Alienware 15

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This article or section does not follow the Laptop page guidelines.

Reason: Hardware table needs IDs, an accessibility and a function keys sections should be added. (Discuss in Talk:Alienware 15)
Hardware PCI/USB ID Working?
GPU (Intel) Yes
GPU (NVIDIA) Yes
Touchpad Yes
Camera Yes
Wireless Yes
Bluetooth Yes
Ethernet Yes
Card reader Yes

For a general overview of laptop-related articles and recommendations, see Laptop. For the macro keys, see extra keyboard keys

Networking

Install the supported driver for the QCA6174 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter.

Download the board.bin file and put it into your firmware library: 

$ wget https://github.com/kvalo/ath10k-firmware/raw/master/QCA6174/hw3.0/2.0/board.bin[dead link 2024-07-30 ⓘ]
# mkdir -p /lib/firmware/ath10k/QCA6174/hw3.0/
# mv board.bin /lib/firmware/ath10k/QCA6174/hw3.0/

then download the specific firmware binary and move it into your firmware library: 

$ wget https://github.com/kvalo/ath10k-firmware/raw/master/QCA6174/hw3.0/2.0/firmware-4.bin_WLAN.RM.2.0-00180-QCARMSWPZ-1[dead link 2024-07-30 ⓘ]
# mv firmware-4.bin_WLAN.RM.2.0-00180-QCARMSWPZ-1 /lib/firmware/ath10k/QCA6174/hw3.0/firmware-4.bin

a reboot is needed to load these files.

Video

Nvidia & Intel video card configuration: NVIDIA Optimus

NVIDIA Corporation GM204M [GeForce GTX 965M]

This article or section is out of date.

Reason: "Currently" was 2016-03-31: is this still relevant? (Discuss in Talk:Alienware 15)

Currently not supported by Bumblebee (Tested on Alienware 15 R2) Please install only Intel driver via xf86-video-intel

NVIDIA Corporation GP104M [GeForce GTX 1070 Mobile]

Make sure nvidia is installed, and install optimus-manager-gitAUR (do not use nvidia-prime).

This configuration supports an external display at high refresh rate, as well as gaming using proton/steam.

Before installing optimus-manager, backup and clear out /etc/X11/xorg.conf and /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/* to avoid user reported freezes when booting.

Optimus manager should generate approximately 

/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-optimus-manager.conf
Section "Files"
	ModulePath "/usr/lib/nvidia"
	ModulePath "/usr/lib32/nvidia"
	ModulePath "/usr/lib32/nvidia/xorg/modules"
	ModulePath "/usr/lib32/xorg/modules"
	ModulePath "/usr/lib64/nvidia/xorg/modules"
	ModulePath "/usr/lib64/nvidia/xorg"
	ModulePath "/usr/lib64/xorg/modules"
EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"
	Identifier "layout"
	Screen 0 "nvidia"
	Inactive "integrated"
EndSection

Section "Device"
	Identifier "nvidia"
	Driver "nvidia"
	BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
	Option "Coolbits" "28"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
	Identifier "nvidia"
	Device "nvidia"
	Option "AllowEmptyInitialConfiguration"
EndSection

Section "Device"
	Identifier "integrated"
	Driver "modesetting"
	BusID "PCI:0:2:0"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
	Identifier "integrated"
	Device "integrated"
EndSection

Then you can switch GPUs using 

$ optimus-manager --switch nvidia

You can set the default GPU by editing /etc/optimus-manager/optimus-manager.conf and setting 

startup_mode=nvidia

You can copy /usr/share/optimus-manager.conf as a starting point.

Control of the light colors

  • Currently unsupported by pyAlienFx and alienfx[1] have some diff from previous version.
  • Probably supported by alienware-kbl, a software to manage the light colors with a graphical interface, python or bash commands.

Issues

Audio

To switch to headphones after plugging them, create: 

/etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf
options snd-hda-intel position_fix=1

Alienware m15 r5 Ryzen Edition

This article or section is a candidate for moving to Alienware M15 R5 Ryzen.

Notes: This is a late addition to this page but would be a better fit in a dedicated page even if it would probably be a little short with only this section. (Discuss in Talk:Alienware 15)

It is possible on this laptop — since it uses Ampere graphics and Optimus — to use hybrid graphics in a power efficient manner. In order to do so, use optimus-manager on "hybrid" settings to generate an Xorg configuration file. To do this, use the following (be sure to use AMDGPU graphics, i.e. xf86-video-amdgpu): 

optimus-manager.conf
[optimus]
startup_mode=hybrid

[amd]
driver=amdgpu

[nvidia]
dynamic_power_management=fine

You will then have to generate correct udev rules to ensure the dedicated GPU will completely turn off when unused: 

/lib/udev/rules.d/80-nvidia-pm.rules
# Enable runtime PM for NVIDIA VGA/3D controller devices on driver bind
ACTION=="bind", SUBSYSTEM=="pci", ATTR{vendor}=="0x10de", ATTR{class}=="0x030000", TEST=="power/control", ATTR{power/control}="auto"
ACTION=="bind", SUBSYSTEM=="pci", ATTR{vendor}=="0x10de", ATTR{class}=="0x030200", TEST=="power/control", ATTR{power/control}="auto"
# Disable runtime PM for NVIDIA VGA/3D controller devices on driver unbind
ACTION=="unbind", SUBSYSTEM=="pci", ATTR{vendor}=="0x10de", ATTR{class}=="0x030000", TEST=="power/control", ATTR{power/control}="on"
ACTION=="unbind", SUBSYSTEM=="pci", ATTR{vendor}=="0x10de", ATTR{class}=="0x030200", TEST=="power/control",    ATTR{power/control}="on"

You can confirm this is properly working by rebooting the system and running the following command: 

cat /sys/bus/pci/devices/0000:01:00.0/power/runtime_status
suspended

You can then install nvidia-prime and use prime-run to run programs on the dedicated GPU.