*** Official Clevo W230SS/Sager NP7338 Owner's Lounge ***

Received my W230ss last weekend. Loving it so far.
Two issues though... I seem to be unable to save my settings in the Nvidia Control Panel. Tried different drivers but no luck.
Also, the Sound Blaster Cinema seem unable to recognize any speakers.

Anyone have similar issues or know how I should solve these?

Thanks in advance!

 

Sound Blaster Cinema isn't recognising my speakers either... silly program.

 

Wasn't on this model, but I had people report that using a different version of the software fixed the problem for them. Where are you two getting that from?

 

A nice set by Stanley can be had at walmart for around $6.00

Sent with love from my Galaxy S4

 

I got an email from Xotic PC asking if I can replace the fan myself. I haven't really tried anything like that ever.

 

I got the software from the Clevo site directly (both the Audio driver and the SBX software).

 

Try getting them from your reseller, they may have a version more suited for your particular model.

 

Pretty easy to do and the reason we ask is because it doesn't require you to be without the machine for a while. I believe they have a service manual they can send over to you via PDF as well so you can have a guide.

 

I am going to try to lift the aluminium thingy as suggested. If that doesn't work, I will go for the fan.

 

Got all my drivers from the Clevo website as well...
Does reflexnotebook even have drivers?

 

They probably refer you to the manufacturer's page

 

I opened up the back earlier tonight and noticed that the hard drive did not have two screws. I have attached two images so that you guys can take a look.

 

Even the two screws they used are obsolete. This system is just snap in and the screws are not used. All you got are two too many.

 

Then what do you think is making the noise? It is like a buzzer going behind your ear at a barber's shop. It's really annoying because the laptop is a beast.

 

As said before it's the fan blades touching the aluminum cover. You need to bend it slightly outwards, so that it can't touch it any longer when the system is at an angle.

 

Ok. I will reopen it in the morning. I must add that the hard drive was somewhat dangling when the bottom was open while the back of the laptop was parallel to the ground.

 

After all it's tightened by the bottom, so yeah when it's open...

 

My NP8278 has the same setup for hard drive retention. Do not be alarmed. The drive is snug as a bug in a rug when the bottom cover is installed.

Sent with love from my Galaxy S4

 

Also if I may point out, you should cover the serial number in your picture above....

 

Nope! It's on the internet now. The internet is forever.

Sent with love from my Galaxy S4

 

Indeed...just a note for FUTURE posts that others might do. This needs to be mentioned from time to time...

 

I have a quick question:

Are the display outputs connected to the Intel chip, or are the muxed to also connect to the nvidia card?

(If you disable intel graphics in device manager, can you still use external displays?)

I am asking because of a weird interaction between some cuda software and optimus which I've only managed to avoid on another laptop by killing intel graphics in device manager. Telling optimus to only use high performance gpu didn't work.

Thanks!

 

Only the Intel card is connected.

 

Duly noted.

 

Thanks! That's a little disappointing, but that's what optimus is all about so it makes sense.

 

Mine arrives on Monday. It's sitting in a warehouse only a couple miles from me right now, too bad UPS does not let you pick up early nor are open on Saturday.....


Thanks LPC-Digital and Larry for everything.


Very excited.

 

My battery icon doesn't have a timer, does anybody know how I can amend this?

 

Congrats. I know you've been waiting a while for this!

 

It's the hard drive. I showed it to my roommate and he confirmed it. It's making the weird buzzing noise when I lift or tilt it. Is it because it is a 7,200 RPM 1 TB hard drive? Dunno...any suggestions would be appreciated.

 

Windows does not have a timer, just a % remaining. If you want get batterycare or batterybar. They will give you an estimated time remaining. BatteryBar is worth the cost for the full version IMHO. It gives you configurable options like auto switching profiles while on battery or plugged in, plus I like the big battery on the taskbar showing % or time remaining.

 

I'd take out the drive and try it on your desktop (if you have one) just to confirm that is indeed that problem.. it's a standard SATA connection. Once confirmed, contact the retailer you got it from, hopefully they can replace the drive without you having to send the whole laptop back. Better yet, buy an SSD and toss the drive

 

Just got mine yesterday. Pretty much everything's perfect, aside from the headphone audio. For some reason, the audio's muffled/distorted/distant sounding when I plug my headphones directly into the audio port, but if I stick them into audio/mic splitters first, and then plug both parts into the audio and mic ports, they sound perfect, (even if the headphones don't have a mic).

Anyone know a fix for this? I've gotten the same results on 3 sets, 2 with mics and 1 without, all of which work perfectly on other devices.

Edit: it seems to come and go. Seems fine now.

 

I just wanted to share my BF4 temps before I repaste with MX4 tomorrow. Does anyone have any performance advice for BF4? I get a solid 60fps when underclocked to 2.4ghz, and settings set to a mix of medium and high. Temps are great, so I wonder if I can overclock the 860m to increase FPS a bit. What program would be able to do that with an 860m??


BF4, team deatmatch 40 person server, mix of medium/high display settings @ 1080p. Undervolted by -30mw:

NO XTU
CPU CORE: 84-81-80-80
Package: 85
GPU 72
SSD 58

XTU UV + UC 2.8ghz
CPU CORE: 71-68-69-70
Package 71
GPU 65
SSD 56

XTU UV + UC 2.4GHZ
CPU CORE 67-64-65-65
Package: 67
GPU 63
SSD 54

Below 2.4ghz and I start to see lower FPS and some choppiness, but my average CPU utilization never rises or falls regardless of cpu frequency. Any ideas why?

 

Install the BIOS Mod and then use NVIDIA Inspector to overclock the GTX860M:

View attachment 111885

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 860M video card benchmark result

 

I've been coding on this laptop for a while and I absolutely love the keyboard feedback. It is pretty tight. I can't wait to play games after the final examinations.

 

Hello everyone

So i have had my w230ss for a week and thought i would do a brief review

I decided to go with Eurocom because they offer a student discount and i'm canadian. Overall they offered above average service. My only complaint was that they didnt have the 1800p screen in stock and it had delayed my order. I had to inquire about it, they didnt let me know. Anywho i decided to go with the 1080p panel because it has better color reproduction and a much lower black level.

Configuration
I paid 1000 CAD with taxes and delivery

I went with the i5 because less heat and i assumed it would have longer battery
8gb ram(upgraded to 16gb with some old dimms i had leftover)
120gb ssd
everything is the same as standard

Battery
The screen is very bright along with the matte finish i usually use it at min brightness/20 percent. When in school i use word + statistics software + chrome. I get around 7 hours of battery, which is extremely impressive for a machine with this much power.
Here's a screenshot after 10 minutes of web browsing
http://i.imgur.com/e9UoVxV.png

Screen
Coming from a retina macbook pro, the colors are comparable. The black level is probably a little bit better and a prefer the matte display. Obviously pixel density is lower and it took me about a week to get used to it.

Fan
I was concerned about this before purchasing the laptop as users had claimed of bursting fans. Fortunately the only time the fan has come on is when gaming. Even when i have youtube open or am streaming netflix the fan cannot be heard.

Overall for 1000 i'm thoroughly impressed, love the computer and power.

 

The screen is definitely comparable to the Retina Macbook Pro. But the colors are highly saturated at times and don't seem natural.

Windows 8.1 has been an absolute delight for me. Things are looking good.

 

Hey Prema how did you manage to oc the memory like that? I can barely add 150mhz to memory QQ.

 

Oh that's a snapshot from the next version of the Mod...

 

^^

 

Your not supposed to tilt a spinning hard drive, especially a high density 2.5". The heads do not have much room and float between the platters. Tilting causes the heads to hit causing data loss and dmg to the drive. I'd expect it to sound like a high pitched screeing sound if it hits. Like a capacitor charging. If it sounds like a vibration then you might need a peice of foam to dampen the drive vibration against the bottom plastic.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk

 

I thought tilting the HDD only causes the motor to wear out faster rather than damaging the platter.

 

The platters are not 100% stiff (nothing can be) so the normal rules of momentum on a spinning object apply.

 

All those days I've carried a laptop while it was on....

Sent from my HTC6500LVW using Tapatalk

 

Carrying it isn't too bad. Tilting it is the problem while running. The faster the platters spin the easier it'll be to damage. 5400rpm drives are a bit more forgiving compared to 7200,10k, or 15krpm drives. I learned this all the hard way when i stupidly turned my laptop on the side to read the serial number while it was on. It took 10 hours to rebuild my raid 5 array . Thankfully, i had a raid 5 array

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk

 

Heh. Anyway I can't wait for mine to come in. I've ordered mine from cyberpower on 22nd and some delays it finally shipped yesterday. It's scheduled to arrive Friday so I am super excited. My configuration is 1080 screen with I7 4810. Adata SP600 256gb and popping in my Plextor 128gb from my g46vw

Sent from my HTC6500LVW using Tapatalk

 

Prema, I have a question for you.
Is there any way to control the fan speed on the 230SS? I would love to have the fan on at all times, or even control my own target levels. Any way to do this (I could try to write the application if I can somehow pass those through to the BIOS or whatever controls fan speed/levels).

And +300 on the core?? I may need to push the CPU frequency back up I start to bottleneck it

 

So I have to keep the laptop parallel to the floor / ground every time I lift it while it is on? My roommate's Vaio has a thin profile has a similar capacity hard drive. He doesn't have a similar issue. It's not a 5,400 RPM HDD.

 

I have shut the lid on my laptop to walk to a meeting to meet others that have done the same many times over the years. Never heard of a disk drive being adversely affected by this.

Sent with love from my Galaxy S4

 

When you shut the lid the machine should be asleep along with the hard drive. If you keep the lid open and move the machine it will obviously keep spinning along as it would if it were flat on a table.

Some computers have software/hardware that will park a spinning drive the moment it detects movement of the computer to save it from damaging the drive but I'm not sure the Clevo has this and probably not based on what people are saying.

So close the lid if you are going to move the machine is the right thing to do on this rig and something i have always done over the years just out of habit anyhow.