*** Official Clevo P37xSM-A/Sager NP9377 owner's lounge ***

I did shoot their support an email yesterday (I'm not calling Canada!) but no response. I did get an email this morning from the sales guy I dealt with @ Eurocom telling me they have an updated BIOS with more features unlocked, and did I want to give it a test?

Amazon are so slick with returns, arranged for NBD and I'll get an email with the hour they expect to arrive. Ebuyer couldn't even manage to turn up on the day and even though they have now had it a week I still have another week or so to get my refund - and they messed up the return, I called this morning and it was listed for a replacement! They are so crap - AVOID!

Amazon say I will have my refund within 48 hours of receipt into their depot .

 

Man that monitor has given you some headaches MickyD. Doesn't sound fun.

120hz locked can be due to 3D but also using the ulmb or "lightboost" feature, so that would have been something to check, but sound like it's a done deal now.

Bummer you didn't like it. I love mine, but there will be other monitors so no worries. It's not cheap so if you don't love it, I wouldn't keep it either.


In laptop news, lappy traveled to Alaska yesterday. Pulled it out on the plane which was pretty fun. No outlet but not sure the plane would have provided any juice even if there was one, so it was short lived, but it made me laugh a little. This machine was clearly not meant for that.

Nice to have it here now though !

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk

 

Hello everyone, its been awhile since Ive been here and over 100 pages of posts have been made since I was last here. Anyway I was wondering if Nvidia has released a driver yet for this computer yet past 344.60 (note for me its the best of the 344.xx versions) that actually works yet? Note I don't care about over-clocking my 980's.

 

Hi, I.ve been using their latest hotfix driver 353.38 and it's working good for me. Mostly good feedback as well.

https://forums.geforce.com/default/...rs/announcing-geforce-hotfix-driver-353-38/1/

If you get a messed up screen scroll down for the hotfix info.

 

Not fun at all! This was supposed to be a 'feelgood' impulse purchase. At least I've got a bunch of cables to try if I feel like getting something else.

I tried all combo's of 3d/ulmb/g-sync/v-sync even disabled 3D altogether but whenever it was working at 120hz the screen flashes happened. That was the final straw, a max of 120hz would have been acceptable, even the refresh rate hotkey being finicky was kinda OK. It did look great though.

Glad to hear the machine made the trip OK. On the plane? That's just posing . I did that on a flight to the US with my AW. 3D glasses as well!

 

Ok thanks man, stupid question.. Can I just download the 277 meg hot fix or do I have to download the 292 meg original first?

EDIT: Also the main issue Ive had with any driver other then 344.60 is the HDMI connection to a TV, as it will cause a stutter on the TV, do you know if this is an issue with this driver?

 

Np. The hotfix is the full package , just not WHQL (official) release, kinda like a beta. All the last 3 or four releases have been disastrous for crashing machines!

I do keep a close watch on the driver forums and have not seen any HDMI issues reported so worth a try.

 

Hi Guys, Yesterday I got an email from Eurocom asking if I wanted to try out a new X8 BIOS, of course I went for it. A wise move considering my luck lately? Probably not but I'm game.

I just responded to them:
-----------------------------------
Woah! The most complex flash I have ever watched, and I've done a bunch over the years on desktop rigs! I already had a bootable USB so I just needed to confirm the sequence.
The time to boot is quite stressful, what with your logo popping up twice but just be patient and all was well.
Now for the new bios options - a true jaw dropping moment!! It went from basically being able to do nothing to a full blown enthusiast version!
Now, the big question is bios recovery. When I manage to make a selection out-of-range, how can I default it to get it to start? I don't see the cmos battery under the base cover.
--------------------------------------

First XTU run, just to make sure it's stable: http://hwbot.org/xtu/analyze/2913126?recalculate=true I don't know if this is a open link or you have to be logged in?

I don't know if this BIOS is public yet as I didn't check their site but I've asked them if it's OK to share if anyone wants it.

Edit: Got the OK so I'll post details if anyone wants it?

 

98C?!

Do you have pictures of the BIOS options?

 

Guess who makes their BIOS...

 

Great work man! That saves me a post as well as I was about to ask you if it was one of yours! From what I can tell the EC is also included in the package. It's just a shame that a reset requires the keyboard to be removed (to get at the cmos battery), I haven't seen that many options since my EVGA Classified MB!

I'll get some together later today.

Yeah the temp only peaked there for a short period but I won't be messing with it any more until I fix that. Looks like liquid metal time. I already repasted with Gelid Extreme and even did it twice just to see the spread patten. I also have it on a U3 Plus cooling pad, but it was a hot day (80c+).

 

Some of the new x8 bios options:

2015-07-05 19.06.25 by MickyD1234 posted Jul 5, 2015 at 6:41 PM

2015-07-05 19.10.44 by MickyD1234 posted Jul 5, 2015 at 6:41 PM

2015-07-05 19.09.23 by MickyD1234 posted Jul 5, 2015 at 6:41 PM

2015-07-05 19.08.49 by MickyD1234 posted Jul 5, 2015 at 6:41 PM

2015-07-05 19.08.06 by MickyD1234 posted Jul 5, 2015 at 6:41 PM

2015-07-05 19.07.55 by MickyD1234 posted Jul 5, 2015 at 6:41 PM

2015-07-05 19.07.04 by MickyD1234 posted Jul 5, 2015 at 6:41 PM

 

Freebie Alert!

Anyone want a code for AC: Unity? First quote of this message gets a link and code PM'd .

I got it with the Azus Swift monitor.

Gone

 

me pretty please

 

PM'd .

 

Just wanted to say thanks so much, sucks that its not working right now but I sent a message to them to get it worked out so, no worries I am sure they will fix it for me! So thank you so so much that was very nice of you to give it away to me for free! +2 ++++Karna!

 

@MickyD1234 do you know if this bios is for Sager np9377sm-a that is from XoticPC? or is this just for eurocom machines? Also what ram are you using I have Kingston Hyper X 16gb 1600 and was wondering if I could get 1866 out of them or not?

 

It is Eurocom branded so I wouldn't recommend trying it. The package also includes an EC flash and I'm fairly sure this is OEM specific. When I have seen people mis-match these, things like the hotkeys mess up or the keyboard colors don't work?

I have no idea what the memory is as it was a freebie upgrade when I purchased it. I did see that it had no XMP profiles so is probably not a big-name brand? Personally I would not touch memory speeds (except maybe selecting XMP profiles). On desktops I found memory overclocking was the easiest way to brick the BIOS. Easy to fix on enthusiast desktop boards, they always have an easy way to reset the bios. On these you have to remove the keyboard to remove the cmos battery. I haven't looked at how tricky that is but I would definitely want to check that out before 'playing' with this BIOS.

@Prema, as the author, would be able to answer these questions (if he has the time!) definitively but I suggest you take a look through his site: https://biosmods.wordpress.com/ to see what's on offer.

His MXM Vbios for the 980m might be an interesting experiment? But with the crappy NV drivers ATM I've held off from trying it. Until I can get a stable run across all my benchmarks at the factory max of +135, there's no point of unlocking it IMO.

 

The unlocking provides higher limits to prevent the throttle you are describing.

 

Throttling is not the problem ATM, it's TDR's and crashes back to desktop. Yes the boost clock is unstable in some games and I'm sure the vbios will fix that, and I can use an earlier driver, but then I have to mess around trying to get Sli on the latest titles. As long as I don't OC at all everything is good,so with all this win 10 code being tested out I'm holding off. Thanks.

 

I had a feeling... Which is why I asked for the screenshot lol. I suppose I could have just asked you.

 

Everyone, and Robbo99999,

I finally got around to modding my Zalman NC-2000. Is it overkill? Yes. Is it awesome? Yes. I used 4 120mm Dead Silence fans, and a 2.0 amp power supply (decided to not use usb to power for obvious reasons). Here are the pics....and from initial tests, looks like it drops idle temps by 5/10C and gaming temps by 10/15C. You can see I drilled more holes so that it gets more airflow (to CPU, GPU's, and the Sata SSD Drives).

 

It worked out....little rough looking, but laptop sits on top, so if I decide to make another one....I will probably use a template before just manually drilling the holes. The aluminum Zalman is great to work with though.

 

Good job, if you've seen a decrease in temps over the standard unit then I think you can call that a success!

I did notice that you've changed how the airflow is delivered, you've gone to the direct root of placing the fans directly underneath the holes rather than adding in an extra 2 fans into the '2 spare fan etched templates' (NC2000 users will know what I'm talking about here) next to the 2 existing fans. If you had done that then you would have preserved the original look and air flow characteristics of the cooler, which would have been a bit neater and maybe just as effective. I do realise why you drilled those extra holes at the top though, because on my laptop the rear vents sit over the solid unventilated part of the cooler - that's why I shift my laptop forward on my cooler so that the front lip of the laptop overhangs the front of the cooler by about 1.5 inches - that way the rear vents of the laptop line up with the holes in the cooler. Unfortunately by drilling in those extra holes you did at the top you had no choice but to put the fans directly under the vents, the lack of ventilation holes at the top of the NC 2000 is there to direct the air flow to the whole underside of the laptop and by drilling those holes would have wrecked the aerodynamics of the cooler. What made you decide to not just put an extra 2 fans right next to the existing 2 fans? If you mod another NC2000 I reckon you could get good results by adding 2 fans in those positions I just mentioned, and then just shift your laptop forward on the cooler so that the existing ventilation holes line up with you laptop vents - will look neater & may work just as effectively. The way you've modded it, it now works just like another cooler on the market - can't remember the name, but it's really popular & it has 2 or 4 movable fans you can place where you like - if you want to go that route then you may as well just buy that cooler.

 

Prema Mod for these models has been updated to v2:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/prema-bios-mod-review.667818/page-168#post-10041080

 

Let us know how you get on, it's an odd problem.

 

Everyone, and Robbo99999,

I am going to have to respectfully disagree with you on many points I am attaching some more pics as well.
1) In regards to placing the extra two fans in the two additional etched template area....that would be physically impossible. For whatever reason, the two fans with the housing they used effectively cover all four of the existing area (including the two spare etched areas). Assuming you could remove the housing, you would be left with tiny tiny fans....the fans the nc 2000 uses are easily 1/4 the size of a 120mm fan, which is why I am using larger fans to displace more air. Also, most of the coolers on the market use crappy fans, and anything that is powered by usb is limited to a total of 5V and 900ma (total! that sucks).
2) The piece which I removed from the Zalman, which is completely plastic and also what the Zalman fans were mounted to, in my opinion, has lousy aerodynamics. My reasoning is this: The way the nc 2000 is designed, their two fans are place under the aluminum plate (under the area which has no holes, so the air is forced first to travel up (with a loss of air out the sides, and then whatever pressure is left has to travel down to the holes in the bottom); and as you pointed out, the existing holes don't match up with the intakes for the sager.
3) Without getting into a physics discussion, plastic is a really bad material for heat dissipation, and transfer can only occur through conduction of diffusion, convection, or radiation. Since plastic is a bad choice for thermal transfer of heat (which is why heatsinks are copper), I would even argue that by placing the fans directly under the intake areas of the laptop, you reduce the loss of air in a semi-closed system (which is what the stock zalman does in a weird way by having the fans air blow against a closed metal plate versus blowing air direct into intake areas).
4) Regardless of all the preceding info, I believe the "proof is in the pudding". I will post numbers once I have spend hours of gaming with the modded cooler, but my temps have dropped significantly (literally 10-15C from what they were at before...and now I don't have to run internal fans at max) Part of the reason why I used the Dead Silence fans is because they are ridiculously quiet.

 

pics of the plastic part

 

what is new in the new prema mod v2?

 

Did you follow his link and look at his blog?

 

Thanks for those pics of the dissembled plastic base & fans, I hadn't realised the fans had a housing round them, I can see now that the fans operate and push air in the same way that laptop fans push air through a heatsink (laterally). Yes, I can also see now that there is hardly any space left for more fans due to those housings. In order to maintain the original aerodynamics of the cooler then you would have had to have added another fan with a housing that pushes the air in the same way (laterally, like a laptop fan style), but there is hardly any space there for it, and I don't know if it's even possible to buy such fans anyway (EDIT: well you could literally buy a laptop CPU fan but could you hook it up); there might be space for one such fan if you were to move the 2 existing fans to the left & right to create more space in the middle, but it's difficult & like I said I don't know if you can even source such fans.

(I don't think the plastic base of the NC 2000 has a negative impact on heat dissipation though, because it's not in contact with the notebook, the part that is in contact & in close proximity to the notebook is the thick aluminium upper of the cooler, so I don't think the product would be improved by having a metal base).

Yep, so in this case I can see why you modded it in the way you have. It is very much like the Cooler Master U3 product though - how you've modded it - so to some extent you may as well just buy this one right: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cooler-Master-R9-NBC-U3PK-GP-Aluminium-Adjustable/dp/B00ED3WMTC

If you really have seen a huge drop in temps with your mod, then that's a great outcome, that's what you're aiming for - so well done!

 

The airflow with the holes has always had a nice impact in temps if you don't mind the cosmetics Nicely done mod by the way.

 

Let me just say that I have been using this for a bit now... Unless Prema changed anything inbetween... And it has dramatically increased system stability. I haven't had a single issue with it.

BTW I haven't forgotten Prema, I had multiple unexpected expenses this month, might have to wait til next but I'm forever reminded and forever thankful when I turn my machine on. <3

 

yes I click the link and I go to his blog and I don't see anywhere, that it says whats new?

 

I believe the biggest change is the support for SPD writing to ram modules in the system with the lock bit being removed.

 

Thanks for the input Robbo99999 and Meaker! I have a feeling that if I was going to make a second one it would look way nicer the second time around lol. I ran the XTU stress test and the CPU temps averaged around 60C with a few spikes at about 80C....before XTU would spike at 93C.

I checked out the U3 CoolerMaster...looks cool...but the fans look tiny... are they little ones like the Zalman? I know that the NC2000 used two little ones...like 400 or 450ma a piece for a total of like 900ma...and the usb max output is like 1a.... I like that you can move them...but I'm assuming that the usb just cant power four regular or oversize fans......I was lucky to find a power supply with a 2.0A output and four fan connectors

some of those little high rpm fans are loud too....one thing I can say is that the fans I bought are ridiculously quiet. I'll probably buy the same brand when I get around to building a tower.

 

Hello All. I just pulled the trigger on a NP9377 but starting to wonder if I made a mistake? I had a few questions and hoped some of you guys that own one could fill me in.

This machine is intended to replace my dekstop (i7 4770, HD7990 GPU). I ordered it with only a single 980m, as I didn't see the need for more power @ 1080p, but I'm wondering if I should of went with either the 970m/980m sli setup instead? My reasoning was that, by the time the 980m starts to show it's age, the next generation of mobile GPUs will be in full swing and could upgrade at that time? I just don't want to be let down, especially when I decide to hook it up to my 120hz 1440p monitor.

I was also curious what the exact specs of the display were? (ordered from xoticPC) The description was a little vague. Do they overclock well/at all? IPS or TN? How are the viewing angles?

Also, as I don't know anyone that owns one of these machines, how is the general build quality and materials? It's hard to tell from the photos what it's made out of. I'd hope, at the price point, it'd be made out of some sort of metal, but I'm guessing it's probably plastic?

edit: And is there anything I should know about this machine (common knowledge/issues/perks/etc about the computer)? I see this thread is over 200 pages long so I've probably missed out on a lot lol

thanks in advance. Have a lot of reading to catch up on here

 

Hi there, welcome.

I went with Sli simply because at this price I want it to be the best today - and it is! Who knows where MMX GPU's are heading or how much of a premium we will have to pay for the privilege? It's a dice roll IMO and to be taken when funds are tight.

Don't confuse laptop upgrading with desktops - as I did back in the day. The components have the same names but often do not work well together and need special steps to be taken to get an upgrade to work. The big advantage of a forum like this is a lot of like minded people just wanting the best out of their investment.

I went with Eurocom because they were the only builder that offered 120hz display options - both matte and glossy. Once you've gamed on a 120hz panel it's hard to go back. It's not just a thing about FPS reaching those big numbers, even at lower FPS it just looks smoother and the contrast better - only any use if gaming is your thing, you wouldn't want a glossy panel for traveling or variable background lighting. Since you have the 120hz 1440p monitor you are all set.

I can't talk to the viewing angles or overclocking it, or even the technology, it just looks great.

Build quality (yes plastic case) is I would say a notch down from my AW R4. Things like panel flex when shutting it that I don't have on the other machine.

They are possibly the most tunable laptops around, I just updated my BIOS from Eurocom and before I had very little I could 'play' with, now it looks like an enthusiast desktop MB with a TON of options to fine tune it.

The price point is simply down to a small market and high specifications, when the 980m shows it's age that is when I install a modded vbios and overclock the heck out of it. Right now it eats up everything I throw at it (except Batman AK which has been pulled for being so badly optimized). Even BMAK is playable, while looking like a PS3 game.

I'm very pleased with my purchase, no gotchas I have experienced yet.

Good luck.

 

Thanks for the reply Micky. I considered your argument for getting an SLI setup upfront and it actually makes a lot of sense. You sold me... I just modified my order for two 980m's. You may be responsible for my untimely demise once my lady finds out though lol

Sadly XoticPC doesn't offer glossy as I'd much prefer it over the standard screen. Perhaps it's possible to upgrade it down the road.

How warm do those 980's tend to get?

 

Oops! Good call tho IMO, might be time for a 'sweetener' for the lady?

I don't see an issue with upgrading except finding the right part. A lot of AW owners have done this and the AW 17 forum has a sticky on what is needed, since with them it requires a special cable as well as the correct model panel. The 120hz panels are 'native' so the circuitry HAS to support 120hz at POST.

I'm surprised none of the builders I tried offered any panel options but it is catching on as a requirement of the discerning (gaming) buyer .

Mine seems fairly typical for temps. When hammered with a benchmark I would see it stabilize around 86c. A bit too hot for my liking but I was assured that this was within acceptable limits. Turns out this is easily fixable, mostly. The problem stems from the fan table. At around 87c the fan goes to high. At around 85c the boost clock starts dropping. Press the hot key to manually control the fans and bingo. Never goes over 76c.

This problem has been kinda fixed by Prema (premamod.com) with his modified vBIOS. The throttling temp has been raised to 92c so the fans can kick-in before throttling. He has also fixed the Sli voltages. For some reason one card always runs a few mv lower than the other. This will affect stability when pushed.

What's your wait time ?

 

Good information to know. Thanks.

Not too sure on wait time. They're sending me a bill for the price difference on the extra GPU so I'm hoping that happens asap. If I had to guess, they probably wont be shipping it out until the end of the week at the earliest. I'll be keeping my fingers crossed.

 

Yes the screens can be swapped at a later date, just check with xotic if your warranty is still active what their policy is.

 

Thanks for the information

One last quick question. I pretty much ordered the base model 9377 which only comes with a single 1TB HDD. I'd ideally like to upgrade to an mSATA SSD and a few larger 2.5" mechanical drives. Since tomorrow is prime day at Amazon, I'm hoping to catch some deals.

With that said, do I need to purchase anything extra (brackets?) to install a second 2.5" drive? I came across this video and the guy implies that you do, which seems a little odd to me. I would assume that the laptop comes with the required brackets to mount the drives.



Any ideas?

 

The brackets should be in the box.

 

Great. Thank you Meaker

 

Not a problem, enjoy your machine

 

I recently swapped back my SSD's and HD's from my 9377 into my P35X. I put my 128GB SSD and 1TB HD into the Sager and re-installed. For some reason the CPU was hitting 98 after just a couple mins in game. GPUs seemed fine, maybe a touch hot in the high 70s. Other than a slow boot speed I wasn't having any issues before the swap, GPU and CPU temps were good at stock settings and even had it overclocked for months now with no issues at all. I did a repaste back in December and its been good ever since. It's a fresh install, and I've even done the windows 8 clean wipe or whatever they call it and reinstalled the drivers a 2nd time.

I checked that the fans were all three working, and benchmarks show normal stock scores. I did have some issues the first install (XTU would not install, weird pausing mouse issue). Those have since went away and I set my CPU back to stock settings (for some reason it thought its defaults are higher than they should be so I always have to manually set the current, power and multipliers back to stock settings, I remember doing this before too, and have read about others with this same issue).

Any ideas what else I can check? I am going to check for a BIOS update but I think it's really odd it went from running good to doing this after only changing the drives. I didn't see anything out of order when I poppod the bottom off just now.

My single biggest complaint about both the Clevos I've had was that I always have to mess with it to get things working correct, even more than normal lol. This model has always booted slow with single and dual SSDs and I don't know why. My P35X will reboot in seconds, where it takes a min or more with the same SSD.

*I forgot sager doesn't appear to do any BIOS updates, or at least I could never find them.

 

Hey guys, a little late to the party, but I finally pulled the trigger on a 9377-s. I've known Hutsady personally for a long time (worked with him at Best Buy) and I purchased an ASUS ROG G73 from XoticPC back in 2010ish. Had a great experience back then, and this one is no different. Laptop will be coming on Wednesday, so I'm pretty stoked. Got the 4810HQ, 980m in SLI, 16gb Kingston, 2x 500gb Samsung EVO 850, 1TB 7200. Have been a mac guy for a while (while also keeping up on Windows) but they keep neutering their Macbook Pro line. After this last refresh, and the abysmal GPU they put in it, I knew it was time to move on, at least in the laptop department. Depending on how beastly this thing is for video and photo editing, I might even sell my Mac Pro (8 core, 32gb ram, 1TB, 2x D700). We'll see. Just excited to get this thing and go nuts on it! Only upgrade I'm thinking about doing soonish to it would be to swap out the panel for a 120hz panel. Amazon has the model that'll work for this pretty cheap, so I figured why not? Anything I should be aware of? Thanks in advance! You guys have been a ton of help as I've read a ton on these forums about this laptop.

 

Didn't know where to post but I flashed Prima v2 for this laptop. Now it won't boot at all. It just keeps shutting itself off. I cannot even keep it on long enough to flash back to v1

OMG! Any ideas?

 

DBL post sorry