Alienware 15

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
This article or section is out of date.
Reason:
This seems to be included in linux-firmware now. (Discuss in
Talk:Alienware 15
)
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—HTTP 404]
# 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—HTTP 404]
# 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This article or section is out of date.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 the
NVIDIA
driver is installed, and install
optimus-manager-git
AUR
(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.