*** Official Clevo P75xDM and P77xDM/Sager NP9758-G and NP9778-G "Batman 2.0" Owner's Lounge ***

@Meaker I ordered from AVADirect, they won't be available until Monday. I'll just see which version I have. There seems to be different SKUs as some users have them there already and some do not. I was talking to another gentleman (besides @myx )who had them, as well as a few that did not (including the aforementioned review unit).

I'll verify my setup soon, hopefully we can give some clarification to new/prospective users to base there purchase on. With any luck we can Identify a method to verify if someone can expect there purchase to have the cables already. Initial guess is that the difference between P750DM-G and P751DM-G may be more than exhaust finishes this generation.

 

Or you can just take out the keyboard, it's like taking candy from a baby. ) Just not as cruel....

 

@myx, yeah I will see what's what, as soon as time permits. I'm only able to chat with you fine gentlemen in between compile times. Also, my intent is to give some insight to people who have not purchased the workstation yet and are incapable of checking for themselves. It was certainly something I was hunting for before purchase.

I see what you did there.

 

Please let us know if you get the wireless sorted out.. Thks

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk

 

I'm working with intel on it. They say it's a bug that has a work around fix added in the release for kernel 4.4+ so I'm trying the backport drivers now. I'll update when I get it working.

 

Ok, after watching a video teardown, I can confirm that the P750DM-G does NOT have the WWAN antenna leads in place.

Further, the WWAN uses the M.2 NGFF (I believe 2230?) PCIe slot. So any WWAN modules you have laying around, or were planning on ripping out of another machine, will most likely be too large and incompatible. What's more, the module being so small (honestly tiny) the leads are going to be a higher gauge wire (using the American standard) so any antennas you may have planned on ripping out of another machine (or grabbing on eBay) will be too chunky, AND the contacts too large.

I guess my next step is to contact Clevo, or a distributor and see about getting the WWAN leads from the P751DM-g on special order.

Edit: After a bit of research, Fortune Technology appears to have the part numbers and compatible parts for all current Clevo models. If it can be verified, it would be a good place to go for parts/part numbers. They appear to do only trade sales: only resellers, computer stores or online e-tailers.

 

Ok thanks to about a day of troubleshooting and a lot of help from an intel linux wireless engineer I have the 8260 working properly in AC mode. I'm using Fedora 22 XFCE with kernel 4.2.6-200. There is a bug with the AP where it has an invalid WMM parameter. AP has invalid WMM params (AIFSN=1 for ACI 2), disabling WMM, and the drivers for kernels 4.3 and older allow it to fail and disable WMM, which stops HT and VHT (802.11n and 802.11ac). They fixed it for the drivers for kernel 4.4+ so to get it working you need to backport the driver (and you'll need an older firmware). You're going to have to build and install a kernel module so you'll need developer tools installed. I have practically all of them already installed so I'm not sure exactly which ones you'll need for this, but I'm assuming you'll need kernel-headers, kernel-devel, make, gcc, gcc-c++, maybe more. If you run the commands you can read the error messages to figure out which tools you're missing. To build and install the module, see: https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/users/drivers/iwlwifi/core_release


clone the repository

git clone https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/iwlwifi/backport-iwlwifi.git -b release/LinuxCore15

then you need to compile and build the kernel module

$ make defconfig-iwlwifi-public
$ sed -i 's/CPTCFG_IWLMVM_VENDOR_CMDS=y/# CPTCFG_IWLMVM_VENDOR_CMDS is not set/' .config
$ make -j4


then install the module with

$ sudo make install

then you will need this firmware so download this file:

https://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/iwlwifi/linux-firmware.git/plain/iwlwifi-8000C-13.ucode

and place it in

/lib/firmware/

make sure you rename or remove any iwlwifi-8000C-X.ucode there where X is 13 or greater so that this firmware file will be the one to load. This is not the most recent firmware available but it's the most recent one that will work.

If you update your kernel you'll need to repeat compiling and installing the kernel module until you reach kernel 4.4+ when you'll have the driver with the fixes already, but stick with the 13 firmware for now.

Then reboot and you should have the 8260 working in 802.11ac. I tested it and the throughput is still nowhere near the theoretical limit but it performs much better and more like you would expect a wireless ac card to perform. The intel engineer who helped me with this was amazing, and definitely reaffirmed my faith in intel. They apparently are having issues with the newest firmwares and are working full tilt on fixing it, so to get the quick responses and help that I got was amazing.

I think this solution will work for any linux distribution with a kernel version of at least 4.1 though check to make sure that the firmware location is the same and I only tested it with Fedora 22.

With this I now have everything I care about working correctly under linux. NVIDIA (with proprietary drivers but it works) , the keyboard backlights, the wifi, almost all of the hotkeys (the only one that doesn't work is the one that disables the touchpad but I found another workaround for that). This is a great laptop for linux. I just wish the batter would last a little longer, but hey it's always a trade off between power and performance.

 

Did you figure.out how to control the backlight of keyboard with commandline or something?

 

Check out https://bitbucket.org/lynthium/clevo-xsm-wmi/overview

his module is based on the tuxedo-wmi module. He did everything in Arch, I did the same thing with small modifications for Fedora. He updated his project to add the way I did it. You get a kernel module (which a few different people have to varying degrees of success) and a utility program, so in addition to the hotkeys working you can also set the keyboard backlight with software.

 

Well maybe I just might wait a few more months.

Big Display News!! This could mean 17" 4K is right around the corner, and these are touch screen! Hopefully they get G-Sync.

The new N series laptops come in two different sizes. The first, the N552, has a 15.6 inch display, while the larger N752 has a 17.3 inch screen. Both however come with the same 4k (3,840 x 2,160) IPS panel, with a 100-percent sRGB color palette.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/asus-n-series-laptops-get-skylake-cpus-4k-displays/

 

If someone still has a ZM model, it would be HDMI 1.4. But the newer DM versions have 2.0. Specs might have been copied from the older models to the newer models possibly.

 

Hello good notebook review folks, awhile ago I had purchased my barebones P750DM-G barebones from R&J Tech, and now I am starting to plan my budget for upgrading it.
I had tried to read through all 200 pages of discussion here to find out any news on installing the desktop 980 GPU in this laptop. I did buy the 330 watt psu to go with my laptop, but after reading a page on the special power port for the desktop gpu, I'm not sure how much the larger psu will mean if the gpu won't fit or if the power port is not active.
Does anyone have a picture of the desktop 980 GPU from Clevo themselves? I have seen some pictures of the desktop gpu, and considering how much wider it looks, I am not sure if it will work or not. I do know that clevo has the P870DM which supports the desktop gpu, but it is more expensive than the P750DM-G, and considering that it took me two months of saving up money on my credit card... I don't think I could have pulled off saving up just $2,000 or so for the barebones with the desktop gpu included, that is of course without the cpu and memory and ssds and such...
So if anyone can provide any insight if the desktop gpu in the P750DM-G is possible or not, I'd appreciate it.
Thanks.

 

Pat what are you referencing? HDCP 2.2? If so even though the new laptops have HDMI 2.0 doesn't mean they'll have HDCP 2.2

 

The desktop 980 won't work in the P750DM Model. Neither the 200W nor the 180W version.

Maybe with major modding for the 180W version, but surely not out of the box!

 

I guess I will have to make due with the GTX 980M then.

 

Slap a few millivolts on there and a bit of tweaking and you have yourself a fair amount of the way there anyway

 

Yup, I was looking at the wiki page for the nvidia specs and there does not seem to be very large jumps, at least not with the published specs. But I'd really like to see some data on the difference in power draw and heat between the 980M and the desktop 980.

 

The heat is the TDP (all significant levels of power becomes heat in electronics).

The core is most efficient around the 980M stock levels (that is the reason why the clocks are set at that point), beyond that you double the power to get about 30% more performance.

 

Does anyone know if the Creative X-Fi software works when I'm using an USB DAC?

 

@ JADabandon http://forum.techinferno.com/clevo/11083-gtx-980-n16e-gxx-all-variants.html
skim through this thread, it is about 6 pages. All the info you need. It appears some very capable minds are interested in the same outcome as you. This may also slightly interest you: http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...g-4th-quarter-2015-mainstream-in-2016.777013/


Also to anyone inquiring about the WWAN support for the P750DM-G. I've reached out to my reseller, they in turn reached out to the manufacturer for me. Here is the response I received:

Hello Xavier,

The notebook manufacturer has reached out to their engineering team, but the initial response suggests this notebook will not work with the WWAN module in any official capacity. I will let you know if they update us with any more information.

Best regards,

 

yeah, I haven't needed to overclock the cpu yet, I'd like to overclock the system ram, and I would definitely like to overclock the GPU.
But I haven't taken the time to mess with the Nvidia drivers to let me overclock yet, and I have yet to find any bios updates for the laptop and exactly how overclocking would work with this thing.
Heh, maybe over the holidays I'll learn more about this laptop.

 

Thanks for the link, I'll read over it on my lunch break!

 

@JADabandon just showing a little link love. That second one is far more appealing in my eyes. I'm certainly tracking that development.

 

The ZM supports HDMI 2.0... Whether it supports HDCP 2.2 is debatable, however a software update should rectify this... If this can be done for TVs, should be done by NVIDIA for laptops..

 

Okay guys so R&J Tech responded to me saying no go on the P750DM-G and the desktop GTX 980. I am sure that people will still work at making it work. But assuming that it becomes too difficult for most people to accomplish, how many people will wait for Clevo to make a Pascal mxm card for us?

 

I'd keep the 980m in there, and use an eGPU on that beautiful Thunderbolt port. I was following the development of shoehorning the 980 as well, but there is no telling whether nVidia will release a 1080(?) card as an upgrade for the few models that support the 980. I'm sticking with whatever dock shows up, hopefully that will last me through a few upgrade cycles.

 

hum yah, I guess I can try watching for a thunderbolt egpu box, hopefully they won't cost a lot, I'm still not exactly sure how the laptop will handle the internal and external graphics cards, will it still use the internal screen? Or will you have two gpus and two screens? I remember some talking about hoping to use them together as a SLI setup.

 

It requires Optimus ATM. A side effect of Optimus tech is that video can be sent back through to the laptops screen. With Intel finally on board with eGPU setups, I can't imagine much preventing nVidia from giving us a solution to that, that doesn't require Optimus (for setups like ours). Nothing official there yet though as far as nVidia support..

As far as the 2 GPUs, DirectX 12 is allowing some interesting things there. I've read up that DirectX 12 can get the 2 GPUs to play nice, as in work together. Even if they are not identical archetectures or even if they are not from the same vendor. In fact, some evidence has been shown that an AMD and an nVidia GPU working together is better than an AMD crossfire, or nVidia SLI setup.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/comput...d-testing-finds-amd-and-nvidia-can-play-nice/

 

Sounds interesting, maybe I won't have to worry about getting a Clevo Pascal card for my laptop then, just get a desktop one in a external box.

 

FYI, it's not really Optimus that is required. It's that the Intel IGP is connected to the display. Then connecting an eGPU uses the PCIE bus exactly the same way as regular Optimus laptops do (they don't have any physical connection to the laptop screen).

In order for a full dGPU system like the P700 series to display back to the local display, you would need to instead find some way of allowing the eGPU to write to the internal dGPU framebuffer (970M/980M) instead.

From what I've learnt with the Linux hybrid graphics driver systems, it may be possible to do this already (write other GPU data into the dGPU buffer, basically Optimus in reverse). The Windows driver already does this (albeit it doesn't actually tell you this as a feature). This happens when Optimus laptops have the external display outputs are wired directly to the GPU. When you setup in multi-monitor mode, it's possible to run Intel GPU jobs over to the dGPU outputs.
ie: Reverse PRIME Linux module https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/PRIME#Reverse_PRIME

Theoretically, there's no reason why you couldn't retool this to go between 2 dGPUs rather than 1 + IGP.

 

I hadn't seen that before. That would be pretty nice to increase performance, and maybe get any benefits/optimization one company has over the other (witcher 3 hair comes to mind).

 

What you need to know about HDCP 2.2​

"HDCP stands for High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection, a copy prevention technology that’s been used on HDMI connections for over ten years. Version 2.2 is the latest, designed specifically to prevent illegal copying of 4K Ultra HD content. Like earlier versions, HDCP 2.2 creates a secure connection between a source and display via a “digital handshake.”

Lots of 4K TVs and 4K media players have been sold since the first models arrived in mid-2013, and many of those products – especially from 2013 – lack support for HDCP 2.2. Worse, these products cannot be upgraded because HDCP 2.2 requires a “hardware” update – it’s not something you can fix with a firmware update. "

http://www.crutchfield.com/S-wB8hmIu9h2n/learn/what-you-need-to-know-about-hdcp-2-2.html

 

Regarding the WWAN modules, my reseller clearly states, (and has sold such modules fully working in p751dm-g that they sell), that the following modules are working:

Huawei ME936 4G Module for Mobile Internet

Huawei MU736 3G Module for Mobile Internet

As previously mentioned, all the P751DM-G they sell are equipped with antennas leading to the 3g/lte slot and hardwired sim slot.

 

@Stooj I haven't seen the whitepapers myself, but someone in this thread mentioned the fact that in these desktop processor based notebooks, the path to the IGP is closed (thus the POST errors when trying to boot without the dGPU on board). As you stated, that is the route that Optimus takes. In this case the path through the dGPU is the only route. nVidia will come up with something, if demand gives them incentive.

@ pat@XOTICPC, you're exactly on to it. I can't find the exact link. But the prevailing wisdom is that in those Frankenstein configurations. The 2 cards bolster each other short comings, such that a mixed config gives the greatest returns. Some blog news site posted a combined crossfire/SLI test rig, I think it was LinusTechTips but don't quote me.

@myx yeah I got the same word from my guys. 751 has 'em, 750 doesn't. Worst still, the hardware connections for the SIM card and/or LTE/4G M.2 port may be closed on the 750. You called it earlier.

 

Well, turns out my audio issues weren't unfounded. I need new speakers and subwoofer installed.
Went to my dealer (Assismatica, in Portugal) and they were very nice in checking the issue and ordering the parts without me having to leave the notebook with them.
When the new speakers arrive I'll just leave the laptop with them for a day so they replace them and I'll be a happy camper

 

From looking at Reverse Prime, you should be able to go anywhere the PCIE bus goes even with existing hardware. Some have theorised you can use the PRIME module/driver on a desktop to write between 2 different PCIE GPUs. Even so far as between different brands (ie 1 AMD GPU and 1 Nvidia GPU). Given that the PRIME module is a pure reverse-engineer of the Optimus functionality it also lacks some of the built-in restriction (ie targetting an Intel IGP for output).

A similar case to this is some old AMD laptops came with 2 AMD dGPUs (prior to APUs coming out). So hardware was CPU + discrete low power GPU + discrete high power GPU and you could successfully render between the 2 GPUs without mux.

EDIT: Either way, I remain hopeful for TB3 eGPU back to the laptop panel. It's technically possible to do entirely within software from what I've seen, so it's just a function of whether Nvidia will build it into their Windows driver to take that kind of situation into account.

 

If that is the case I may never have to worry about replacing the video card that I have now! Although I may still do it if a compatible Pascal mxm card comes out from Clevo.

 

Question 1: Does anyone know what brand the 15.4" 4K G-Sync panels are? I went into Bestbuy today and took at look at a samsung 4K 15.4 panel on one of their laptops and I was not impressed, compared to the 17" 4k IGZO display that the alienware had. Alienware's 17" 4k IPS IGZO looked AMAZING! I don't know why it doesn't show up on panelook.com. It's like the pixel density was less on the Samsung, where the Alienware looked much better.

Question 2: XoticPC has an option for COPPER COOLING UPGRADE - Extra Cooling Copper Heatsinks Applied to the Heatsink/Heatpipes. Does Mythlogic have a similar option? and does it help much?

Question 3: It appears that the Sharp display is the best looking display so I'm going to go with that display I think even though it doesn't have G-Sync does Mythlogic or XoticPC have options for the Sharp 4k display? Because it's not listed.. Why is Eurocomm the only one that offers it? Can other retailers offer it upon special request?

 

Yeah i'm particularlg interested in a Sharp 4k display. judging by Eurocom the g-sync 4k is samsung..

 

(double post)

 

Hi guys, I am a very happy new owner of a p750dm-g with a 4K Samsung Display, however a couple of weeks ago I woke up to a screen with vertical marks like this (it is supposed to be a black screen booting windows):



They seem to go away the following day. These vertical marks were present in the Bios so could be a display issue. This Sunday I woke up with horizontal marks on the top 1/3 the screen, but they went away in 30 seconds and I couldn't register with the camera.

Have you guys seen the happening? I guess it could be a display problem, would you send it back for replacement? I am considering mailing the laptop back to the retailer, because I am afraid that the display will fail me when it runs out of warranty, but let me know your opinion.

Thanks

 

Did it happen prior to or after trying out osx?

 

prior I think. In linux waking from sleep the first time. Then installed osx, and then in windows waking from sleep at the second time. But I have been doing mostly Windows because I am stuck with M$'s Kinect SDK.

 

Did anybody notice mysn/xmg has a new bios for P751DM-G? Has anybody flashed it yet?
http://www.mysn.de/driver/XMG/XMG_U506_und_U706/Bios/XMG_U506/

@XMG any info/fedback regarding this bios version?

 

just flash it and find out urself

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Please, I already pmed Prema couse I kinda ****ed up.

It's not the first time I do this, but this time things didn't go as planned.

So I downloaded the bios files, made my msdos boot disk ..
1. disable uefi
2. boot msdos
3. meset.exe -> auto reboot
4. flashme.bat -> a bunch of things going on screen, yellow lines with gbe/ptr region does not exist (or something similar). then a green line with FPT operation succesful.
And when I thought just a few more seconds to go, I get a an error 18 - Secure Rom Flash failed.

The laptop auto shutdown and theeeeen I get these weird symptoms:
1. IF (big if) laptop boots, windows starts loading, I get a BSOD with error MEMORY MANAGEMENT
2. the laptop suddenly boots awfully slow, from the time I pres the power button until the XMG logo shows up
3. the new bios version is 1.05.05 but my bios still shows previous version (1.05.04 ).


So what I did was try to flash again the version that worked for sure aka 1.05.04. Same error 18 Secure Rom flash failed. That error popus just at the end after al the stuff shows flashing, checking, clearing etc.

So then, the laptop boots (slow as a s s), bios shows v 1.05.04 but I get a message on boot
Me FW Downgrade - Request MeSpiLock Failed, just before the XMG logo. Windows eventually booted, but some things were a bit off:
- pin login was suddenly disabled
-some wireless networks were some how forgotten.

And then, I did whaaaaat, tried to flash again 1.05.05, but this from windows, since there's a bat file for windows flash aswell.
flashmex64.bat and got an error message regarding ME something, don't remember exactly so I ran wmeset, which I figured it's the windows equivalent of meset.exe.

Did that, and apparently the flash went ok. I got the same yellow warning messages ptr region does not exist, gpe region does not exist (or something along those lines), FPT operation succesful, more lines with flashing,clearing, checking, etc etc, and no more Secure Rom error. The laptop shutdown by itself.

Took out the battery, ac plug, and let it sit for a minute or two and booted up. Now, the time between poweron and actuall UEFI logo showing up seems a bit longer than usuall but at least everything else looks like it's working in good order

I did PM Prema in hopes that he can help me clear things up, like at least tell me how I check if everything is ok or..don't know. I am a bit freaked out by this thing today.

It never happened to me before, ever since my first Clevo years ago. All flashes went ok, except today.

I hope whatever I did is not halfas bad as I think and most of all I hope that when Prema releases his bios version I can flash that and "restore full functionality" (even though I hope I didn't break anything now).

After all, I am writing this post from the laptop....

TL;DR: tried new bios and didn't go smoothly at all....

 

If it operates normally then it's fine.

I would avoid windows flashing in future if you can, it's the most risky form.

 

Maybe get a usb flasher as a back up plan ,for when and if things really do screw up in the future.

 

As @Meaker said, if it's running fine, it probably is. I am a tad concerned about the long time between pressing the power button and actually getting anything on the screen. It takes like 3-4 seconds (gonna have to time it to be more precise) but it seems longer than before...

Any tips?

 

that seems to be normal though. my machine takes about 6-7 seconds to show the boot logo, total boot time from pressing power button to logon screen is around 15 seconds.

so no worries

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk