Alienware Area 51m: linux experience? remove/switch off nvidia GPU?

[relleums]

Has anybody experience with linux on Dell's alienware Area 51m?

I found some hints in Dell's forum. But I want to bring the question up again here, as the LTT-forum is probably the unofficial Area51m owners club.

 

What I read so far:

- There is no official support by Dell. (Fair enough. I never had a laptop with official linux support yet.)

- The network adapters by Killer are only supported in latest linux kernels >~5.

- The reverse engineered nveau drivers for the nvidia GPU cause crashes.

- The 3rd party nvidia drivers do not crash, but GPU power-draw can still drain the battery for no apparent reason.

- Sound over Blutooth has issues.

- The Area51m can not be ordered without its GPU. (I discussed with our contract partner at Dell).

Do you know whether the nvidia GPU can be truly switched off, or even better can be removed? What is about the trackpad?

And most important: Can the RGB illumination be controlled? At least in bios?

 

For my development of simulations for particle physics, the Area 51m would be awesome if it would not have the nvidia GPU. I only need its beast CPU. I will never play any Game on it.

I admit: I fell in love with the Area 51m's design. Thus I am blind, and I want this to work.

 

However, a decent Linux experience is very important to me. So I will most likely order a 'boring' Dell Precision 7740 with only the Intel GPU.

[genexis_x]

If you want a desktop replacement laptop, area 51m isn't a good choice since it has many issues including cooling

[Super Spartan]

2 minutes ago, GeneXiS_X said:

If you want a desktop replacement laptop, area 51m isn't a good choice since it has many issues including cooling

Please do not spread such info without solid proof. Yes there has been a large amount of users with burned GPU
s in the first batches which has then been fixed via BIOS and VBIOS upgrades to decrease the voltage of the GPU slightly.

 

It has one of the best cooling systems in any desktop replacement laptop out there.

 

 

Additionally, it runs perfectly especially if you repaste it with some decent thermal paste which I have done but even on the stock dell paste, with a -100mV temps were in check. See my review here: Alienware m15 / i9-8950HK Review by Ultra Male

 

You will find benchmarks and temps in the 2nd post of the review and those were taken with the stock thermal paste by the way, straight out of the box.

 

@relleums As for your question, I've head a few people having success storied with Linux with the Area-51m although I don't know the details and I am certain you cannot control the lighting effects without the Alienware Command Center. Additionally, the lighting effects cannot be changed in the BIOS, it's done only through the Alienware Command Center.

 

It's worth a try though to setup Linux alongside Windows so you have both. I hear that Ubuntu is the recommended Linux distro by Dell.

[relleums]

1 hour ago, Ultra Male said:

I am certain you cannot control the lighting effects without the Alienware Command Center. Additionally, the lighting effects cannot be changed in the BIOS, it's done only through the Alienware Command Center.

Thanks for clarifying.

[Super Spartan]

42 minutes ago, relleums said:

Thanks for clarifying.

I asked this question for you on NBR Forum in the Area-51m owners lounge and here's a very positive reply:

 

Quote

I'm currently running Ubuntu Mate on my machine with great performance. The only annoyance right now is that the internal LAN card is not supported (no drivers) although it is picked up and identified by the OS. Nvidia drivers work. Steam works. I have no complaints. The setup is rock solid. I haven't messed with lighting at all but whatever is set from windows, remains set on Linux too as settings are stored in the firmware. I have set mine as a single color across all lights(not a big rgb fan).

 

[genexis_x]

10 hours ago, Ultra Male said:

Please do not spread such info without solid proof.

Since when I spread wrong info without solid proof? High price, cooling isn't great, 2400MHz RAM etc. Clevo LGA units with Prema and delided CPUs are better choices imo. Even laptop god D2Ultima doesn't recommend it

 

Personally I''m not a fan with 51m, however since you're a user you might have different opinions

[relleums]

14 hours ago, Ultra Male said:

I asked this question for you on NBR Forum in the Area-51m owners lounge and here's a very positive reply:

Thanks! I found your question and will search the NBR Forum for more info.

NBR here is short for NoteBookReview,

see: http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/official-alienware-area-51m-owners-lounge.826831/

[Super Spartan]

13 hours ago, GeneXiS_X said:

Since when I spread wrong info without solid proof? High price, cooling isn't great, 2400MHz RAM etc. Clevo LGA units with Prema and delided CPUs are better choices imo. Even laptop god D2Ultima doesn't recommend it

 

Personally I''m not a fan with 51m, however since you're a user you might have different opinions

I didn't mean you spread wrong info. I meant about this particular opinion. Noone is denying that Clevos with Prema BIOS is a better value to performance or even features, no doubt about that, in fact I was one of the main Prema BIOS testers for the Clevo P870DM and Clevo P870DM3 and also the Prema VBIOS.

 

Yes, the Alienware is overpriced, everyone knows that since more than 10 years that's not new. They are overpriced just like Apple, partly because of the brand, the fans, the popular Alien logo and effects, the superb Dell customer service and on-site technical support. D2Ultima is also my friend by the way. If you are not a fan, you are entitled to your opinion but it is not fair that someone comes asking about a simple question such us how well Linux runs on the Area-51m and you jump in with such a vague statement as it has so many issues including cooling? Really? show me those "so many" issues and the cooling issues are there in 99% of laptops out there now due to the multi core fast CPUs. We all know heat issues can be fixed either by undervolting or applying better thermal paste unless there is a big flaw in design by the cooling system of a particular laptop which the Alienware Area-51m does NOT suffer from.

 

Give me any test or game and I'll run it for you and show you real proof the it has no issues.

 

I respect your suggestions and opinion as I've seen you have many great posts so please don't take this as an attack or anything. Just wanting to be fair to the laptop brand not because I own it but we have to be more specific when we make such broad claims that a certain laptop sucks otherwise it may and will deter many buyers.

[genexis_x]

5 minutes ago, Ultra Male said:

snip

Sorry I was in a bad mood today, apologies if I said anything wrong

 

I would say the cooling will be perfect if you put in a delided CPU

 

Cheers

[Super Spartan]

2 minutes ago, GeneXiS_X said:

Sorry I was in a bad mood today, apologies if I said anything wrong

 

I would say the cooling will be perfect if you put in a delided CPU

 

Cheers

No problem bro. Keep up the superb recommendations that you always give. We highly appreciate that. Cheers