**Official Clevo P151SM1 / Sager NP8230 Owner's Lounge**

Well, the GT60 would probably be very similar in terms of performance-- so the games you are playing would be close to identical on either machine. I've seen an MSI GT60 / GT70 in person at a retail store, they are definitely not my cup of tea. I don't want people to see my laptop and immediately believe it is for gaming. 1.) I like to bring my laptop to work and i don't want my boss judging me. 2.) Gaming laptops are more likely to get stolen ( they look flashy and flashy=expensive to a thief's eye. )

In addition i felt as though MSI's keyboard felt cheap ( which is odd because it gets a lot of praise online-- i didn't like it at all. ) the power buttons and LED indicators all look very cheap in build quality. It's almost unnecessarily thick-- it makes this laptop look like an ultraportable lol. And cooling wise it isn't much better at least from what i've read. One advantage the MSI has is the drive bay options ( 2 mSATAs etc ). I didn't plan on doing anything crazy ( raid 0 mSATAs etc ) one SSD is already blistering fast so whatever.

I would highly recommend that you throw at least a 64GB mSATA SSD into your 8230. It'll be the most significant upgrade you can do for the least amount of money.

 

Oh I did, i got the 120gb intel 525 as the so drive and a 750gb 7200 as my storage drive. I mainly didnt get the msi due to a lot of heat/fan issues on Thais one fan for both GPS and CPU. The keyboard looked nice (steel series) but i like savers keyboard as well (used to have a 3790).

 

And once again many thanks for the updates blankenship. You mention that this laptop won´t hold its own in say 2 years or so due to lagging. I´m assuming you´re refering to how it will handle newer games, not that the parts will degrade etc...In other words, it should still perform just as well in 2 years as it does today with the games I´m playing now, however in 2 years I do not expect it to run newer games on ultra-high.

 

I just don't expect my laptops i purchase to satisfy my needs for longer than 3 years. It's part of my buying decision-- which is why i'm not getting a sager np8250-S.

If you take care of this laptop i would be willing to vouch that it'll hold up construction wise and temperature wise for a long time. I would recommend solid state as a whole ( 128 gb msata and 240 gb 2.5" ssd on my machine ) which cuts down on vibration and moving parts. Also saves on battery life too and makes everything faster. You can also reuse SSDs in future machines ( this is a 240GB recycled from my last laptop which was an older Asus ROG.

 

I think I´m going to order it as is for now, only with windows 8 because it´s the same price pretty much everywhere (ie. $80). The only additional things I may purchase are the Intel wireless and the IC diamond thermal compound. Hopefully later on I will purchase a 128 or 250 GB SSD and install it. I don´t suppose installing the SSD and then reinstalling the OS onto that should be too difficult down the road. Also, SSD´s may drop in price in some months, who knows. What do you think about that?

 

I received my laptop yesterday. I really liked this laptop. Installation of OS and drivers was quick and simple. The battery life is quite decent, I used the laptop for 3 hrs and still 20% battery remaining which is very respectable for a gaming notebook. So on normal usage, you will get around 3 hrs of battery life. I have not played any graphic intensive game on it yet so I may not be the right person to comment about the GPU and CPU temperature. I played prototype 2 for about an hour , and max GPU and CPU temp was in mid 60's.

I also ran the unified valley benchmark with ultra setting and 8xAA. Here are the results :
FPS: 21.5
Score:899
Min FPS: 12.1
Max FPS: 39.8

The GPU temp never went over 65 during this test.

My system has been running continuously for about 22 hrs and CPU is idling between 45-50 and GPU 35-45.
So overall, I am very impressed with this laptop.

 

Which version did you get, the 765M or 770M?

 

As far as i know the only version you can get is the 770M.

 

Oh that might only be an option in the UK at the moment.

 

I've been getting freezing/hanging when browsing with Google Chrome for some reason since I got this. Sometimes opening tabs, or when certain objects on the page are loading my computer would hang completely (can't move mouse, keyboard, everything standing still) for about 15 seconds or so and then it goes back to normal. Playing games has been fine, I did tests for CPU, memory, GPU, the whole shabang, and though the heat seemed excessive, there was no freezing of any kind. I don't know if it's the hard drive or maybe Google Chrome still has that Flash problem or what but

 

Problem definitely sounds like it is software related. Confirm that all of your drivers are up to date and remove any utilities that you may not need-- then reinstall one by one and see if you can pinpoint which is causing it. If it is chrome specific try reinstalling chrome too. A fresh install of windows and drivers might be in order for a problem that severe-- and be careful which windows updates you install. I only go for the important ones-- never the optionals.

Hope that helps and you figure out what is causing it. Mine is still running beautifully after about 4 days of use.

 

First time poster, if I'm doing it wrong or this is wrong place, feel free to tell me.

@Blankenship7, Can you give more info on those benchmarks. I am not getting the same benchmarks and both mushkin and xoticpc are telling me that the port is probably a sata 2 port and therefore incapable of getting the speeds you claim you're getting (I really really hope you are right and they are wrong).

@everyone, more info on my problem

I just got this laptop and I'm having a problem. I just bought a new mushkin atlas msata 240gb.
Mushkin Enhanced MKNSSDAT240GB Solid State Drive - Newegg.com

I installed Win 7 64-bit on the msata, an ssd ( Crucial m4 CT512M4SSD2BAA Solid State Drive - Newegg.com), and the hdd that came with the laptop.

I then ran CrystalDiskMark on all three. The results show the m4 with 500+ mb/s while the msata atlas has 200+ mb/s on seq reads. ummm huh ?
ssd benchmarks --> https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B0_-iDwC-j2zcUpJTllWTmxEazQ/edit?usp=sharing
msata benchmarks --> https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B0_-iDwC-j2zYW52dFB6WWI2bG8/edit?usp=sharing

I called sager, and they said both the ssd slot and the msata slot are sata 3. I have a support ticket in with mushkin right now but on the following review they say that the low read times are because the port is sata II.
Really long newegg link --> Mushkin Enhanced Atlas Series MKNSSDAT240GB-DX Solid State Drive - Newegg.com
Copied here for posterity:
" Manufacturer Response:

Dear Misbah,
Thanks for purchasing this Mushkin mSATA drive!
To get rated speeds, the drive must be installed in an mSATA slot rated for SATA 3.0. The slot you currently have this installed in is SATA 2.0.
Please feel free to email me with any questions you might have: [email protected]
Thanks!
"

The cost of the msata drive is roughly $200. It's under a replacement only policy which means I can't return it. Space is not an issue for me, so if the drive wont give me at least the speed of the m4 ssd, I'm out $200.

Anyone have any ideas on this ridiculously crappy benchmark ?

 

Hi,
I've been lurking for awhile and saw this machine on Xotic and wanted to know if anyone here is a multimedia designer who uses the Adobe suite for video editing and heavy graphics. How does this system do in regards to those demands. I'm not a gamer so I can't quite get a comparison in that vein.

I'd be looking at getting the 4800 processor, 750gb hd and 16 gb ram.

I priced 2 machines and the only difference seems to be the screen size, the 15in one being about $150 cheaper.

Also, have a lot of people bought from Xotic and dealt with repair issues? Has anyone had any problems with them as a company or getting things repaired?

Extra random questions:
- Is it worth the difference to go from the 765 to 770 video card? It seems to be since there is the ability to get 3gbs of video memory.
- I saw this on newegg - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=34-231-089 - and I know it has the slower processor and 765 video card and wanted to know if anyone else considered it and why didn't they get it. People seem to have problems with the keyboards at the very least.

Thanks so much,
Dawn

 

The heat seemed excessive? Care to elaborate?

Also, you guys get extra warranty or just the one year?

 

I just got mine today and I'll do a more thorough (read: quantitative) review once I download more games/benchmarks. For now, you must bear with my subjective initial impressions. Note: I've never owned a Clevo laptop, so I bought this not knowing what to expect. No one I knew ever heard of them, but I decided to take a leap of faith based on all the positive reviews on NBR.

Reseller: XoticPC did a fine job of meeting all their deadlines and everything went smoothly with Hutsady looking after my order and answering all of my questions. I chose them because after searching through these forums I found that they handled customer service issues well and were always helpful and polite. 10/10 would recommend.

Build Quality (whatever that means): When I first felt it the and carried it around, the two adjectives "solid" and "unyielding" came to mind. It's no Toughbook, but it feels far less flimsy than my 2009 Lenovo T500 which felt like thin, weak plastic. Nope, no flex to be found here. I don't know what it is with people on the Alienware forums bashing Sager/Clevo build quality, but it seems far better put together than many laptops made by the well known brands. That said , the mildly rough texturing on the palmrests took a bit of getting used to after switching over from a 13" Macbook Air, and the similarly-textured touchpad is nothing to write home about. As with most Clevo laptops, a mouse would be a wise investment.

Keyboard: If I had to nitpick, I would say that the arrow keys clatter a bit louder than the rest of the keys (because they are directly over the optical drive, I suppose?), but all in all, the typing experience is not too different what I was getting on my Macbook Air, with these keys having a little more travel and grip. Typing is quiet, though I'm still getting used to the layout.

Update:Some keys sometimes feel like there's something under them because you press down and hear a slightly louder sound than normal.

Screen: I do some photo-editing on the side, so I got the 95% gamut upgrade (but stock screen is still excellent, I here). It's a beautiful screen with great viewing angles and brightness/contrast despite being matte, which makes me wonder why anyone wants glossy screens at all. There's no graininess or dullness to speak of, just vibrant colors without the shiny mirror effect. This is hands down one of the best TN screens I've seen on a laptop.

Sound: Ironically, the fairly conspicuous speaker grille stretching across the length of the keyboard does not produce the great sounds it should be making even with the fancy SoundBlaster software. Headphones will improve the sound quality greatly, as there seems to be a lack of bass.

Fans: A lot of people complain about Clevos having loud fans, so I panicked about it a little before I ordered it. Turns out, it's not so bad. On low speed, it's not noticeable. Whirrs quietly for a few minutes, and goes silent again. When I ran Far Cry 3 on the ultra preset, the fans ramped up to what I would classify as "medium loud". No hairdryer here, but good luck gaming incognito in a silent environment. Another good reason to have headphones while gaming, I say.

Update: Even without headphones, the sound is not particularly bad. Maybe those with the 157 or 150SM have it tougher with the 780M, but fans seem to be having no problem at all.

Heat: Clevos do a good job keeping themselves cool, and this one is no exception. I never felt any heat during my 2 hours of gaming other than my own body heat, but I'll have to see how it fares after extended sessions.

Gaming Performance: The GTX 770M does not disappoint when running games at native resolution. I only got the chance to run Far Cry 3, Saints Row 3 and Bioshock Infinite, but all ran smoothly on max settings. Bioshock averaged about 36 fps on its benchmark utility n UltraDX11 without DDOF, but I don't have hard data for the other two games just yet.

Update: Chivalry, Just Cause 2, Grid 2, Saints Row 3 run very smoothly at max settings. Far Cry 3 occasionally slows down a bit when moving through different sections of the map, but for the most part it runs fine.

Battery Life: On power saving mode and minimum brightness while web-browsing and typing up this review, I drained 47% in a little over two hours. Expect four to four and a half hours of battery life under normal conditions.

Misc: The 120W power brick is decently slim and portable, thank goodness. Not Razer-slim, but a step up from the huge brick that plagued the W110ER. The laptop is fairly thick but not so cumbersome that it's not portable. It's just six pounds, which is about the weight of a college textbook.

In sum, it's a great machine with a few easily circumvented weaknesses (notably sound and touchpad) but far more noticeable strengths (screen, keyboard, gaming performance). Even though it doesn't look like much, this laptop gets all the important bits right.

 

Thanks for the review CupOfRamen, glad the hear the computer is working out for you. That 95% screen is a beauty huh

 

Does that mean there is no bass from the headphone port or just the speakers?

Also, can I upgrade to the Intel ac 7260 down the road if I select the integrated card? I want the 7260 but it states it will not work with Windows 7, unless I'm missing something?

 

The wireless card is in a standard mini pcie slot.

 

Just to be clear, if I get the integrated Wi-Fi option, I'll have a free PCIe slot?

 

No, the stock pcie wireless card will be there. You can replace it with an aftermarket one later although i recommend the intel 6000 series if you really need that stated win 7 support. I doubt the intel drivers would fail in win 7 anyways but i'm not 100% for the AC card.

P.S- just finished my video review just editing it a bit ( its about 10 minutes long ) one of my first video reviews so bare with me. I'm going to upload it to youtube and link it here soon.

 

The video is still uploading ( says about an hour remaining )

When it is done it'll be at this link: Sager NP8230 review (Clevo P151SM) - YouTube

Let me know of any questions or issues loading the video. P.S- Sorry about my poor camera quality hopefully my commentary is enough to make it worth your time.

Thanks

 

Thanks Blankenship. First good video review so far! Nice to see CPU temps hovering below 70 under load.

Could you perhaps tell us how good the audio jacks are, compared to consumer laptops (headphone music n gaming)?

 

To be honest i can't really be of assistance here-- my headphones ( the ones in the video ) are wireless via a USB bluetooth/soundcard combo. This means that all laptop onboard audio tech is disabled when i'm using my headphones. I can comment that if you ever had an issue with poor sound quality on a laptop ( usually due to a poor sound card etc ) you can always alleviate that problem by simply buying a USB headset instead ( which has it's own soundcard. )

 

Alright thanks, hope to see another video in case you are planning ! BTW how is quality of the ports - USBs, Power etc.? (Will they become loose after constant use, rendering loose connections in the future)

 

The ports seem fine ( i've never had an issue like that on a laptop ) Like i said there really isn't much i can say negative about the build quality. If i was really nitpicking i'd say that the spacebar is a little bit louder than the rest of the keyboard but that's no big deal.

 

Sounds nice. (Had bad memories - Previous gaming laptops: Asus: Power port loose connection in 2 yrs; Gateway: Started having loose connection in the audio jack rendering my wired headphone useless).

Did ya get time to play around with the touchpad? Official specs indicate multi-gesture support - Is that true/ response feedback?

 

I've used the trackpad maybe for ~10 minutes. I always use an external mouse because it's for gaming. However, the trackpad is accurate, and the only multi gesture i've used so far is Two finger scrolling for webpages-- which worked great. I'd give the trackpad an 8/10 in comparison with other laptops i've owned. It's really unimportant for me though

 

Perfect! Looking forward to more reviews.

Enjoy ur NP8230!

 

Once again many thanks blankenship. First good video review of this laptop. I´m wondering, you mention that the build quality is pretty good. I´m concerned about that, because I will be travelling alot internationally and not in perhaps the safest conditions. Just how ¨good¨ is the build quality, and is it really that portable? Let´s say you´ve got another 16 kilos of stuff in a back pack, would this be very difficult to carry around as well, in a carrying bag perhaps?

Also all this talk about LAN parties....I´ve never been to, nor even heard of one actually taking place in the person. How do you peoples go about finding these?

 

Well, i think i covered about everything i could build quality wise. I've had maybe 10 other laptops in the past and this one is definitely tied for first with my old Asus ROG-- I would say that this plastic might scratch easier than the rubberized plastic, but i haven't scratched or scuffed the laptop whatsoever so far. Like anything if you are traveling alot make sure that you have a very good laptop bag to protect your notebook. Also, make sure that the bag you get has guards that cover the zippers ( those rub against the notebook and damage it over extended periods ).

The LAN parties that i go to are just like 5-6 of my close friends gathering at the kitchen table of one of our houses a couple times a week.

 

The build quality is also addressed on the first post of this thread FYI.

Man, love those long awesome multiplayer sessions! Its like weekly oxygen therapy

 

The speakers. With headphones, the sound is perfectly fine. After trying to experiment with several games using the built in speakers, I found that for the most part the speakers do okay. For movies, however, some dialogue from people with low voices sound a bit quieter than it should. Really, unless you're a audiophile, the speakers should not be a critical factor in your decision.

I do think people tend to give these machines a harder time for their speakers because it competes directly with laptops by MSI which have excellent speaker systems. It's not that Clevos have terrible speakers, but rather the fact that another manufacturer does it far better.

 

There were some issues which they do seem to have fixed this gen to be fair.

 

I had already suspected this. In most reviews, users were needlessly very critical of clevo speakers and audio jacks. I think its wrong to say they are "downright terrible" just by comparing them with Dynaudio because majority of online viewers looking for a honest review might not be "audiophiles" and misunderstand them to be malfunctional audio hardware!

Thanks for the info. I think the best way to review sound would be to grade them out of 10 or comparing them to common brands and not the hi-fi ones.

 

Going to be re pasting and reinstalling windows today to see if I can narrow down my heat issues to hardware /software/imanidiot.

 

I was using the dot method with Prolimatech PK-1. I used the line method for the CPU. I guess the dot/line method is only for certain thermal pastes, but not for PK-1. I've repasted like 5 times doing the same thing and the temps weren't changing so I put a ton of paste on the GPU and spread it out with a credit card kind of. And max temps running furmark went down to 77 degrees from 90+.

 

Joining the party here, I've just placed my Sager NP8230 order today with LPC! Larry has been a great help and everything went very smooth as far as getting the order processed.

Now comes the hardest part...to wait for it to be built and shipped...I will update with my experience and first impressions once I receive the unit.

 

hmm.. where did you buy the adapter? I'm thinking of getting this laptop because of the gtx 770m

mSATA... where did u get yours?

just curious

 

hmm...what do you mean by the adapter?

I did not get an mSATA drive just yet, I have a spare regular SSD and will be using that for my boot drive.

I can't wait!

This is the spec for the NP8230 I ordered:

15.6” Full HD 16:9 LED-Backlit MATTE 95% NTSC C...
4th Generation Intel® Core™ i7-4700MQ Processor...
NVIDIA® GeForce™ GTX 770M 3GB GDDR5 Memory
8GB Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM at 1600MHz - 2 X 4GB
750GB 7200rpm SATA 300 Hard Drive
Intel® Dual Band Wireless-N 7260 802.11ac 2x2 P...
IC Diamond Thermal Compound - CPU + GPU
Guaranteed no dead or partially-lit pixels**
8X DVD±R/RW/4X +DL Super-Multi Drive & Software

 

Yes, on this model the mSATA slots are directly on the motherboard and don't require an adapter in the 2.5" bays.

 

Hello all! I am new to the entire gaming laptop world, but after much research this is the laptop I have ordered (from Xotic PC)! Suffice to say, I am very excited to receive my np8230. That being said, I am a straight up newbie when it comes to getting a laptop like this set-up and running well. So, to all of you with experience:

Right out of the box (with windows 7 home premium pre-installed by Xotic), what steps do I need to take in order to get this thing running at optimal or near-optimal condition? As far as drivers, tweaks, physical maintenance, etc. goes. Just really anything that comes to mind that can help! Thank you all again!

 

Congrats on the order! It should be ready to go out of the box, all you have to do is install what ever games you want and start playing.
If anything maybe update the video card drivers to the latest ones.

 

Oh ok thank you! So basically everything is up-to-date (drivers, etc.) besides the graphics card drivers out of the box? And I just noticed the NBR savings advertised on your profile, haha too bad I didn't see that before ordering...but I am very excited to get this in!

 

Oh also, can someone link me to a good mSATA ssd to put in (one that fits/works correctly, obviously) from newegg? I'm looking to keep it under $150 for that (so I guess a 120-128GB one?)

 

I'd like to configure my OS onto it. I've read the speed gains are awesome!

 

I've personally had great experiences with Samsung SSDs, maybe you can try the 840 Pro 128GB:

Amazon.com: Samsung Electronics 840 Pro Series 2.5-Inch 128 SATA_6_0_gb Solid State Drive MZ-7PD128BW: Computers & Accessories

 

That looks like a great price for a samsung! And that will fit in the 1 open mSata slot correct?

 

no, that's a regular SSD drive, I could not find a Samsung msata drive anywhere. Anyone has any suggestions on a solid mSata drive? I'm looking to eventually purchase one myself too.

 

Intel 525 mSATA drives or Samsung PM841 mSATA drives are nice ones.