*The Offical MSI GX60 Owners Lounge*

it is not a fresh install, I do have the disk with me, not pro tho.

I am really lazy to reinstall, if I do I got to reinstall all my programs and what not... lazy....I'll try to figure out without reinstalling, maybe.... we'll see

I will reinstall in the end if I have to

 

just another dumb question, if I updated the video drivers through AMD's automatic functions on their website, do I still need to download this?

AMD CATALYST

Cheers! thanks in advance

BTW, I finally managed to fix the booting problem, seems like I was shutting down the pc rather than putting it to sleep like most people do

 

Depends what version the auto updater is spitting out at the moment.

 

I get this on the information tab: AMD VISION Engine Control Center Version 2012.1219.1521.27485

but as I stated in my concerns before in hardware the vision engine cc only shows the onboard card, but on device manager Im able to see the other card is there, which is why I wonder if I should install those drivers.

 

Hey guys,
I have a GT780DX, and a friend wants a similar laptop (this screen is amazing, and the laptop's been very reliable so far). It seems like the GX60 is a pretty good deal for someone who's gonna do some gaming (borderlands 2, CS:GO, SC2, etc.) but who doesn't do anything intensive otherwise. However, I have a few questions....
1- How bad are the drivers? Lots of people seem to be pretty disappointed with the quality of drivers from ATi, for what is otherwise a great GPU.
2- How weak is the CPU in practice? I'd think it really won't change anything for everyday use, and the gaming performances should still be better than stronger cpu + similarly priced, weaker GPU (660m).
3- Is the trackpad still really bad? Mine is pretty terrible, even with updated drivers. Good thing I'm always using a mouse, but he'd be using the trackpad often.

This would be the exact model, at a slightly lower price, in Canada:
MSI GX60 0NC-021US AMD A10-4600M 8GB 750GB 15.6in HD Radeon HD7970M 2GB BT BR HDMI Win8 Notebook
He'll throw in an SSD and windows 7, but otherwise keep it as-is.

 

Well, I for one am far from dissapointed in my purchase.
The GX60 is the first Gaming laptop I have bought and I have had no issues at all with Skyrim, Battlefield 3, Witcher 2 etc. Even a hugely enhanced and modded Skyrim is fluent and on the original ATi drivers it came in the box with.
I have read a lot of talk about the APU being too underpowered to run most games, those people obviously haven't owned a GX60. I tell you, it's darn impressive for games so far. It outperforms my mates ASUS dedicated gaming laptop with Nvidia inside. He runs an i7 CPU. It just goes to show you that the GPU for gaming is the more important feature when faced with a choice of CPU Or GPU.
I have had some driver issues upgrading to the newer ATi drivers however, the rig was already better than my mates ASUS out of the box with frames per second. The only thing I miss is a backlit kb however, for the price? this is a complete steal.
I have no issues at all recommending the GX60, even my mate is bummed he payed more than double the price for his ASUS with his "monster" i7 inside and my cheaper priced (not quality) gets a better famre per second ;-)
Oh and before I forget, he has returned his ASUS twice due to GPU Overheat issues as well. He's now on his 3rd board or GPU replacement under the return for defects policy.
My MSi GX60 is still runnning as well, actually better now I updated drivers, since I opened the box and started using it. Really very good value. I expected the worst and got nothing close to that. Happy as.

 

Point 2 - There are cpu intensive games where a i7 + 660m is on the par or better than this laptop. CS:GO didnt run that well on my gx60 tbh. I had a desktop with a phenom II x4 and a 5870 which ran CS:GO much much better so i gues CS:GO is more about the cpu. Still thye gx60 is a very good choice particularly when a new cpu can be installed.

 

Yeah, can't wait for AMD to officialy confirm whether new line of APU's will fit in GX60 or not.

If it will then I hope for at least 20% better performane after an upgrade, more if forced turbo can be done on the upgraded CPU the same way it can be done on A-10 4600m.

 

How can we do this?

 

Use PSCheck - it can make the A-10 work constantly on 2.7 Ghz instead of just 2.3 Ghz.

 

Are we still unsure whether or not AMD will be releasing new mobile APU's that will be compatible with this laptop? I'm looking around at some laptops. My GT783 was my favorite gaming laptop I've owned, and want to come back to MSI. This one looks to be on par with what I need it to do, but if it's upgradability is dead from the get-go, then I may look elsewhere.

I read through the first 60+ pages of the thread, and the last 10+ with no mention of the new APU's or when to expect an announcement. Anyone have any info?

 

Richland (a10-5750m) the next APU (based on the same CPU cores as the trinity a10-4600m that ships in the gx60) will still be based on the same Piledriver CPU architecture, but with a clock bump and supposedly better power management to enable that while still running at 35w, and provide somewhere in the region of 20% better 3DMark11 performance. It is supposed to ship Q2 2013. The reason things have gone quiet is that nothing has really come from AMD about it following the press announcement, from what I can see.

Kaveri, which uses the steamroller architecture and is fabbed on 28nm rather than 32nm, should ship Q1 2014, provide a greater performance boost, and hopefully be compatible with the socket FM2 in the gx60. The trouble is AMD haven't confirmed that Kaveri or Richand will be compatible.

 

"Also on May 7 AMD will release low power Richland APUs for notebooks in BGA form factor. Kabini chips will follow at the end of May with updated FX chips with the Piledriver architecture coming out in June 2013."

AMD to release Richland APUs on March 19

Do they currently have a BGA form factor?

 

While Richland is likely to be socket compatable, I highly doubt any GCN based APU, Like Kaveri, set to release in 2H13 will be the same socket. And the GX60 and other notebooks use FS1r2 socket, not the FM2 that desktop units use. The BGA is for low voltage APUs, soldered onto what is called the FP2 interface.

Although if FM2 survives, then it could be an indicator that FS1r2 will too. I suspect AMD may want to drive motherboard/chipset sales with its steamroller APU release, which they can do if its good enough.

I also suspect that the GCN GPU will require different and possibly greater pinout than the VLIW4 in Trinity and Richland, and there may be more lines for the more memory bandwidth. Of course GX60 users don't care much about the iGPU, it just needs to be socket compatable.

I believe that the hardware in the final PS4 and XBox 720 will actually be custom chips based on Kaveri's HSA, because games will be coded specifically to take advantage of it, compared to the world of software makers that could care less to make their application work better on AMD hardware. This is a good reason for the Kaveri delay, and custom use to consoles. And there may be Kaveri based notebooks hitting the scene in time for holiday shopping this year. It should have a big IPC improvement over Piledriver, so the CPU is much less of a bottleneck.

 

I think you're probably right. AMD have been happy to change desktop sockets after only a short time, so sadly they will no doubt care even less for notebook owners who by and large won't contemplate upgrading the CPU. I can't imagine changing sockets so frequently does much to entice people to go AMD for custom desktop builds when they most likely will need to change out the motherboard as well come upgrade time.

 

Question~

What is the different in our Heaphone out, and Line out?

To my knowledge Headphone out is amped, Line should not be.

Question #2!

If I am correct, where is a better place to plug my headphone amp connect to, "Headphone Out" or "Line Out"? (assuming I'm not using a DAC, that's actually more ideal...I know...)

 

AMD has maintained sockets longer than Intel, so Intel is no alternative in that respect. I am actually using a motherboard from early 2010, meant for Phenoms, currently running a few generations later Vishera, and hoping the Steamroller update is also compatable. Because its just a CPU, no GPU. Llano was like the only platform that was ever changed after one year. Now Trinity has its Piledriver replacement for FM2 users. Having an APU, with ever changing GPU tech, all bets are off. Not AMD's fault, unless they put in spare I/O to predict what the future designs will require, and flexible chipsets. Plus, part of industry revenue, including AMD's is in motherboard sales $150 every 3 years to upgrade a mobo is not a big deal in the scheme of things.

I expect, that since Richland APUs should be socket compatable with Trinity notebooks, and has 1866 RAM controller, that a lot of notebook upgraders are going to be happy forking out bucks for an APU and RAM. Hopefully for the GX60 owners, the CPU itself is a nice bump, with perhaps better turbo use when not using the iGPU.

 

I'm not sure if this was discussed already since I didn't read all the pages but I couldn't find an answer searching in this thread.

I was just trying to extend the desktop to 2 screens (23" screen via VGA and 42" TV via HDMI) and I couldn't get the internal screen to work at the same time. So I am only able to have two screens active at a time.
Is this the way it is supposed to be or is there something wrong with my setup?

Cheers,
-pisto

 

AMD Eyefinity FAQs .Klik the "What are the basic requirements for connecting multiple displays?" For a Three monitor setup u will need to use the display port for at least one monitor

 

That's unfortunate, I know why I still love my old Amilo SA3650 so much, could use 4 passive screens at once.
So just to get this straight: if I would want to use 3 external monitors (VGA, HDMI & active DP) I still could not use the internal screen? Meaning I then would have to ditch either the VGA or the HDMI monitor to use the internal screen?

 

I think thats correct. The chip can control 2 outputs and the display port chip can control a couple more.

 

Alright. Since I read this limitation is due to the available number of clocks I am wondering if the means that the APU and the 7970 share the same clocks (I assume they generate it or am I mistaken)?

 

Hi,

I have a solution for Windows 7 users experiencing an odd brightness issue that happens when you are on battery power. Note: This fix only applies to Windows 7 users, I don't think it is the same issue as what is being experienced by Windows 8 users.

So here is the fix:
1. Right-click on your Desktop and select Graphics Properties. You should then be looking at the AMD VISION Engine Control Center.
2. Click on the Preferences button on the top right corner and select Advanced View. You should now see more categories under the Search field.
3. Click on the Power category and then select PowerPlay™. You should now see all the PowerPlay options to the right of the category view.
4. Either uncheck Enable Vari-Bright™ or set the Vari-Bright setting to Maximize Quality.
5. Click the Apply button at the bottom right corner. Give your display at least 5 seconds to adjust to this setting.

To test whether this setting works, unplug from the power outlet and run from battery to see if your display brightness and color is the same as when you were connected to the power outlet.

If you find your display colors are washed out or seem too bright (regardless of whether you are connected to the power outlet or on battery), you can tweak your color settings here:
1. Go back to the AMD VISION Engine Control Center and select My Built-in Displays from the category view.
2. Then select Display Color (Built-in Display). The options to tweak the colors should now be available on the right. Make sure to click Apply to make the changes effective.
3. You can try tweaking the Contrast and Brightness settings to adjust issues you may be having with the colors or brightness.

Hope the above helps. I also have a post on replacing the internal WiFi card in the MSI subforum at Techinferno if you interested.

Enjoy,
-Ad

 

Hi,
New to the forums. So much info here my brain is cooked lol!
Ordered and received my gx60 from newegg a few days ago. having lotsa fun with it for the most part.
I do seem to be having an issue getting the video drivers to update? I downloaded this..
13-1_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc_whql, file version 9.12.0.0, catalyst 13.1. file size 146mb
Installed over old drivers.It appears to have updated the 7660g, driver details lists the file date as 12/19/2012.
How ever it doesn't appear to have updated the 7970m? That is still showing as version 8.982.7.0 with a date of 8/8/12 ?
Kinda has me stumped
It's working great so far and real happy with it. (Other than the Really loud bd drive). But I would like to be able to figure out how to get the the graphics up to date to get the most out of it! Any info would be greatly appreciated!

 

I have this issue as well.

anyway an update on my status: some windows maintenance patch seems to have fixed the switchblade issue I had, now I do get the led color change

however Im still having some huge performance issues with Dota 2, I just realized that with this card's power I should be able to run everything maxed, however with MOST things maxed I still experience FPS drop, devices and a higher fan/temperature activity compared to other games (probably more simpler ones such as CS:GO) i've read however that these glitches are due to the driver's incompatibility with DX9

but I would appreciate if anyone has any advice on improving my system's performance

 

you can manually update the driver. Just go to the device manager and select update driver, and tell it where to find it, typically when you run them it unpacks all the drivers to the C drive in a folder named AMD or Support.

Are you loading the mobility specific driver or tried using the AMD verification tool that seems to be meant for AMD enduro systems with HD7xxxM GPUs.

I am not sure that Display Driver ver. 9.012 is the mobile driver, as its the same number I see on the desktop graphics 13.1, and I cannot seem to go straight to mobile drivers, wants you to use their verification tool to figure out what to load.

 

You can find direct downloads from sites like guru3d I believe.

 

Got it finally. Looks like I did download the wrong driver set. Got the mobility version http://www2.ati.com/DriverS/mobile/13-1_mobility_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc_whql.exe that seemed to update everything i needed. I Don't really have any real taxing games. Skyrim though does look very good, super super smooth cranked up Thanks!

 

I did the device manager update, and now according to CCC my drivers are old so I installed that..again I think, still seems to only register the on-board video.

I also noticed this error at the bottom "Driver Install: the driver package does not specify a hardware identifier"

 

I'm not near as computer savy as alot of people on hear. All i can say is using the driver from the link in my last post, did update both my onchip and card drivers. I also did see the error in the log, it referred to to an hdmi audio if i remember correctly. In device manager my hdmi still shows it's working. I don't have anyway to test if that is true though. Seems like i saw something in an earlier post here or somewhere else that if you do a custom install you can prevent that. Don't quote me on that because I'm a newbie

 

Man I hope I didnt make a mistake buying this laptop. Picked it up from new egg for 1099 no tax free 2 day shipping. It comes tomorrow. I read EVERY page of this thread... so i know that out of the box ill benchmark it then im going to wipe the harddrive and install win 7. benchmark with windows 7 and then install 13.1 over the msi drivers (not sure if i should use CCC to install 13.1 or if i should manually get them from the amd webpage). once thats done ill test the brightness to makesure its still working. if its still working ill make it so it fixes the HDMI Audio. Then ill benchmark using 13.1

HOPEFULLY from there on out, im all good. I just hope i dont have the problems of not being able to see the 7970 and dear god i hope i dont have dead/stuck pixels.

But I may just not open it and pay newegg the return shipping... because I can get a Sager 15.6'' with the i7 3930qm and the 7970m for $1450 and not have to worry about bottlenecks and the like.

Wishing I didnt buy from newegg though, their return policy sucks. Should have looked in to that more but thats my fault.

 

Don't act like a troll!

 

.... ??

 

I can assure you i am not trolling in anyway. Im voicing my concerns and hoping that you people, the community whom have experience with this laptop, can shed some light on my dilemma.

To add to my situation, I'm selling my desktop computer (i7 2700k, 8gigs 1600mhz corsair ram, GTX 670, 80gb raptor 10,000rpm HD). Im under cutting myself but i got both the cpu and gpu for free so no matter which way i slice it im making a profit. I have two people coming to look at it tomorrow and both are offering somewhere around $550 - $650. Since ibought the GX 60 off of new egg with 170 of it being newegg giftcards, after return shipping I guess i would have about 900. add 600 from selling my desktop and together thats 1500. I could easily get the sager with a 3630qm and 7970m and not have to worry much about bottlenecks and i would also know that i'd be able to upgrade both the cpu and gpu at a later date.

if only there was confirmation that the next set of cpu/apu from amd will be compatible with the GX60. if so, i wouldnt second guess it..but as it is now..idk man.. idk..

of course this would mean being w/o a pc for awhile but i have a ps3, vita, and friends to hang out with so I do believe I would survive quite easily.

I have to make my decision soon, however. =/

thanks for listening. and if anyone has any input, that would be appreciated.

 

If you're worried about bottlenecks, go with the Lenovo y580/MSI GE60/Asus N56VZ instead. For $1500, I think you can get an MS-16F3 barebones with 680m or Alienware m17x r4 with 7970m (if you find a great deal), both of which I would choose over the Sager. Why did you buy the laptop from Newegg instead of an MSI reseller?

 

Lenovo 580 is worse than GX60. Don't know about the others.

 

I had $170 in MSI giftcards. =/ thus making the laptop about $940 for me

 

not many people post here anymore.

is the laptop dead?

 

Haha what? There's been about 7 posts in the last day. What's your definition of active?

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk 2

 

If you want responses, post a question.

You posted a bunch of irrelevant stuff about your situation, that sounds a lot like trolling. If you can pay for more, and demand the most, then get more. Don't complain about this laptop that might not be good enough for you, or complain about Newegg, or explain how much you are selling your desktop for, etc...

Your first post on the site was "Man I hope I didnt make a mistake buying this laptop." In a thread about people that have purchased this laptop. Seeing as it is a first post, perhaps you dont know forum etiquette or maybe you do and were banned and have come back as "decoy"

Anyway, then you had some good input about your plan for the machine
"Picked it up from new egg for 1099 no tax free 2 day shipping. It comes tomorrow. I read EVERY page of this thread... so i know that out of the box ill benchmark it then im going to wipe the harddrive and install win 7. benchmark with windows 7 and then install 13.1 over the msi drivers (not sure if i should use CCC to install 13.1 or if i should manually get them from the amd webpage). once thats done ill test the brightness to makesure its still working. if its still working ill make it so it fixes the HDMI Audio. Then ill benchmark using 13.1"

But its all pointless, as you might just not even open it, so why do we care about your plan that will never be? Did you come for some reassurance that the last 98 pages didn't give? And you never asked a question to respond to.

 

Clearly its much different than yours. hahahaha.

I just set up my RMA with newegg. I didnt open the laptop. Im going to pick up the Sager NP9150 from xotic with the 7970m for 1450

I dont recall complaining about the latop, tommy. Also there were many other people who posted ''irrelevant'' stuff and I dont see you jumping on them. Was i banned and came back? No, im quite new here. But im no stranger to forum etiquette. I figured people here were a friendly bunch but you seem to be proving otherwise.

As for some reassurance that the 98 pages didnt give, I cant answer this. Im very indecisive and over all I'm just worried about the longevity and performance in my games. All i've encountered on the GX60 have been benchmarks done by websites and most of them were done back in october before many updates have came out.

You want a question? Heres a question.

"Has the GX60's performance significantly gone up since its debut back in october? I ask because I hope the performance is better than when most websites benched it showing bottlenecks and/or bad results at times.''

 

Finally, a good question, and if you read every page of the thread, then users have posted significant gains from driver updates. So much as to even sacrifice brightness control for better performance with Beta drivers. etc..

So, now where have we gotten? That you never even gave it a try, but told us how its too limited for you. Would any energy someone put in here have even swayed your indecision? Had you waited until today, then none of us would have known you thought so little of this laptop and were selling your desktop at a discount, but not really since you got certain pieces for free.

 

Catalyst 13.2 beta 6

http://www2.ati.com/drivers/beta/AMD_Catalyst_13.2_Beta6.exe

 

Calm down Tommyboy. You're acting like an elitist. We're here to help people as a community. Be it helping them with the actual product or helping them make a decision that's good for them. Your misplaced anger and chastising is not good towards new people. Even if he is a bit off the mark on your "forum etiquette"

Decoy: if you're worried the best advice is to with peace of mind. You can't put a price on that. As I just got this laptop last week I upgraded from a gateway fx. If you're okay with spending less now and getting something better later, then do that. But if you want the peace of mind, return it and get your saver.

 

You can calm yourself Ghost if you think simple common sense is elitist, no anger here. By the way, your post is pointless, since he is already returning the laptop, making his posts pointless as I figured to begin with. Was your purchase a mistake or dead as he put it?

 

I regret buying the laptop a bit. It's not bad the the a10 does noticeably hold back the 7970 in Starcraft 2, guild wars 2 WvW, and a very select few others.

If the next CPU set is comparable the. All worry its out the window. But as it stands now its a nail biter.

As for common sense, you need to relax. Stop bashing the guy for Christ sake.

You made no attempt to give pros and cons to the sager or reassure that the laptop isn't bad. He is/was clearly conflicted and is/was looking for reassurance. Sometimes reading through 99 pages doesn't do anything because nothing was directed at that specific individual. But please try to be a tad more friendly

 

That's wierd, that Starcraft II lags for you bro.

Did you run it with forced turbo on A-10?

I tested it for few matches on ULTRA and it ran without any lag on my GX60.

 

Perhaps I meant you had no common sense, so just relax and quit bringing it up, the guy asked for a response, so I gave him an explanation on why his first post warranted no response. Its that simple.

 

Okay whatever I'm done with it and you.

And yeah I've forced 2.7ghz and the Dgpu is on and I have maybe 25 fps. Changing resolution and graphic quality does little due to the bottleneck

 

25 fps?

I get like 50-60 fps on my GX60 on maximum settings...

There must be something wrong with your CCC settings or drivers, because A-10 is not as weak as you think.

RTS games love quad cores and A-10 is a quad core, so Stacraft II should run great, try to verify your settings.