*** Official Sager NP7851 / Clevo N850EP6 Owner's Lounge ***

Have not been able to find many reviews on this laptop, and since I just ordered one, I figured I would open the lounge to all visitors and see if there is anyone else out there with this model.
Bought mine from Xoticpc. Specs are below

Display: 15.6" Full HD 144Hz, Wide View Angle 72% NTSC Matte Display (1920x1080)

Processor: Chipset: 8th Generation Intel® Core™ i7-8750H Processor ( 2.2 GHz ), 9MB Smart Cache
Intel® HM370 Express Chipset

Hard Drive & Optical Drive
Standard Optical Drive:
1TB 7200RPM HDD(Upgradeable)

Graphics Controller: NVIDIA® GeForce™ GTX 1060 with 6GB GDDR5 Video RAM
Support PCIe x16
Microsoft® DirectX® 12 compatible
Battery Boost 2.0 Ready
NVIDIA® PhysX® Technology
NVIDIA® GeForce CUDA™ Technology
Support 4 active displays

Standard Memory:

Number of SODIMMS: 8GB DDR4 2666MHz Supports Dual Channel DDR4
Expandable up to 32GB, depends on 8GB/16GB SODIMM module
Two 260 pins SODIMM sockets, support for DDR4 2400MHz*
(Real operation frequency depends on processor)

Audio Features: High Definition audio interface
Built-in Array Microphone
Built-in two speakers
Sound Blaster™ Cinema 5

Network / Communication: Built-in Gigabit Ethernet LAN
Intel® Dual Band Wireless-AC + Bluetooth, M.2 interface

Slots:

Input / Output Ports: Two M.2 Card Slots,
- 1st for WLAN Combo M.2 2230 Card with PCIe and USB interface
- 2nd for SSD M.2 2280 Card with SATA / PCIe Gen3x4 interface

6-in-1 Card Reader
(MMC/RSMMC/SD/Mini-SD/SDHC/SDXC)

1 x HDMI™ output Port (with HDCP)
1 x Mini Display 1.3 Port
1 x Mini Display 1.2 Port
1 x USB 2.0 Port
1 x USB 3.0 Port
1 x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Port (Type A)
1 x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Port (Type C)
1 x Headphone Jack
1 x Microphone Jack
1 x RJ-45 LAN (10/100/1000Mbps)

Power System
Battery: Removable 6 cells smart Lithium-Ion battery pack 62Wh
Full Range 180W AC Adapter AC-in 100~240V, 50~60Hz, DC output 19.5V, 9.23A

Cooling
Standard Cooling:

Optional Cooling: Copper CPU Heatsink
IC Diamond Thermal Compound

Size & Weight
Size: 14.88” (w) x 10.51” (d) x 1.18” (h)
Weight: 5.51 lbs. including Battery Pack

Keyboard / Point Device
Keyboard: Multi languages full color illuminated full size keyboard with numeric pad
Point Device: Integrated touchpad with Microsoft PTP multi-gesture and scrolling function

Additional Features
Extra Features: Built-in 2.0M FHD Video Camera
FlexiCharger
Intel® Optane™ Technology
Virtual Reality ready via HDMI or miniDP from dGPU
Microsoft Cortana with Voice Technology
Windows Mixed Reality Compatible
Kensington® Lock
Intel® PTT (Platform Trust Technology)




http://www.xoticpc.com/sager-np7851-clevo-n857ep6.html

 

Has anyone tried Linux on this laptop?

 

How are you liking the model so far? Any pros or Cons?

 

I haven't had a ton of time to really dig into it and put it through some tests yet. I've basiclly been re-downloading programs and transfering stuff from my old laptop to this one. I can say, it downloads and transfers stuff well....

As for all the complaints i've read about heat on this model, I haven't noticed much yet. I did get the IC Diamond thermal compound, and i've undervolted the CPU using ThrottleStop, so that may have made a difference.

The only test i've run is the Far Cry 5 built in test, and I got around 70 FPS for high and around 60 FPS for ultra, with a min of 56 on high, and 48 on ultra. The fans did spin up during the test, but compared to my 5 year old Sager, they were not loud.

The screen is nice. Bright and crisp. Good colors
The build is good. Not much bend or flex for a plastic build. The cover opens one handed which is nice. My old laptop was a two hander.
Compared to my old Sager, 5.5 pounds is nice and light, so no complaints there.
The keyboard is just your normal laptop keyboard. i'm not too picky so i have no complaints.

I did open it up and installed a 2.5" drive for storage. Other than taking out 12 screws, very easy to open and swap out components. Will be upgrading the ram in the near future.

The only con i can think of right now is the placement of the GPU fan exit port. It's on the right side of the laptop, and for a right handed person using a mouse, that may present a cooked hand issue under extended load. I tend to keep my mouse towards the bottom of the laptop so it may not be a problem.

Like i said though, i've not had much time to put it through any paces. When i do, will be happy to update this post.

 

I much enjoy your cooked hand reference. Yeah, that would be a bit annoying if you play for extended periods of time

 

The ideal position for the laptop is with th back raised a few cm which will help with warm hands too.

 

So I played about a half an hour of Far Cry 5 last night on High. Again, i can only compare it to my old laptop, but the volume of the fans is not bad, even at full speed. I was always afraid my old laptop was going to lift off the fans were so loud....

As for heat, i checked right after finishing and the CPU maxed at 86C and the GPU maxed at 68C. The top left quadrant of the laptop, which is where the CPU is located, got warm/hot to the touch. The WSAD keys stayed comfortable though. The top right quadrant got warm at most.

As for gameplay, i had no problems. No stuttering, no tearing. Obviously needs more time, but so far i'm satisfied with it's performance.

My only concern so far is the heat. I'll have to play with the temps overlayed to see if that 86C max was consistant or if it was just right before the fans sped up.

I may play more with undervolting, see if i can find the point where it starts to become unstable and stay right above that.

 

That's pretty normal for the 8750H.

 

Do you think a future bios update will help? I'm thinking about getting a cooling pad as well.

 

Not really, the CPU gets as hot as it gets, reduced power would mean reduced performance.

 

So, as has been stated before, the speakers in this laptop are awful. I'm talking worse than normal. You have to be at Max volume to even hear it, and then it sounds like it's coming out of a tin can.
Last night, while watching a movie, I hooked up a little Bluetooth speaker I got and it worked great.
So my question is, does anyone have a favorite under $50? Right now I'm looking at the Oontz angle 3.

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk

 

What are you looking for? Something to stay at home most of the time or something to always go with you?

 

Little of both I guess. It will basically stay with the computer. Don't travel a ton so it will mostly be at home.

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk

 

That has not been my experience, the volume is fine and decently loud. But I'll grant that the low range (bass) is quite awful.

 

I just booted `Xbuntu 18.04.1` from a USB. My experience was really good, most stuff is working: WiFi, Keyboard special functions keys (volume, brightness, wifi on/off ).
NOT WORKING: keyboard back light color control.
UNTESTED: Sleeping laptop, opening/closing lid.
Also, I did get an error in `dmesg` (kernal log) from `nouveau` (open source NVIDIA drivers) that this driver did crash, but from my limited research that's very normal for 1060 GTX and I'm pretty sure that installing the closed source NVIDIA drivers would fix it little issue.

Note getting it to boot from USB was super easy: press F2 on boot to get into the BIOS, in the BIOS navigate to the rightmost tab select the `boot override` option for your UEFI USB boot disk.

Overall I would rate this laptop pretty high for Linux support (better than I was hoping for), even considering that it has a recent NVIDIA GPU (always gonna be a problem no matter the rest of the computer.)

 

I'm a proud owner of the Prostar N850EP6. Took a few hours to realize that the Clevo Control Center was causing some GPU throttling, which put my frames back by a lot. Killing it thru cmd helped a lot, though does anyone know if you can edit the fan curves within the BIOS?

The thermal issues worried me like others had stated here. I haven't played for long enough (because I'm saving it for college in less than a week) but after 30 min or so the keys seemed fine, my right hand a bit sweaty from the exhaust but that was fine. When paired with the Razer Atheris, this thing is a beast.

Regarding thermals it did seem to hit the 85-90C zone, even in a game I was testing like Minecraft (!!!!). Is that normal for the i7-8750H? Also the 8750H obviously seems to do worse in single core gaming (such as MC) than multicore / multithread gaming, and having plenty of cores, this is better than the past mobile CPUs and even my desktop CPU when it comes to multicore.

I don't think that the laptop is thermal throttling at all, because I haven't encountered any lag spikes, except for CS:GO, which gives me acceptable frames at 120-180 but there are momentary freezes and "hiccups" when playing the game. Other than that, all the other games ran akin to my desktop, which was why I bought this laptop, to nearly replicate its performance.

In terms of build, I do agree that it's pretty sturdy for a plastic build, and feels pretty satisfying opening and closing the laptop. The battery block is quite big, but that's to be expected. Screen is actually nice, and similar to my desktop's monitor (An Acer Predator). Even though the monitor is 144 hz, I wish they offered a gsync model.

Keys feel nice and sturdy, but not sure how they'll do in the long run. For someone who's going to college in just a few days, it may not be touched as much as I have done with other laptops and my desktop years ago. Keys are definitely better than I expected.

As with the speakers.... yeah... i'll stick with my Razer Kraken 7.1's (and with Synapse it syncs the headphone mixer / EQ so it should have the same sound quality). But in terms of speaker quality, too much high end, tinny, and nearly no bass at all.

So putting aside the stressful first two days of why the laptop wasn't running as fast as it was supposed to be, I fixed it, I think.


Though seriously, 85-90C, is that normal? I mean, keep in mind that it's @2.20 GHZ and has turbo clocking up into the 4's.

 

So I'm not the only one who held their mouse like that!

 

Keep an eye on the thread "Clevo drivers update utility". A guy from obsidian-pc is making a replacement for Clevo control center. Does fan control, including table creation, driver updater, and keyboard LED control. You can beta test it with us. You should check it out.

As for temps, that is what everyone is seeing with the 8750H. If you are worried, just hit fn+1 to go Max fans while you play. Otherwise, that utility I was talking about has/will have a gaming mode for the fans.

.

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk