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Still no fix in sight for Alienware M17x stuttering audio issue, maybe you can help
Back in November we reported on another in what's becoming a long line of issues with Dell's and Alienware's laptops, with M17x owners suffering from "skipping, stuttering audio" -- rather unbecoming in a high-end gaming rig. Dell was quickly on the case and initially indicated that a BIOS update last month contained a fix, only to learn that it didn't resolve all things for all people. There's still no proper resolution in sight, but Dell's Community Manager John Blain has told us that "getting the community more closely involved with this is going to be key." If you have an affected M17x John is asking that you stop on over to the Direct2Dell blog and shoot him a message with your machine's vitals. He's pledging to aggregate everything together and "expedite a resolution for those affected." Godspeed, mobile gamers. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in] Update: Tipster Adam wrote in with a fix that worked for him -- check out his advice in full after the break.
BIOS update for Alienware M15x laptops turning them into bug-eyed bricks?
We've received a slew of tips this morning that Dell's latest BIOS update for the Alienware M15x laptop is causing some pretty ugly issues. According to reports this is a different sort of update, run from an application rather than installed separately, and after the first reboot the machine gets to the POST screen then... nothing. Multiple users are complaining of this issue and one claims that Dell is shipping him a new motherboard to fix it. We're still waiting to hear back from Dell to confirm this either way (hello weekend!), and until then we'd advise sticking with your existing version. In the mean time you can feel free to ponder just what the heck is going on at Dell's QA department. 1/11/2010 Update: We got a response from John Blain at Dell, who has indicated that the team there is "fully aware" of the issue and is making this a "top priority." 1/14/2010 Update: John dropped us another note yesterday to let us know that Dell has confirmed the issue, pulling the offending firmware update and apologizing for any inconvenience. It's unclear right now what the resolution will be for those early flashers, but we're guessing free round-trip ticket to Texas is probably in the cards -- for their laptops, anyway. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
