Ryzeki's MSI GX660R Review

How is the touchpad? Does it have multitouch? Scrolling?

 

do you have a:
-scale
-camera
?

otherwise great review!

 

so this concludes that the gx660 has a kick as* cooling setup.. Right?

 

Indeed. Of course, I've modded the case, so that might have something to do with it.

I am, however, not sure if 840/1050 is completely stable with my current voltages. I had a screen shutdown after forty minutes or of of maxed Dragon Age Origins. Event Viewer gave me the "audit failed transport" error. When I did 800/1050 I got the striped screen freeze.

The problem is I have no idea if it's the GPU that's crashing or not. I'm monitoring temperatures with MSI Afterburner's OSD, and I haven't gone above 83C. It might be my CPU going bonkers, since I have no way of checking its heat after a reboot.

 

Does anybody else have a 80GB SSD drive in their GX660
RK Computer told me that a 80GB SSD wouldn't work. He said people were having some problems

I hope not. I get my MSI on Friday! I can't wait. Is the SPDIF out Optical or Coaxial?

 

Which 80GB SSD were they offering? Any SSD with a SATA interface should work without any problem.

As for the SPDIF, what do I look for to check?

 

Look in the audio connections. The last one is a digital out jack. Is there a red light/optical in there

 

Hey Forge snap some HD pics of the machine and post them!!
I want to see what this laptop looks like in real life.

 

No light that I could see. Analog, it looks like. I'll start my copper-laying tomorrow, so I'll be sure to take pictures.

 

So is the audio off the hook or what. I've heard it sounds good but does it get loud?? Distortion up top??

 

It gets plenty loud for a laptop, I am very impressed. Even at 100% volume it sounds excellent with no real distortion that I can hear. Volume must be limited to prevent distortion.

I find myself wanting a little more volume simply because it does sound so good, however I'm sure anyone will be satisfied with the Audio on this machine.

 

What sound device does it use? Is it realtek? I wonder how it will sound plugged in via the 3 3.5mm jacks for my 5.1 surround sound. My Sager NP8120 sounded like shiznit. No clarity whatsoever

 

Do you have Loudness Equalization enabled in the audio properties?

 

I do not, and can't test it out tonight to see the difference. I'll check it tomorrow.

 

What happens is that you lose the ability to create restore disks with the 80gig ssd drive. The data partition set aside for the program is too small and you can't change it to the main disk.

 

Huh. Never knew that. In any case, just make regular backups in case something gets so FUBAR you have to reinstall your OS.

 

When we first received this machine we tried the Loudness Equalization and in our opinion it reduced the loudness. Out of the box the sounds gets very loud without needing to tweak it.

 

Good to know. Thanks!

 

Hey guys!
I know that this is a review thread, but a thread about the laptop I'm about to buy. First of all, I live in Hungary, which is in eastern-middle Europe. Salaries are not that high here (average salaries are like 450 dollar / month here) so I've been thinking a lot about what to buy. I've just started the university (I'm a freshem ) and I need a good laptop that I can use for many things, like at the uni, or at home while watching movies or playing games. However I'd be happy to have that price you guys offer in the US (1500ish), but taxes would be too high to order it from there, so I have to get it from Hungary. The specs here are:
Resolution: 1920x1080
Processzor type: IntelR Coret i5 Mobile i5-450M
CPU MHz / FSB / Cache: 2.4GHz / 4,8GT/s / 3MB L2 Cache - 2.6GHz Turbo Boost
Memory: 4GB / 1066MHz DDR3
HDD: 500GB SATA 7200
Optical drive: DVDRW SuperMulti
Chipset: Mobile IntelR HM55
VGA Type: ATI Mobilityt RadeonR HD5870 / 1GB GDDR5
VGA output: HDMI / DSUB
Webcamera: 2.0MPixel HD 720p
WIFI: 802.11b, g, n
Bluetooth: Van
USB port: 2x, USB 3.0 - 2x
eSATA: 1x


So it has a lesser CPU, less memory, but it costs 1650 dollars.
So what do you guys think, shall I buy it? I really like all the reviews I've seen about this laptop, I'd like to have it for 3-5 years atleast, can't afford to buy another one soon.
Thanks for reading this
Regards
tenorx

 

How much of a frame rate decrease would you see over the 1366x768 model? I'm thinking of getting this laptop but the huge screen for gaming might be an issue later when more demanding games come out.

 

Then just reduce the resolution to something like 1600x900 and put on a little AA. But I can say it's punting pretty much every game I'm throwing at it.

 

The Borderland performance hit comes largely from dynamic shadow. It is unknown either ATI did bad job on Borderland or Borderland favor nvidia over ATI on shadow part. But my FPS gain is immense once dynamic shadow is turned off.


Excellent review =)

 

Got lost planet 2 bench working. I just needed to download an update for DirectX. I will try to upload the pics tomorrow, but I will leave the DX9 here.

Lost Planet 2
Settings: Test A, 1920x1080, no AA, all high, DX9
Min:28fps, Max:56fps, avg: 40fps
Comments: Lost planet 2 looks quite good graphically. I noticed that DX9 still looked great and performed amazingly well. The whole test seemed completely smooth, in part thanks to the motion blur. DX9 allows maxed settings with ease.

Pic for DX9

Sadly, the same cannot be said for DX11. Using DX11 with no DX11 (weird eh?) I got an average of 36fps. With DX11 on low, it was reduced to 28ish, medium to 22, and high to 18 or less fps. Visually, I didn't notice much between low and high at all. Tessalation was there when you enabled wireframe, but without wireframe, you would be hardpressed to find the extra visual power for the huge drop in fps.

Reducing resolution does help a lot. just or kicks, on 720p res all high medium DX11, the average goes back up to near 35fps.

 

Thanks! and performance hit is both on ATi and nvidia. My GTX260 would pay to get nearly the same performance I get from my radeon haha.

At highest/enabled settinggs, my GTX260m used to crumple under 23fps and worse! I could only get fluid performance removing shadows, Ambient occlusion, flareouts, bloom etc, and until then I would approach the 60fps mark. And even then, I would get fps drops.

 

I get mine tomorrow via UPS!!! Yeaaaa boyyyy

 

I just got my GX660R today
I've been playing with it for the last 5 hours.
Loaded up a couple Games and stuff.
Everything runs great except it crashes in 3DMark06
What drivers are you guys using
I have the new 10.8 Catalyst!!

 

Damn it. It crashes in BF2 also.

 

In Event Viewer are you getting any errors? What exactly is the crash like? Crash to desktop or does the screen lock up and you need a hard reset?

 

What is Event Viewer? I'd 3DMark and in BF2 I get lines and a freeze
I have to reboot!
Should I try Catalyst 10.5?

 

Search in your Win7 search bar. After finding Event Viewer and clicking on it, expand the option on the left menu bar called Administrative View. Look to see what errors you get at around the time of your crashes.

 

That's confusing
What drivers are u using
I'm running furmark now and my GPU temp is at 85c with fans on auto
I'm only 6 minutes in too

 

I use 10.8 and nothing has crashed at stock clocks or 770/1050.

And are you having trouble finding Event Viewer, or what?

 

I found it
"summary of Admin Events" right?
It shows like this-

Critical
Error
Warning
Info
Audit success

It shows 98 errors in the last 24hrs
But I don't understand the errors

 

Bad company 2 doesn't crash but BF2 and 3Dmark do

 

Can anybody link me the correct 10.5 drivers.
I can't find them

 

NM. I fixed the problem. 10.8 drivers only gave me 20-35 FPS in the old school BF2 (not Bad Company) and crashing freezing issues. Uninstalled 10.8 and ran Driver Sweeper in Safe Mode to remove what's left of ATI Drivers and installed the older ATI 10.5 drivers and now I'm over 100 FPS in BF2- no freezing issues and scored 13131 (Turbo Mode on) in 3DMark06. Damn those new drivers. It seems like alot of guys are having the same problems with new drivers.

 

I installed 10.8 for a while now and I don't have problems.

 

Same. No crashes unless I do monster overclocks.

Rob, if you're seeing "Audit events have been dropped by the transport. 0", that's the result of a high overclock, bad hardware, or bad drivers. In your case, it looked like bad drivers.

 

Forge how in gods name did you get you overclock so high!!
I can't even get 740/1040 stable. I get the striped screen freeze too.
I actually just reinstalled 10.8 Catalyst instead of the old 10.5's and i played with a few settings in the control panel. Everything seems to be running ok now.

 

damn i get frozen striped screen at 710/1010
Stress Testing with Furmark 1680x1050 8X AA
Am i not suppose to use the ATI Overdrive in the Control panel??

 

Not all GPUs are made exactly the same, and they don't respond favorably to OC. Mine gets to 840/1040 stable so far, with no crashes or black stripped screens. Maybe your GPU just isn't able to OC. It would probably require a voltage change.

For OC, I am using MSI afterburner, I don't use ATi Overdrive. I don't even have it enabled haha.

Which begs the question.. maybe we need to up the voltage to increase our OC capability? Core is not a problem, but memory is so far. with 1100 memory we would be able to game much easier at 1080 res.

 

im really un happy

my computer freezes in Crysis and other apps
what are the chances my GPU is Bad

 

i just disabled ATI Overdrive. Even though my clocks were at stock
let me try crysis again. I was never even in the game. It was playing videos and loading then it froze!!!

 

Yeah, check that everything works in stock. If you have problems at stock you gotta send it back for replacement.

Without OC, and all stock you should NOT have any freezes, crashes, etc. I haven't had one yet except the black stripped screen but I caused it with 840/1070 clocks.

 

Hey will one of you guys do me a favor
and do a small overclock with the ATI Overdrive tool. I disabled ATI Overdrive in the CCC and Crysis plays great now. I think I'm using the wrong overclock tool. I'm willing to bet $10 that Overdrive is crap

 

Are you guys adding voltage to your 5870
I'm using MSI afterburner and can't even get my clocks to 715/1015
I'm debating on returning my comp. Something ain't right
How are you stress testing ?

 

Another question:
Does it have media keys on the keyboard? (play-pause, volume, next, etc.)

 

It has volume and next but that's it
You do this via the FN Key and the arrows

 

Volume and next? Where?

The only hotkeys on the top control bar are the programmable P1 key, the CPU overclock button, fan button, this page-looking icon I don't know about yet, WiFi, Bluetooth, Power settings, and external light settings. Volume is controlled by the left and right arrow. There are no play/pause/stop hotkeys.

 

Page looking Icon disables the windows button.