Alienware M17x R4 (8 Beeps)

Sure. Unfortunately you cannot get the iGPU to operate with the 120hz display, even unplugging the panel and connecting a multi-sync monitor will not get past POST (bios testing at start-up). It's been tried .

This does give you one advantage over other models in that you never need to disable the on-board, which is needed for non-standard GPU's to work. Downside is, as you have discovered, if the dGPU starts to fail you cannot just remove it and use the on-board.

BIOS changes on your model was a bum steer - sorry, I was thinking about how to get other cards to work and as I said, not needed on the 120hz model.

With a 680m, being a standard card for the R4, it's plug and play (although care needs to be taken with thermal pads as they are different on each card). You can use a 7xx or 8xx card but then you have to mod a driver .inf file to recognize the non-stock card.

Looking closer at the options, the 7xx cards have been successful in the R4 but I found that the 680m runs so cool that I can easily OC it to match 780m stock performance. It is also showing lower failure rates for the 680m (the 780m runs hotter at stock). The 3D also still works with the 680m, although not many people care about that. The 8xx cards were around for a short time and got such a bad rep that I advise avoiding at all costs!

HTH, any questions, don't hesitate .

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Alienware M17x R4 (8 Beeps)