***The MSI GS60 Ghost Pro 970M Owner's Lounge***

I've been following mobile G-sync saga. It's supposed to be coming officially sometimes later in selected notebook models.

We know about it because of accidentally leaked drivers from Asus that enabled G-sync. That's how some folks with Asus G751 and MSI GT72 got G-sync working on their internal screens.

Unfortunately for us (and many other notebook models), it works only if you don't have Nvidia Optimus and also only with some specific screen models.

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphics-Cards/Mobile-G-Sync-Confirmed-and-Tested-Leaked-Alpha-Driver
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...ry-display-supporting-displayport-1-2.770187/

 

Ah, thanks for the post! I am glad it is at least being worked on. It will be nice to see.

 

At the moment they need to figure out how to properly implement it without blanking issues.

 

Is there a way to check the EC and BIOS version without going into the BIOS?

 

The flash tool should tell you(if one exists)

 

Built-in Windows command line tool "msinfo32" shows BIOS and EC versions.

GPU-Z shows VBIOS version info:

http://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/

HWInfo64 gives these plus tons of extra info:

http://www.hwinfo.com/download.php

 

What does HWInfo Pro have that HWInfo doesn't?

 

What is HWInfo Pro?

 

Where do you see a pro version? As far as I know, HWiNFO is freeware.

 

I meant HWMonitor PRO not HWInfo, sorry for the confusion .......

 

A difference of a few features:

 

Hi
I bought the Msi 3k model. It has the backlight bleeding problem and also one more thing. The right fan is constantly working. The fa speed is always between 2800 and 3000 RPM. Is this normal? I can't return it since I had a friend of mine bought it from America and he game it to me in Greece where the warranty doesn't apply. The fan works properly or should I be worried?

 

My right fan always spins too. It's normal. The left one does as well but only when the gpu is active. Msi changed the fan profile to force this a while back

 

Yes, both these issues are unfortunately expected.

CPU fan is always on and speed never goes below ~2,800 RPM. Also for me it's usually around 2,800-3,000 RPM when idle / with light load, more with higher load.

Even just some Windows background processes are enough to trigger higher fan speed (Win8.1 is quite bad with those, TiWorker thing is particularly annoying).

GPU fan is always on if Nvidia GPU is active (power button is orange), even if GPU does virtually nothing and GPU temp is 32 C.

Backlight bleeding is very common, so even if you did get replacement unit, you would very likely just get another one still with it (both MSI GS60 units I had got backlight bleeding, 3K one was worse than 1080p one).

 

Good News ....... hopefully this is true

https://forums.geforce.com/default/...king-with-347-09-347-25/post/4466443/#4466443

 

Today I checked briefly in person Clevo P650SA (with GTX 965M, i7-4720HQ).

I can compare it with my MSI GS60:

- Clevo was noticeably more quiet in idle / low use than MSI (virtually silent vs you know fan is always running on MSI)
- Clevo was a bit more quiet also under the load but here the difference was much less perceivable (both are quite noisy, but not nearly as bad as thin Gigabyte notebooks, at least compared to videos I've seen)
- the same as in MSI, also Clevo can get fan spinning noisily just with Windows 8.1 background processes
- GPU temperatures are pretty insane in Clevo (for comparison in one test Clevo got 54 C, MSI 65 C)
- CPU temperatures in Clevo are noticeably worse than in MSI (82 C in Clevo vs 71 C in MSI)

- build quality of Clevo was surprisingly high, at least on the level of MSI if not even a bit higher
- brushed aluminum surface finish looked nicer than on MSI
- no creaky parts, solid chassis, screen lid felt more rigid than on MSI
- felt a bit heavier than MSI, but subjectively still pretty lightweight and small (felt smaller than MSI)
- power brick about the same size and weight as for MSI

- keyboard was good too, a bit more clicky tactile feeling than MSI one, I liked bigger Enter key
- smooth trackpad surface felt better than on MSI, yay for separate buttons
- fingerprint scanner is great feature, I had it on my older Thinkpad and I do miss it on MSI

- screen was 1080p IPS matte
- subjectively it felt a bit worse than MSI one, but still very decent
- less bright at maximum brightness, colors were less popping, more matte coating "grain"
- MSI screen is much more "in-your-face"

- GTX 965M seems pretty capable at 1080p but it did struggle a lot when I tried 4K res supersampling antialiasing, i.e. not just proportionally slower vs GTX 970M but hard performance cliff (in my own tests)

Overall impression was pretty good.

Clevo P650 with GTX 970M should be very comparable to MSI GS60, better in some aspects, worse in others. The biggest flaw is probably CPU temperatures (the biggest flaw of MSI GS60 is IMHO too high idle noise and hard upgrade access).

 

Thanks for the comparison, interesting to know - I was toying up between a MSI GS60 and Clevo P650SE for ages - I the end I bought an XMG P505 (a rebranded Clevo P651SE i.e. 970M GPU and sandblasted, not brushed metal case).

They book look like great machines, but in the end I went for the Clevo because thought it would be a little quieter/cooler, is easier to upgrade and to specify exactly what components you want initially, and has slightly more robust (if chunkier/heavier) build quality and battery life is a little better. I also prefer the separate track pad buttons on the Clevo and the larger enter key. The GS60 looks nicer, though...

XMG provide MX-2 thermal paste as standard in the CPU/GPU on the P505 as well, "which is nice", as re-pasting is not something I like doing myself.

I went for a SATA SSD (Samsung 850 EVO), and no M2 drive (which can get very hot!) nor HDD, to keep temperatures and noise down further.

I also considered a 2015 Razer Blade, which is a gorgeous machine, but would have had to import it into the UK (which ain't cheap) and purchased a 3rd party one year (only) warranty, as Razer doesn't do international warranties. Noise and heat was also a concern, as is lack of upgradability. If I'd bought the Razer Blade, I could have recouped some money by selling my Macbook Air, however, as it's small enough for lightweight travelling, but with the P505 I will probably now keep this as my XMG will stay mainly at home.

 

Nice review, How did you manage to get your hands on it? I've been thinking of upgrading to this clevo model myself in a few months, it's actually between 650SG and the Batman because they both have the IGZO screen option. 650SG GPU has dual fans so it's not surprising that it's cooler than GS 60 but its high CPU temp is quite surprising to me, is it because the fan doesn't spin fast enough?

 

@Oxford_Guy Yup, should be a good machine.

@SeagateBoy I lucked out - somebody I know bought it. High CPU temperatures are the weakest point of this generation of notebooks. GPU temperatures are ok everywhere, Maxwells are cool, but Haswell CPUs are hot. I went with MSI partly because it had the lowest CPU temperatures from all thin notebooks (maybe it's indeed because its CPU fan is spinning more, maybe it's that weird design with upside down system board that makes it hard to access but easier to cool).

Also that Clevo had i7-4720HQ vs i7-4710HQ in my MSI. Though that's just 100 Mhz difference, which could translate to maybe 2-3 C more.

 

Agree with the upside down design, it allows for air in take from the top which I believe helps cool the CPU. My first GS60 had 4710 and my current one has 4720, I seriously don't see any difference in performance and temps except that my fan never goes down to 2800, the lowest is 2900 but I don't know if it's due to a different fan profile .......

 

Hey guys. I'm currently in need of some money so I'm selling my laptop MSI GS60 ghost pro 046 with an extra 250gb ssd for $1500 on amazon. Only used it for like 3 weeks . link - http://goo.gl/1H8I5v

Thanks.

 

Hello owners,
I am curious. If I managed to get my hands on the 6400mah battery from one of the razer blades would it attach to the gs60? I know it will fit. If it attaches the sub 3hr battery life could be gone!

 

It's not even the same shape. What makes you think it would fit?

 

Hello everyone,

Has any of you encountered problem with the scrolling function with the latest update of the touchpad? It appears that when I use the previous version of the driver, the scrolling works fine, but if I update it, it doesn't work anymore, at all.

I don't know, maybe there is a conflict between the one I installed based upon Xenthar advices and the one pre-installed in the built-in driver ?

 

He's right, GS60 battery is a fat 'L' shape while Razer's battery is just a long rectangle but if you managed to somehow fit it, please let me know

 

When playing in a laptop with high res, would it be better to play games at 1080p and crank up the settings or play it on native and reduce settings?

 

Tough to say. It depends on the game. It's really best to do what's best for you. I do either but tend to push fhd over 3k

 

3k is still going to be harsher on the frame rate usually, 3k for older games, likely 1080p for newer ones.

 

Does anyone here have and undervolt GT970M vbios or knows how to undervolt it?

 

Have you tried the request thread over at tech inferno?

 

That's not going to work

 

How is this unit for MMOs and RTS games? Also, was it ever confirmed as to whether the 2.5" drive slot was SATA III or SATA II?

Could I expect to play FPS games on High rather than Ultra and how well does the screen handle downscaling to 900p in FPS games in terms of clarity?

 

2.5" slot is SATA III (6.0Gbps)... I swapped a SSD in mine with great results.

 

Thanks! I am really close to pulling the trigger on this one. On a small screen like this do games look pretty good on high vs. ultra detail?

 

No I didn't. But I think I will. Do I need to be a TI donator?

 

So I bought the GS60 4K from XoticPC, received it about a week ago... and got hit with the "crappy yellows" thing. Almost, but not quite as bad as the Y50 it was supposed to replace. I'd rather not begin the laptop quest all over again, so I might just send it in for an equivalent GS60 with a 3K screen.

That said: While I haven't seen anyone mention the yellows problem on the GS60 3K screens, I haven't seen anybody confirm the absence of the issue either. Can anybody confirm that the 970M model of the GS60-3K does NOT have that godawful mustard-yellow-displaying RGBW samsung screen? Also, any word on what panel it actually does have?

 

For a custom one I would suspect a beer money donation would be in order. For a regular download you can make 5 quality posts on the forum and get them for free.

 

It does not have the yellow issue. I've had the 4k panel in the Y50 and the same type in the UX303LN. The 3k panel is IPS and is beautiful. I would argue that it's the best panel I've ever had actually. The viewing angles and brightness are stellar and the color accuracy is good enough(92% sRGB). To be honest, I can't tell the difference between it and a 98%+ screen, when it comes to the colors. Also, it's 60Hz, not 48Hz like the 4k model. The scaling issues are MUCH more tolerable too.

 

Hey guys, I ordered a GS60 but I was wondering if the 2 M.2 slots could be used without RAID? Just as separate drives with different capacities. Thanks!

 

Of course. Never heard of a machine that forces redundancy

 

Thanks Xentar712. I haven't bought a laptop in a while, I got worried because every time the M.2 slots are mentioned, people mention RAID.

 

MSI ships them in raid 0 as standard (which is all performance and no redundancy by the way).

Each drive is on a dedicated SATA channel so they can be split up however you like. (drives can also be added without impacting the current setup).

If you order from a reseller most will let you specify how they are configured as standard.

 

Simply press and hold on DEL key to enter BIOS, then go to Advanced, you can change SATA mode from RAID to AHCI or IDE.
And then you can load OS after, additionally, you should use Shift + F10 in the OS installer and run diskpart to clean each disk completely due to ghost RAID array info in MBR.

 

Hi everyone! I bought just 2 weeks ago this laptop and now I'm looking for a coolinpad that "fit" with that.
Someone have a advice?
Thanks

 

Cooling pads are pretty pointless with this design since the vents are set up the way they are. I've only measured a degree or two difference in temp and many times there was no change. That said, if you want one to just save your lap, I'd get the cheapest possible. If I didn't already have one, I'd probably be using a piece of wood.

 

Hi everyone,

I am looking for a 15inch gaming laptop with 16GB of RAM and the 970M. I live in the UK and my budget is circa £1,500.

I've been seriously considering buying the GS60 for a while now, but I've been a bit put off by the 4K screen. I am mainly interested in gaming, and I don't see the benefit of having such hi-res, and having to scale down systematically every time I want to play. Unfortunately in the UK the Full HD version only comes with 8GB of Ram. Am I right in thinking the 4K screen will be a problem? Also since it’s a thin laptop I am also concerned about the GS60’s durability. I don’t plan on dropping it, but I have kids so a bit of resistance would be important.

I see that the new Apache GE62 2QF is coming out shortly, has the 970m. + 16GB RAM +full HD. Does anyone know how it would compare to the GS60? Am I right in thinking that since it’s a bit thicker and heavier, the temps would be better and the build more solid?

Any thoughts on the matter would be greatly appreciated!! Thanks in advance.

 

This might have been asked before, I'm looking for a guide/advice to replace my GS60 4K screen with Sharp IGZO 4K if possible, any help would be appreciated

 

I've been playing games with 1080p res on my 4K screen, so far so good not much scaling issues there. Temperature wise, it's quite good even though it's thin, you can check Xotic's review video on youtube.

The only thing about the 4K screen is that if you see it from an angle (like from the top right/left) it becomes milky, the colours don't wash out but the brightness changes, also the light bleed is quite bad on my unit.

Have you considered clevo P650Sx?

 

Thanks for the response! I did consider the Clevo but my cousin has one and says that the build isn't great. I have some cash so I'd rather indulge and get somethign branded.

I'm also considering the new Alienware 15 with the 980m. Any thoughts on that?

 

I'm not sure about the build of MSI either actually, my first one came defective, it'd shut off by itself after an hour of use or so. The replacement has some minor defects, the CPU fan makes high pitch noises at 2900 RPM, the GPU fan rattles a bit at high RPM, the keyboard bulges slightly around the 'enter' key area. So ...... there it goes LOL

If I go with Dell (Alienware) it'll be because Dell has in-home service here in the US, MSI support is not that good, both of my GS60 have high wear level on their batteries out of the box and some people have reported the same thing, I brought this up to an MSI technical supervisor in California, both my email and call were unanswered. I broached this topic to the MSI rep here at NBR and didn't get any good response either. And the first time I called their support for my defective GS 60, I didn't get much help, they just gave me the canned response "please send your unit for RMA" and I had to bear the shipping cost for a defective $2000 laptop

All in all, I don't think a $2000 laptop should have all these defects (even if they are minor) but again I might just be very unlucky ....... just sharing my experience, not to scare you away from MSI