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Thanks,

glad to know about the Hybrid power because i thought that was part of the official MSI BIOS vs the Barebone.

 

Before I go, I do have couple of questions / request regarding MSI's Afterburner. I remember back in days, it used to display the actual 'Frequency / Mhz' on the right side of the slide bar. I've just downloaded and tried 2 different versions. The release (older), and the latest beta (still old). No dice... I can't get it to display the actual frequencies. All I see are + or -. I guess you're supposed to calculate the base frequency vs. how much you're increasing, or decreasing? Why is it doing this?

Is it because Afterburner isn't able to properly read the newer 780Ms? Or did they change something? Also, is there a way to hack it? Hidden config file perhaps? If anyone can shed some light on this issue, I'd greatly appreciate it.


The second issue which I'm having is with the Synaptics touch-pad driver. I can't find a setting where you can de-activate the touch-pad based on Keyboard use detection. Older drivers used to have this function where if you begin to type something, the the touchpad would deacivate and re-activate based on specific time interval on 'key' press detection, say about half of a second to 3/4 a second. During typing, all sorts of things happen because I accidentally touched the touchpad. The cursor would move out of the area, or sometimes it even launches something lol! And yes, I've set the palmcheck setting to lowest (or is it supposed to be set to max for the result I want?). No help... If anyone knows of a workaround, please do let me know.. One thought is to try the Sentellic drivers..a

Thanks in advance. I'm outta here...

 

I think you are supposed to crank it up to max. Also my touchpad disables it self at boot since i have an external wireless mouse plugged in so i need to hit that button to turn it back on which is great cause its off till i need it but i know that is one more step.

My MSI afterburner 2.31 looks like this. Core clock and Memory speed is right there. Not sure what you are after ?

 

You're right. The Palm detection does need to be set to max. Now it works. Whew, was annoying.

Regarding the Afterburner, that's how it shows on mine as well. But the MHz level should show up (at least it used to...) when you slide the bar left and right without applying. Like this --> MSI Afterburner


Also, since you have the same laptop as me (with the original bios / EC). Would you please test 1 thing for me? With the laptop booted to windows. Turn on the Keyboard LED (if it's not already on). Then shut down the laptop, and turn turn the laptop on again:

Does the Keyboard LED come on automatically?

And If I may ask you to do one more: Now with the laptop turned on, and in windows, if the Keyboard LED lit, turn off the keyboard lights. After turning off the lights, would you mind repeating the process once more? Shutdown completely, then turn the laptop on again, to verify that Keyboard LED will stay off.

Because I don't remember how the keyboard lights behaved prior to the EC flash, I can't come to a conclusion that this is indeed a side-effect or not.

Much obliged!

 

Oh now i get what you mean...

Yeah you have to do the math now or just look on the right hand side after you raised the MHZ and it should show you what you are after. It will show current clock status.

 

How about the keyboard lights?

 

From what i can tell by just testing the keyboard lights.

If i turned them off say before i shut down they will remain off next time i boot till i turn them back on.

And if i had them on and shut down they will be on the next time i power on.


They do not flash like when the machine powers on then power down like it would be remembering a setting only after Windows posts, nothing like that, they are either on or off based on what i last chose before shutting it down.

 

Thanks for checking. That confirms it. This is the only known side effect with the Bios / EC. I'll update the section. I wonder if the keyboard lights can be turned on via dos command or something.. That would be the only workaround I can think of (other than leaving KLM as as auto-start which I don't want to do...)

Thanks!

 

The keyboard LED's really are non issue as i personally find them only good in total darkness since they are not that bright to begin with . So for me on or off does not really matter because when you need them if they are off its matter of a light press next to the power button to get them back.

 

I feel the same way. I usually leave it off. And turn it back on when I want it. But since I began this process (describing the process of bios flashing), I felt obligated to make sure whatever difference I saw was documented. The keyboard LEDs were the only unknown. But thanks to your test, we can nip this in the bud. I've already updated this in the previous posts where I had described the steps.

Thanks and take care!

 

At stock speeds, Hybrid power isn't necessarily needed, but once you bump the clocks up a bit, it kicks in. When I game or benchmark at 135+ on the core (980mhz), it is actually using a bit of the battery because the stock PSU can't supply enough. This is the issue the Sager guys are running into with the 180W brick. Once you start tinkering with overclocking it'll come in handy. After an hour of BF3 overclocked the battery had dropped down about 6%, but clocks remained stable at 980.

Also, Quadzilla I wanted to make sure I wasn't mistaken and spreading bogus temps... so, loaded up BF3 and played a few matches for a little over an hour. Laptop is sitting flat on my coffee table, nothing propped up or coolers etc. Was curious what the fans would do while directly monitoring:

GPU warmed up to 93C, stabilized around 91-92C... let it run like this for about 20 minutes while playing. Then, hit the turbo fan, and temps did in fact drop down quickly to 80C, over a few more minutes down to about 76C, and then over the next half hour dropped down to 72-73C. Stopped after that round to grab some lunch. Took a quick snapshot with my phone. This is after a little over an hour of 95-99% utilization.

 

Thanks Be77 that is mighty impressive it comes down that much and maybe i will have to test to see if i let mine get that hot it will bring them down eventually to normal temps. Admittedly my testing where it was scorching hot then i hit turbo was done during Vantage and not enough time, say 10-20 minutes to let the fans do there thing and bring the temps back down.

I think though how i have it setup now after repasting it a few times it is better then it was certainly and good enough with the fan profile i made running in the background.


Fresh Windows 8 Vantage score vs Fresh Windows 7 Vantage score same factory drivers . Thought my scores seemed kind of off on Windows 8 but not sure what that is about.

Win 8



Win 7

 

Did you run it a few times on each as they can vary but vantage it totally CPU bound so it will be to do with your CPU doing other things perhaps.

 

Yeah that was after 4-5 runs on each OS . My Windows 8 was consistently low every run and my Windows 7 score varied but not by more then 100 points instead of 1000 less with the 2 OS's. 3dmark 11 scores were very similar with Windows 7 beating it but not by the same margin. Its only a benchmark though and i was just testing too see how well Win 7 ran vs Win 8 on the machine since they do not provide official support it seems for it.

Originally i was against Windows 8 but with Classic Shell and all my games running equally i am fine with Win 8.

 

My final hardware mod (for now): Operation - Kill that noise!

1. Suppies: a 'dab' of White Lithium Grease
2. Thicker Hobby foam
3. Double sided 3M foam tape
4. Xacto Knife
(Coffee & Cigarette optional)


Preface: My fan was fine. Quite and smooth when I got it. But upon closer inspection, regardless how quite and smooth it was, there was a room for some improvements in 2 areas.

1. Make sure the fan bearings / shaft are properly lubed
2. Make sure there are any (or minimize) centrifugal vibration

I'm an experienced hobby craft builder (full sized 26CC gas engine helis, and gas powered buggies, i.e.: HPI Baja 5B, etc..,) Also have Centrury Predator Gasser Helicoptor (both which I've built)

Within this hobby craft, I'd be the first to tell you, if you don't identify the vibration and kill, it, it will KILL your machine. Now this is a bit extreme comparison. After all, we're talking about a small computer fan in a laptop here lol1


Upon inspection, I've noticed that the fan assembly does not touch the laptop anywhere except for the thin plastic pieces where the prongs go into, and they are screwed onto the Motherboard directly. So the thin plastic taps are only 'held' in place by the long prongs And the fan is 'actually' screwed onto the MB directly in only 1 place (small screw on the upper right)
I wanted to make sure that there is no way the fan can move, or vibration while fastened (likely does, and as fan vribrates,
There is no way in hell that the toerance of the prings and the small plastic tabs are tight enough to eliminate the vibration completely (or at least as much as possible). it will scratch / rub while vibrating, the prongs will create wider gap = "more vibration in the future.. And because the fans are set in place via 3 prongs that goes into the small plastic tabs (bottom cover of the laptop),

So, what do you? FOAM-IT!


Supplies needed: Grease (this is what I use when I'm building my own bearings)


Just peel off the center sticker on the fan, put a dab of the grease inside it, seal the sticker back up (make sure the sticker is tight). Once the fan starts to run, the heat / friction of the bearing shaft of the fan will melt the grease, and apply itself. This is a 'Set it and forget it' type of thing.
I will not go into too much detail, just use a dab, don't need to over do it. In this case, less is better!

3M double sided foam tape and Xacto knife.


Hobby Foam (this is the extra foam I had laying around. (special order) very soft, but dense). Used to protect the Helicoptor "Gyro" from vibration


1. 4 small square pieces of double sided 3M tapes were applied to the points on top of the screw holes. Then cut s very thin layer of the soft hobby foam and stick it on top of the foam tape (at this point, no adhesive from the foam tapes are exposed) fan will gently sit on top of them once seated


2. Cut a long piece of foam tape and carefully align and tape it onto the metal tabs on the fan itself. This is the point where it makes contact with the small (cheap) foams which MSI has already applied to the exhaust vent / sinks. Once the tape is in place, using the xacto knife, carefully cut off the excess, leaving a thin application of this tape on the metal tabs. I've used my dirty fingers the make sure the the adhesives are worn off on the other side of the long strip. I don't want the foam tape to stick to the MSI applied foam on the vents and end up tearing it if I have to remove the fan again the future for cleaning or whatever..


Why do this? To ensure that the hot air isn't be re-circulated. In case the hot air, which is intended to blow out, leaks in and gets recycled. The foams applied by MSI may do the job, but I have no way of making sure that it does. Therefore, I've nipped it in the bud. Added additional 'blockade' if you will, to make sure that the fan's contacts are properly 'sealed and tight'
http://imageshack.us/a/img20/1338/vuad.jpg

3. Place the fan and take a screw driver (think / sharp one) and gently spin it on top of the foams in place that that will create a small hole so that the screw can go in easily when you close the lid back up. Fan seated without the holes, looks someting like this




That's all. It took me about 20 minutes to do. With the grease and the home-made vibration pads, I cannot feel any vibration, almost none when the fan is blowing at full speed. I don't know if it's the grease, or the foams (perhaps both), but what was quite is now even quieter.

At idle, I have to put my ears to the machine just to make sure the fan is spinning

This is my final hardware tinkering (for now). All else will be just simple software mods (actually, I may soon do the 330W PSU mod...) Then onto Unlcked vBios.....

Have fun!

 

Excellent work man, your mods are amazing, keep it up.

 

Really nice mods! People should really try pherein's tool. I use it now instead of turbo fan! I will let you guys know about my profile, but really it's a very easy to use tool, no point in not trying it! Plus a simple reboot removes the profile in case you don't feel like using it

I was playing Crysis 2 at extreme with a couple of settings in ultra, with my GTX780m OC to 980/2900 and I had locked on 60fps for the most part with vsync, with temps around 78C for CPU and 82 for GPU with a fan speed of about 70%. Loud but less than full turbo fan! Parts that are less heavy drop down temps a bit along with a bit reduced fan speed.

I will try the fan mod and see if it changes anything, as well as getting new thermal pads.

 

I'm going to try pherein's too for sure, ETA is thursday for my laptop and I'm getting really exited and giddy in anticipation.
Seems pherein's tool is a much better alternative than the new firmware for the fan profile as they say it just makes the fans spin faster and doesn't really show much of an improvment. I'd rather have have quiet fans on while not gaming and full control when gaming.

 

I have been telling anyone and everyone to use Phereins tool . You can easily automate for boot at Windows as well so no need to remember to start the app or even hit the turbo button . His program has your back so to speak. That is of course if you are concerned about high temperatures based on how the stock fan profile handles it..

 

Not so much worried but keep under control, more so when you feel the need to OC. I'm not too interested in breaking any benchmark records but love to play my games at the highest possible settings with all the bell's and whistle's on whenever possible running smoothly.

 

Yeah i do not think there is any cause for worry but at the same time i think MSI should adjust the fan profiles themselves to be a tad more aggressive. They probably never will because they want the machine to run as quietly as possible at the cost of some higher temps.

Alot of this temp thing is what you are accustomed to from your last notebook or desktop. Some people could care less or just do not know and i guess according to MSI the temps even if high should be ok .

It is a call each individual has to make themselves but i am grateful at least there are fan tools to handle this .

 

What about some pads on the bottom of the fan itself too? Just a couple of small squares.

 

I think 'someone' at MSI will address this via EC-FW modification...... all I can say for now.

 

Nice mate....
But it will be compatible with the new barebones??

 

Hi folks,

I got my MSI 1763 last week from my reseller. (Austria). The problem is that the system is always running with the nvidia graphic card (power button orange) - only during the boot and the login screen the button is white (intel HD)

Bios Version : E1763IG6.703 from 04/23/13
EC Version : 1763EG61 Ver 5.02 from 05/1413

Processor : i7-4900MQ.

I used the drivers provided on the CD , and updated the intel HD Drivers from the intel website.

I could't find any options in the bios or the Nividia / Intel Settings regarding optimus so i think it might be a problem with the Bios ?

Anyone else with this issue ?

 

You could always flash your barebones to MSI retail bios/ec.

 

Never do that unless you like an expensive paperweight.

 

MSILover on this thread already has done this and it worked perfectly. Not saying its the norm, but in this case it works.

 

That's interesting. I deal with customers who try this and fail somewhat regularly. I'd still take a word of caution doing it but that does open up some pretty interesting possibilities. I know I would personally run away screaming due to the possibility of a brick.

 

Derek probably did not see on post #566 of this thread that MSI_Lover (member of NBR) went in great detail of how to flash the OEM BIOS properly.

Whether everyone or anyone should do it though is a personal judgment call they need to make themselves.

 

Even with a detailed guide, and a successful result using it, it's something still to be taken with caution. Even something as simple as flashing a BIOS from one version to the next on the intended compatible system can go wrong randomly. Not saying it's not possible, but I am just trying to express the caution that flashing BIOS should have and any reseller will express as we're the ones that will ultimately wind up with the warranty issues if something does go wrong.

 

Absolutely agree with you and that is why in all my replies i put a minor disclaimer about a person needing to decide only for themselves if they should do it or it is worth it .


MSI_Lover though went to great lengths on explaining how it should be done properly and deserves kudos for taking the risk plus outlining the right way to handle it vs just tossing some files on a USB stick and clicking OK


Even with something like this there is a right way and a wrong way to do it i guess is the best way to say it.

 

Agreed with both above posts. Even with a guide I would still be slightly nervous to try it, but the guide he made is very detailed and eases some tensions about flashing bios.

 

Hmmmm, let's just say a 'project' is in the works addressing this for MSI notebooks. My guess is 'yes', but really can't speak to barebones units, don't know much, and even if I did, it's a situation where I still can't say, LOL!

 

I am just grateful someone wrote that fan application so i can handle it myself. I don't think MSI's fan profiles will ever be as aggressive as i like anyhow as from what i can tell they do want to keep the noise levels down but the only way to achieve that is higher temps because once the fan spins up to a certain RPM the machine takes on a whole new level of noise that many people may not like or appreciate regardless of the temps which i can understand.

I also thought they could either make a fan app themselves or just an addition to the BIOS.


FAN= Agressive: Fans will run faster at the expense of noise.

FAN= Quiet: Fans will run hotter at the expense of higher temperatures

 

Hi,

I just recently got my Barebones MSI 1763 780m from Ken at Gentech.

Went a head and sprung for 4900MQ and diamond paste. Also did SSD Raid-0 with W7 and upgraded network card.

This rig out runs my i7950 SLI 470 desktop oced to 3900mhz!!!

I am loving this setup!!!

Many thanks to Ken who answered emails late in the evenings and beyond walking me through all the build questions.

Glad I went with this route.

v7

 

Good choice on all fronts :thumbsup: . Enjoy the new beast it certainly is powerful .

 

Don't forget intel XTU if you need a little more CPU juice.

 

The one I got from Powernotebooks has a completely open and unlocked bios!

But. When I try to install the intel xtu it says no processor found? I have the basline hasewell.

Easier to OC with the bios or get that utility working?

 

Use intel XTU 3.2 just google that one. Interesting about the unlocked BIOS though id love to get a hold of that one . Can you run the machine off the Nvidia GPU only and disable the IGP ?. On my old ALienware i could do this and have the best of the both worlds but running directly off the Nvidia gave much better results in games because of poor optimus utilization.

Wish you could share that BIOS with us :thumbsup:.

 

I havent seen any options to disable the IGP but I didnt really look that hard. Honestly, there options are insane. I am an avid overclocker of desktops and understand that, but sheesh, this bios is nuts. I dont even know where to begin.

Interesting that you used to get better performance with the IGP disabled. Im benching pretty much right where I should be. When disabling the LCD screen and doing direct HDMI 780m, I only lost 21 points on 3dmark! So I think this new haswell and optimiss def kicked it up a notch!

 

Yep benchmarks are all in line where they should be even with optimus running but games are a different story. Nvidia makes sure that those applications are running full bore utilization wise. When i would run directly off the Nvidia card i would get 99% utilization in games where if i was running in Optimus mode it would swing up and down but be more like 60-70% utilization. You will need to monitor it for yourself too see it when gaming to really understand what i mean.

That BIOS sounds insane and i am seriously jealous of you lol..

 

Well one test im going to try tonight is to get a frame rate of like metro last light with everything on insane, then compare the LCD VS the HDMI with LCD disabled. That should give me a decent representation of how the IGP path is degrading the performance.

This bios is nuts though. There is even an overclocking setting but all the values are foreign to me. Lots of voltage tweaks and the like but nothing really straightforward. The only setting I can find that has to do with disabling the IGPU is just muxing settings, which in our case should be set and is set to to "no muxer"

 

I do not think just pluggin in a LCD will get rid of Optimus. When you are running on the Nvidia card alone the Intel card should be gone from the device manager and only the Nvidia will be under display adapters. Also under the Nvidia display settings you will regain digital vibrance which is missing because its being passed through the intel IGP.

Yeah i dont know which muxing setting might change it and since you do not want to touch those settings unless you can do a blind flash in case things go south with changing the wrong setting then dont change anything. It happened to me before on one of my rigs but you could blind flash or force flash to revive the machine . Not sure if MSI has that fail safe in place but id imagine they might .

The BIOS does sound sweet though and being able to OC the CPU without software is a nifty thing to have.

Congrats on your new monster again . i have been enjoying mine thoroughly with or without Optimus it's still a fine machine just something i believe all PC manufactures should give us the choice to disable and i am not the first to ask for it and i wont be the last .

 

Well the way these notebooks are designed I think the HDMI route is the closest were going to get to disabling it.
When connecting through the HDMI you are jacked RIGHT into the 780m. The LCD screen is actually connected to the framebuffer of the IGP so even if there was a setting to disable the IGP, you wouldnt be able to enable the LCD screen due to that pipe going missing.

All in all though this is a BEAST machine and we are all lucky to be able to have them! What desktop Nvidia card you think the 780m is on par with?

 

I think its between a 670 and 680 desktop card. Certainly let me know the results of plugged and unplugged from the monitor results .

 

Svet says he can do the GT60/GT70/barebones unlocked bios for us..... no problem. All he needs is your current bios and EC Firmware versions.

Notebook Modified & Private BIOS'es & EC-FW

I am sending him another donation right now.

Enjoy!

 

I will also donate to him. I offered svl7 a nice donation to unlock the GT60 bios, and he was interested and was trying to help me out. But I wasn't able to get his bios dump program to work? Anyone know how to do this? I want to be able to OC my 4900MQ via bios instead of software! And with my 240W power supply inbound, I am thinking I should be good to go. I am just hoping the system will utilize the extra power and not be locked down due to this hybrid power thing MSI decided to run with.

 

Bios dump program? You mean you want to save a copy of your current bios, right? Try this:

Download, and use AmiFlash, http://www.ami.com/support/downloads/amiflash.zip. Just extract all files to a directory of choice, then where extracted, go to ..\amiflash\Aptio\AFUWIN\64\ , run the AFUWINGUI.exe file, and then click on "save"...... saving the .ROM file to another location of choice.

 

Thanks! I think I got it saved! I will sent it over to SVL7.