The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Thermally the P960ED looks great. It has 3 fans and a good number of heat pipes. There may be way to unlock the power limited cpu but we don’t know at this point. What do know if you get a lighter laptop with a 63w battery while having the 2.5” bay available which you don’t get on the TongFang. Also the TongFang is limiting both m.2 drive options to be NVME. You can use one M.2 SATA at least on the clevo and NVME for 2 M.2 slots. You also have the option to use 3000Mhz ram with XMP set in bios. There are more options if you stick with the clevo at least with the rtx 2060. Once you go up to 2070 then only TongFang offers Max-P version as clevo goes max-q.
Just beware most resellers are giving single channel on 3000Mhz ram. If you upgrade it yourself I would get the g.skill ripjaw 16GB dual channel kit for about $155. Edit: prices cycles to $119! Recheck site.
GentechPC offers free thermal repaste on laptops and thermal pad upgrades with orders priced the same as without.
I am in europe! I will be ordering from laptoppartsforless.frl.
The owner Fritz has been great in communicating with me. He offers a thermal pads upgrade for 15 euros. The memory is all clocked at 2400mhz though. (except the 2x16gb kit, which is too expensive and unnecessary for me)
Sounds like a good deal. As long as the memory is dual channel. You can always upgrade memory later as prices continue to drop. Not hard to do in this chassis.
Jarrod said he had to rerun his test results because of an error he made. YouTube is taking a while to process his upload but it will be there soon. Just check back.
Jarrodtech:
This video has been reuploaded with some important fixes. I’ve redone the thermal testing, including temperatures and clock speeds, as well as some game benchmarks, along with the conclusion at the end as a result. In the original video, I noted a 26 watt CPU TDP limitation under combined CPU and GPU load, however after further testing this appears to be incorrect. After a reset of Windows (a fresh install), the limit instead appeared to be higher at 39 watts, invalidating some of my data, which is why I have taken an extra day to retest and change the video.
Most games actually saw the same performance, which was expected as they’re not all CPU heavy, so only results were updated were there were notable differences (eg Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and Shadow of the Tomb Raider). How did this happen? Why the difference in results? I believe this was because when I first got the laptop, I downloaded the control panel software for the Clevo P960ED from another source, and after receiving the correct software/driver packages to use, the original configuration must have remained in place which introduced these lower limits.
This explains why after a Windows reset the performance was better than what I reported in the original video. To summarise, the laptop performs better than I stated in the initial review, I have retested and fixed the video. Sorry for the confusion! This mistake will most likely mean the video will not perform as well due to the YouTube algorithm, however I feel it is more important that the information provided be as accurate as possible, the old video has been deleted which unfortunately also means all previous comments too.
Well I'm convinced to get the 2060 version. Compared to Jarrod's dual-channel benchmarks of the Gigabyte X9 with the 2070MQ, the gaming benchmarks are almost identical.
Was kind of wanting the 17.3" P970, but after cutting a cardboard mockup I decided it's just too tight of a fit for my laptop bag (a different bag is not an option).
Probably going with GenTech for the penny repaste. Any recommendations on which TIM to use?
Also does anyone have the make/model of the power brick? I'd like an extra one (one to stay home and one in the bag) and want to see if I can save a couple bucks getting it on my own. I imagine any 180W+ with the same size and polarity would work.
I got the Kryonaut + Fujipoly thermal pads from GenTech and it works pretty well, GPU ~61C \ CPU ~76C during benchmarks and games. I believe
@Specv89 got the Conductonaut option and does have better thermals, but the trade off here is that Kryonaut is non-conductive so if any bleeds out then it won't cause a short or damage components... Might not be a non issue if applied properly, but I like to be cautious...
Power brick supplied with the unit is a Chicony A17-180P4A w/ 5.5mm tip (no center conductor).
EDIT: I should note that my temps are from a 2080MQ variant (P960EN)...
Also I noticed the width of the P970 is listed as 15.96" on most sites but 15.69" on others, and also 398mm on some sites, which is 15.69."
I made my cardboard mockup based on 15.96" and it barely fit, just hitting the corners enough to make me nervous. That little 1/4" difference might fit now so now I'm back to indecision. I emailed GenTech and asked them to actually measure a P970 and get back to me.
It can’t hurt to ever wait although I don’t know when the free thermal upgrades will end for GenTechPC. Even if it does, it doesn’t look too difficult to reach the heat sinks. Non-conductive Kryonaut has the advantage of a 300’C+ max heat limit vs liquid metal that may require reapplication. Conductonaut has a 140’C Max temp if I remember correctly.
Looking at the specs the P970 has a better display over the P960 you may notice less ghosting at 3ms vs 7ms. This probably isn’t a big deal though. Given the chance I would like know the color accuracy differences. I think the P970 is a great competitor to the 17” GS75, the only downside it does weigh half a pound more, but seeing that the 16” P960 with ram / storage comes in at 4.85lbs, to me that is the hardest form factor to beat in the thin and light class.
One other side note. This keyboard looks so easy to replace. Or upgrade? I would love to know if the per key RGB version is plug and play. It’s hard to say as the ribbon cable may have more connections to hook up vs the zoned lighting.
Yes, 2060 version is the most optimal choice. You don't need more than 6GB of video memory for any games right now when playing at 1080p and performance is very close to 2070 max q. Especially considering power limitation.
That is true enough but I would aim for the 2070mq since many sellers showed a recent 3% price drop on the P960EF version ($1679). Some games need the extra push on very high and ultra settings for 1080p. For a $150 the extra vram cores / tensor cores / shaders will make a difference with RTX on and DLSS in future proofing. But I digress here. The 2080mq P960EN results shared from fellow members looked really good for this chassis (vs full GTX 1080). Since the 2060 looks good in it’s class I would wait to see the 2070mq numbers since they may fall well in line with the others outperforming the Aero 15. I want a 2080mq but the price is still a bit high. I could get a Oculus Rift for $350 and the P960EF above and still save $230. But who knows. You wait and something better comes.
Hey guys I watched Jarrod’s Tech updated video on the Metabox P960ED. The only slide he updated was 1st one for temps. I believe your results with the RTX 2060 will fair a little better than his posted scores on the other slides that were limited by the 26w TDP cap. Edit: after checking back with Jarrod he did update some of the game slides and felt the differences weren’t that substantial. The simulated benchmarks however were not updated e.g 3DMARK, so those results may improve/vary on your current power profile.
I think he said his gaming results did not change except in a couple of games which I'd not too surprising. The CPU is generally not that important in average FPS.
At 180W you shouldn’t be facing a large power restriction for a base mobile rtx card. It may server better for higher gpu tiers that can carry you over a cpu limited hurdle but as newer games become more cpu intensive, and they already are in some games this is something to be concerned about since you are investing in the future. And although this machine is thin and light it appears to be thermally competent to handle a 2060 with a i7-8750h at 180W. But yeah this isn’t going to be a big jump forward in performance results as they vary per game and per bench type.
Just picked up an Aftershock Slate 15 and my Nvidia and Synaptics control panels (palmcheck is on by default and it is driving me nuts!) are completely missing.
The Metabox P960 has the same lid design as the P970, without the stupid LED grills? I love the look of the P970 design. Something musclecary about them. If they came with a full 2070 I'd get one over the PB51.
Read earlier posts, 2 users posted numbers for 2080mq which overclocked rather well. I thought someone ordered a 2070mq but I haven’t seen numbers yet.
No benchmarks just gaming performance and temps at the highest screen settings( 1080p).
Benchmarks help gauge performance but never really tell the whole story.
I have a question for current owners. Do you get the bios / firmware updates from Sager or are they provided from your reseller?
The Clevo p960 or Sager named NP896 have a reseller versions: Aftershockpc Slate 15 or Xotic G67 Hawk or Metabox Prime-S 16.
Taking XOTIC for an example. They sell both the vanilla P960EF / NP8962 and the Xotic G67 Hawk however the G67 has the option for installing the Prema bios go figure ($50). This is an enhanced unlocked bios which is another topic all in it’s own.
So if you bought the vanilla version. I would assume they share the same software packages, power profiles and bios / firmware updates from say SagerNotebooks? Otherwise the reseller name brand has it’s own download sources for it right? If you bought you laptop from GenTechPC or ProStar you don’t necessarily download updates from them? Or could you buy a Prema bios later even on a vanilla build?
It makes you think about the software updates and if unlocking a custom power profile is feasible especially if you pick up a 230w power adapter down the road.
The vanilla Sager version you would just get the drivers / BIOS from Sager. Some of the resellers have them for download as well, but some, like Xotic, just redirect you to Sager. As for the rebranded versions that Xotic and other places have, they would have their own BIOS to flash, even if just for their own boot logo. I'm not sure if they're interchangeable though. Would be nice to flash the Obsidian or Xotic unlocked BIOS onto a vanilla Sager, but even if it would work, they usually flash it themselves remotely, specifically to prevent that sort of thing.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.
