Kurt's P-7801u FX upgrades

Hi everyone, this is my first post here.

I purchased my P-7801u FX brand new from NewEgg in 2009. I haven't modified it in anyway, but I am going to begin that process now.

Tonight I will be doing a memory upgrade install. I went with two sticks of 4 gig DDR3 1333 for 8 gigs total. Crucial 8GB (2 x 4GB) 204-Pin DDR3 SO-DIMM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10600) Laptop Memory Model CT2KIT51264BF1339

While at the office today I flashed to the most recent bios release 9C.23.00 from the gateway website. I will also flash to the newest NVIDIA drivers tonight and take a baseline 3DMark Vantage benchmark. Then another after the memory upgrade to see if that makes a difference.

Ultimately I am looking for a processor upgrade as well. Currently I am looking at a T9900 chip.

Thanks for looking, I'll post my results after my benchmarks tonight.

 

Just a heads up, the 1333 MHz memory will default to 1066 MHz................

 

I would recommend the 9c.17.00 bios because of the fan fluctuating to keep your gpu cool.

The 9c.20/9c.23 bioses disable fan fluctuating and don't kick the fan in until the gpu gets hot. (Unless you modded your bios to enable the fan fluctuating)

Personally I would like to keep my gpu cooler all the time.

Last Thought: The latest drivers don't necessarily give you the best performance personally I would Prefer DOX's Forceware 185.85 or 195.62 just a recommendation.

 

Can this be changed in the bios? Why would it default to 1066 if the motherboard can support 1333?

I will see if I can modify that GPU fan settings through bios. I don't understand why gateway would release a bios that would be detrimental to their systems.

 

Here is the vantage benchmark score from last night.

Stock CPU and memory, newest bios and GPU drivers.



Tonight I will do the memory upgrade and take another benchmark. I'm not expecting much of an increase as I don't believe memory has a huge impact on 3Dmark scores.

 

Sorry for the dumb question, can someone tell me how to enter the bios? I've tried both F2 and F10 on post and neither of those commands allow me to enter bios.

Thanks.

 

It seems that after my bios update, my stock P8400 is running faster than spec. According to CPU-Z it's running at 2394.xx MHz and according to Real Temp it's running at 2367 MHz under the XS Bench stress.

Would the updated bios have changed my frequencies or perhaps changed the multiplier? I've never attempted to OC this machine, so these setting had to have been changed somehow.

 

On singled thread apps the CPU will turbo one of the cores. Under dual thread heavy load you will see default clocks. This is a normal function of speed step.

The board may support and alow use of 1333 MHz memory but the chipset only supports 1066 MHz memory. Since the SPD in the faster memory will include timings for the 1066 memory speed it should run fine, with one exception.

Some memory does not like Command rate at 1T. Our bios has proven over and over again that it will force 1T rates. If the memory will not run at that rate you most likely will find either it will not boot or will only work with one stick at a time.

 

Can I force the frequency settings up to 1333 MHz through bios?

I'm frustrated that Crucial advertised this as appropriate memory for the P7801-u through their website, and now I find that they won't work as advertised.

 

It does work as advertised, unless they specify it runs at 1333 MHz on a PM45. It could be their 1066 MHz does not like command rate 1T and this is why they specify this as the memory that will work with the P7801. I have 1333 memory as well but this was to have the faster ram incase I upgraded and knowing it works in a P78 and P79 system.

The PM45 is limited to 1066 MHz on the memory so unless you are looking to do some serious hard modding of the main board this is all you will get..................

 

Hi guys, New poster here as well... just registered. But have been a visitor to this great group many, many times for answers. Best laptop help on the planet IMO.

So Kurt, did you have to change the ram timing in order to make the 8gb work? The reason why I'm asking is I just tried installing two 4gb sticks from Corsair, that are the correct spec, but it will not boot up. I can pull one of them out and run it just fine on the 4gb. I can even pop in one of my OEM 2gb along with one of the Corsair 4gb and it runs fine as well... but once I go to two of them, no workie. What other than timing could be causing this?

 

Our systems are known for this. Some ram again will not opperate on command rate 1T. Our bios will force this timing, despite the SPD, and if the two sticks will not support it you can not run it. This happens as the sticks are forced to do 1T in synchronous dual channel, apparently your sticks are ok with it as asyncronous dual channel.

Now I know this to be true of 9c.17.00 but a higher bios may have had that fixed. I think someone tried it to no avail but I could easily be wrong here. Also this MAY NOT be an issue with the P79 boards but I am not sure of this either.

 

I actually haven't gotten around to installing the RAM yet. I know it takes 5 minutes, but I just haven't had the time yet. I will let you know how it turns out.

 

Thanks for the reply guys. But when you say they're known for this, are you referring to the fact that I'm trying to go up to 8gb on the ram, or that they're known for not being able to change the timings? Actually, I would be surprised if it has anything to do with timings because it is at the recommended Corsair timings already... wouldn't think that anything different would solve the issue.

What I find the strangest is the fact that it seems to run fine on 2 completely different sticks of ram (one 4gb Corsair and one OEM 2gb Samsung)... But when I go to the matched set of 2 sticks of identical 4gb Corsair, doesn't boot up at all. This is very frustrating, and I'd love to have a solution.

Btw, the Corsair part number is CM3X4GSD1066 (DDR3 of course)... And the only other change from original p-7801u is I'm running Windows 7 64-bit on the system, rather than the original piece of garbage Vista.

 

Timings are way more comprehensive than the 7,7,7,20 you usually see advertised. Gateway P78xx versions are known to force ram to run at command rate 1T, if the ram does not like this it will not boot.................

 

Ok, so just installed the 8 gigs of Corsair DDR3 1333. Windows recognized the 8 gigs right away, however just like TANWare mentioned, I'm only getting a max frequency of 533 MHz witch is 1066 MHz in dual channel. Same as OEM standards that came with the P-7801u.




I'm going to enter bios and see if I can force the frequency up to 1333 MHz.

At this time, the only improvement so far over the stock RAM is that it's running the same frequency but at 1.28 V instead of the 1.5V that came stock. That's a significant improvement.

 

Tried to adjust the RAM frequency through the bios, however I can't figure out how to enter the bios. I've tried F1, F10 and holding Delete but all it does is give me boot options or a memory debug tool.

Decided to run another Vantage benchmark. My score actually went down 42 points which works out to be a .01% drop in score. This is statistically insignificant and most likely just an inconsistency in the Vantage benchmark.




It looks like the GPU maxed out at 96 C, so not a lot of room for an overclock there. I've been using the MSI Kombustor to stress the GPU, and it looks like it throttles down 20% when it hits 100 C. So, virtually no room for an OC there.

I'm going to load up Fallout New Vegas for about an hour and see how hot the GPU gets. That is about the most graphic intensive game I'm running right now. Maybe there is some overhead there.

 

Done tweaking for the day. I decided to go ahead and do a GPU OC. Using MSI afterburner utility and MSI Kombustor stress tests.

I went from a stable 5% OC on the GPU so I bumped it up to 10%. The GPU temps did top out at 99 C, but seemed to still pass the MSI Kombustor stress tests.



After determining the GPU was stable at a 10% OC, I ran yet another Vantage benchmark. The overall P score went from 3728 to 3809. This works out to be about a 3% increase in overall performance. Again, not very significant.

Important to note was the Vantage GPU score which went from 3660 to 3899. This works out to approximately a 7% increase in graphic performance.

Conclusions:
According to Vantage, the memory upgrade and 10% GPU overclock yielded a 3% overall performance gain and a 7% graphic performance gain. With max GPU temperatures hitting 99 C, I've determined that this very small gain in performance is not worth excess strain placed on the GPU. I don't believe these synthetic figures will amount to any real world gain in gaming performance.

If the numbers were a little different, perhaps I would continue to tweak my P-7801u, however I think I'll revert the GPU frequency back to stock. Now I need to determine if it's worth a $150-200 CPU upgrade, or should I just purchase a new laptop.

 

Essentially if your games are playable at stock there is no advantage to the OC. If however thet little bit extra makes a difference where a game is a bit jerky then it may be worth it. To OC just to say you have the numbers is not really worth it IMHO. This is why I only correct clock my 260m.

I used to overclock my 980m but in hind sigh it really netted me nothing substantial. I can say with RealFlight there were some airporst that were slightly better but nothing to write home about. The 260m though is a pretty big difference. Eventually a new system with say a 675m or so should be even nicer. That is for another day...............

 

Yes, I think that's where I am now. I'm looking at these two for the moment...

Newegg.com - SAMSUNG Athena NP700G7C-S01US Notebook Intel Core i7 3610QM(2.30GHz) 17.3" 16GB Memory DDR3 1600 1.5TB HDD 7200rpm Blu-ray Player NVIDIA GeForce GTX 675M

Newegg.com - MSI G Series GT780DX-406US Notebook Intel Core i7 2670QM(2.20GHz) 17.3" 12GB Memory DDR3 750GB HDD 7200rpm DVD Super Multi NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570M

^^^ That Samsung machine is pretty much what I was going to build in to a desktop. i7, GTX675, 16 gigs DDR3, blue ray...and for about a grand cheaper than what I have priced out for a desktop build on newegg.com.

 

The Samsung is out of stock at Newegg. But it sure looks nice.It has a backlit keyboard also.

 

Yes, it's been out of stock for almost 2 weeks. I got an auto notify yesterday that it was back in stock, but I guess it sold out quickly.

I'm not really in a rush for a new gaming laptop with summer around the corner. I'll be in to one this fall though.