Aaron44126

Thanks, and yes, I am familiar with Storage Spaces and had been using it prior to getting the Precision 7770. Hoping that it is more reliable. I normally don't have bad data drives doing BSODs... I'd rather expect straight-up read errors or hangs. What is weird is that it was working fine for the past few months... and now it is not. (I just finished moving all of my data from the RAID array to an external drive. The transfer ran for about 7.5 hours to a USB 3 drive. I'm about to do the Storage Spaces setup, and then I will work on putting the data all back. I could have just blown it away and pulled from my NAS backup, but I think that would have taken even longer.......)

Dunno what he is using for ripping? I use AnyDVD HD and it is very good about getting around disc protections. (All it does it remove protections, still need some other software like MakeMKV to do the rip.)

The BIOS doesn't save anything with regards to the RAID arrays configured... It is all handled by metadata stored on the drives themselves. (You can move a RST array to another system just by moving the drives over and it will be automatically recognized.)

I'd also check to see if it is visible from your working Windows system as a second drive. Even if you don't have admin rights, you should be able to open Device Manager or Disk Management and confirm its presence. (It will let you see devices, just not change anything.) I'm at a loss as well, I wonder if there is some Dell BIOS security thing that has been put in place that prevents other drives from being recognized. If you put the original SSD in there and go through Windows setup to the point of picking a drive to install on, does it show up as an option? Or do you get no drives in the list in that case as well?

Got another one very shortly after rolling the BIOS back, so that's not it. (This one also blames refs.sys.) I rolled back the December 2022 Windows Update (which I did at the same time as the BIOS update). I'm working on switching from Intel RAID to Storage Spaces (so that I can disable Intel RST in BIOS) and if that doesn't fix it, I'll see about using tools like this to determine if I have a bad drive.

Got another BSOD after clearing the NVRAM. I'm now pretty sure that it is storage related. (I got one BSOD from the BitLocker driver, one from the ReFS file system driver, ...) Since I didn't start getting these until after the 1.8.0 BIOS update, I am now rolling back to 1.7.1 and I will see if the issue persists. Other things I can think of: Intel RST doesn't like my 8TB drives and I'll have to disable RAID and use AHCI/NVMe mode. (...A pain; I'll have to migrate all of my data off of the RAID array, set up Storage Spaces, and move it back.) It wouldn't be the first time someone has had issue with Intel RST running drives with "higher-than-spec'ed" capacity. ...Maybe one of my 8TB drives is actually flaky and I'll have to have it replaced.

Huh. The Intel RST driver is only required if the system is set to "RAID" mode (which is the default setting from the factory, even if you didn't include any RAID arrays in your build). I didn't have any issues getting that driver to load on Windows 10. (I've only used the stock Windows 11 image from Dell, I have not tried to install it myself.) I can't speculate as to why Windows setup would not be able to see the drives if the system is set to AHCI/NVMe mode. I've never encountered that before .....

Sam Bankman-Fried Pleads Not Guilty To Federal Fraud Charges In New York https://www.cnbc.com/2023/01/03/sam-bankman-fried-pleads-not-guilty-to-fraud-charges-in-new-york.html I guess "swift justice" isn't a thing.

You need the Intel Rapid Storage drivers from Dell. The generic package from Intel's web site does not work with newer Dell systems. Go to dell.com/support and find the RST package that applies to your model. Extract it and find the "f6flpy" folder -- that contains the driver files for Windows setup. Alternatively, you can go to BIOS setup and switch the disk controller mode from "RAID" to "AHCI/NVMe" (if you do not plan to use a RAID array). Then Windows setup will be able to find the drives without an extra driver needed. Note that the existing Windows install will not boot after switching the disk controller mode unless you take extra steps.

Twitter failing to pay rent on office space (and facing a lawsuit). https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/01/musk-led-twitter-faces-another-lawsuit-alleging-it-failed-to-pay-bills/

Here we go! https://www.tomshardware.com/news/alienware-m18-bigger-screens-ces-2023 HX in "first quarter", I'll be darned. The schedule is shook up. No idea when the Precisions will arrive. It would be perhaps two months earlier than normal, April-ish. It's the 18-incher that everyone has been talking about. I like that they put the numeric keypad back, but no 4K means "yawn" to me. I don't understand why that isn't a standard offering (even if they'd have to limit it to "just" 120 Hz). Keyboard layout looks mostly reasonable but dedicated PgUp/PgDn are missing. And it's dumb too, since they have a right windows key and super wide right Ctrl key; they could ditch the right Windows key and shrink the right Ctrl key and have the space for PgUp/PgDn right there. If says you can fit 4 SSDs, but with an advertised "9 TB" max capacity, I'm guessing some of those are smaller than 2280 size? (Wouldn't be the first time that they've done that with Alienware.) RAM is capped at 64GB. [Edit] Dell G15/G16 https://www.tomshardware.com/news/dell-g15-g16-retro-colors Acer also has an 18" laptop https://www.tomshardware.com/news/acer-predator-helios-16-18-nitro-ces-2023-specs-price Razer too https://www.theverge.com/2023/1/3/23530833/razer-blade-16-18-gaming-laptops-specs-price Anyway, looking like March is the month for the first 13th-gen HX laptops. [Edit 2] 18" for ASUS. https://www.tomshardware.com/news/asus-rog-ces-2023-scar-g18-specs-price

Eh, since the CAMM modules get physically larger as capacity increases, I can totally see them stuffing CAMM into a non-Precision laptop but not giving it the physical space to hold a 128GB module. On the upper end, 4090 goes "only" to 150W? Is this without dynamic boost? Ampere GPUs can go up to 175W. [Edit] Nevermind, I now see that it says right there that this is without dynamic boost.

NVIDIA has some details out for laptops. February 8 -- GeForce 4090 and 4080 laptops available February 22 -- GeForce 4070, 4060, and 4050 follow (Now need information on specific models and specs...)

Indeed, but we could see perhaps an Alienware product announcement from Dell, or HX laptops from other gaming laptop OEMs, with release windows giving a hint of when the HX CPUs will "really" be available. (Dell Precision 7000 tends to lag behind gaming laptops of the same generation by something like 4-6 weeks.) I'm fully expecting any HX laptops announced to have a "second quarter 2023" release window, but regular H laptops might start dropping around the end of this month or early February.

13950HX actually has a slightly higher clock speed than 13900HX (...and is listed cheaper??). https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/232149/intel-core-i913950hx-processor-36m-cache-up-to-5-50-ghz.html https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/232171/intel-core-i913900hx-processor-36m-cache-up-to-5-40-ghz.html It looks like the same story as last year; HX CPUs with models ending in "50" are "business versions" with extra features (i.e. ECC memory support).

Just came here to post the same thing, ha. Intel has their own announcement: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/intel-announces-worlds-fastest-mobile-processor.html A little surprised to see HX announced; it breaks their pattern of announcing only the lower-end CPU first that they have had for the last two years. I haven't seen any specific laptops announced with 13th-gen HX CPUs, but that might be coming any moment now since CES is just getting underway. (Still not really expecting to see them launch before April at the earliest, but I could always be wrong.)

Indeed, IoT and non-IoT are binary-equivalent. The only difference is in how licensing/activation works, support length, and also ISOs for one of them has better multi-language options if you want an install in a language other than English (don't remember which, probably non-IoT). You can switch between the two just by swapping product keys. I'd presume that there will be a way to install updates intended for the IoT version on the non-IoT version without much hassle, after the first five years of support runs out, but we're a ways off from that yet. Also, technically, IoT is supposed to be run only in "kiosk mode" (only one application running) but that is not actually enforced.....

Not surprised that pushing the graphics power level higher also restricts the CPU a bit. (...This is quite possibly why Dell put the GPU power limit where they did.) At least you have the option to give more power priority to the GPU when you need to run a more GPU-heavy workload. Undervolting will help out some with CPU performance, but I'd say that would be the case even if you weren't messing with the GPU power levels.

Great work with pushing the GPU power limit higher. I added a note about this procedure in the OP.

This is normal for warranty claims, they generally want to have the defective part back. You could potentially be charged for it if you do not return it. (I've never actually heard of anyone wanting to hang onto it for an extended period of time.....)

I have also hit hardcore flickering/artifacting when running with graphics switching off which did persist after a reboot / into BIOS setup screens. This was with nothing going on to "artificially" push the GPU harder. I have a video of it that I took with my phone. I will likely warranty this eventually but for now I am just running with graphics switching on (not causing me any trouble).

Now three times in the last two weeks the system has unexpectedly crashed when I was not using it. It's been super stable before that. I have three different BSODs with nothing in common between them. I'm generally cautious about making system changes so I don't have much to point to. I am suspecting maybe the 1.8.0 BIOS update? I know they messed with the CPU power stuff in the latest update, so I went and did the RTC Reset procedure to clear the NVRAM to reset everything to "default", to make sure that changes that I made previously (AC/DC loadline fix + unlocking undervolting, which I never actually used) aren't causing the problem. If it persists, I'll consider rolling back to an earlier BIOS version...

I feel like this is an over-the-top solution that won't help out much in the end. The laptop's cooling system is more about getting heat from the CPU/GPU out of the system as quickly as possible. The CPU is going to run at 100°C under full load if the power limits are high enough, and lowering the temperature of the air going in by 10°C or so may help a little bit ... but I have a hard time believing that it would be worth the complexity of setting this thing up plus the power that it would use and noise that it would make just to nudge the CPU speeds up by a few hundred MHz at best. (Also, would it really be that portable? Just use a desktop with a bigger cooler...) Plus, for the default configuration, the power limit is more of a performance limiter than the thermal limit is. (Especially on the GPU side.) Reducing the input air temperature won't help at all there.

This is crazy. That error code is indeed for a RAM issue..... Was your new motherboard tested with the original RAM or the Ripjaws first? Wondering if perhaps the same issue was created a second time, somehow it just doesn't like the Ripjaws and they cause some kind of permanent failure. In general, I recommend "mainstream" memory for these systems (Samsung, Kingston, Crucial, etc.) because it would not be the first time that "enthusiast" memory (Corsair, G.Skill, etc.) has caused a problem, though I have never heard of something like this where there was a "permanent" issue. .....If you first tried the new motherboard with the original RAM and it was still broken, then clearly there is some other problem in the system. Odd because replacing the motherboard actually replaces most of the components that could have gone bad. ...Maybe the GPU? I am at a loss. In any case, since it is new and under warranty, if Dell can't get it fixed promptly then just tell them that you want a full system replacement.