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May 7th, 2014 10:00

SLI Not Enabled?

Hi there Alienware Club, new member here! Had a few questions about my new Alienware 18 laptop that I just bought. Here's the configuration that I ordered:

  • Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit, English
  • 4th Generation Intel Core i7-4940MX processor (Quad Core, 8MB Cache, Overclocked up to 4.4GHz)
  • 32GB Dual Channel DDR3L at 1600MHz
  • Dual NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) GTX 880M graphics with 16GB total (2x 8GB) GDDR5 - NVIDIA SLI(R) Enabled
  • 768GB RAID 0 (3x256GB SSD) + 256GB mSATA SSD Storage Drive

I wanted to make sure that my SLI was working as intended so I did a quick Google search to see what the best route to test it was and everyone seemed to be suggesting that I go into the NVIDIA  Control Panel and under the "3D Settings" menu I should see "Show SLI Visual Indicators" right above "Show PhysX Visual Indicators". Problem is, I don't seem to have the SLI option at all, as seen here:

Screenshot 1

So to double check things I decided to run GPU-Z. Down at the bottom of the window it says NVIDIA SLI: Disabled. And, just for due diligence, here's a screenshot of that:

Screenshot 2

I also decided to run the video game Crysis 3 and using GPU-Z I saw that my first graphics card had a 99% load and my second graphics card had a 0% load. So all signs seem to be pointing to my SLI not working as intended.

I called Alienware Technical Support at 1 (877) 330-9732 and the person I spoke with did a screen share with me to look into it. He checked through the NVIDIA Control Panel and said everything looked correct and then he ran the AlienAutopsy program and did a test for only one of the graphics cards and then said that SLI was working fine.

So, I suppose my question is what now? Am I simply being dense and overlooking something obvious or is my SLI not working as it should? If that is indeed the case, what are my next steps? I did double check through the NVIDIA Control Panel to make sure my drivers were updated and, at least according to the NVIDIA Control Panel, they are. So I'm at a loss.

Bonus Question:
I also saw that my order confirmation for my purchase listed two 880M graphics cards at 8GB each (for a total of 16GB). You can see the specific specs listed up above. However, whenever I check the graphics cards in AlienAutopsy, it says that each card is 4GB each. See here:

Screenshot 3

So, in short, why would it list 4GB each (it also says this at the bottom of the screen when testing the graphics card) and yet my configuration and order confirmation lists 8GB each? Any clarity on this would be super appreciated!

Alright, apologies for the lengthy post but figured I'd be as thorough as possible in explaining my situation to you all. Hope you can help me out! Cheers!

4 Operator

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1.8K Posts

May 7th, 2014 15:00

Hi MathewAllen,

I would like to review your case. Please send me a private message with your Service Tag, contact information and link to this thread. I'll get back to you as soon as I can. 

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