MSI GT72s Motherboard failure and upgrade to MSI GT72vr Motherboard using GTX 980m Successful!

Hey there so a random but awesome thread here. I have a MSI GT72s model known as the MS-1782. I have been plagued with random power losses on the MS-1782 MoBo. I was able to pickup a MSI GT72vr MS-17851 V1.0 MoBo for a steal. The GTX1070 in it was dead but the motherboard was in perfect condition. I swapped the MS-17851 board into the chasis of my GT72s MS-1782 with zero modification. I used the MS-17851 heatsink for the CPU and then I used the MS-1782 GPU heatsink & VRM heatsink from the GT72s for the GTX 980m 8GB. Computer booted with no issues however it did not automatically install the drivers for the 980m. I disabled driver signature enforcement and downloaded the latest driver I could get to work possible which was the Nvidia 452.02. The next issue I ran into was that the GPU was downclocked to 405MHz clock and Mem clock. I was able to solve that issue by using Nvidia Inspector and manually setting the GPU to 1127MHz core clock and 1253MHz mem clock. Now I can fully utilize the GTX 980m in a motherboard that is was never supposed to be backwards compatible with. The last issue I am working on now is getting G-Sync working again as with my older MS-1782 MoBo I had 75Hz refresh rate and G-Sync. Currently I cannot load the drivers any newer then 452.02 and G-Sync does not appear as an option and I can only reach a max of 60Hz refresh rate even though I know my monitor is a 75Hz monitor. I've learned so much from the fellow enthusiasts off of this forum and I am glad to be able to share this to people who maybe are looking to fix their old MSI GT72s that had a faulty motherboard. For anyone who follows this any more advice to get later drivers to work and G-Sync back would be phenomenal. My board has the i7-6700hq CPU and I am using an MSI GTX 980m 8GB model GPU. Hope you all can also benefit from my research. You will have to modify the Nvidia Driver .inf file to properly be able to detect the GTX 980m and install it correctly otherwise it will only show as a basic Microsoft display adapter.

 

You will only get your GSync back with an MSI GTX 1070.
the other way around is of buying a GTX 1070 and install it in the GT72s. This solved my powerlosses. Because the 980m cards are the wrongdoer.

 

Was the issue with your old GT72s board the power IC? If so might get a VR board to replace my dead board too.

Else the new chassis, battery and screen is going to waste.

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Yes it was. Also a new update today I was able to update to an even newer driver last night I am now running the 457.51 Nvidia Driver stable however still no G-Sync. Computer plays just like a GT80 Titan they only could do 60FPS as well. The performance is great. If you plan to do the same upgrade You will need the CPU heatsink for the newer VR board but your GPU heatsink and VRM Heatsink will work just fine.

 

I bought an entire parts GT72vr laptop. The only thing wrong with it was the GPU in it was bad (the 1070). It would boot with the 1070 but there was blue dots everywhere on the GT72vr. I robbed it of its motherboard and installed the VR board into my GT72s chasis and used my old GTX 980m. I am up and fully functional minus the loss of G-Sync. There was a lot of people with early model GT72s 6th gen's that have all kind of VRM/IC problems and the 2nd gen board (GT72vr) did not have those problems carry over so much.

 

I take it you lost the ability to use MUX with the upgrade i.e to switch from iGPU to dGPU.

 

Being that I had a parts laptop I used the switch board from the vr. I have not tried to switch between the iGPU and dGPU yet but I don't see why you could not. In the bios with it being unlocked there is an option to boot only from the iGPU if I wanted too.

 

But it might be wired on the board for the igpu just because the option is in the bios doesn't mean the physical MUX switch hardwear is.

Planning on replacing the board sometime early next year after I fully upgraded my clevo laptop.

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Well feel free to message me about it. I fully document all my builds/repairs so I have all the photos of it. I also know alot about the old clevos as well if you ever need help in that area.

Here is a few pics of what it looked like together with the board you are speaking of. I know that the decals on the GT72s do not match the decals of the vr top case. You can see I used a few daughter/sister boards from the vr chasis in my s chasis. I did just end up keeping my touchpad and front LED's the s models ones.

 

Thanks, bud I have had the laptop completely disassembled to replace the entire chassis after a hinge failure took it all out.

That's why I was going to replace the mainboard and the GPU it took out at same time as I have already replaced the screen, chassis, battery, fans might as well continue to replace everything else.

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I am honestly surprised this one hasn't had a hinge failure. My GT70 0NE did and ended up having to replace the whole bottom case. The GT72 screens so so thin they are super fragile if you don't open them lightly.

 

Then your very lucky with your GT72, mine failed even though i opened it up via the middle, first the left started to go then the right just went hold my beer and took the whole posting system out both on the laptop bezel and also the mid cage, I can still boot the laptop without the GPU but there is a nice burn smell coming from the Powerjack after awhile and i traced that back to the two chips on the underside of the mainboard just offside of said jack. This happens with a 330w or 230w PSU.

I want to keep the laptop as it was a Laptop my late grand father helped me with getting so has very big sentimental value.

But in all honesty whom in their right might would have a metal hinge system bolted to plastic posts and brass inserts, I wished MSI would simply just wake up on designing front.
Heck my Lenovo Thinkpad R61e has a better hinge system as its on a magnesium central cage (I could throw the Thinkpad to the ground with screen open and only the screen would fail).

 

Yea I have to agree. I have a few old Toshiba Qosmio laptops, a HP Omen X 17, and few of the older alienware m17x R1's, and alienware m18x R2 that I know will all have hinge issues down the road.

 

Cheers for this thread! Pictures and clear, understandable text.
@hacktrix2006. Thought your 1060 upgrade destroyed itself? I gave up on the MSI GTX 1070 install and bought a NEW 8gb Frankenstein 980m for $300 Canuck that works great minus g sync.

 

I don't have a 1060 laying around to test it I only have the dead 1070 that came with the VR parts laptop and the 980m 8GB model i had left over from my S model. It was all around very easy. Remember if you downgrade to the 980m model you will need an S model 980m heatsink and S model 980m VRM heatsink.

 

The GTX1060 still works but the coils started to bubble so I put back in my GTX 970m then mainboard crapped the bed and took the GTX970m out as it shorts now.

So will be replacing mainboard and GPU when time and money permit.

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The attachments here are of interest.The one in Blue the Blossom guy is a "FOR HIRE" bios modder The one in Black is from the Eurocom highwaymen!
I didnt downgrade. I replaced a cooked 980m when I couldnt get the MSI 1070 to work in my GT72 6QE. I was warned by the seller the card was an Oddball and only worked GT83-73-63. lappys which are Titans.
It is Revision 1.2
My rig is not GT72S Came GT72 6QE with 4gb 980m, now 8gb 980m
The guy blossomcrown is answering wanted to know why MSI GTX 1070 card he got wouldnt work in his GT83 rig.
Using the igpu settings in the hidden bios didnt work for me because it would automatically switch back on the OS loading. I dont recall now if I tried it with the Mux switch in the Intel position.Damn!

 

You could try blind flashing the 1070 you have to a correct vbios if you are speaking of a 1070

 

Dont think so. Another fellow tried every v bios in the Tech PU Collection with Zip results with this card. Very strange tho that in all the posts in all the different threads and sites, this is the first I,ve heard of an on card chip for the signal switch.

 

Yes there on the early GT72s models like the 2qe or 6qe and others part of the S generation had MUX switches to be able to switch between your dGPU and iGPU. When you press the MUX switch button it will restart the computer and will start with the iGPU. The MSI GT72vr did away with the MUX switch all together. In these 2 pics I am attaching the first is my MSI GT72s you can see the icon for the GPU MUX switch and on the second image on my MSI GT72vr you can see they replaced the icon with a screen off button. The daughter boards appear to be nearly identical looking at them however. I believe it is simply just built into the MoBo EC that controls the MUX.

 

Yeah! I believe that is the way the switch works, in EC. I use that program "RWeverything" on my 9th gen GL63 9SDK to set my battery charge levels so I dont have to use garbage Dragon Centre. Might get ambitious, put it on the GT72 and see what values change when the Mux switch is flipped. I already know it cant be used for setting charge level on GT72,So!
I got so frustrated with the 1070, I almost got suicidal and flashed the GT72VR EC to the GT72.

https://www.reddit.com/r/MSILaptops/comments/jf0bwx/adjusting_battery_charge_level_without_dragon/

 

We should all just by eGPU setups and quit relying on this dGPU's lol. I don't remember if the GT72 has a thunderbolt port or not.

 

Aw! come on now. Thats no fun. Yes the GT72 6Qx and 72S 6Qx have daisy chain Type C-USB 3.1-Thunderbolt 3.
The T Bolt firmware update is on the MSI site along with install instructions. I believe it defaults to USB 3.1 and you have to have a Thunderbolt device hooked up to do the T Bolt Firmware update. https://www.msi.com/Laptop/support/GT72-6QE-DOMINATOR-PRO-G#down-firmware

 

lol. Now if only we can get games to start adding SLI and CF support again so my GT80 Titan and Alienware m17x r1 and m18x r2 can be fully used

 

Did you ever get the G sync working on the 980m? The replacement 8gb 980m card I used has no g sync and my 75mhz rated screen is now standard 60mhz. OSD (RTTS thru HWinfo) in most light games never exceeds 60 FPS ? Cyberpunk shows 30-40 FPS on medium set and RDR2 30-45 on high.For a $300 New card, im happy.

 

TB Firmware Update could be done if TB was forced enabled in the BIOS via the special key combo else yes a TB Device needed to be connected for it to show up.

 

not recommended update FW for thunderbolt ,.,.some this device is dead after this
in default ,.,.,.is this blocked BIOS/ADVANCED/TB FW update - disabled

similar advanced setup in admin bios - possitible soft/brick device

 

I have not yet found a way to renable G-Sync. Before the MoBo swap I had G-Sync and 75Hz rate. But with the new vr board cannot find a way to enable G-Sync or get faster then 60Hz. Thats the only downfall at the moment.

 

What panel you got? Edid override can get you back 75hz. As for gsync if it doesn't have screen and card I'd in the cookie there is no way to enable it.

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Interesting that you max out at 60 FPS with a Stock MSI 980m on the GT72VR board and I am also stuck at 60 FPS max with the "Frankenstein card-same PCB layout and heatsink" on the stock GT72 6QE. Your posting that info saved me blowing $600 on a "Franky" 1070 card for my 6QE.
Reduced 75 to 60hz screen rate=60FPS ??? Set by Vbios or Mobo bios??
edit: on the MSI GT72 6QE support site there is a notation on the bios update saying it is for "panel support". Im guessing thats the update to the same panel the GT72VR uses.120 hz ??

 

I dont think MSI would Post a faulty update on their site with a couple of million users out there willing to sue like in the past MXM Upgrade Scandal. Trouble with sites and posts are mostly from posters who have screwed up and are looking for an answer to remedy it.The "Wizards", who have never experienced, or fixed that specific problem jump in with advice and the semi relavent input seems to get the topic classed as verified and becomes "folklore" when in truth maybe 1/1000 percent of 5 million users have had this problem and mostly all of them have been overclocking,benching,overheating and just generally beating the crap out of their rigs to a point they were never designed to operate, If you track the posters, it doesnt take long to catch "the pattern".
And here we are! Off the tracks again!
To do the update, you have to "Enable Thunderbolt FW Update" in BIOS or you will surely poop the pooch!

 

You can go above 60fps with a 60z screen my GTX 1060 was spending most of its time at 100fps without tearing. Also the 75Hz can be gained if you have the right screen or know how to EDID Override edit.

If you have an LG LP173WF4-SPF1 screen

Use the attached .zip file which has 3 .bin files, One from when my system was G-Sync'd, One that forces 75hz and another that does 100hz and 75hz. Use CRU (Custom Resolution Utillity) to import it in and reboot.

 

Thank for the offer but I am not wanting to play this game anymore! The 8gb 980m replacement card I got works fine.With the Liquid Metal TIM on CPU and GPU and 12 wk Thermal-rite pads,the temp on either has been 86c Max with a 72-76c average HWinfo/RTTS after a hard extended workout gaming or lengthy Handbrake encodes.
That is with ALL STOCK settings and NO cooling assist.

 

Are you saying you cant use both cards at once on the GT80 SLI? Im not familar with how that works. In relation to the GTx3 series card I have.

 

Mine is as well a 6QE factory it was 75hz. but since I am running modded .inf to correctly install the GPU drivers it won't let me push my refresh rate faster then 60Hz which is not a huge deal.I don't believe swapping to the 120Hz lcd will fix the issue it is a software issue. I am working on a way around it at the moment.

 

So I can use Edid to override the settings and force 75Hz? My 980m 8gb is defiantly a G-Sync model. Where do I go about find thie Edid software.

 

As for my GT80 yea you can use both cards but only if the game you are playing supports SLI standard

 

These .bin files you sent for the panel override are they installed by via vbios update or something else?

 

Using your Custom Resolution Utility I have now been able to switch over to 75Hz! Now if we can make G-Sync work this would be 100% success

 

75Hz defiantly working with CRU Just can't figure out how to enable the factory G-Sync mode

 

You won't be able to get gsync working as the cookie required (Whitelist) doesn't have the GPU or screen info in it. Its encrypted and signed so even modding it in will not work as its in the bios.

However since 75hz is working fine you could use CRU and the 100hz bin to see i f that works.

I have a 120hz screen however you need to replace the EDP cable from a 40 pin to 30 pin to a 40pin to 40pin in order to get it to work and yes to get 120hz but you still won't get gsync.

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Should have been NO PROBLEM! Read top centre of box! Hah! Hah!