*** Official Clevo P970Ex Owner's Lounge ***

I like the Clevo performance wise but because of the bend screen I will return it. The reseller says that almost all P970’s have this issue, so I don’t order a new one. Only other problem is the temperature of the keyboard, but that can be resolvee with an external keyboard (at home at least).
So looking for other options...

 

Bent screens common? Not that I'm aware of.

 

I couldn’t imagine that either, it is realy off 3-4mm in the center.
I’ve asked a repair/replacement of the screen because I don’t trust a bended screen in the long run and it is bad for viewing angles. But I was told that it was common, so I decided to return it for a refund.
The laptop workes great, so I would of kept it if I recieved a repair.

 

Received mine with 9750H/2060 (NP8976) yesterday. (BTW I guess now we should add P970Rx to the title of this thread?)

Did a quick comparison test with 8750H from one of my friends, at 45 W sustained CPU package power with AIDA64 FPU stress only, there is no difference in the voltage and frequency (the 8750H had even tiny bit higher frequency but that's within the range of individual difference). Although this is just an n = 1 experiment, it's very likely the power efficiency stayed the same, as expected.

CPU temperature with stock thermal paste is already decent, with sustained 45 W at 78-80 °C.

Unfortunately I guess I will have to send the unit back for a repair, due to a defect in the keyboard. The Y key will be triggered by adjacent keys like 6, 7, T, U as well...So while I was tyyping tyhe tyexty above I had to correctyyyy tyhe tyyypos all tyhe tyime, otherwise ity will look like tyhis.

 

That sounds like an issue with the matrix of the actual traces that route the signals, bummer.

 

So the technician from Sager agreed to send just a new keyboard to me with a deposit fee prepaid, so I can swap out the keyboard and send the bad keyboard back to them, instead of sending back the whole unit. Just swapped in the keyboard and now it seems working fine.

 

Great and quick fix.
Customer service like it should.

 

That sounds ideal

 

I havent done a thing but windows updated some stuff and nvidia drivers made this score go up.

this is just stock with underclock btw. the goal is the score is 17805 what 3d mark calls a 4k gaming machine because im going to put a uhd panel in it but will probably do a external screen

i would be interested in the 9750 scores

these are my real temperatures during 3dmark with fans on max and a mobile fan raising thing.
there is a power limit throttle never a temperature limit ever its ready for the 2080 gtx as far as temperature.





Iwanted to add this



this came up because there are laptops that compete with this one with a g synch in the internal display.

I think gsync is largely useless but it may actually be really important in 4k gaming. regardless if a laptop has the external display driven by the gpu ( and most do this is just verifying it) it runs the external display in gsync so this shows the ports that run on gpu and the one that runs on igpu

there is the triton which doesnt h9ave optimus and asus has a mux to switch( which is better i cant deny) but all laptops have gsync ( that i know of but most importantly this one does, just on external display.)

 

eluktroniks now sell their 2070 max q laptop with software that automatically changes it from max q to max p if you plug in a 230 watt power supply.

but its not just that you literally do not need to change the vbios at all the new max q drivers just go to max p clock settings I can show you you may not even need any clevo software unless thier bios defeats it.

with no change at all mind you stock vbios afterburner now does oc scan and shows the 2070 clock speed from 1500 to 2100. check whats happening to other peoples 2070 maxq.

this could be very old news to you all but i just learned about it today

this will show the vbios is stock but the oc of max q now goes to over 2000 although it stays at 1845 which is probably the max p level.

 

I changed my Clevo P970EF with bend screen in a Tongfang i7-9750H with RTX2070. Better results, I run it in balanced mode because than it is super quiet and has still good performance.
On performance, the CPU can consume up to 80W (with undervolt), it is insane .

 

you have a max p and a 230 watt power supply and its 21670 gpu score

I have a max q with a 180 watt power supply at 19600 and not even thinking about it it was a update.

because the hardware is exactly the same this isnt suprising, I guess the next thing is to plug in a 230 watt power supply and my score should be 21600 . it was already verified with the tong fang but whats different now is it just does it automatically no need to flash anything. but then overclock should go even higher, like mine is overclocking to 180 watts now automatically

now the cpu part of your score and the overall will always be ahead of mine its non overclocking cpu.

but what im looking for this isnt even the right test im looking for the uhd gaming which is way more gpu intensive thats all thats lacking. the max p level is all im shooting for

the gpu only score is all i need from this test

 

You could plug in wall adapter and see if your draw from the wall is around 200-210w a 180w brick will draw at max load.

 

Yeah, Cinebench R15 score is 1310 constant (multiple runs). But the Tongfang allows a power limit of 80W on the CPU standard and it keeps it all under control temp wise.

 

Hey, I'm relatively new to a lot of the higher-end laptop scene, trying to learn stuff. Just got a p970ef from AVADirect. Loving it. Runs 20c cooler than my previous MSI gs65, however, on WoW for some reason, it gets UpTo 20 fps less than the MSI. Could this be because I'm using single-chanel ram vs dual? I want to put another 16GB in but wanted to do it on my own as I'm also putting in a new SSD as well.
What do I need to know about the ram before adding a second sodimm?

 

Wow is a CPU benchmark at this point and yes running single channel will hurt performance.

 

A lot... .
Single channel is not done on a gaming rig

 

Awesome, thanks you guys.
So in theory, I could get any 16GB 2667mhz CL19 Ram to put in (that's the latency and speed of the current stick) to get that dual-chanel performance right? Or is there a specific way to find a match for the current stick?

 

Speed and CAS matching is fine though CPU-z will confirm your exact modules.

 

Isn’t that slow?
I have 2x8Gb 2666MHz CL15 (Kingston hyper x) modules.

 

Yes, well, it's not any worse than the timings that I had in my MSI GS65... I apologize if I interrupted another conversation that was going on about power supplies... but I did have a question about that. The power supply from the p970ef is the exact same as the one for my MSI except the MSI is 230W I believe, would it be beneficial to use the 230W power supply? Would that allow extra power to go to the CPU/GPU and allow for better overclocking or turbo?

 

It is limited by bios anyway

 

is there any evidence of this?

 

There will be a system power draw limit at some level.

 

the new nividia driver turned my laptop into a 180watt max p. faster than the razer 90watt max q not as fast as the tong fang 2070 max p

i have no way to figure out what happens but if the cpu is power throttled now the gpu goes higher. so lets give it the random number of a 100 watt 2070 max p.

what is funky about this project is, there is no way for the bios to limit the watts of the gpu, the reason being there is no readout coming from the gpu, no sort of way to detect what it uses. its literally in the software driver. a lot of what nvidia says about max q is obviously false its in the driver thats it.




razer 90watt maxq 2000 lower gpu score. the maxp score in approx 1k more than the 100w maxp

 

The ECU had readouts not exposed to the user.

 

You were about to give me a panic attack saying that the maxQ was boosting like a maxP, making me instantly regret buying my PB51 when I could have the 2080 maxQ xD

 

A chassis designed for a max-q is not going to appreciate such a thing anyway lol.

 

My tongfang has a GPU score of 2300 more... I ended on 21670 for GPU.
Power draw should be 115W if I’m not mistaken. I have a 230W power supply.

 

that is 1800 more

 

it does it has the speed of the maxp but still not the score i already showed a picture of it page 51

 

I'd be concerned at the vrm and cooling.

 

So this machine uses the same display as the Tongfang right? PWM under 100% brightness?

(Panel in question: BOE07AF)

 

I've got a question about what yall are using for your custom fan profiles? I have tried using the fan speed setting app that came stock with the laptop, though it seems to not work all the time. Often times it will just be stuck at 25% fan speed until I default the settings and put them back where I want them... I don't want to have to do that every time, is there a good software you guys would recommend that could handle this a bit better? I tried speedfan, though it doesn't detect the fans, at least not how it does on my desktop.
Thanks!

 

When I had the P970, the standaard program was very good. Besides the panel that was bent, the laptop was very good .
Other programs are often not good for laptops.

 

What is the thickness of the thermal pads for this laptop?

The heatsink is copper compatible with liquid metal?

What thermal paste to use if not? Currently I have Kryonaut with undervolt and still getting to 100C. Around 83 max on GPU.

 

All your posts are kind of related, try to keep it all to one thread/post.

 

I am trying to get as much feedback as possible from everyone possible, will keep it in mind for further posts.

I really want to solve my problems on Battlefield V as it is the one I most play.

 

I had issues with it too for quite some time. I can say I've confidently sorted those issues out 90%. BF5 is very playable on the 2070 max-q the 8GB vRAM is able to play pretty much all the triple A titles on on Ultra 1080p. Initially I had the issue with RTX features not listed in BF5 settings (Required an update to Windows 1903 or it may have been the previous big update 18**)). And most frustratingly it would work fine then start freezing then crashing with no error message. Their are tons of posts on this particular issue.After multiple hours of reinstalling these huge game install sizes, searching long threads on forums to no avail. I've gotten it working and boy is it beautiful, BF1 runs like sex on the P970RF 100+ FPS Ultra settings, I even frame scale 1.30x and still maintain 80+ FPS
Give me a quick explanation of the issues you are experiencing with BF5

 

The issue was overheating.

I think the CPU heatsink with only 3 screws is a very big ****.

My partial solution is:

Repasted, instead of Kryonaut I used Arctic MX4
Undervolt -100mV CPU and AC/DC set to 1 on unlocked BIOS.
CPU and GPU fan 100%

I still see package temperature of 100 degrees gaming but not on the cores.

I use throttlestop with -0.50mV undervolt in cache iGPU and system agent.

Temperatures are now on 80-90 but I see more than 10 degrees difference in the cores.

Max GPU temperature is 73 now.

My FPS have decreased but also the temperatures.

I’m playing 2k 144hz with all settings on low at around 100fps.

Without the undervolt I play at around 130fps.

Future frame rendering is on.

DX11, with DX12 I have microstutterings

Windows 1903 with all updates.

I have tweaked my RAM to CL15-16-16-32-420

How can I achieve decent consistency in temperatures in my cores with this **** design cooler ?

Thank you.

 

I had a PB51RF (RTX 2070 non max-q, i9-9980HK, 4k OLED) that died within a week after purchase. Maybe a bad VRM. Reseller could not get their hands on a replacement unit reasonably fast, so I got a P970RN (i7-9750H / RTX 2080 max-q) as a replacement unit as the price was identical. Ironically almost the same physical footprint as my older "15.6, just slightly wider.

After reading through this thread I was apprehensive, but my unit seems good in the fit and finish department. Cleaned off the stock gunk on the CPU/GPU really, really thoroughly (seemed to be some kind of dust or gunk left from the machining process as well, or maybe just oxidation) and applied thin layers of conductonaut. Still testing stability with undervolt, but at -100mv on core/cache and -50mv on igpu atm. Even with somewhat moderate fan profiles applied I can so far not force the CPU over 80c or the GPU over 70c. This in actual games such as FarCry 5 and Witcher 3, as well as synthetic stress tests. ~23c in the room back of the laptop slightly raised off of the table. Obviously, no sign of throttling.

It seems to run well so far. 3Dmark scores are slightly lower than with the PB51 whitch had a mild overclock. The PB51 ran a lot hotter though, even after repasting and undervolting. Will have to look more into tweaking and see if I can get some more out of it. If it continues to work as nicely as it has so far, this will be pleasant companion.

 

Can it be due to an uneven heatsink? When you say you applied thin layers you mean to cpu gpu and the heatsinks or only on the dies? Did you cover them with nail polish and super 33+ tape or just applied it risking spills?

if you can provide any more information it would be awesome as I have bought the Conductonaut but I have not risked my laptop repaste still as I only see 100 degrees on cores playing BFV

 

He doesn’t report uneven core temps, only CPU/GPU temps.

I had the Clevo P970EF (RTX2070mq with i7-8750H and while the machine performed good, The biggest drawback was the temp of the keyboard. It became to hot to touch.

I have a Tongfang now (i7-9750H with full RTX2070) and this keyboard stays cool. In general this is also a very decent laptop. The keyboard and trackpad of the Clevo where better for productivity stuff.

 

1. Manufactorer suggest conductonaut is applied to both surfaces. Generally, my personal experience with gooping for the past 20 years since I OC'd AMD Durons and Athlons with the original Arctic Silver, have been: go thin, thin, but you have to cover properly. I've never "painted an X" or something like that, I take time and smear it thinly and evenly out with an old credit card or even butter knife. Clearly that is not necessary with conductonaut.

2. I said nothing about heatsinks being warped, except being dirty. You can see this easily when you clean them off and they appear clean, but if you scrub with a solvent, the paper towel or piece of cloth or whatever you use, continue to get dirty for a long time and gradually the copper becomes more polished and oxidation is removed. In reality, proper lapping and polishing could perhaps even get slightly better results, but its a PITA to do on such a complicated piece of heatsink (little room to work).

3. On my motherboard, both the GPU and CPU have some kind of black protectors. The GPUs was (I think) glued onto the PCB, while the CPUs was glued onto the heatsink. I considered using something to cover up the PCB on the CPU just to be sure. But I didn't quite know what to use. I don't know about nail polish, it's a soft acrylic and I think it would degrade quickly from the heat. In the end, unlike a lot of other CPUs I've seen, there's not a lot of stuff on the surface of the CPU PCB.

4. An interesting detail with the cooling solution of these machines, is that the screws are not spring-loaded as they normally are. Instead parts of the heatsink itself flexes and acts as springs. I'm actually more confident in this approach to get even pressure, and it's easier to modify if one wants more more pressure, by adding a small spacer between the screws head and the heatsink. Just make sure to tighten things down slowly and evenly. I would start with the screws around the CPU/GPU and go crisscross back and forth, and then do the outer ones afterwards (the other ones mostly push the cooling pads down onto the vrms and etc).

This pre-cleaning. Excess amounts of clearly seen.

 

A little extra paste has virtually no impact on performance and ensures contact, hence why the factory application comes with a bit extra.

 

You are in all likelihood totally correct and its better to be safe than sorry.

I am just speaking from personal perspective/experience which is certainly not an universal truth However, when one does see the CPU spike rapidly and unevenly in temps after doing it like me, something is probably wrong, so one can always turn off the machine and disassemble to check. It's different for someone selling these things retail.

 

Yes given the risk vs reward you are going to see resellers go on the heavier side.

 

I know I'm pretty late but I thought since all the posts related to the topic I should post it.

In my experience, the CPU throttling issues that were occurring on our P970 laptops & probably other models as well are related to Intel's DPTF (Dynamic Platform Thermal Framework) drivers. (I believe there are three drivers installed with the Intel dptf software).
Windows (for sure has one of these drivers built in or downloaded through updates) & clevos control software may be installing it by default similar to how it has an Intel xtu driver built in.

The later versions of DPTF are even more aggressive in their CPU throttling. I removed the driver using the Autoruns software (what I used). I believe it may be found in the windows device manager also.
After removing the driver I know longer have any issues of the Intel DPTF dynamically changing the PL1 well under the 45 watt limit (I have the 9th gen i7). I've seen later versions downclock all the way down to 35W making benchmark scores look horrible.

Do your research on the software, as it does serve a purpose in keeping thermals down by regulating clocks, voltage, & the throttling boost to protect components. But the CPU natively has throttle regulation built in to prevent going higher then the max temp. Nevertheless, you don't want to cause long-term degradation by running high temps. I monitor my temps & clocks while gaming heavily anyway.
Sorry for the long post just wanted to contribute to the topic since ppl have litterly RMA'ed due to this throttling or contributing it to Clevo's software.

 

Where to get a keyboard for the P970EF? I have contacted PCSpecialist and they don’t want to give me the warranty of my laptop, I recommend everybody to stay away from PC Specialist laptops, warranty is the worse I have ever seen in my life. Any link to buy a new keyboard or compatible keyboard, thank you.

 

Why are they denying warranty? They should be able to service it regardless at a cost too.