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

It can run ok, modding a 240w brick is the best Ide if you intend to overclock.

 

Hey all. I posted earlier in the thread about upgrading to a 970m and potential issues.

MSI GT70 0NE 276US
i7-3610QM CPU @ 2.30GHz
GTX 970m 6GB (Blue card)
Bios: E1762IMS.71X (Unlocked by Svet)
Build Date & Time: 03/28/2014 16:51:11
EC: 1762EMS1 Ver 4.10
EC Build: 06/06/2012
vBios: 84.04.22.00.11
IGFX Vbios: 2126
ME FW Version 8.1.0.1248
Windows 7 install with a RAID setup
Ivy Bridge

I modded my old 680m heatsink, and everything worked alright. I put in the new video card with my old 30M bios and encounted horrific compatiblilty issues with the video. Immediately after that, I flashed my bios to Svets unlocked 71X and the card was recognized but identifies as "Standard VGA graphics adapter". I have since tried using a modified INF but I still cannot get any drivers to install. I am not sure if I am doing the modified INF correctly.
Beyond that, I also have a few other weird issues. I curently cannot change the brightness of my screen at all. It seems locked at bright. I am not sure if this is an issue because of the video card yet. We will see if i can fix this. Additionally, since the bios update, I can no longer access my recovery partition to reinstall my windows 7 OS. Pressing the F3 key now just brings up a boot menu, and the only option is to boot windows 7. Has anyone else had this issue with using Svets unlocked bios?

 

Have you tried the normal .71x bios?

 

Update for me. Consulting with Svet. He helped me with my modded INF, and the drivers installed properly. So I now have a working blue 970m card in my GT70 0NE.

My final specs are

MSI GT70 0NE 276US
i7-3610QM CPU @ 2.30GHz
GTX 970m 6GB (Blue card)
Bios: E1762IMS.71X (Unlocked by Svet)
Build Date & Time: 03/28/2014 16:51:11
EC: 1762EMS1 Ver T.24
EC Build: 04/08/2014
vBios: 84.04.22.00.11
IGFX Vbios: 2126
ME FW Version 8.1.0.1248
Windows 7 install with a RAID setup
Ivy Bridge

The issue with my brightness not working anymore was a compatibility issue between my old EC drivers. Once I flashed them from V4.10 to T.24 everything began working as it did before.

The only issues I have unresolved with this upgrade now, are the loss of being able to access my recovery partition. I will have to get my hands on a Windows 7 install disc or create one. This shouldn't be much trouble, but it certainly isn't as convinient as having my partition available whenever I needed a quick format/reinstall.

Additionally, my 970m is now running permenently. I cannot get my computer to ever use the onboard video anymore. I've yet to research how to solve this, if there is even a way. We will see in the future if I can get this one taken care of. I'd rather not have my 970m running all the time if possible.'

And lastly, I'm now using the modded inf and drivers, which are a little dated compared to Nvidia drivers they are releasing. I would rather be able to upgrade to regular Nvidia drivers, but it still works. And I'm happy with that.

 

Derelict613 I think its been documented fairly well throughout this thread about the requirement for GT60/70 laptops older than the Haswell generation requiring modded INF drivers with the upgrade. I'm not sure about why the current Nvidia drivers won't work. I have to assume its possible Nvidia is messing with our abilities to upgrade our laptops or something. I'm glad you've got it running though and I'm sure its a great upgrade.

As far as the GPU running all the time instead of switching to the Intel gfx, I think that has also been mentioned previously. That seems to only be an issue with the laptop versions prior to Haswell revisions. If you can't get it resolved I will add a note to the first page for future upgraders.

 

Eh guys question... I'm planning to get myself an ivy mobile extreme processor maybe 3920xm or 3940xm. I saw several mobile processor on ebay but they don't accept shipping the item other than the shipping address indicated on my credit card and on my paypal.. if I push my transaction thru ebay, the costume tax here in my country is too much which I don't want to do. I've browsed rjtech.com but it seems that the best ivy bridge they offer is only a 3630QM..

I'm not from the U.S. but I have a friend who stays there and will visit in my country this December... Do you have any suggestions on where I can get myself a mobile extreme processor that I can buy and who accepts international credit card and ship it to my friend in the US? just to make it less cheaper for me to get one.. Many thanks who will reply to my post

 

Omega, I bought my 3920XM off of eBay for around $300 US. You may want to check there as I know some of the vendors I saw were based in China. So you may be able to find one that will work with payment for you and get it quicker than the US.

Here's one from China: http://www.ebay.com/itm/INTEL-i7-39...186729?hash=item35ed574729:g:olUAAOSwNSxVcIjf

and another from Hong Kong. http://www.ebay.com/itm/Free-shippi...549335?hash=item20f886fbd7:g:lAQAAOSwDNdVrteL

Perhaps these could work for you? These prices are in line with what I paid. If you can find someone from the US willing to ship internationally and take payment, you can negotiate. I think I took a $300 US price and got them down to $270.

If you have to go the US route, there are a couple things I suggest. Take a look at Visa Travel Money, Mastercard Travel Card, or American Express Serve for prepaid cards. Perhaps another option is to Paypal your friend some money and he can order it for you, then send it to you? The US is tight on wire fraud and money laundering, so this can be a bit tricky. The main thing they want is to tie transactions to a specific person so that's avoided. It can make things a pain for the honest folk.

If you have the settings in Svet's bios that can change the clock, I'm willing to mess around with mine. Main thing is I think I know where the settings are, but they're cryptic and I don't want to mess anything up.

 

@superguy25

Thanks for the suggestion. There are also vendors here in asia that sells extreme mobile proc.. My problem is, is that customs here in my country are crocodile hungry when they see imported items they tax heavily items especially when it comes to electronics. Not like when you purchase an item and send it to U.S. which tax is not too much compared here. I did wire transfer before when I purchased a 970m with rjtech. If you have another merchant you know of who sell's extreme mobile processor like with rjtech who sell's affordable mxm gpu's then can post it here.

I'll only take advantage of the situation where my friend is staying in NY and will come here to visit on December.

Btw.. there are settings on the bios that you can fiddle with. in the advance option or cpu option there are four settings for the quad speed of the processor. there you can set the frequency settings manually. Or get the Intel Extreme Utility. It works with me but only thru fsb cos my 3610qm is the limiting factor when it comes to oc'ing my laptop. You should also be needing a 240 watts adapter for standard ocing' (for both the gpu and cpu). If you're really serious to ocing then get the 330 watts dell adapter. Those dell adapters are the safest adapters that can be used for our msi gaming notebooks.

 

That sucks. Customs can be brutal. Maybe you can ask them to ship it in an Ex-Lax box?

I think your best bet's probably to work something out with your friend then.

 

Hmmm, in looking at power considerations with the power brick, it looks like I can either keep the 3920XM and go with a 970m, or put the 3630QM back in and go with a 980m. It appears that having both the 3920XM and the 980m could suck more power than the brick can supply, and potentially lead to throttling.

Since I use this laptop for work as well, and will be running VMs, I'm leaning toward the former. Thoughts?

 

Mod a 240W brick and have both

 

How do you do that? I think Omega or Talon did that, but I didn't see details on how to do it. Is it hard to do?

 

or you can just get this instead of modding http://www.dx.com/p/wb-5525-7-4-x-5...for-dell-hp-laptops-black-339274#.VjOKAX4rKUl did not test it yet ....but person on another forum said he was using smt like this . I plan on getting a brick and testing but i do not know how soon that will happen

 

Thanks.

Are the GT60s firmware limited to 180W?

 

well i don't think so if you have the one from svet .....at least i don;t think on ivy bridge ...but either way ...it should provide those 180w in a cleaner less stressful manner considering the beefier power brick

 

The more I thought about it, and considering my employer is paying for my repair, I'm just going to do the 970m again and call it good. I'll just wait until Pascal comes out to do any serious upgrades.

 

hm ...i had question .....do you guys think a 965m wll also work ? cause considering the **** salaries in Romania ....i think that is the most i can get .....

 

I would think so. You may need a modified INF driver though. I also looked at going that way, but Eurocom was charging as much for a 965m here as another shop was for a 970m.

 

yea well i found a shp in Germany that sells it for 300 dollars shipped ...including vat .....and the 970m is 550 dollars shipped ...so yea ....a pretty big difference for me .....i have someone in the states that could order it from Rjtech for 450 dollars .....but even that would be strech for me ....i really want to replace my 675mx ....it's doing ok ....but i really want at least 960 desktop like performance .....so i will take the 965m and oc it as much as the temps allow ....don't want to go above 75 ....cause i plan n keeping the laptop fr another 2-3 years

 

That seems like a good price. Definitely worth considering.

RJTech seems to have the best prices on cards here in the US. $450 for 970m is pretty good. Amazon wanted like $475 for a 965m and $620 for a 970m thru Eurocom. No thanks.

The GT60/70 is a solid machine and still a strong performer. The ability to upgrade it has made it last a lot longer than a soldered on card. Skylake has made me consider getting a new card, but I'm short on cash too. I'm thinking with seeing how the newer capabilities like TB3 shake out, Nvidia's Pascal, and waiting for prices on PCI-e SSDs to come down will make waiting worth it in the long run. And with a suped up GT60, waiting is easy.

 

It isn't hard to do but if you have a friend who knows how to solder then have him solder the original wire from your msi adapter to your new 240 watts.. just get a multimeter and have your pos and neg check first so you know which is which to solder.. better yet is to google.

Promise once you have a 240 watts adapter or even a 330watts. you'll feel the difference especially when you tweak your nb

btw.... hunting for extreme mobile proc again lol

 

That is one good advantage for sandy bridge and ivy bridge nb.. They don't have a limit wattage exceeding 180watts compared to a haswell. I think that's why Talon sold his nb for this though but i'm not sure, just a guess hehe

 

Any of the machines using NOS are hardware limited.

 

Yup, they are all limited by EC firmware.
There's a reserved amount that the hardware itself can withstand but for safety measure MSI has locked this down by default.

 

Сan you help me? I ordered the GTX 970 m, and has decided to prepare her for this video card BIOS. My laptop GT70 0ND (Ivy Bridge) with Windows 7, I was scared firmware to 51x, but I still did it and I am having 2 problems. Upgrede using AFUDOS 2.36, flashed at 51h then wanted to sew unlock 51x, an error "Error: Problem getting flash information". and also now writes for any firmware, no matter how the BIOS was not trying to sew. - It is one I have a problem if you know - help.
2 problem - the screen brightness does not work after flashing at 51x, is there a firmware update and how to sew so all was well? or just install Windows 7 is correct

 

I noticed that the first post only links to the unreleased GT60 bios for the Ivy Bridge based notebooks. Is that a mistake? That bios cannot be used for GT70 notebooks as it will brick them and I feel that should be stated explicitly.

I tried to send a PM to Talon to update the first post but I don't think I have permissions for that. In any case, I have the GT70 51x bios and can send it to him to host somewhere and link to in the first post.

 

If you have a 51x bios or the latest one then your only concern is to mod the heatsink fan only and all is set to go. Remember that the Ivy bridge Gt60 and GT70 difference is only the size of the LCD screen.

 

But what about sager/clevo laptops?

 

Any suggestions for the best way to remove the X bracket? on the 970m? I'm thinking a hair dryer and being very careful.

 

Fixed. If you have the GT70 51x BIOS I'd love to link it. Thanks.

 

I PM'd you. I am a bit concerned about using a hair dryer anywhere near anything electronic. Some of them can get seriously hot. The glue isn't that strong. If you do decide to proceed that way, use a lower heat setting if available and make sure to hold the blow dryer at a safe distance first. I would even consider covering the other parts with tin foil, not wrapping *edit*

 

Thanks. The glue seemed pretty tough last time, so I was trying to find an easier way to do it. I used the plastic applicator for Gelid thermal paste last time as it was like a flat, plastic spatula. Even a little pressure was enough to knock them off and loosen them.

Needless to say, I'm gong to be careful, but I'm still nervous about it. You flying thru BWI this weekend?

 

I use a very thin screwdriver and push through. If you get the glue hot, you will get the solder for the SMDs and make them more likely to break off.

 

I pretty doubt that melting temperature of solder is lower than glue's one. But yeah, it's expensive peace for test.

 

Thanks for the tips.

Card should be here tomorrow, so wish me luck on round 2.

 

I have no idea how to send a private PM with this retarded bulletin board software. Send me a private message please and I will link to where its hosted.

Thanks

 

Nothing is here. Posts needs to be deleted.

 

Back in business, fellas. Card came today. Got it in and all seems to be working well! Had to use a modified INF, but that wasn't much of a surprise.

Interestingly enough, it's running an earlier bios revision than my old one.

Thanks all for the tips on popping off the bracket. It came right off.

 

I have a feeling this card will last you just a tad longer.

 

Lol I certainly hope so! All seems well so far. I haven't had the chance to game on it, but it ran Firestrike just fine.

 

Hi Guys, Just a quick question, I know the GTX 980M runs alot hotter than the GTX970m card on the MSI GT70. Has any one figured out a better cooling solution for the GTX980M card when using an MSI GT70 xx model?. My GTX 970M runs just as cool as the GTX770M. I am thinking of upgrading to a GTX980M but at the back of my mind I know it will be slightly hotter than my GTX 970M card.. Has any one tried to Mod the MSI GT70 xx model heat sink for the GTX 980m card?
Thanks

 

The 970M and 980M have identical PCB layouts, so anything you do for one will impact the other.

 

I know but the MSI GT70 dominator where made with gtx970m and the gtx 980m where used in the GT 72 because they use a better cooling solution. I dont think MSI GT70 used any GTX980m .
Thats why I am asking has any more come up with a better cooling solution for the GT70 with a 980m card?

 

The cooling solution kept up with the GTX780M, it's more down to market positioning of each of the models rather than any cooling restrictions.

 

Hello guys, before i wrote about fps cap in windows 10 ,is there any solution for this ? In full screen there is fps cap (60 fps) , but in windowed mode i am getting full fps without any cap. Somebody using windows 10 ? Thanks

 

Vsync on? Turn it off through nvidia drivers control panel.

 

No, it is closed, also closed in game options, and game dvr closed in xbox settings(somebody was saying reason is because of it), i dont have any fps cap windows 8.1 but in windows 10 capping, all settings is same both of them

 

Hey everyone, I just purchased the gtx 980m 8gb version. Can't wait to get this guy up and running. I have heard people mention something about it running hotter than the 780m. is this true? I thought this graphics card was made to run slightly cooler due to the newer architecture. Also, what are your guys thoughts about the whole installation process? Easy? Hard? I am just trying to get as much knowledge as possible before installing this card. Any tips would help. Thank you.

 

Installing is easy, firstly be sure true bios and firmware for your computer. Then remove your fan, then heatsink and you will see gpu, when you put new card , you will apply thermal paste, there is some videos on youtube , can watch them, after finish installing, flash vbios, then try with nvidia driver, if not work (black screen or something like this) try with prema vbios and modded driver from laptop2go, but be sure when you install close windows driver signing, you will find it at startup setup. Good luck to you

 

That doesn't sound too bad. My current setup is gt60-2od with gtx 780m and intel 4700mq. My current bios version is E16F4IMS.50V but I am not sure which firmware I need to install. There are 2 on MSI website with firmware version I have to install since i have the back lit keyboard. Also, is flashing the vbios necessary in order to properly install the 980m?