The i9-8950HK is the highest end processor from intel. If you saw LinusTechTips video, he overclocked this same processor to 5 ghz in an Asus laptop… and he did it using blowiematrons to help keep it cool… And the laptop managed to score a 1560 Cinebench R15 score, which was impressive.
But did the laptop really hit 5 ghz? Because a true 5.0 ghz OC on a i7-8700K should have managed closer to 1650. That tells us the processor was throwing errors, probably because it wasn’t getting enough power. It may not have thermally throttled, but it was not remaining stable. I'm not expert to this level of fully understand this just yet. I'll let some of the veteran overclockers chime in on this if they can. On top of that, it was a completely unrealistic test for day to day realistic use. No one is going to duct tape blowiematrons to their laptop on a day to day basis… So what is the i9-8950HK really capable of on a day to day basis overclock? That’s what I wanted to find out!
Now I’ve got it in this Aorus X9 laptop, and this laptop has been upgraded with Liquid Metal and thermal pads to help keep it as cool as possible.
Right off the bat, the processor comes OC’d to 4.3 ghz out of the box with a 75 mlv undervolt, but the problem it has is that the power limits are not high enough to steadily maintain 4.3 ghz on a consistent basis. The processor just needs more juice to maintain those clocks. So I started off by raising the short and long power limits to 150w, though it will never use that much anyway.
With the power limits raised, it was able to maintain 4.3 ghz no problem. So I started upping the clock speeds. It wasn’t long before I ran into thermal throttling, so to help the processor run cooler, I increased the default undervolt to -140 mv, and the thermal throttling went away. I was able to increase the clocks up to 4.5 ghz no problem.
But when I went to 4.6 ghz, I started running into current limit throttling, causing the cores to be unstable and fluctuate up and down. I believe this is because Aorus has limited the total amount of power through put in the bios to about 105w. So that means that if you want to increase the clock speed further, you have to keep increasing the power efficiency, which means increasing the undervolt.
At -160 mv, things became stable once more at 4.6 ghz. So I tried going for 4.7 ghz, and it wasn’t stable again. So I increased the undervolt to -180 mv, and things became stable once more.
At 4.7 ghz, we were riding the firmware’s current limit and thermal limits.
I tried getting it to clock to 4.8 ghz, but Aorus seems to have locked the bios so not go above 4.7 clock speeds, so they won’t clock to that speed regardless of load on the CPU. On top of that, we were already riding the thermal limits at 4.7 ghz. It was only not thermally throttling because of our hefty undervolt, so when under a full load of Cinebench R15. In day to day use, it just isn’t going to be stable above 4.7 ghz anyway.
I was able to run Cinebench in a loop just fine and average right around the 1520 mark or so at 4.7 ghz, which is absolutely phenomenal. I was also able to run PUBG and saw a 10 FPS increase by overclocking from 4.3 ghz to 4.7.
But here’s the thing. When undervolted to -180, I ran into stability issues when the processor was running idle and the computer would randomly shut down when it wasn’t doing anything, so that’s no good. It also didn’t like some games like Far Cry 5, and it would run into throttling issues.
I also tried seeing if I could run my Premiere Pro render test, but I found that 4.7 ghz became thermally throttled fairly quickly. So in my opinion, 4.7 ghz is just too much to ask from this processor.
The sweet spot I found for this particular i9-8950HK chip was 4.5 ghz and a -160 mv undervolt. This was the point at which throttling didn’t occur for the games and video rendering that I used it for.
The most impressive thing about this chip is that it acts not like a typical laptop processor, where it becomes power limited severely to the point of crippling potential performance. This thing was able to handle a 105w TDP on a continuous basis and not become thermally throttled. That’s a 130% power throughput increase over base TDP. And that is really impressive.
But ultimately, this means that the i9-8950HK processor does still fall behind significantly when compared to the i7-8700k or i7-8086k chip that you can get in a Clevo P750 or P870 chassis. If you buy these laptops from HIDEvolution, it is going to be possible to undervolt and overclock those processor to hit at least 4.7 ghz on a consistent basis. While the i9-8950HK does barely beat out the Ryzen 7 1700 in the Asus GL702ZC, you can almost buy 3 of the Asus laptops for the price of this single Aorus X9.
Overall, the i9-8950HK is a very impressive processing chip, but at the end of the day, if you want the ultimate CPU performance, you’re better off getting a desktop i7-8700k or Ryzen processor in a laptop.
The main draw to the i9 is that it can fit in much thinner laptops, and the processor will outperform similar laptop CPUs, but in a thinner laptop, whatever processor you have will be limited by the amount of cooling such a thin chassis can provide, so you likely won’t improve performance much at all by upgrading the processor.Ultimately, a thicker laptop can still provide more power because of the additional cooling.
So when it comes down to whether or not I can recommend the i9-8950HK and Aorus X9, I would only recommend it to people who have the budget, who want the best possible performance regardless of price, and are severely turned off by the idea of buying a thicker laptop with a desktop CPU. The Aorus X9 manages to outperform all other laptops that are in a similar thickness category, but it still can’t match the highest performance of full desktop CPUs, though it does get very close. It is an interesting balancing act the Aorus X9, but its a hard sell when its so much more expensive than other laptops with more power and thicker chassis. What are your thoughts?
I've finally released a review of the Aorus X9. You can check it out here:
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undervolter0x0309 Notebook Evangelist
Thanks for sharing! I lust over those Cinebench r15 scores .
Maybe windows is trying to reduce processor speed when no activity is happening. Have you tried switching to non-balanced power mode?
I'm thinking of waiting for the Ryzen 2700 laptop (Helios 500 and hopefully Asus). I do like the aesthetics of the Aorus thoughGizmoSlip likes this. -
lextheimpaler and undervolter0x0309 like this.
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I just released a review on the Aorus X9. Check it out here if you wish:iujona likes this. -
Nice review and subbed. HIDevolution I guess....I saw another reviewer, Western Gents doing a review on LM and he said its not worth using LM Conductanaut since TG Kryonaut is only around 2c higher in temps, however I would like to try LM for the Aorus.
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So you still need an 8950HK... ( At about the same price) But to squeeze a tiny bit of overclocking room you get a fat chasis.
The Clevo 8700k are also as or often more expensive.
Just putting this in a different perspective.
..the 8850h is power locked so it wont compete -
improwise likes this. -
Or is it a case where Aorus removed the power limit when other manufacturers dont. -
Edit. From one of my older test with BGA clocks. 41x all cores. But with equal Cinebench R15 score as the 4.4GHz overclock showed above.
And with what clockspeed was used for 3DM Fire Strike? The Physics score is equal or even below what you get from lowe clocked i7-8750H in Asus Zephyrus M GM501. Aka 3.9GHz all 6 cores. The physics score don't look like fish or bird.
Last edited: Jul 30, 2018 -
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Papusan and undervolter0x0309 like this.
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Total power limit is also being raised a tad on the 8950HK to around 108W, while the 8850H topped out at 102W. At least in these two machines.undervolter0x0309 likes this. -
it's the first time they break the naming rule of overclocking model (no K attached) and we asked them why doing so & how to differentiate it with K-SKU, they didn't explain why there's 8850H with overclocking but they hinted the capability of OC on 8850H will be restricted.......undervolter0x0309 likes this. -
i think the 8850h is a 8950hk just down clocked and with less cache. They are 8950hks that didnt make the cut to handle the specs of it. Thats why the oc is limited and topped at 102 watts -
No need for pict. But with what oc'd clock speed? 4.2GHz? Because the Physics score you post here is below what you should expect from 4.3GHz all 6 cores. And way too low for 4.4GHz. Thanks
Edit.
And all those 3DM Fire strike Physics results showed here is crippled if it's run with 4.3GHz overclock on all cores https://www.3dmark.com/compare/fs/15988166/fs/15988181/fs/15988233#Last edited: Aug 9, 2018Falkentyne likes this. -
Any advice for how to get performance out of an 8950HK in a thinner chassis that is more thermal limited than the Aorus? Can I just undervolt using XTU to levels of something like -0.050V to get it to thermal throttle less and maintain stability? I have a Eurocom Q8 and it thermal throttles fairly easily. What is the best advice for someone who owns one, does not want to sell it, and wants to get the most performance but not sacrifice stability. It is primarily used for video editing using Adobe Premiere Pro but I also play games on it.
When the CPU is thermal throttling will it ever drop below its base frequency of 2.9 GHZ? I'd like to think that there is some advantage to the 8950HK compared to the 8750H even in a thin chassis that cannot cool it sufficiently. -
Should have went with a Aorus X7 V8....better cooler. I was able to undervolt my 8850H to 0.160mv (stay at 63C on full Load)you shoud be able to do at least 0.120mv but every computer is different... Did you put LM? (Liquid Metal) if not i suggest a repaste. Also you should underclock it to 4.5ghz boost the 300mhz you wont lose much fps maybe 1 or 2 in games plus it may help with stablizing speed on just boost and undervolt. Use XTU. Make sure you dont have command and control app as it doesnt let xtu profile load on windows start up. I get 4.3 stable on mine but i underclocked to 4.1 to get cooler results. when i game i boost it to 4.4 but then it heats up to 70C -
undervolter0x0309 Notebook Evangelist
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Copper-Hea...hIAAOSw9GhYZABv:sc:USPSFirstClass!98052!US!-1
Or just order a normal heatsink and remove them
https://www.ebay.com/itm/4-Heatpipe...172660&hash=item41e97750c1:g:L70AAOSwuPlbaHMR
you could also line up the all the hot surfaces with heatsinks
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fr...2.A0.H0.Xheatsink.TRS1&_nkw=heatsink&_sacat=0
etc.
Your chassis could stop you from doing this last steps, unless you want to carve out some holes.
Other ideas, are copper plates, extra fans (power source though?).
If you give up on mobility then open the thing and stick a pc heatsink or water cooling etc.
I'm joking about the last part , since you can just get a cheaper pc with a 8600k with better specs.
May the force be with you.Last edited: Sep 1, 2018 -
i dont need it. im happy with my temps the guy aboved me asked about his 8950hk -
undervolter0x0309 Notebook Evangelist
JCordero31 likes this. -
None of the V8 Aorus offer 100% Adobe colorspace monitors, this is for photo and video editing primarily. I had them use Grizzly paste but its not metal, its the Grizzly Kryonaut I think its the best they offer.
I can't open it up and mod anything work paid for it I can't really mod the hardware at all.
I can use XTU, so is the concensus that I should set the core voltage offset to -0.120V, and change all the multipliers (1 active core, 2 active core etc) down to 45x from 48x? Are those the correct settings to get it to run cooler.
Am I looking at the proper controls in XTU to do this? -
If its stable you may be able to go higher, so try -0.140V next, I personally won't bother going above that.
When you finish finding your best undervolt and still have throttling or you are not happy about the temps you play with the multiplier.
I won't touch the 1-3 core multiplier as they won't do much for power consumption and heat, you can decrease the 5-6 core multiplier slightly and test back. -
166 Single Core
Open GL 110.06 -
In benchmarking the Q8 I am constantly hitting Power Limit Throttling. Whether or not I run a GPU bench in the background, and whether or not I undervolt.
The limiting factor seems to be Power Limit Throttling. Is there a way around this?
Overclocking the Aorus X9 DT V8 w/ i9-8950HK TO THE MAX!
Discussion in 'Gigabyte and Aorus' started by GizmoSlip, Jul 2, 2018.