New Aorus X5 (GTX 965M SLI) and X3 (GTX 970M)

Thanks Neptune, that's good to hear - was really surprised at the performance loss. Is the BIOS update pushed to the machine when connected to internet or do you have to manually download it?

 

The BIOS update would not be pushed automatically. It can be downloaded from the Aorus website or using the Drivers Update software that is preinstalled on the notebook.

 

So what does that mean for actual numbers?

 

I don't have a full review written up yet, but I wanted to provide some information on some of the main topics I haven't addressed, and some observations I have made.

Performance
With SLI and G-SYNC enabled (newest BIOS firmware), I got a Fire Strike score of 7901 (10152 graphics, 11350 physics, 2534 combined). During the test, the CPU reached a max temp of 92°C and the GPUs peaked at 62°C and 66°C. I haven't had time to test benchmark any games yet, but I'm hoping to test GTA V, TW3, and some others before this weekend.

Fan Noise/Performance
The fans are loud when set to Gaming or Normal within the COMMAND & CONTROL program. However, set the fans to Quiet, and it is barely noticeable in most environments. Running Fire Strike with the fans set to quiet, I got a score of 3553 (4997 graphics, 5498 physics, 961 combined). Not that great of a score considering the hardware (on par with an i7-4710HQ and a single GTX 860M), but the max temps during the test were 63°C for the CPU and 56°C/59°C for the GPUs. I ran GTA V for a little bit with the fans set to Quiet (didn't benchmark it and ran at default settings), and it looked good. I'll try to get some actual benchmarks on the Quiet setting as well.

Hardware (Memory)
The system comes with 16GB of Crucial Ballistix Sport PC3-14900 (BLS8G3N18AES4) memory preinstalled, and includes two open slots for additional modules. I purchased two more sticks of the BLS8G3N18AES4 modules and installed in the two open slots. Upon the initial installation, the BIOS wouldn't POST. I removed the added memory and it booted just fine. So I reset the CMOS battery and disconnected/reconnected the main battery after reinstalling the new modules, and after being on a solid black screen for about 30 seconds (most likely due to resetting the CMOS), I was able to boot into BIOS. The additional modules were recognized were recognized in BIOS and in Windows. The only other issue I had with the memory installation is there is some shielding tape on the mainboard where the memory is installed. There appears to be some wires or chips at the base of the SODIMM connector covered by the shielding tape, which made it difficult to get the modules seated completely. I had to hold the modules down while pushing the clips into place since the fit was so tight. I contacted Aorus US support center about it, and they said that although it's a tight fit, there shouldn't be any issues.

 

I've also had this weird memory issue with my X7 Pro sync. Installed Corsair 1866mhz in and the system wouldnt post. I thought I had to have matching DIMs (this model had G.SKILL 1866mhz ram in it) but what I did that worked was I removed the GSKILL Ram, reseated it and put the Corsair Ram and it posted fine. Never had a blackscreen issue since.

 

I was shopping for gaming laptops and saw this. I'm considering the Ghost Pro mainly because I'm concerned about overheating. Are the temps cited in the benchmarks above out of line?

I ask because I need something that will last about five years since I can't afford an upgrade every two. Will I be replacing a burned out laptop if I get this or am I better off sticking to a single gpu solution for longevity?

 

You should have no problem with temps in the X5. The GPU temps are down right frigid compared to the Ghost (i've had 4 incarnations of the Ghost over the last year, all have had GPU temps in the high 70 low 80's). CPU temps are a bit high, but well within thermal guidelines for the Broadwell chips. I'd say go for the X5, you won't regret it. Plus it's infinitely more upgradable than the Ghost, if that's an issue.

 

The temps are within a decent range for a slim gaming notebook. The GS60 with the i7-4710HQ CPU and GTX 970M GPU would reach CPU temps of about 85°C and GPU temps of around 75°C. The CPU does run a bit hotter on the X5 (at about 90°C being stressed), but the GPUs are running quite a bit cooler on the X5. Either way, it should not be an issue as long as temps stay below 100°C, but the temperatures are going to be higher on just about any thin & light gaming notebook like the X5 or the GS60.

If you're still worried about the temps, here's my recommendations to you.

1. Don't buy a slim gaming notebook. The temps will be higher no matter what on notebooks like the X5 or GS60, because there's less space inside the chassis for airflow. You might want to consider something like a Sager/Clevo. It'll be a bit heavier than the GS60 and thicker than both, but you'll get better airflow with the larger chassis.
2. Apply a better thermal compound to the CPU and GPU(s). Unless you know what you're doing, DO NOT attempt to do this yourself! There's a lot of things to consider when changing your thermal paste, like how much to apply, how much pressure needs to be applied between the heatsink and the CPU/GPU, and both of these can be dependent on what type of thermal paste you choose to use. Most sites you can order gaming notebooks from (XOTIC PC and Gentech PC for example) will give you an option for upgrading the thermal compound, and if they do it, the unit will remain under warranty.
3. Throttle your CPU/GPU(s). On the X5, you can adjust the fan speed with the COMMAND&CONTROL program. If you set the fans to "Quiet", the CPU and GPUs will be throttled to prevent them from going over a certain temperature that would necessitate higher fan speeds. Benchmarking at these fan speeds resulted in CPU temps of about 63°C and GPU temps of about 56-59°C. I ran GTA V at both max and quiet fan speeds, and was getting 50-60fps on both settings with no noticeable difference between the two. So you could keep the fan speed set to "Quiet" for normal use, and change it to "Gaming" if you notice any issues while running more graphically intensive games.

 

I've re-pasted with IC Diamond and all settings are the same as on the review video. The CPU runs much cooler than the stock thermal paste:

 

Now that's much better. I'd be fine with that. Was the ambient temperatures around the same as the review video?

I'd wonder how long that IC Diamond would last though. I had to repaste my old Alienware 17 every six months or so.

You should do a +135mhz overclock on both GPU cores and +100mhz on memory and see what that yields in firestrike and temperatures.

 

Those are massive differences! I'm considerring ordering this one over the Gigabyte P37x. When ordering from you and requesting the IC Diamond, do you check the temps afterwards? Or could/would you if I asked for it? What would be the wait time?

 

Has anyone tried using Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra? There should be no risk of corrosion, as Aorus states that their heatpipes are made of copper and HIDevolution has it as an option.

 

Ok guys - placed my order with Gentech this morning. Should have the machine by late next week. I had them add the IC Diamond paste as well. Will let you all know how it goes once I receive it.

 

Can anyone measure from the top of the touchpad to the bottom(before the textured part)?

I want to know how much of usable touchpad space there is.

 

FIY, the Video Capture board on one of the M.2 slot can be replace with M.2 SSDs:

 

Is there a version of the x5 coming with a 4k izgo screen?

 

As of yet there hasn't been any info on that. TBH, the 3k screen on the X5 is gorgeous, so an IGZO 4k isn't really necessary. That and I don't think there is a 4k IGZO with G-Sync, at least not at 15"'s.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

When this model was announced it was in every write up in had a 4k izgo screen.
Is it true that one with g sync does not exist?

 

In January of this year when they had announced it, it was supposed to have a 4k display but no g-sync. I'm assuming they ending up adding g-sync and only the 3k panel was available with g-sync.

So as of right now there is only one display, the 3k g-sync model.

 

Like ssj92 said, the Aorus X5 will only have 3K screen with G-Sync.

 

I'm curious as to whether G-Sync compatibility really is panel dependent. Currently available 4K panels max out at 60 Hz, which we deemed insufficient when we thought that a refresh rate of 75 Hz was a requirement. Now we know that the Aorus X5 has a 60 Hz panel despite its G-Sync capability. Unless Nvidia state otherwise, I'll continue to assume that the amount of 4K notebooks and G-Sync ones are too sparse for us to have witnessed both specifications in the same package.

Alternative explanations to the change of panel in the X5 could be the higher framerates at native resolution, less painful Windows scaling, unique qualities to the panel they chose (it has recieved lots of praise), lower cost, or availability issues. I wanted a 4K display, but gaming isn't my primary use of any machine at the moment. On a pure gaming machine, 3K will have a lot of people pleased, even if IGZO 4K was a headline-grabbing feature when it was announced.

 

A 4k display would have been preferred for me. 1080p scaling is excellent on a 4k display(at least on my samsung 4k display).

I'm not sure if the laptop panel also requires a g-sync module like the regular monitors for desktops.

If it does, then that explains why it's limited to specific panels. If not, then I'm not entirely sure how a laptop panel is certified for g-sync.

 

Well, there's certainly no module attached to the panel. Mobile G-Sync uses eDP standards to work. Maybe the eDP scalers need certain certifications to support it? Obviously something's keeping OEMs from pushing a software update to enable G-Sync when they're releasing otherwise unchanged G-Sync revisions of current notebooks.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9303/nvidia-launches-mobile-gsync

 

This was simply mis-information on the part of reporters when G-Sync for mobile was announced. It came about because the demo machine and specs were taken from the Clevo P770ZM which used a 1080p 75hz panel. I'm guessing that 75hz bit was simply copy/pasted around until it was "assumed" to be the truth, but was never part of the original NV announcement. EDIT: The Acer X34 desktop display @75hz was announced by Nvidia in the same marketing release which may have also caused confusion.

As for panel limitations, I believe the certification part comes down to whether the panel actually responds correctly to the eDP variable timing command and also determining the minimum refresh-rate of the panel. Theoretically, if the frame-rate falls below then G-Sync gets disabled and you go into a regular v-sync mode. Problem is many mobile panels will not accept anything below 48hz and simply dropped out(as observed on the ASUS laptop when the test drivers were leaked) rather than sit on their minimum rate. As I understand, most of the G-Sync "approved" panels will go <40hz which may be the defining characteristic. Otherwise 48-60hz G-Sync "range" would be pretty silly as that is far too small a range to work with.

All that said, has anybody tried overclocking the X5 display as has been done on the P770ZM? (the P770ZM has been pushed to 100hz which is VERY enticing) I'm looking at it (tossing up between X5, GS60 and P650SG). But I'm not sure G-Sync is worth the extra 1000-1500 at only 60hz (I'm in Australia where we routinely get boned for hardware costs).

 

Thank you for the clarification! I didn't even know many panels had a lower limit that started as soon as 48 Hz. I would try to overclock the panel, but I'm not an Aorus owner yet, and may not end up being one. There are no news regarding availability in my region, unfortunately. I may end up with a Skylake multimedia notebook like the upcoming Dell XPS 15 along with an external graphics card instead.

 

Once I sell my Alienware M18xR2 I'll jump on the Aorus ship assuming nothing else comes out within the next few weeks which I doubt.

I'm curious as to if a repaste really does help as much as it did for GenTechPC , any other owners try a before/after comparison yet?

 

If it's done properly people should get the similar results.

 

Except I'll be using Liquid Ultra instead of IC Diamond.

 

Webhallen now takes orders for the X5 in Denmark, Sweden, and Finland. I made an inquiry regarding the keyboard layout and they confirmed that the model they sell indeed has a Nordic keyboard. Without further ado, I went ahead and reserved one for pick-up in Copenhagen, but the reservation is non-binding so I'm still not convinced I'll be an Aorus owner. It depends on how quickly they get it in stock.

EDIT: The package reached their store in Copenhagen on the 30th of July. A close relative will pick it up for me on the 12th of August, and it'll be in my hands on the 16th. In other words, I'll soon get to play with the cool kids, all hesitation withdrawn.

 

Great TIM! Just be very careful with it.

 

Update:
You can have four M.2 SSDs in RAID-0 by remove the Capture card and the 2.5" hard drive with a M.2 adapter:

 

Has anyone run into an issue trying to display out to a G-Sync monitor like the ROG Swift? I bought a Swift for use at Quakecon this year, but I could not get it to work with the Aorus mDP. It would only display a small 640x480 box on the Swift, no matter what I tried. Every other monitor I used works fine, so I think it has to due with G-Sync some how.

 

I could have sworn I read somewhere that the X5 didn't support 9.5 mm HDDs... Perhaps I conjured up that tidbit of information based on how no configuration is sold with more than 1TB, which happens to be today's ceiling for the 7 mm standard. Good thing I have a new 2TB Samsung Spinpoint M9T drive at hand.

Now I just need to get some Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra, a couple of Crucial BLS8G3N18AES4 memory modules, a Razer 150W power adapter, and a hard case with protective foam and I should be golden. When it comes to the latter, I would have used a booq Vyper XL2 since I've been happy with my XS3 if it wasn't for the X5's unorthodox depth. I'd still also like to get a hold of Sharp's LQ156D1JW04 panel for perfect 1080p scaling and other non-gaming purposes, though that might be more of a pipe dream.

Unrelated question: when you go from RAID 1 to 0 in the BIOS, is any formatting performed or needed? In the manual, it's stated that you need to make a backup before changing the RAID setting, but then again you'd expect any manufacturer to urge you to do just that because of liability issues that could arise from data loss.

 

Edit - meant to quote

 

Hey, GenTechPC - my college starts on the 21st and I would like to have this notebook before it does. Your website lists it as pre-order but it seems that the X5 is already out - people have started buying and receiving theirs.

Do you have an estimate on when you will be able to sell these? I really need a computer for college ASAP. How long does build take? Delivery?

 

When changing RAID type you will have to format. Is it known the Sharp panel will work in the x5?

 

I don't see why it wouldn't work, both are eDP right? You'd probably just loose G-SYNC.

 

Does this model have always on usb?
Is there a performance review comparing it with a laptop with a 980 gtx like a sager 8652 or a gigabyte p35x

 

So far there is no published ranking of the x5 having performance that beats the 980 gtx.
The cpu score does best the 980 gtx laptops
But all the frame rate tests show it is between a 970m and a 980m

Its such a tough call. Compare it to. 8652 with 2 256 gb m2 and a 3k ips. It is competitve but worse.

 

Where as a an x7 is significantly faster.
This is contrary to the paper specs but in all benchmarksa
And the resellers are also not releasing benchmarks

 

Im not positive everyone looking at this machine isnt in the same main boat as me.
After looking at the 3dmark numbers on the horus review im really dwelling on the sager with the 980 gtx.
Because its not jist the fps which will sometimes bebfixable eith settings for sli
But all the 3dmark scores show it loses to a haswell 980 gtx laptop from the same maker. There were even owners none of them hooked us up which is pretty weird

 

wait what?

 

It is very strange. Completelt strange actually
That no one has given us any sort of graphics benchmark on this laptop.. People bought it and then they stopped posting. Ressellers had it arrive biut there is no benchmark.
Xotic pc lists its performance on its site as similar to a single 965m laptop.

The only one ive found is this

http://m.hexus.net/tech/reviews/laptop/83678-aorus-x5/

 

It shows a 3dmark score below a single 980 gtx haswell laptop.
It actually shows a fps ranking on notebookcheck similar to a single 970m laptop


Notebookcheck.net

 

I had not seen this post. This puts a 3dmark score below a haswell 980 gtx laptop which is around 8300
You have to then think about how much thinner is it really than gigabytes own p35x. Its not actually.

 

And the performance is not really so super compared to a single 970m broadwell laptop like a ghost gs60 but it is significantly larger

Notebookcheck.net actual fps in games right now list it as being around what a hasqell 970m laptop scores.
That being a problem with sli notebooka is they need settings changed drivers updated.
However even the benchmarks show the performance claims are false advertising.

 

I stand corrected theres a 3dmarknscore here too. Its just really disapointing. I have to scratch this one off. I can get an open box x7 with a 3dmarknscore over 10k for less.
Theres no compelling selling point for an x5. And it is the newest thing.

 

There may not be a compelling reason for you to purchase this notebook, but it's not necessarily true for everyone else. I personally do not want a display over 15.6" because to me, a 17" is too large to be carrying for extended periods of time. I was originally considering a P35X, but many of the reviews I read on the P35X claimed that there was a lot of flex in the keyboard. The keyboard on my X5 is very solid. I also require a high amount of RAM for testing code with intricate algorithms, which 16GB on most notebooks won't cut it.

To give you a real-world idea of how it performs, I have been playing GTA V with the display settings set to high and very high, and I am consistently getting 59-61 fps.

 

Oh definitely a neat modern laptop.

But im lost as to its market. Before there is a 965 m sli laptop we need to ask why?

 

Comparing a single 980M to two 965Ms in SLI, some games have better frame rates with the 980M, and some have better frame rates with the 965Ms. With notebookcheck.net's comparisons, it's too close to say whether one is better than the other. If you base it off the highest frame rate listed for a specific game and settings, then the 980M will "outperform" the two 965Ms, but that's because there are other factors that contribute to the higher frame rates, like the CPU (some of the frame rates listed are from notebooks using a desktop CPU) or better airflow to keep the GPU and CPU at lower temps. If you compare the X5 results to a comparable notebook (not just a similar CPU, but also a similar form factor, like the P37X), the frame rates are very close.

As for the 970M, the two 965Ms have outperformed a single 970M in nearly every one of notebookcheck.net's tests. The main exception to that is Arkham Knight, which probably shouldn't even be listed due to all of the issues surrounding it.

I guess my point is that you can't just look at one single component to determine why it was chosen for a specific build, or say it's definitely better or worse based off benchmark scores (or even frame rates) when the build and other components are not the same. The closest comparison that could be made to the X5 in terms of specs and form factor would be the P35X. GenTechPC got a combined Fire Strike score of 8302 on it, which may be higher than the X5, but the P37X v3 got a combined score of 8307, yet is pretty much equal in frame rate tests.

All that being said, the market is for anyone looking for performance similar to a single 980M. So why have the SLI option? The main reason that stands out to me is better thermal management. On the X5, the GPUs under load reach about 65°C, whereas the 980M on the P35X gets up to around 82°C under load. So there may not be any major differences in performance between two 965Ms and one 980M, but there are other factors that contribute to why certain components are chosen over others.