Alienware 18 R1 4980HQ Upgrade

[lime]

Hi all,

 

Recently picked up an 18r1 for an absolute steal.

 

Wanting to know if anyone has tried inserting the crystalwell microcode into the A12 unlocked bios to get 4980hq support? Don't really wanna fancy dropping $150aud on a CPU if someone knows for certain that it wont work.

 

Thanks

- lime

[panda_zzz]

If we are talking about 4980hq from aliexpress you should be prepared that it is a lottery. I personally received one non-working, one partially working with one memory channel.

[lime]

3 hours ago, panda_zzz said:

If we are talking about 4980hq from aliexpress you should be prepared that it is a lottery. I personally received one non-working, one partially working with one memory channel.

I am aware about the QC issues, but it's either that or finding one on Taobao/xy which is proving difficult.

 

Looked in the bios earlier today and although Dell says they added the 40661 (crystalwell) microcode in BIOS A05, this is actually a typo and they meant 40660.

[sliderfra]

put a 4930mx in it, with the vacuum chamber it should overclock nicely

[ssj92]

Not sure if I am missing anything but a 4930MX or 4940MX will provide much better performance when overclocked. 

 

You can hit 4Ghz all day without any additional voltage. 4.3Ghz should be easy to obtain and cool. 

 

I guess the biggest advantage is the Iris iGPU but if you're losing one memory channel it;s already not worth it to me. 

 

If you provide me the microcode I can try updating the BIOS for you but be sure you have a programmer and backup your original BIOS.