The Official MSI GT60/70 970m/980m Upgrade Thread

Interestingly enough, my laptop went from being detected as a GT60-0ND (even with the swap to a 3920XM) to just a pain old GT60.

Another thing to comment about the heatsink is that the 970m didn't fit perfectly inside the copper rectangle. It's just a little wider one way and narrower the other. Fit the electronics comments that didn't match up, I just used the Clevo thermal pads and put them in the equivalent space in my heatsink.

Obviously a 7xx/8xx heatsink would have been a better fit, but the temps seem to be fine with this one.

 

GT60-0LD? GT60-0NC?

 

Lol bios now just says GT60.

 

Lol Welcome to the real world... You will inherit my signature. Oh and by the way that heatsink you posted will work fine because we do have the same model. I just upgraded mine to a 780/880m heatsink afterwards.

 

Yeah I wasn't too worried about it when I saw the temps. They seemed to be in line with what everyone else posted.

 

It's amazing it went from Fermi to kepler to maxwell

 

Execuse me , i saw now your message. My bios version 84.04.22.00.09

I don't know it is clevo vbios or msi vbios. I asked my manufacturer , they told this is msi card. I didn't update vbios. Just i opened my computer , and i saw this vbios version

 

Yeah and it keeps on getting stronger and upgradeable friendly

 

Does anyone know if we have a 970/980m overclocking thread? I'm just wondering what sort of results are realistic with my 970m.
I upped the core 135 & 200 on the memory which gave a 500 point fire strike boost. In gaming the fps increased a few too. I'm just wondering if clocking the core or memory gives the best results and what people have managed to reach with theirs.
While gaming temps sit around 72C playing Evil Within (found that game likes to cook things)

Mick

 

That's exactly what I needed, thanks!
Hopefully it all goes smoothly.
Which method is the easiest or preferred way to update the BIOS?

 

The PDF explains it and is super easy to follow. You just need to basically out the files on a usb stick and reboot and enter the bios update system.

 

Hey marshall, sorry for the late reply, but i had a busy weekend....
You don't need another inf file for this VBIOS. the standard voltage is a bit higher so you have a bigger overclock potential but that means the temps are up too. I changed back to the clevo original VBIOS because of the temps.
I just game on my laptop and the standard 970m is fast enough for high settings....

The PREMA MOD is very cool and the scores are great and stable but i just don't want to game with the fan on max..

 

I've just have my 980m working fine with bumblebee in ubuntu. If somebody wants more info I can post it here.

 

Just in case of a bad flash is there a way to recover?

 

Yeah I would like to know what the options are I'm thinking of flashing mine to the msi vbios. I dont need any extra overclocking of voltage mods, as the stock 970m seems to work fine with everything so far. It would be nice to not have to use a 'hacked' driver.
Dunno if its worth the risk tho

Mick

 

I have tried three vbios so far.. premamod, svl7, and stock and all required the modified inf. file. I would not call that a "hacked" driver though... it's just a modified inf so that the installation software recognizes the device ID as a 970M. Not even close to hacked. The only difficult part is that the modified inf is then not recognized as part of a signed driver package and requires temporarily allowing Windows to install unsigned drivers.

I have noticed a few things about the GT60 with the GTX 790M and so far the upgrade to the 970M has been just amazing. But I've seen discussions primarily on other boards of throttling due what some have incorrectly defined as a power issue (not enough power to the machine). I think this is completely false. I have measured no significant overall power demand increase between my old card and the new card... irrespective of core and memory speed settings. I have also recorded that I'm at least 15% away from max power output. In addition, I've noticed no overheating of the power brick which is also a dead give away to power issues when a brick is exceeding it's limits. I have however seen throttling now on several occasions and in every case it's had to do with temps, and interestingly mostly CPU temps. The new GPU will only exceed 80C using Kombustor (MSI tool) but never runs hot in any game or 3d mark. However, my CPU has exceeded 80C and I've now seen up to 50% throttling and only so far explicitly due to the CPU temps rising (nothing to do with power in).
Keep in mind I have not overvolted CPU or GPU thus far and I also do not have a higher wattage cpu that some of you do have. This is my opinion but keep an eye out for throttling and note your cpu and gpu temps.

After testing the three vbios I have settled on the svl7 vbios as the gpu runs cool and yet I also have the most control over settings.
There is also a great set of tools out there to set temp / fan speed profiles for the CPU and GPU (Fan Control Tools by Pherein version 1.0.3). I may make them available (they are already available elsewhere in the forum) but the bottom line is you can set the trigger temp and fan speed for both cpu and gpu. It's written for the 16F2 but the control chips are the same in 16F3 (and I believe 16F4) so if you choose your board as 16F2 it will work just fine. It does require re-applying settings on re-power but it's great.

With svl7, I am overclocking the core +220 mhz and memory +650 mhz without any issues and current firestrike score over 7100 (without voltage increase on CPU or GPU).

 

Unfortunately not. The only way is reflashing the BIOS chip (desoldering it or getting an already flashed chip and soldering it in place of the bad one) or RMA your notebook.
Personal (and painful) experience unfortunately.

 

Honestly this should NEVER happen unless YOU modified your own bios and either way much less likely to happen with vbios
especially if a bios has been tested on a compatible machine. You should not have a bad flash if you:
1) flash the bios or vbios using the proper tools and follow the proper steps.
2) you perform your flash with everything stable with stock settings.

If this is only about vbios on a GT60 then it's unlikely you will have issues even if it fails as long as the gpu remains "live" because you will at least have video from the embedded intel chip which is half the battle (i.e. black screen due to vbios issue with just one gpu installed). There are switches and commands for nvflash to force a flash if necessary as well.

FYI, over my 20 years tinkering with computers I've flashed various bios over 30 times without issue.

 

My MSI 980m runs at 86ºC. I don't know if it's normal or not.

 

Thanks for the info I was hoping to change the clevo vbios to msi's to enable the use of Nvidia's drivers without the need of a modified inf file. But from what you've said it sounds like if I flash to the msi vbios I'll still have to use a modified inf for each new driver?

Agreed on being very happy with the 970m, its a great gpu! With regards to any throttling, my setup is different to most here as my laptop is already a modified GX660, with upgraded cpu and gpu, and I also have a more powerful power brick.
The great thing about the 970m for me is that it runs faster, colder and I believe draws less power than the 7970m I've taken out. So win,win,& win

The only type of throttling I have experienced, is like you said when temps get too high, and it was the cpu reaching 100C during prolonged gaming with all cpu cores unlocked (throttlestop) & overclocked, and an overclocked gpu...So quite a bit of heat. Once that had happened I knocked the core clocks down a bit to keep the temps reigned in.

Ive just been playing Evil Within, and the temps were CPU: 89c (unlocked&overclocked) & GPU: 73C (stock)

Mick

 

Thanks for the info.
Decided not to flash since someone is interested in buying my GT60 ,so unless the back off im not going to risk it.
thanks for everyones great info, but selling it to a friend for a great price so I might just be looking for a new laptop instead.

 

you can't use an msi vbios . msi vbios works only with haswell because the bios recognizes that gpu. for GT60-ONE or ivy bridge nb. there's no release of a new gpu for the bios to read it so you need a clevo vbios to run the 9xxm card. I tried it and leads to blank screen in windows.
If you still not satisfied with what I said then update your gpu to msi vbios.

 

Thanks for clearing that up Omega, that would be quite a problem if I tried the msi vbios. Think I will leave well alone then

 

Nvidia put out new drivers today. Has anyone tested them?

 

Release notes.
http://us.download.nvidia.com/Windows/347.52/347.52-win8-win7-notebook-release-notes.pdf

 

Thanks. I'm mainly curious about performance improvements and overclocking ability though.

 

Hmm, perhaps we will have to wait till Svet has tested the driver with enough amount of users to confirm.

 

I've not tried them, but looking over in the graphics card section, it looks like the overclocking is still broken in 347.52

 

Yep!!! Tested it and still a no go when it comes to oc'ing 9xxm gpu's. Ver 345.05 from asus (with modified .inf) is the the last batch that can use afterburner, inspector etc.
Driver 347 is a no go for tweaking gpu guys.

 

What breaks OC'ing?

I haven't OC'ed a graphics card in ages, let alone on a laptop. Is it something Nvidia hosed in the driver, or disabled? Or that Afterburner can't talk to the driver?

 

Nvidia messed around with the clocking system due to throttling reports and this is a side effect.

 

Have they acknowledged this issue? Is it only for mobile gpu's?

 

Driver-caused since Nvidia wants to stop people from doing overclocking.

 

Not great news, I hope they change their minds. I'd of thought that catering for the enthusiasts is what helps things move forward. Have Nvidia decided that you can now only be a desktop enthusiast!

Really poor decision

 

I think I'll stick with my 780m a little longer until Nvidia solves this issue (I hope).

 

Hello everyone, so I just kicked in the GT60 club yesterday, I got a pretty good GPU (GTX 870m) can't say the preformence is low or anything but was wondering if I can and should upgrade to the GTX 980M atm, and if I can in total or should I wait for the 1xxx series? Can I brick the video card/Laptop when flashing the VBios?
Would be nice if I could get some answers since I've been looking for them in more then 20 pages now and I cant seem to find am XD

Laptop model:MSI GT60 2PC Dominator
Intel core i7-4710MQ
Nvidia GTX 870M

And will it bottleneck if I throw in a GTX 980m?

 

I wouldn't worry about it bottlenecking. However, the 870 is a pretty decent card, despite running hot. The 980M isn't a cheap upgrade - you're looking at $720 USD plus shipping at a minimum. If your 870 plays everything you want well at your desired settings, I don't see a need to upgrade.

I'd expect the next series to be out sometime in the fall. Think about how long you plan to keep this laptop. Take a look at your gaming plans and until then and if the 870 will meet your needs, I'd keep the cash. Keep in mind Skylake is also expected to be out in the fall, and should be a big game changer. It may be worth holding on to the cash and putting it toward a new laptop when that comes out.

You can, of course, try to sell your 870 and defray the costs of the upgrade. I decided to do it as I couldn't justify a new laptop with what's out there currently compared to what I have now, plus what's expected later this year.

 

for those who live in the US
i've ordered the 980m card from rjtech and inserted my borderlinx address ( a virtual address that you can ship your stuff to , and then ship them from there to your original address abroad ) .
rjtech says on the website that shipping takes around 5 business days to get to your address in the US .it's been around 8 business days and the card didn't arrive yet
so..for those who orderd the card through rjtech , how much time did it take for the arrival of the card ?

 

Did you do UPS or US mail? It would have been 5 business days plus processing (he shipped it 2 days after order) to my place on the east coast via UPS ground. It came in 2 days by mail. It had to be signed for though which was a bit of a challenge.

I'd check to see if any delivery attempts were made, and hopefully your servicer had someone to sign for it.

 

i don't know which one is UPS and which one is US mail . because i didn't order it my self
here in lovely egypt , when you want something from the US , you have to make it through a middle man.that middle man takes care of everything and then takes around 5% of the item you purchased as a fee
my middle man paid 20 USD for internal shipping . don't know what is that ,UPS or mail .
and he says my stuff hasn't arrived to the assigned address yet . so i figured i'd ask the people who actually has the luxury of living in the US
i freakin' envy every single one of you

 

I'm guessing it was probably sent UPS then, and I'm guessing your handler is on the east coast. That would be 5 business days ground. Pretty much a week. UPS is pretty consistent, but won't deliver on the weekend. So depending on the how quickly they shipped, and if there's a weekend in there, you're probably looking at 10-14 calendar days to get to your handler if everything goes well. Not sure how long your handler's processing time is, or if UPS screwed up somewhere along the way. That could add some extra time in there as well.

Hopefully it'll get there soon and be on its way to you. I can imagine your anxiety and excitement - it drove me nuts just after 2 days and messing with the post office to get it delivered. It'd be even more difficult with throwing a foreign country into the mix.

Good luck to you! :fingers crossed:

 

can anyone confirm that both their mini display ports are still working after the upgrade? I know mine were working with my gt60 with the 880m, my hdmi port works, and one of the display port connector works, the other does not with the 970, the laptop does react in that it momentarily turns the power LED red when i connect it. but no display detected in the nvidia control panel, tried with 2 different cables that both work fine in the other display port and another pc, Not the end of the world, and I don't want to risk changing back to the 880 just to test if it's the card or connector port. But it'd be nice to know if this is a result of card compatibility or if it's something on my end

 

Mine works fine. connected the hdmi cable (nb port to LED port) to a LED TV-3D and it works wonders.!!!! so no issues with me. make a fresh install of your windows and check it out again.

 

It could be a dodgy contact in the mxm slot for the output pins for that port.

 

Best to clean the metal contacts with alcohol, wait till they are dried, then try again.

 

Hm....

 

so it means that previous nvidia mobile drivers have bug issues so the driver's can be overclocked? What the F#!.. I hope someone out there can find a way to get back the old tweaking stuff for nividia drivers to "unsafeguard systems from operating outside design limits".

 

Tbh, I'm quite happy to stay on the 344.80 drivers as everything runs well and I can overclock if I fancy. Now if some super set of drivers come out that can better any overclocking gains then I might jump ship. But it's still a pile of poo Nvidia's stance

Mick

 

Actually it's ridiculous.
First off, overclocking is only possible for the people in the know and all they need is a disclaimer.
Second, people can smoke all they want costing the world $billions of dollars in healthcare costs and millions of years in lifespan but you can't overclock a notebook computer they want you to replace every two years??

 

Tsk tsk.. Nvidia made so many Nvidia haters nowawadays... For the meantime, is this a good update?