Gaming Comparison at Recommended Settings

Our goal here was to find a balance of image quality and performance for each title. In general, we turned up the details until the M11x could no longer break 30FPS, using the predefined quality settings in each game. You saw the results of this investigation on the previous page, so now let's compare the new and old M11x at reasonable detail settings. Rather than a chart we've decided to stick with a table format for this section, showing the percent improvement of the M11x R2 over the original in the various titles (or the drop in performance in a few titles).

M11x R1 vs. R2 Gaming
Game Title M11x R1 M11x R2 Percentage
Batman: Arkham Asylum (Very High) 59 63 107%
Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Medium) 21.6 31.6 146%
Crysis: Warhead (Mainstream) 31.9 32.5 102%
DiRT 2 (Medium) 31.2 34.8 112%
Empire: Total War (High) 34.5 32.4 94%
Far Cry 2 (High DX10) 29.4 30 102%
Left 4 Dead 2 (Very High) 44.2 43.2 98%
Mass Effect 2 (Max) 39.9 37.2 93%
STALKER: Call of Pripyat (Med. + Full Dyn.) 57.3 57.5 100%

If the differences on the previous page were underwhelming, things are if anything worse at these "reasonable" settings. Only Bad Company 2 shows a noticeable increase, and again this is very likely as much to do with drivers as with the CPU upgrade. DiRT 2 shows a borderline noticeable improvement of 12%, and everything else is under 10% and not likely to be noticed without running benchmarks. If you were hoping the upgraded CPU would be a boon, clearly that is not the case—at least not in games. We'll see where the i7-640UM really helps once we get to the application benchmarks

Also, we should make note that the original M11x results are using the overclock to a 166MHz FSB (1.60GHz CPU), which definitely helps it keep up. The M11x R2 also features overclocking, and we'll look at that in a moment, but Intel's Turbo Boost actually tends to do a better job of maximizing performance in most cases. Ultimately, then, the M11x R2 isn't much better as a gaming platform if we look at just the raw numbers.

We do need to make note of the advantage of Optimus again, however, as it provides a couple benefits. Automatic switching between the IGP and dGPU is nice, and being able to switch without blocking because of running applications is good as well. However, the real benefit to Optimus is that NVIDIA is committed to providing driver updates through their Verde driver program. Alienware did provide at least one driver update from the original 189 series driver to a 197 series driver, but NVIDIA has moved to a 256 series driver. While the changes to date generally don't affect the M11x, at some point we will have new games that need a new driver to run properly. Will Alienware still be providing driver support for the M11x R1? We can't say, but if you have an Optimus system it won't matter as you can get the regular driver updates from NVIDIA. In that sense, the M11x R2 is definitely a win for gaming, even if it's not substantially faster.

Gaming at Various Detail Settings Application Performance: Arrandale ULV beats OCed CULV
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  • JarredWalton - Friday, July 9, 2010 - link

    It's going to come down to whether you value Optimus and regular driver updates from NVIDIA. I suspect the i5-520UM will be slightly faster in applications but that's about it. I do, so I'd go for the Fast Track R2; Linux people will want the original though. Another thought: grab the original and buy your own SSD for about the same price as the Fast Track... would be nice. :-)
  • SlyNine - Friday, July 9, 2010 - link

    I wish you guys would test for throttling on the CPU and GPU under load. After the whole XPS16 Studio deal. When plugged in it was slower then on battery, it could clock down as low as 300mhz while trying to play a game. Turning almost every game in to a studdering mess. Then it turns out this is COMMON practice for Dell. Other systems have done this as well.

    Throttlestop by unclewebb is the easiest way to check for it.
  • Shadowmaster625 - Friday, July 9, 2010 - link

    Intel is really dropping the ball here with arrandale ULV. There is no compelling reason to not choose a SU7300, up until Intel stops making SU7300s.
  • Roland00 - Friday, July 9, 2010 - link

    all evidence points towards the fact that Intel wasn't quite ready for 32nm due to the canceling of the notebook version of nehalem 45nm (Auburndale) and the mainstream dual core nehalem 45nm (Havendale). Now when Intel announced they were canceling Auburndale and Havendale they were doing so for is 32nm replacement Arrandale (mobile) and Clarksdale (desktop) were comming around nicely and they didn't need a 45nm version.

    The evidence points to the contrary, there is too much leakage on 32nm thus you can actually get better battery life with the 45nm chips. Then again Intel is doing 32nm so much better than TMSC is doing their 40nm bulk (not really comparable, but TMSC really messed up with this one) and there 32nm chips are still awesome just not as great as they looked on paper.
  • cjl - Friday, July 9, 2010 - link

    Not at all. Intel's 32nm is definitely lower leakage and power than their 45nm. The problem is that the Nehalem architecture is more power hungry than Core. This more than offsets the advantages from changing processes to 32nm.

    If you need proof that 32nm is more power efficient than 45nm, just look at the i7-980x vs the i7-975. Same clock speed and 50% more cores, and it doesn't use any more power.
  • HexiumVII - Friday, July 9, 2010 - link

    I had the R2 for about a month. It was pretty nice and turned heads with the dancing lights. Overall its quite nice for the road warrior. The trackpad was surprisingly good after playing with the M17. A few things made me return it. First battery life I could only eek out about 5 hours at most, with internet browsing in todays world, you can get a little over 4. Its quite heavy for it's size, a lb or so less would be awesome, any lighter and it would be hard to balance. It really has room for a bigger screen. Viewing angles, contrast, are all very acceptable compared to most other models under $2k out there. The Geforce 335 is a bit dated and slow, need something a little faster. Needs USB3.0/eSata/gigabit to get things on this bugger faster. I had an Intel G2 in there and it felt a tad bit faster, battery life didnt improve much. Its hard to do that many things on an 11inch screen.

    Probably going to get a new Acer TimelineX or Sony Z. Or a new Tablet if something exciting comes out in the next two months.
  • bakareshi - Thursday, July 15, 2010 - link

    "The Geforce 335 is a bit dated and slow"

    The GT 335m that your R2 sported was by no means dated or slow for this category of notebook. In fact, the GT335m debuted in the m11xr1 that began shipping in the second quarter of this year. As for GPU speed, there is nothing faster offered under a 13" form factor. The 13" Vaio Z is the closest competitor, which still sports a slower GPU for about a thaousand dollars more.
  • fire400 - Friday, July 9, 2010 - link

    This laptop is a piece of junk.
  • plewis00 - Friday, July 9, 2010 - link

    Sounds like jealousy from not being able to afford this 'piece of junk', strange because maybe 80-90% of the people who use or see this machine either want it or buy it...
  • erple2 - Saturday, July 10, 2010 - link

    You'll need to provide sources to back up that 80-90%.

    :)

    However, it's just as much hyperbole as fire400 put forth, so that's ok..

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