17 R5, Thermal and Overclock buttons not working

Me too, from few days on my Area-51m same problem, i can't modify thermal or overcloking.

For @Voidheart  and @Lorenzo16 ,

I apologize in advance for this super long post.

The problem came when AWCC tried to download an update and then the update will not install.  You get an error.  And every time you open up AWCC, it downloads the update it says it needs but won't install. AWCC was still functional for me, but having it do this annoying thing every time I opened it was maddening. First time around I uninstalled/reinstalled.   Did not fix it.  So I had to use the nuclear option.  Please read this entire post before you do this.  It will save you time and frustration (I hope).

Unfortunately, Dell doesn't make it as easy as uninstalling and re-installing AWCC.  In fact, they just leave users hanging in the wind.  So having spent hours trying to solve this problem, and there are other instances of this problem out there in the community forum which were somewhat helpful, I'm going to tell you what worked, if I can still remember all the steps.  The root of the problem seems to be in the registry, so you have to clean out all the junk leftover there before re-installing the AWCC and associated software.  It is important to re-install the software by using the 'Run as Administrator' option.

The Nuclear Option

1. Download and install a program called Revo Uninstaller--gonna need this to hunt down every last vestige of AWCC in the registry and remove it.  (You may need to do this in the Administrator account...I can't remember.  I would try installing it via your user account first, going into the Administrator account to verify that it is there, too. (Step 3)
2. Download the install package for Command Center and OC Controls.  Remember where you downloaded 

   them to.  Usually in MyDocuments\Downloads.  Or you can create a folder in the root directory of C: drive and put them in there so it's easy to find when you're switching between the admin account and your user account.

3. Enable the Administrator account if it's not already on your computer--  type 'CMD' (lower case is fine) into the search field when you hit the windows key on your keyboard.  This will open up the command prompt window.  Type in the following command and hit return: 'net user administrator /active:yes'.  You should get an acknowledgement that the command was processed successfully.
4. While logged into your user account, uninstall 'Alienware Command Center Suite', 'Alienware Command Center', and 'Alienware OC Controls' in that order.  Uninstalling the first one on this list may also remove the other two programs, but if not then just uninstall them. (On further reflection, it might be better to remove these programs with Revo Uninstaller from the Administrator account.  It should work and if it does step 6 won't be necessary.  Read Step 6 for info on using Revo Uninstaller.)
5. Reboot your computer and enter the Administrator account (You should see it on the lower left hand corner of your screen when you get to the sign in screen.  Once you're in your Administrator account, go back to the 'Apps & Features' where you uninstalled the programs above and make sure they are not there.  If they are still there, which they might be, then use Revo Uninstaller to get rid of them.
6. Use Revo Uninstaller to get rid of the last vestiges of Alienware Command Center apps leftover in the registry.  Open up Revo Uninstaller and it will give you a list of your user installed software.  You will see 'Alienware Command Center Suite' and 'Alienware OC Controls'.  Double-click on 'Alienware Command Center Suite' and it will open up a diolog box.   When you double-click it will say that it's creating a restore point.  After it does that you will get a dialog box that tells you it is going to uninstall it, and also offer you an option of to scan the registry and delete the leftovers.  Select the 'advanced' mode, and it will scan the registry and show you everything that's leftover from the uninstall.  These will be line items with check boxes.  Just 'Select All' and delete all of them.  Do the same for OC controls if it's still there after doing ACC Suite.
7. Reboot into the Administrator account. Go find the two install packages from Step 2.  This next step is key to getting this stuff to work.  You are going to install them starting with ACC Suite first.  Now don't double-click on the file and install, what you have to do is right-click on the install file and from the pop-up menu select 'Run as Administrator'.  This makes sure that it installs and tags all the files with administrative rights.  Install OC Controls the same way.  Once you're done doing that, reboot back into the Administrator account (same one you used to install them).
8. Once you're back into the Administrator account, wait a couple of minutes for all of the start up items to load.  The drivers for Alienware Command Center take that long to load, even if you're booting from and SSD.  Now run Alienware Command Center and it will go through its setup.  After it is done setting up, it should run properly.  Now installing it while in the Administrator account does not install it to any of your user accounts.  Frustrating, right?  So what you have to do is create a shortcut (by simply dragging and dropping from the Start Menu onto your desktop.  Then from there, drop a copy of the shortcut in your user account folder  (C:\Users\ \Desktop).  You are going to use this shortcut from your user account.
9. Before you reboot into your user account, go to the command prompt and disable the Administrator account by simply entering the following command and hitting return: 'net user administrator /active:no'.  Once you're done with that, reboot your computer.
10. Go to your user account like normal.  Go ahead and click on the start menu button and you will not see 'Alienware Command Center' listed.  Again, the program is really installed, but the info for the installation isn't tied into your user account.  To fix that, remember the shortcut you created above?  Go find it and run it.  Now here is where my memory gets foggy. I can't remember if by doing this it completely fixed the problem or not.  You know by this point that it runs logged into the Administrator account.  I think when I used the shortcut to run it from my user account it wasn't fully functional.  The fix for that I believe is to install the software on your user account just like you did for the Administrator account....right click, select 'Run as Administrator' when installing.  Do that for both programs.  Reboot, wait a couple of minutes, and then run Alienware Command Center.  It should be fixed.  It should work without it trying to download updates because this is the latest version.

OC Controls--Do you really need it?

I hope this works for you and I apologize for being somewhat uncertain about my exact final steps.  Aside from this, let me address the issue of the OC controls that are within Alienware Command Center.  When you open up the program you will see the the laptop picture on the left at the bottom with 4 buttons for 'Overclock', 'Thermal, 'Audio', and 'Power'.  The overclock box may say 'N/A' inside it. I actually never used it, but if you have and older BIOS version, I think there was a feature you could toggle to enable overclocking and by default it is set to 'Disable'.  The latest BIOS version I have, they have removed that selectable feature and you cannot enable overclocking.  I think the reason for this is because people may have fried their processors fiddling with the controls.  I really don't know. You may have to revert to an older BIOS to get this control to work.  But I have the i7-8750H in my 17 R5.  The processor itself handles the speed it's running at depending on the load  and thermal limits of the processor.  It works really well. I regularly get 3.8-4.0 Ghz while gaming.  The Achilles heel of these gaming laptops is they do not have nearly as good thermal dissipation as a desktop for obvious reasons--everything crammed next to each other.  The GPU is right next to the CPU and the cooling fans cannot move enough air to really cool them adequately.  Even though my CPU is rated at 45W TDP, it still get really hot, like 90C-96C under a full load.  Gaming it usually sits around 80-90C for a game like Battlefield V.  The GPU seems to be able to OC itself just fine.  I have the 1070 and the GPU frequency has not problem maxing out at 1480 Mhz and the memory clock out 3800-4000Mhz.  You don't really need to manually OC the CPU or GPU.  They do just fine on their own. 

Lastly, the question I've had lately is whether or not to disconnect the internal battery when I'm doing a lot of CPU/GPU-intensive activities, like Battlefield V. The battery does heat up and of course heat is the enemy of batteries.  What I noticed is that when I max out the CPU/GPU load and I'm plugged into the power supply with the battery in, I would begin to see the battery power level start to slowly drop off.  Specifically, this happened when I was running Folding@Home on Medium power setting in the app and also running a game.  That's because the app itself is running all the cores at 100% load and the GPU is also running at near full load.  It turns out that the battery is actually supplementing the ability of the CPU/GPU to handle a bigger load by helping stabilize the system voltage and also being able to feed more current into the system.  I didn't figure this out until I pulled off the bottom cover, disconnected the battery, and just ran plugged into the power supply.  When I did that and ran Folding@Home, the CPU would not go to full frequency and would hover around 1.2 GHz.  It would throttle up with a game, but just not with Folding@Home running on Med or Full power modes.  the GPU would do the same thing but the game would still run at a lower from rate, about 10-15% lower than when the battery was connected and also plugged into the power supply.  I had originally thought that disconnecting the battery would provide more power to run games and such because I thought you'd be losing some of that gaming power to recharge the battery.  Turns out that doesn't seem to be how it works but it also could be the case that there are settings somewhere in the firmware or power management software that change how the CPU/GPU act when the battery is disconnected and you're running straight from the power supply.  Could it be the case that the power supply (240W) is under powered and the battery helps provide the extra juice needed for max loads?  Maybe.  I don't know.  It's a real head-scratcher.  I wish that Dell would provide some insight on this question.

Good luck and let me know if you have any problems!  Hope this was helpful!

@Konadreamer 

I will try this solution, but this program , everytime i have a problem with AWCC.

I faced this problem too. All you have to do is delete the alienware folder from program files and delete the alienware folder from the regestry editor too. Now, go to the dell website and sownload the following drivers:            1) Alienware command centre                                                                                                                                      2) Alienware os controls.

Install them both one after the other, then, you are good to go.

@Konadreamer​ THE GOAT.

Thanks for your help, it was very helpfull.