want up front.
Which thermal paste did you applied bro?
He shows i
Hey hows the result for the new paste pls reply ty
You can't put too much thermal paste unless you end up using a whole tube. The most important thing is to have the correct mounting pressure. Great vid congrats on 100 subs
Yeah I know what you are saying! I can't remember if i edited out the part where i briefly talk about this but as long as you don't put too little you cant screw it up!
Thank you
Does it void the warranty? Like although you found the installation defect, would they take it back?
Nope doesn’t void it. You are free to work on your own machine
Yeah manufacturers were putting those voided if tampered seals on all sorts of things until the FTC remembered to enforce that being illegal. www.techdirt.com/articles/20180410/17590439606/ftc-suddenly-remembers-warranty-void-if-removed-stickers-are-illegal-sends-out-stern-letters-to-manufacturers.shtml
Is there any way that you can add additional ssd?
@MrDrinkgreentea there is only a storage unit if you dont have the bigger battery, as displayed in this video.
Does this have the vapor chamber cooling system?
The Specs for the machine indicate it does have a vapor chamber
Awesome video! Subbed
When can I send you mine to do this? 😀
Alien Fx on my m15 r3 keeps malfunctioning you thing is the keyboard or software? I've reinstalled it already and same issue, keyboard even stops working at times
probably hardware related then. I have not had any issue with the lights on mine.
@@advancedvector6833 I had to factory reset and spend over 50hrs on the phone with dell. They never call back. Finally get replacement after 4 months
Someone knows where’s the battery of the mother Board?
Can’t wait the next chapter “thermal & performance test - how it’s running after repasting”.
And what will be your decision regarding switching to i7 ....
I still not decided which one should I get i7 or i9 ....
I am editing it now hope to post it soon!
I think you broke that little connector on the eDP cable. I just got this laptop. Gonna repaste cause cpu temp is 100. Thanks for the video
Would you say it was designed well inside and out?
I do think the build quality is very good. The components seam high quality and it was thought out. Still has some heating issues but if you are talking about just fit finish and quality of the actual machine yes its very good. I'm completely satisfied on that front
Hi, nice video and explantation. I got the same model as yours. But recently I have been suffering with Kernel Data Inpage Errors. But I don't know why...
Hey, I have an Alienware 15 R3 (not M15 R3). It easily touches 100 degrees temps no matter what I do, even on playing games on Medium settings. I consistently get frame drops to under 10. For eg, I get 40 fps on Destiny 2 on medium settings. Same for GTA 5. With fps dropping to less than 10 in graphics heavy situations. I've tried repasting the CPU. Also, broke my motherboard doing so, so had to get it replaced by Dell. The CPU and the GPU are soldered on the mobo I guess, so even that has been changed. ( Earlier one also had the same prob). I've seen that it overheats more on power than on battery. Is there something specific I can do to solve this. I'm fed up with this junk.
You can try Undervolting the CPU. I actually have a 15 R4 and have not noticed any heating issues on mine but maybe they changed something with the newer revision that fixed some cooling issue.
@@advancedvector6833 Hey thanks for the reply. I'll try that. Also, my battery lost its capacity to hold charge a long time back but over time it has really swelled up and opened up the front casing quite a bit. Is something wrong with my power adapter? Too much power resulting in overheating the computer? I've been using a US power adapter in India (with socket compatibility adapter) as I bought the machine from the US.
@@advancedvector6833 Ok so tried undervolting the CPU. - 0.125mV using Intel XTU and also undervolted the GPU using MSI Afterburner- 875 mV for 1680 Mhz.
CPU stress test shows consisent temps of 95* C + temps. Highest was 100* C. Power throttling consistently + thermal throttling here and there.
Didn't stress test GPU but was playing Dota 2 while the system crashed and so I reverted everything back to normal.
The plus side- no frame drops (60 FPS) consistently). So I'm gonna try with afterburner more. I'm afraid about the CPU tho. The last time I did try to undervolt using Throttlestop, something happened and system crashed. Won't turn on. Had to turn off Intel speedstep in BIOS to turn it back on but was running 0.8 ghz. To counter that I had to turn off turboboost in BIOS, and CPU was consistently running at 2.8 ghz. Internet said solution is to clear CMOS. Tried to do that+ thought of repasting side by side and broke off the LCD connector on the motherboard. That's a cheeky thing if one doesn't know his way around computers. This is my workstation and the only computer I got, so I'm quite nervous about the undervolting stuff. It's safe, right?
*** Next to the video cable, be real careful with the tape that holds down the webcam connector. lift it in the same direction as in this video.
Very nice video, congrats! However, I would have liked if you showed your CPU/GPU results after all the procedure. If the difference is less than 5%, then it's not really worth the time and effort and risk. But if it's >10%... man that's a different story.
Oh and whats going on with Dell? So much engineering talent in designing a state of the art laptop, only to be screwed by a careless production line assembler who has no patience to check his/her work?
Can you do a video for a replacement screen please?? :D
Is it possible to replace/upgrade the CPU or/and GPU?
It is not possible to upgrade anything except the hard drive
@@advancedvector6833 Ahhh that's annoying. I have the m17 R3 so I assume it'll be the same for my model too.
I'm glad I specced it out then! Thanks for the reply
Hey! Dell claims that they've included a vapor chamber in the cooling system but I couldn't figure where it was in that teardown. Is it really there? And is it just very very small to the point where it's useless but present for namesake?
I didn't notice where it might be. You'd have to confirm with Dell to find out where it is.
I was wondering the same thing. It looks like only Heat Pipes and it doesn't look like it is much improved over the R2 design. What did they change on the R3?
@@petersonfamily6223 yup exactly. Apparently the heat pipes are thicker and fan blades are wider from R2. But I couldn't find the vapor chamber.
Question is the ram soldered or did I just miss it?
It is soldered on unfortunately
@@advancedvector6833 Ok thanks I thought since it was really expensive I could spec up the gpu and downgrade the ram and storage for future upgrade but that will be impossible. Would 16 gb ram be enough for gaming and video editing maybe occasional streaming or 32 could be a must?
This would greatly depend on your workload however for gaming 16GB should be more than enough for the foreseeable future. Likely the machine would be fairly outdated before we start seeing a need for 32GB as a standard. As far as video editing and whatnot this really just depends on what kind of editing you are doing. If its just light hobby type stuff 16 should be plenty. However if you start talking about wanting to do 2k/4k video and effects etc...it can really start adding up quickly. My current editing desktop has 32 and for the stuff i'm producing on youtube I have not run across an instance where it wasn't enough but a few times I have worked on projects where my RAM jumped up into the mid 20GB's so 16 would have been too little. I was working on 2k gopro footage and tying it together with 2k video from my Mavic Mini drone for an engagement video for my sister. Hope this helps!
Is ram still not upgradeable on m15 r3?
Nope you cannot upgrade RAM
at 26:00 you really should use microfiber cloths when you wipe off thermal paste. The small fibers that are left behind can cause negative effects. If you don't want to dirty up a microfiber cloth, then you can use a coffee filter. They are also microfiber, and disposable.
You validated yourself at 30:30.
Ah yeah. There is for sure the best way to do things and then there's the way things actually get done. :p all kidding aside I should order in some of those wipes...
How long does the Dell technician take to come to your home after the phone call?
It depends. In the past i've had it come as quickly as just a day but it seems with COVID its taking a little longer to schedule these things.
@@advancedvector6833 thank you for the reply
I know it's supposed to be sold on, but where was the RAM?
The think you keep pointing at and keep going on and on about is actually the GPU. The CPU is the chip to the left of the big chip with badly seated frame guard. Hope this helps you understand better which chip's thermals will be improving once your done with your repair.
Man, you need a spudger. Using the screwdriver to remove the WiFi antenna leads was giving me an anxiety attack! :D
Haha. I can honestly say I have never had a problem with that before. I have broken an antenna lead before but it was because I forgot to unplug it before taking the screen off
Hey bro, where is the Ram?? Is it not upgradable? I can't find any videos on where it's located. I would really really appreciate a video or any insight from you. Thanks for the video, you are the first lol I subscribed
Yeah RAM is NOT up gradable. It all soldered onto the board so you have to buy what you want up front. there is no option to upgrade after the fact.
it's soldered on but i cant also find where exactly it is... btw, is it dual channel? i would like them to replace the third ssd for one sodimm slot.
@@thenatous_ its dual all dual channels
Thanks for this. Do you get 2 Nvme copper heat sinks if you only order one SSD drive?
I honestly am not sure as the unit I purchased had all three drive bays populated. You'd have to check with Dell Customer Service
@@advancedvector6833 My M15 R3 just came in, and I ordered it with one 1TB SSD instead of the two 512 SSDs in a RAID configuration. The system doesn't come with a heat sink for the empty bay. I had hoped it would. If I had known it did not, I would have selected the two 512 SSDs in a RAID configuration option. A 6 parts PC World series with a Dell Engineer is very good and he speaks to the need for an SSD heat sink because of the heat they generate. I do have an aftermarket one I can install if I decide to add another SSD.
100 subs vector!
I know it! So crazy!
Can u upgrade this or no after purchase
The only thing that can be upgraded after purchase is the hard drives. Everything else is soldered on to the motherboard.
Yeah that’s way more complicated than I imagined :/ I doubt I’ll be able to do this to mine. Dang.
Yeah definitely not for everyone. When i first started I would not have been willing to tear apart a $3000 laptop either. However after you have had it for a few years I highly recommend taking it all apart to blow it out/clean it. By this time it will need a good dusting and its value will have depreciated enough that if you do ruin something you can get spare parts for a lot cheaper. It helps so you can build up the confidence to do it on new machines.
Why not use q-tips to clean that stuff off?
You certainly could but it might take a lot of q-tips to get it off. The best thing is the alcohol wipes but those are also more expensive than paper towels and a jug of alcohol.
can you please link me the screw driver set you used for this process please?
I stripped the IO cover screws in the top left and right and I don’t want to continue stripping more !please id appreciate it a lot
Hey! I’m out of the house but as soon as I get back I’ll show you what I recommend!
So this is not the ones I used in the video but when i'm out working on client computers this set is the one I always take with me. amzn.to/3ruIaqJ
@@advancedvector6833 thank you so much!what about the ifixit essiental kit?will that do?
Yeah any of the ifixit stuff should work. I bought a kit almost 10 years ago now and am still using it! Other than one bit that I lost everything is still holding up well. I’m likely gonna buy one of their bigger kits this year for my workshop and keep my smaller kit for when I’m on the road.
Doesn't look to be any memory lots. If that's the case I dodges the bullet there
How is the battery life?
Honestly pretty middle of the road for light activities. I was getting about 3 hours from just web browsing etc...
Advanced Vector Wow thats not great. What brightness were you using?
where is the ram ? onbroad ?
Yes it’s on board
what are the specs of the laptop u got?
I got the i9 with a 2080(unfortunately they sent me the wrong one and it had a 2070) as well as 32GB of ram and the 1TB Raid 0 Plus
@@advancedvector6833 feels bad, I waiting on mine rn, hopefully they give me the good stuff
Please put a timestamp. Just a little bit more effort but will do a lot for the viewers. I wanted to know if the RAM is removeable or not.
Is the SSD Changable
Yes this has 2 NVME 2280 slots and 1 2230 slot. It does NOT have a spot for 2.5" ssd though.
Advanced Vector thanks
Advanced Vector so the www.kingston.com/us/ssd/kc2500-NVMe-PCIe-SSD?partnum=SKC2500M8%2F2000G should fit?
Next teardown: Alienware M17 R3, GE75 Raider and ROG Strix SCAR-17 with 10980HK & RTX 2080 SUPER.
By the way, sir. I think you need to report that manufacture defect to Dell; and peel off the whole thing and realign it nicely.
So did it help? Seems the r2 and r3 are much harder to work on compared to the r1.
I did a video on the results. bottom line is yes it did help.
Is ram not upgradeable?
nope, soldered
20:00 holy shet this is really serious
yeah. I saw a solid 6-10 degree drop in my gpu after fixing this.
I got a 15 (!!!) degree drop after doing this. Insane how they put so much R&D into cooling and use the $.50 garbage stamp thermal paste.
I ordered mine yesterday and it doesn’t get here until this time next month 😭 I guess COVID is slowing things down.
Yeah i had to wait 3 weeks to get mine.