Hands down the best 4th Gen laptop?

In terms of cooling and overclock potential, what is considered the king of cooling in the 4th generation with a socket?

After recent issues trying to sell in the marketplace, I have decided to look back into building a secondary laptop.

So with that in mind, what is the best 15.6 and potentially 17.3 inch laptop in terms of cooling and bios OCing. I have a 4930mx and also 4980hq that I can test with.

Pascal confirmation would be preferred, but this may just turn into a server of some kind, haven't hammered out the details yet.

@Mr. Fox @Papusan @Falkentyne @Ashtrix

 

I know you have had AW17 before. Maybe look after an Clevo P375SM with @Prema firmware. MSI Gt70 is an option for your 4th gen chips but I'm quite sure even with Svet mod bios I think this models will struggle with power cap you can't fix.
Not so known with smaller machines as 15 inch you also ask for (maybe this or this with Prema firmware).

 

Have you seen anything of the P157SM-A? I only plan to run a single GPU, if it did get Pascal confirmation then it would be a mobile machine for me while I am away from home, which would actually get used away from home more so than the 13 R3 I have.

A couple of chinese sites claim to have the 4980hq installed and working but no validation (cpu-z or otherwise)

My brother may have the p157sma that he stole from me, not sure how I would go about acquiring it to test though.

Does it use PEG mode or its brand equivalent?

I also assume I would have to have Prema BIOS for Pascal and proper overclocking...

Thanks guys.

 

Not so familar with smaller notebooks. As I said above... I don't trust MSI (17 inch)... And for 17 inch machines there ain't much other options outside Clevo and the Aw17. For 15 inch I can't see many other options for you. The ODM/OEM already started destroy most of their machines with BGA Junk around that time.

Edit. Read the added reviews for specs.

 

Hmmm

Do you recall who may have a P375SM-A around the forums? Maybe I can send them my 4980hq for testing if they are reputable members, though it could be because optimus is enabled that the 4980hq actually has potential to work. @Meaker@Sager any thoughts?

Maybe I can mod the heatsinks more akin to the P870, 2 exchangers and 2 fans for the GPU or for the CPU, just depends on the temps of the vanilla system.

 

All of the Clevo laptops before the P870 had terrible cooling. Those with Haswell CPUs had extremely poor quality cooling systems. The only laptops I know of that had a Haswell CPU and good cooling were the Viking and Ranger.

I would absolutely not recommend a P375SM-A or a P377SM-A. They had horrible thermal management.

 

I benched my son's old GT70 and the cooling wasn't bad. But as I mentioned above... What is it worth if the firmware is castreted and can't be fixed properly? Nothing will perform better than what you're allowed due firmware. And the worse it will be the smaller chassis you get.

 

Yes, that metered performance crap is a serious problem for all laptops. The losers that make them are lazy control freaks that don't care if the products they sell are garbage. Once in awhile somebody releases a really good laptop on accident. As soon as they realize what happened, they quickly look for a way to "fix" it so it will stop working correctly, or they replace it with a broken newer model. And, as well all know, "newer is always better" LOL. Anyone that doesn't know should ask their friends on Facebook. They always have all the answers for everything.

 

It's a reason I still have my P870. Nothing worthy to buy. And I won't spend my money on new desktop builds with the old soon EOL Intel 14nm+++ chips. AMD follow the same paths... Nothing! Useless if you have oc'ing as hobby and you don't want switch over to LN2 and short time fun. As well can't use it the way you want 24/7. We live in sad times now, bro Fox.

 

Even if there was hardware that deserved a measure of excitement, of which there is not any, we'd still have the suckiness of Windows 10 to screw things up. Yes... we live in very sad, dark times for technology. We're surrounded by and overrun with rampant unchecked wanton stupidity.

 

Viking is too much to be walking around daily, plus I would have to invest into parts. I could simply rebuild my Ranger but its far from travel-ready anymore lol

P157SM-A would be good but Im not finding good information regarding it. Artificial power limits on the CPU. I would at very least want to be able to maintain 4.0Ghz at load with the 4980hq. That would couple well enough with Pascal and still be mobile enough.

Otherwise the only laptop I am interested in is the F5, but that would force me to deal with the Marketplace again in order to justify it.

Right now I have 4930mx / 4980hq / 32GB 2133Mhz and various amounts of SSD / HDD's I could pull from other systems to make a complete system. Various WLAN cards as well but I would be using the AX1650 if possible.

Beyond that the compromise between the two is the P770ZM as it does have a couple validations for the notebook 1070, uses the 5775c w/ L4 cache and I would be able to use my 32GB 2133Mhz, and attempt to sell my 4980hq / 4930mx to partially justify it.

 

Reading this topic and getting reminded of the crappy version that my P377SM-A had has the 880M's came with a faulty fan table for vBios and only a Dell vBIOS fixed them!

God i miss GPU drivers crashing due to faulty firmwares

 

Thus far, my current thoughts.

P157SM-A - Some potential reports that the 4980hq works, but may not be able to hold 4Ghz and unable to confirm if Pascal works without the modded BIOS.

Tornado F5 - would need to sell everything from 4th Gen, and also my 13 R3.

P770ZM - Could use the 32GB 2133Mhz RAM, i7 5775C w/ L4 cache. Would need to sell 4930mx / 4980hq and potentially 13 R3.

Not sure what other options are on the table.

August is my deadline for leaving the country, need to start consolidating hardware into something that has more purpose.

 

Another option if you can get a cheap Clevo P750Tm if 15 inch is what you want/prefer for portability. At least compare it with the other options and what you are willing to pay. I would check it out once Clevo is out with their new models.

 

Im aware of the model, and the size is what I am looking for however the problem comes down to price. Were there older variants that used 7th gen and pascal? If so then I could at least mod for 8700k later.

 

The P750DM2 was the 15” with Sky/Kaby Lake and Pascal.

 

See @yrekabakery 's post.

I would wait and see what pop up after Clevo have ready the new models.

 

Does that function with 8700k as well?

Problem with Clevo laptops has always been the same, finding them second hand on the cheap is always like searching for gold.

Tornado F5 (for now) seems more accessible.

 

Yeah, with the BIOS and tape mod.

The Tornado F5 has uncooled CPU VRMs and a 95W power limit (can be bypassed using IMON slope/offset), so I’d be wary in the long term of sticking Coffee Lake in there unless you mod some VRM cooling. A couple of F5 Coffee Lake users in the owner’s lounge already had their boards go kaput in that area during the last few months.

 

Yeah saw that as well. I dont mind modding, get some displacement wouldnt be too much of an issue.

Which brings me back to bringing the potential price down. The original idea was a to and fro laptop but I could also live with leaving it at the secondary location.

If that is the case then the P37xSM could be quite viable, if I could find a barebones unit. Though I probably wouldnt be able to use the 4980hq. Optimus is likely the reason why it works in the P15xSM units.

 

GT72 or whatever clevo (P771ZM?)was avaliable at the time. Sadly, neither are PGA (BGA/LGA). P377SMA/P375SMA don't have great thermal management and just aren't easy to get your hands on (and are just junk to deal with IMO, never buy a clevo unless you want a toy)I Zbook 17 G2/G1 are also possibilities, but I believe GPU cooling may suffer, however I was able to hold 4ghz with a 4810MQ with stock paste at max fan speed.

Edit: If you're just looking for a 15" in general, Helios 500 is pretty good value (haha funny BGA meme or whatever boomers call it) Older clevo's are decent, but have the quality of a mcdonalds child toy. If I were to use something long term, I'd want something that feels slightly better like a 6/10 gaming laptop from some generic company. They'll probably be your only options aside from the Tornade F5 or P15xxM

 

Main point here is to try and use the hardware I have before dealing with the Marketplace again. Im currently out 400 USD dealing with the Marketplace.

Its looking like P157SM-A or P370SM are the best options for re-using my old hardware.

If not then need to sell my stuff and hope for the best I dont get scammed, and get a Tornado F5

Not interested in BGA systems at present.

 

The p37x series would do about 4ghz with a tuned reasonable chip.

 

Honestly, don't even bother with those options. I can all but promise that you're going to be extremely disappointed. The HP ZBook also has absolutely horrible thermal management. Chassis is well made, but the cooling is totally a joke. The Haswell era in general was an absolute joke for notebook owners. Getting another Ranger or Viking is really the only option that isn't pathetic if you are hell bent on using that CPU. You'll be able to run it a good 500-700MHz higher clock speed at the same or better temperature in a Ranger or Viking chassis than you can in a Clevo from that era.

Tornado F5 is a decent machine. It can be a little space heater as well, but nothing as bad as trying to find a platform that will work well with your old CPU.

 

Then I might just keep a look out for the p750zm. Upgrade it to 5775c and maybe a 1070 if I can get mine back.

Sell my cpu's and call it a day.

I never had any interest in zbooks, or helios 500. Liked the p157sm but despise Optimus, and seems difficult to test the 4980hq I have in those platforms.

 

You might find a Dell Precision that could use your Haswell CPU and 1070, but don't quote me on that. I don't remember what CPU generation Dell put their turdbook cancer hex on the Precision line and I stopped paying attention to Dell exactly at the Haswell point in time. That point in time precisely coincided with their fall from grace and they've done nothing to redeem themselves since.

Haswell was the line of demarcation when Intel went full retard on mobile processors (moved to BGA filth) so the options are extremely limited for that processor generation. There are hardly any good options.

The HP ZBook 15 and 17 are built like a brick house, but their thermal management is hideous, even running the CPU stock with a huge undervolt you'll have thermal throttling and 95°C+ with heavy CPU workloads.

 

What about the W540 if you can live with the godawful touchpad?

 

Same problem for the W540 as the HP ZBook line. Fantastic chassis (if you don't count the garbage touchpad) and horrible thermal management. I've had quite a few Thinkpads over the years (provided by employer for work) and thermal management is something they never seemed to do well with. And, they (IBM/Lenovo) have done a lot of weird and restrictive things with their firmware. Really stupid proprietary Nazi stuff, like encapsulating the vBIOS into the system BIOS, even with MXM cards.

 

Yeah not interested lol some people got the p5000 working but with issues.

The p750zm should be able to accept 5775c which uses lower power requirements to get similar parity to the 7700k. That sounds perfect for a laptop.

I'm sure TouchPad could be replaced but is hardly an improvement over my t440p as the gpu is bga.

 

I had one. It was an excellent laptop except for poor thermal management. I really liked it except for that. It ran much hotter than the Tornado F5. With a @Prema BIOS its 4790K overclocked very nicely with the help of AC cooling. Without AC cooling it was an inferno. But, to be fair... thermals were no worse, or maybe even slightly better than the BGA turdbooks with much slower processors that didn't overclock worth a damn.

It was nicknamed "El Cazador" and I had a lot of fun with it. Just beware that the cooling is inadequate.

 

@TheReciever - if I were in your shoes I would cut my losses, ditch the CPU and buy a reasonably priced used P870DM3 or newer P870. (I would urge you to skip the P870DM-G due to the MXM slot placement being wrong and no ability to use the vapor chamber.) That's really the only laptop that has been made that's worth a damn since the M18xR2 and Ranger 17 became obsolete. Tornado F5 is also really decent, but it's thermal management pales in comparison to the P870.

 

My attempt at doing so has had the GPU stolen and a claim filed against me, which could now mean 800 USD lost. Original cost of the card and also lost funds from the sale.

So I hope you can see my disposition dealing with selling components online so soon. Would rather minimize exposure to selling at the moment.

I would only be running the 4790 long enough to make the tweaks needed for the 5775c, as that runs cooler than Haswell/Devils Canyon.

This is what I can find at the moment, may shoot him an offer for 400 if he wouldnt mind selling me the unit without RAM/storage.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Eurocom-P5-Pro-P750ZM-15-6-FHD-i7-4790-3-6GHz-32GB-256GB-Win-10-Pro-U-S-A-K-B/163962479701?_trkparms=aid=111001&algo=REC.SEED&ao=1&asc=20160727114228&meid=c4bb49e73ca84a3587b38faa4eaffaf5&pid=100290&rk=1&rkt=4&sd=163962479701&itm=163962479701&pmt=1&noa=1&pg=2060778&_trksid=p2060778.c100290.m3507

As I already have 32GB 2133Mhz, and plenty of storage sitting around.

I could put more effort into selling the 13 R3 I suppose if this is the route I plan to go through with.

EDIT: Who has Cazador anymore? I know you like to sell on the forums when possible. Maybe I can ping them and pry it off their hands, as the Prema BIOS would likely be of great use.

Was it an eDP model motherboard?

 

It’s called the Alienware 17 R1

 

I didn't know about that. Man, I am so sorry to hear a member of this community did that to you. I got a PM from someone that got screwed out of over $1,000 for a laptop paid for and never received on another forum, and it looks like that same shyster has an account here as well. It really sucks that such a great community has dishonest people, even if it is a tiny minority. Most of the people here are really awesome.

I sold El Cazador to @Dr. AMK and I think he may have sold it to someone else. If he still has it, he is a very trustworthy friend and you can rest assured that he will not mistreat you. I and many others have had very good experiences buying and selling with Brother @Dr. AMK.

 

Well it was claimed to have been stolen in route, and because UPS isnt on the same page one location told him to file a claim when it was already insured. So currently Im out of the 1070 that I paid for as well as the funds paid to me from another member. Still waiting for UPS to pay up, as I insured it. I dont believe this person had malicious intent.

Its why despite being absolutely correct about just selling and moving to a newer but still used platform, my experience has be a bit irrational at the moment lol.

The p750zm looks to be the best middle ground as I can still use my storage in it, my RAM (probably the hardest to sell), and get to lower the temps with a 5775c

 

Oh, that's a huge relief. Glad to hear that. UPS and FedEx is like dealing with the government/USPS (never good) but I suspect you will eventually get paid if you are persistent.

 

My opinion might be unpopular - but if a laptop is used as an actual laptop most of the time, not sitting on a table docked to external monitor(s) and other peripherals, display quality and other aspects such as input devices come into play a lot more. And I speak from experience - I used to have the most powerful in its class Haswell machine, but because of low resolution display and its weight replaced it with a newer thin & light - and don't have any regrets whatsoever.

Thus, I would choose Thinkpad W541. It is by no means perfect, but among Haswell and prior era machines it looks best to me because:
* 3K IPS display
* 32GB RAM
* Thunderbolt & Expresscard for eGPU
* Thinkpad keyboard with trackpoint (albeit off-centered)
* The usual Thinkpad stuff - durability & repairability, with easily sourced parts

But there are cons too:
* No touchscreen
* Weight
* Off-centered keyboard & trackpad
* Crippling power management on battery - but on the other hand it allows the machine to achieve very good runtimes for the era & included hardware, so that's more of a compromise than an actual problem

I'd probably get one anyway if it had a touchscreen... and unless there were numerous Intel CPU security flaws discovered over the last couple years, which won't likely stop anytime soon. So personally I won't touch any old and/or Intel machine - which pretty much any and all worthy machines from the era fall under, because AMD APUs were slow and rare at the time.

So my personal recommendation to anyone looking for a laptop right now would be to limit themselves to Ryzen 2XXX and newer AMD machines. They may be not perfect, and AMD also suffers from recent security flaws discovered - but nowhere near as much as Intel, and thus their CPUs don't take as much of the performance hit from mitigations.

 

Dang. For $500, I would definitely grab one in spite of its thermal management mediocrity. And, Tempe is only about a 40 minute drive from my house. If I had the extra cash, I'd go buy one right now and use the local pick option. Now I wish I hadn't seen that, LOL. I've really got no use for it, but that's a very good price considering it is brand new. I wonder how many they have? They must have purchased all of Eurocom's leftover old stock or something.

 

Problem with the w540/541p is my t440p. I already have the 4980hq in it, 16GB of 2133mhz ram and 100whr battery, when tuned I can get just shy of 8 hours of use on an battery that came with it.

Along with 1080p IPS, and with t450 TouchPad, it would render the w54x more useless than my 13 r3 since I can't even attempt gaming with it.

It's the only reason I brought it up, it's accessible and the price is quite fair.

I could probably replicate the p770dm pascal mod here as the motherboard looks similar. I would have to figure out if it's eDP board though

 

T440p is a very nice machine and great value. However, for me personally 16GB RAM is a major deal-breaker, as well as 14" FHD display without a touchscreen. Yes, I treat old machines by modern standards - but then again, we live in 2020 not in 2013.

 

I dont like dirty screens, so touchscreens are a no go. 16GB is already overkill for its use case as its mostly email and Teams with some browsing. My drivers already went through 2-3 rugged touchscreens, to me its just another point of failure that isnt justifiable.

but, everyones use case is unique. Not criticizing, just laying out how it doesnt work for me.

 

Yes. Under normal circumstances I would not even give it a second thought, but for the price I have to intentionally resist my impulsive urge to grab one even though I have no use or need for it whatsoever. $500 for a new P750ZM is insane and hard to just walk away from. That would be a really perfect setup for someone that needs a reliable laptop for work. The 970M isn't impressive if one was planning to use it for gaming, but it would be really decent with a 1070, or even a 1060. Gaming aside, the 970M would be all anyone would need for a really strong daily driver.

 

Thanks for the endorsement.

It seems to check most the boxes, I should be able to install the 5775c, use my 32GB 2133Mhz at least, if I get my 1070 back in some miracle then I could try installing as the motherboard looks similar though it looks like no one has attempted yet.

Eurocom had once offered an unlocked BIOS for it, not sure if its still being hosted but it would help in getting the 1070/1060 running.

Might be able to overclock the RAM as well which would be new.

Would make for a fairly balanced system overall.

 

It's disappointing that even now many if not most machines are unable to accept screens with resolutions over FHD. I personally believe that users deserve WQHD and above resolutions, at least on 13" and larger displays. Also it's very sad that we only see 16:10 & 3:2 displays on premium consumer machines, while business-class & gaming devices are still limited to 16:9.

 

This laptop has a 4K option. Though I personally have no interest in it. Prefer 1080p120+hz for my use case.

The only reason for me to desire the 4K option if its the variant with the eDP connector, which vary well may be the case.

I do have a N173HHE-G32 panel I can test with it.

If I can confirm its 4K, then ill likely impulse buy and regret it later lol

I missed the part in the description about it being FHD, which likely means its LVDS.

There are motherboards for it on ebay as well for 150 USD. I could try to resell the motherboard it comes with for hopefully 100USD might go quickly.

 

Apologize in advance for the double post, but maybe we can organize a 4 man group buy to bring the price down to 450 USD?

Naturally we would need a mediator someone everyone could trust or at least a respected member of the forums

I know other forums do that sort of thing but its usually for particular fans or new keys for mech keyboards that sort of thing.

Naturally NBR wouldnt be involved in any official fashion as well.

What do you guys think? @Mr. Fox @Papusan

Where would I best post a thread about such a scenario?

 

From personal experience, I've had great experience with the Zbook 17's CPU cooling, however GPU cooling pales in comparison to the M6800 of the same era. I don't know about the 17 G2/G1 running a 4980HQ, but the M6800 can from what I have seen (I've seen a ebay listing thats no longer up with Hwinfo validation pictures, of which I didn't save as I'm in fact a moron.)
As for the W540/W541/T540p, I wouldn't really consider it a option as the only thing you can gain over the T440P in your current position is a slightly better dGPU and TB2, of which the Zbook 17 G1/G2 can do both.
The W540/W541/T540P has the size/screen going for it, and potentially the keyboard, but the firmware is locked down to hell as well as the cooling (I don't think coreboot is released for it yet, and BGA kepler is nauseating) the 17 G2 has the CPU cooling and docking station, but frankly butterfly macbook keyboard level without the amazing trackpad, and the M6800 has slightly worse CPU cooling but better GPU cooling, but cannot run Pascal properly afaik (Radeon cards do work fine, but you don't have one).

As for the P750ZM or other haswell era LGA laptops that may exist, why go for those when you get a P750xM (whatever the name is) or a Tornado F5, and stick a 8700T or 8700 in it, and get far superior performance to anything mentioned above? Only reason I can think of is price. If you do get a P750ZM, I believe that you can do the pascal "mod", I think there may be a thread somewhere here or there.

 

I have seen the mod, I think it was for the DM-G and the motherboard layout looks to be the same, you have to remove one M.2 and one capacitor to make it clear.

For this platform I can also use my 32GB of 2133Mhz where as what ever is in the system now I could sell for peanuts and not care that much. Clevo also seem better at memory OCing support, while I wouldnt really want faster speeds, OCing the timings would be more tangible with the L4 cache the 5775c brings to the table. It can perform about around a 7700k, which would suffice for a machine I could potentially purchase for 450 USD.

The F5 has the specs, but I would have to pay duties as the model that is available right now for around 750 USD charges 90 USD for shipping and what ever taxes may be stuck to it. Not to mention, I hate that keyboard. For something I would want to put an 8700k in, that brings the price up to 1200 or so.

The TM1 or basically any other derivative are significantly more expensive from what I can see. I dont explicitly need a 6+ core machine either, as those are quite expensive to me on ebay.

Real question is if I can get a 1080p120hz panel running, hopefully I can at the very least test with just an external monitor before getting to that point.

Currently how I see it.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
P750ZM - 450 + 13 Shipping
4790 - Sell for 90 USD, pick up 5775c for 220 USD
RAM - Sell for w/e it will move at. Install my 32GB 2133Mhz
970m - Use until attempted Pascal upgrade, then sell on the cheap 150 USD?
Storage - I can cull from existing systems and have a complimentary scenario
WLAN - Can probably install the AX1650, have one sitting around.
Mainboard - Sell for 100 USD, pick up eDP for 150 USD

Total: 430 USD

w/ 1070: 830 USD (unless I somehow get my 1070 back, then 430 USD)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
F5
7700k - Sell for 300 USD, purchase 8700k 375 USD
1070 - TDP Mod to 170w
16GB - Sell for 32GB 3000Mhz 200 USD
Storage - cull from existing systems
WLAN - install AX1650

Total estimate: 1115 USD

W/ GTX 1080 and heatsink : 2356 +/- 10% USD
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
F5 definitely has more performance, no argument there, but P750zm offers enough for what I would expect of it, while being a new unique experience and allows me to use more of my existing hardware.

 

Here's a question: why bother with Intlel which runs hot as hell, hilariously insecure and is stuck on 4c/8t? Why not get a modern Ryzen laptop instead? Kaby Lake and everything below it was obsoleted the second Ryzen came out in 2017.

Something with a 4800H will curbstomp everything short of a overclocked 8700k or 9900k in a Clevo. Unless you're that guy that absolutely does not want a BGA laptop that is.

 

Mentioned already in thread, don't want bga. So yes, I am that guy.

If I need more pc grunt, I have my desktop. I built that to be ready for 64GB ram, 3950x and what ever gpu AMD releases in the future. If I need more power than what's in my sig, would rather invest my money there, but I don't, and as mentioned before this isn't a top end requirement.

My 4930mx had done me just fine for games, I maxed out anything I played. Before anyone brings up battlefield, I don't play them, not enjoyable. Would rather play mass effect trilogy or dead space

I already know the 5775c will do better than my 4930mx while running cooler, it's a question of if I can get a 1070 running in it. Only reason I switched was because I spent too much time modding lol