New LG Gram 17

Mine seems fine, I haven't noticed it having poor sound quality. I did turn off the DTS app stuff that came with the laptop, I use Dolby Atmos Headphone or nothing depending on what I'm doing.

Do you have high impedance headphones by chance? I'm using a pair of 32 ohm Beyerdynamic MMX300's (Basically the DT770's with a cardioid microphone attached). They sound great.

 

What I hear with Synaptics Smartaudio on the headphones is a high pass filter at around 300 Hz, so there is no bottom end at all. Toggling "Disable all sound effects" twice leads to having the full bottom end. This happens regardless of the headphones I use. But as stated, no issues with the Microsoft driver besides not having that filter on the speakers.

 

I reinstalled the driver using LG DnA Center and now the problem is here again. Looking at the device manager it seems to be caused by the fact anytime headphones are plugged in, a new headphone device appears with (wrong) default settings. My Synaptics SmartAudio HD driver version is 8.66.92.58 from 2/13/2019. Do you have a different one?

 

I have the same driver version as you.

 

I did some more stuff in the meantime as my razer fan/hat pipe assembly arrived. Mostly stuff that didn't work out in the end.

But first I dumped my bios using a CH341 usb eeprom burner and a bios clamp. I located the bios chip near the fan and detached the battery and was able to read my bios. This will allow me to safely flash a modded bios in the future. The bios chip is easy to reach, which makes this procedure mostly painless.



I then cut the fan cable and figured out the pins of the fan cable and the razer fan using an oscilloscope to find out which one is the sensor. The pin-out on my board (looking the normal way with the fan on the left and the ssd on the right) is (left to right & colors):

+5V(red) | Speed Sensor (blue) | Ground (black) | PWM Control (yellow)

the order was different on the razer fan. Every fan needs checking. I soldered the plug to the razer fan and was able to make it turn using the motherboard. At this point I realized it indeed is a much louder fan. Prior tests also showed that it does not move that much more air than the stock fan. It is in fact quite similar with very thin blades, just a bit larger in diameter.

I found no reasonable way to attach the full razer assembly to the CPU so I started modding the fan to make the stock heatpipe fit and ended up with this:



I had to remove quite a bit of material from the sides of the fan to be able to sandwich the fins + heat pipe in between. It all looked quite promising, but when I finally was ready to test I found I had damaged the fan and now it makes a bad noise and doesn't turn well anymore . Obviously this did not improve cooling at all.

I went back to the stock fan and tried a different extra heat pipe arrangement:



This is more in line what Brad from bradshack did in the matebook x pro. The idea is to use the fan case as an extra "fin". However I found performance to be worse than before with my larger heat pipe which sat just on top of the original one. Maybe part of the reason is that the LG gram fan isn't all metal, but has plastic sides. This means the heat cannot move to the underside of the fan. I plan to change that in the future using graphene.

The next day I had a new idea. The heat fins on the razer assembly have the perfect size for the unused gap between fan and case exit. Using hot air I detached the fins from the razer heatpipe. I then used those fins in my gram and this has worked quite well. I used graphene to attached the extra fins, but had to remove a bit of plastic from the exhaust plastic fins to make the new fins fit perfect. This mod allows me to sustain ~25W again even with the less performant heat pipe arrangement. The ideal fin size without mods would be 74mm x 18mm x 6mm btw and the razer is 75x20x6.



That sums up what I did. I'm happy with performance but I wished temps were lower. I now believe the stock fan isn't that bad and the big issue is the heat pipe + heat fin configuration.

I might try to mod my bios or ask someone on bios-mods to do it for me to maybe gain more fan control.

For a final future push I decided I will go back to the larger heatpipe, but this time I will solder it to the orig pipe using low temperature solder. I have to wait for that to arrive. Then I'll use more graphene to attach the extra fins on both sides and hopefully link the top and the bottom of the fan case thermally.

 

btw. hfm, where did you buy the extra fan + heat pipe for the LG Gram 13 ? I'd like to get a spare before I start soldering and my fan cable is now a bit diy looking.

 

I didn't get a fan, just the heat pipe assembly. Bought it from an ebay seller.

 

Whats the black raised rim made out of that keeps the screen separated from keyboard when the laptop is closed? I see a black rim on the photos, it's not rubber is it?

(Reason I ask is my last 17inch was a HP Envy 2000 series, came with a rubber trim around its screen and it started disintegrating in the tropics.)

Cheers,

 

I'd say the rim is made from a mixture of rubber and plastic.. probably not pure rubber, but it definitely has a rubber-like feel.

 

@hfm Were you able to resolve your linux boot issues? I too have a flood of acpi error messages on boot with the default arch linux kernel. It eventually boots, but the resulting system is unstable (random restarts, suspend has worked exactly once).

Using pci=noacpi clears up all these issues, but the resulting system doesn't detect the trackpad, and suspend also doesn't work (the screen turns off, but then the system cannot be woken up. The capslock led flashes, and F5 and power leds are solid).

We really need a firmware update, or an understanding of whats wrong with the ACPI implementation to fix it. Or, as is apparently the case, maybe Fedora has managed to mitigate the problem and whatever they are doing (kernel config, kernel patches?) could applied more generally. Ill try to check if a fedora livecd will boot with no issue...

 

Fedora 30 works fine for everything I can find so far, so this isn't a problem with the laptop, it's a problem with the build of the kernel and drivers Arch is using. I haven't had the time to sift through and determine what needs to change for Arch, honestly I'm pretty distro agnostic so I don't really care much it's not sitting high on my list of priorities. I did try to build a 5.0.7 kernel for Manjaro and made sure the LG_LAPTOP drivers were included. This didn't fix the problem, so it's something else causing it.

The LiveCD for Ubuntu 19.04 also worked without issue, but I've seen LiveCDs work and then when I install the ACPI issues start so YMMV.

 

new review for the gram 17:

https://www.notebookcheck.net/LG-Gram-17Z990-i7-8565U-WQXGA-Laptop-Review.418092.0.html

Overall a good review, but they really missed pointing out the 16:10 screen. They also state max. ram size is 24 GB when it is in fact 40 GB.

 

Hi all - what's the best way to replace the 256GB drive that comes with the Costco edition I'm getting with an NVME? Is there recovery media to use to do a clean install? My thought is to use the 256GB down the road to run Ubuntu. Thanks!

 

If you look through the thread there's already discussion about it. Also you could start reading here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/change-ssd.828261/#post-10889475

There's a couple different ways to attack it depending on what hardware you have on hand. This is just one of them.

 

I will say the one nice thing about this review, aside from the inaccurate info about the display panel is that there's an .icm file to download and try out. Panels can vary along with environment the panel is in, but it's nice to try another calibration to see how I like it.

Obviously just made some assumptions and didn't pay much attention to detail, I've seen this kind of cut-and-paste error from notebookcheck's reviews before. It's weirdly sometimes a contrast between getting basic things wrong mixed with some very in-depth information. I really like their reviews overall. It can be frustrating sometimes seeing these basic errors from them. They really should have played up the 16:10 aspect ratio of the display up more. It's really one of this notebook's strong points and you don't see it very often.

 

@nalim, am I right to assume you used the the following SODIMM stick: SAMSUNG 32 gb M471A4G43MB1-CTD ? Or is there any other DDR4 32 GB SODIMM?

 

Thanks. I think my question now is more whether it's worth it to start fresh from a clean install of Win10 as opposed to using LG's build. Does LG's build include a lot of annoying software I don't want?

Next question would be whether the Win10 license that comes with the machine would work if I installed from Win10 installation media.

 

If you're using an MS account your key is probably tied to the machine so you can reinstall the same edition I would imagine. Might want to extract your key just in case. But, I would just clone it, there's really nothing there you can't easily uninstall, and you do need some of the LG software to take advantage of some features.

 

Yes, this is the stick I bought at https://www.scan.co.uk/products/32g...21300-2666-non-ecc-unbuffered-cas-19-19-19-12

 

I've got a Gram17 and and extra 1TB NVMe drive coming to me. I was hoping to just put the 1TB drive in the extra bay of the Gram, clone the original drive onto it with free Macrium then swap the drives out. No extra hardware needed? Should this work OK?

 

Should work. Might have to format the old one afterward using a rescue USB though, I've seen problems with a cloned drive existing alongside the clone of it. This might not be an issue though.

 

Back from a trip, I finally got my hands on a thermal camera. I looked at the motherboard under load and there are two chips that reach high temperatures (besides the CPU). I marked them red on hfm's screenshot. These two reach 90 degree celsius under full load and probably need additional cooling when the tdp is set higher.

The yellow chips get hot during charging, but they only reach 45 degree celsius, so no worries there.

If someone is looking for it, I also marked the bios chip pink.



I also saw that my current solution with the added fins doesn't do much as these fins don't really get hot. Next thing I'll do is solder them onto the heat pipe using low temp solder and a copper plate.I also ordered another heat pipe (non-plated copper to enable soldering) from china and when it arrives, I'll do a dual heatpipe solder solution.

I used the gram17 a lot during my week of travel and it's been a joy. I never had to look for an outlet as the battery lasts all day when writing code and occasionally doing a compile.

 

I saw this issue also. Of the distributions I tried to boot into, the only one that worked without that issue was Elementary OS Juno. The Elementary OS boot ISO I used is using kernel version 4.15. All the other distros I tried were either using 4.18 or 5.0, which had the same problem with the ACPI Error messages flooding the screen. I was able to install Elementary OS Juno on the drive without any problems, but I tried to install the 4.18 kernel just to see if the same ACPI error message came up, and it did. Hopefully this is something that can be fixed soon...

 

I just installed Deepin recently which is on kernel 4.15. Works great. Maybe at some point I'll try to get to the bottom of this but I would imagine it will be a non-issue as some distros move forward.

 

Were you able to compile the lg_laptop kernel module on Deepin? I tried to compile it on Elementary OS and wasn't successful.

 

I didn't need to. Monitor brightness and volume work fine in Deepin. I did compile my own 5.0 kernels for Manjaro and couldn't get it working. Well, compiling the kernel with the LG_LAPTOP driver worked fine, it just didn't fix the acpi issues. So far Fedora 30 and Deepin have both worked fine.

 

I got a new toy, Sonnet Breakaway Box 550 + Asus Strix RTX 2070 OC. Loving it!

The Firestrike scores were way lower than my old 7700K + 1080, but the Time Spy scores are about equal with graphics being faster and CPU being slower.

I tried a couple games at native res with details cranked up (I'm not using an external monitor) and they all have played really well so far. Going to install some more intense games and see how that goes.

EDIT: just played Metro Last Light for a bit, ran like butter at native res with details cranked. Like it so far.

 

I am using an Akitio Node Thunderbolt 3 egpu enclosure with a 1660Ti on the inside and it's working great as well. Using an external monitor does boost framerates a lot - especially for resolutions above 1080p. Setting the speed shift setting in Throttlestop to 0 will make the CPU switch frequency much less often, which does help with framerate stability.

 

Thanks for the info. I will try one of those distros and see if I have any better luck compiling the code. The volume and screen controls were working in elementary also. I was mainly looking at the lg_laptop module for the battery_care_limit function, and to disable the touchpad.

 

I am using throttlestop for that reason, though I can't use an external monitor, don't have one and my typical sitting arrangement won't fit one. I am very happy with it though. I get enough work time with multi monitor at the office.

 

Has anyone figured out the key combination both for entering the bios and for entering the boot menu on boot?

 

To enter the BIOS press F2 once the LG logo appears. I don't think there is a keystroke for a boot menu, but in the BIOS, the boot order can be changed.. which is almost everything you can do there.

 

Hold F10 for the boot menu.

 

there is a new bios version 1.0.1903.1210, dated 25.03.2019.

 

Where did you get that BIOS? Can you tell a difference to the old one?

 

It was updated through Windows 10 update (EFI method). Simply open Settings/Windows Update and check for update. I can't see any difference yet

 

I have to say I'm really impressed by Gram 17. I'm a professional developer (java, python, nosql db) and I own several laptops (clevo DTP, alienware m17, alienware 13r3, dell xps13) and I found the gram perfect for my work. With 40GB RAM, 3TB ssd space it can handle all my coding tasks (fedora linux/ windows 10 dualboot, idea IDE, virtualbox, cassandra db) well (not as fast as the clevo of cource) but the blend of features (lightness, performance, battery life, screen resolution/ratio, thunderbolt port, fingerprint reader, touchpad) is difficult to match

 

I just checked, also double checked my windows update history, I don't see anything.

 

I've had the Gram 15 and the glossy screen made it totally useless in many environments. Can you show a picture of your protector installation? I've always been skeptical of these things on laptop screen. Aside from the bubbles, don't you lose clarity?

Do you guys think that there might be a compatible panel that we can change? I wonder if this one would be compatible http://www.panelook.com/G170HAN01.0_AUO_17_LCM_overview_34364.html

 

I doubt that is going to fit it's 16:9 not 16:10. We would also have to check to see if the connector is 30 or 40 pin eDP. I would imagine it's probably 40 pin.

 

The protector I installed looks very similar to those found on newer non-glare thinkpad screens. I tried making an image, but it seems impossible to capture the anti-gloss quality. Of course, you lose some brightness, but with this brand it's ok (for me). It also doesn't lead to "rainbow" pixels or fuzziness as some other anti-glare protectors do.

Only problems I see with it are:
It's very hard to install on such a large screen. I now have just one unhappy spot on the second install I did and that's fine for me.
It is slightly too small - there is a thin glossy frame of about 2 pixels around the screen (similar to these newer thinkpad screens).

 

With the boot menu, I was able to boot into the Fedora live cd with no problem. However, looking at dmesg reveals the same gpe flood as on the arch kernel. It seems fedora's configuration simply mitigated this problem from blocking boot, but didn't fix it. I also still seemed to have trouble suspending to ram inside the livecd. I did not try to do any real work inside the livecd to see if I got the same random shutdowns as I do on arch, but Im not terribly optimistic, as nothing else seems better.

Those on fedora, do you have any indications of problems during boot in your syslog? Do you have trouble suspending to ram?

Also, I see a bios update has been mentioned. I dont have Windows installed anymore, is there any other way to flash the bios?

 

No other way to install the new bios that I am aware of since it's a windows exe. It's interesting that you aren't able to get Fedora 30 to work where I am. That's just strange. You could install windows just to update the bios, probably doesn't matter if it's activated or not.

 

Would you recommend a lay person get a screen protector? Seems like it would be easy to mess up (16:10 screen, protector too small, etc)

I'm debating vs the Lg gram 17 vs another laptop with 15 + inch screen but brighter. I'm not really sure if screen size is more important than brightness in practice. Are you happy with the LG gram 17?

 

Do you find yourself using the LG gram 17 more than your macbook even though the macbook is brighter?

 

I have both a mac book pro 2015 15'' and now the lg gram 17 and currently I like the gram more. The macbook feels like a small screen now and as if it was made from solid metal. I do prefer the keyboard and the trackkpad on the MBP, but not by much. I don't use full display brightness on either machine and both have anti-glare protectors installed.

Installing the protector is tricky. I have done it many times over the years, but I only managed one perfect install. The gram went almost perfectly, but it took a few attempts to figure out a way to do it semi-reliably. A dust-free environment would be needed and I don't have that. If you have one then you should easily be able to do it. On the MBP I use a Moshi iVisor and that one can be done easily and is also removable, but unfortunately only available for macs.

 

I still use the MacBook for work and the Gram 17 for everything else since I have so much of my workflow already configured on the Mac. I just haven't gotten around to configuring everything I need for my dev environment on the Gram, though I do have most of it installed for my own personal usage. Perhaps one day I'll give it a trial run for a week or two and see how it goes. Plus it's provided by the company so there's some stuff on it that I can't install on my own device, not that I care about that much as it's not really important things. Much like @Pflugshaupt I don't use full brightness on either notebook, also I don't use screen protectors.

I will say unlike @Pflugshaupt I like the keyboard on the Gram better. These butterfly keyboards are not very good IMO. But @Pflugshaupt has a 2015, so it's the better keyboard before Apple "fixed" it.

 

Another new wrinkle. I decided to try the Pop! OS (19.04) live iso last night just to see what that distro is about, tried to boot off it and was greeted by the spam of ACPI errors. I think if I get some spare time on the weekend I might sit down and try to figure out exactly what it is about some of these distros where they are working properly with our units and others don't. It has to be something missing from the kernel/drivers. I don't think it's the LG_LAPTOP driver as I was successfully able to compile a kernel with that driver and it didn't fix anything.

 

I would certainly appreciate any insight you can give. Im still using mine in pci=noacpi mode, with no touchpad or suspend. Could be worse, but not ideal

 

For people without screen protector, can you comment on screen reflections both outdoor and in rooms where there are bright artificial lights?