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This article or section is out of date.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 ⓘ]}
# 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This article or section is out of date.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-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.