The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Interesting, I will check it out but I am pretty sure the control center on this TongFang QC7) (from komplett.se "Khameleon P9") don't have the possibility to run balanced mode with quiet fans. I assume it's possible downloading and testing control center for any brand as long it's a TongFang QC7.
Sorry, I just checked, and it's actually not possible. But, you can download the Eluktronics control center from their site. So I guess you have to use battery saver mode for quiet fans
Hey thanks for the input! I received my cyberpower version and was able to install the BIOS like you suggested. I also was able to add the control center, which is a million times better than the default one.
On a side note, does anyone have any pictures or videos of re-pasting the processors? I have done it many times before on other laptops, but I chickened out when trying to figure out how the heat sinks connected and what not.
Repasting is very easy on these. There’s two pieces of “foil tape” that you’ll need to lift up. One exposes a screw you’ll need to remove and the other does not.
Hi. Just wanted to share my thoughts on this laptop. I'm new to this forum. After hunting a while for new laptop, i'm settling with 1660 ti ver. Price wise around usd1130 in my country. Rebranded by local tech company. Comes with 512gb n 4gb ram only. First thing to do, upgrade to 2x8gb (usd69) + 1tb nvme (usd120). First impression, stunning by this beast. Minimalist design, nice black magnesium outer chassis without any sticker brand, good battery life, smooth trackpad, so2 ok keyboard n bling2 rgb lighting. For the keyboard, need time to adjust with the correct technique as it felt very different from the usual layout n chiclet style. The screen nice bright with accurate coloring. I can say, the performance top notch n value for money compare to other brand, as other brands cannot offer nice specs as this laptop. Inside, pre install with win10 pro, but it comes with no control center, no sound blaster n bios not update to the latest firmware. Thanks to this thread, Bob n Jarrod vids, I felt confident to bought this laptop n able to look up n update CC n bios from other company's site. Now, really impressed n enjoy with the performance for job related projects n part time gaming. It can handle well any game im in. Battlefield 5, NFS, COD MW n etc. Thanks again, hope this thread continues any give many2 more input in the future. Cheers.
I'm having an issue where I can't get the headphones sound setting to show when using a headset/mic splitter, as suggested in a thread I saw on Reddit. When I use the splitter it still displays 'Speakers (Realtek Audio)' in the sound settings.
Before trying a splitter, I uninstalled Realtek High Definition Audio and simply plugged my gaming headset in through the headset jack, and when I did this the headphones option was showing up and the audio quality in my games was much better. The downside was that my audio quality through the speakers was terrible as it was unable to use Sound Blaster, so I had to re-install Realtek.
I've updated all audio drivers and the Intel Smart Sound Technology but the problem still persists, and it seems that the only option if you want the headphones to appear is to remove Realtek.
Has anyone else experienced the same issue with headsets and did you find a fix?
Is anyone here using the Maingear Element? I'm asking because I'm curious about their use/recommendation of the "Intel Driver & Support Assistant" - see the Maingear download page:
I'm bought the MAG-15 1660Ti version recently and have been using it for around 5 days now. Admittedly I haven't gone through all 187 pages but I had been lurking around every now and then since the reviews came out. For the most part I really like it, the screen, weight and form factor. The battery life is great.
Unfortunately, I'm having an issue wherein my GPU usage (monitored via MSI Afterburner) hovers around 40-50% (Both in Gaming and Gaming+Eluktroboost). The games I have been playing are CSGO, The Witcher 3, and Dying Light. Now, for CSGO I can understand this but the same thing happens with The Witcher 3 and Dying Light. I know that the GPU has a 75C TL but I have seen others still hit 95%+ usage on similar titles.
But, when I connect my laptop to an external monitor borrowed from a friend using HDMI (BENQ 24" 1080p60Hz), my GPU utilization is 98-99% and I can see the FPS results are as expected. I'm not sure what is causing such behavior where on the laptop it is 40-50% and would appreciate any help with this (I did try the search feature but couldn't find someone with a similar problem). I tried going from BIOS 64 to 58 but that did not make a difference.
I have installed the latest drivers from the Eluktronics website. I installed GeForce experience with the latest NVIDIA drivers as well.
Any help resolving this is greatly appreciated. Please let me know if you require any other information.
Thanks for reading my post.
You my friend are running into something called Nvidia optimus. I'll give you an oversimplified explanation that's probably wrong in a few places, but it'll help you get the basic gist. I'm sure you know that most gaming laptops have both an integrated and dedicated GPU. The thing is for Optimus to work, the dGPU has to send frames through the integrated GPU. This means that on certain titles, the integrated GPU will actually be bottlenecking the dGPU. This happens especially on CPU bottlenecked games, high fps games, and low settings, as the CPU and integrated GPU share a power limit. However, the display port and HDMI outputs on most laptops are directly wired to the dGPU, so when you hook up an external monitor, the integrated GPU no longer acts as a bottleneck. The laptop review YouTube channel Jarrod Tech has a video showing the FPS boost from simply using an external monitor.
So in short, don't be worried, this is how it's supposed to act, even if we don't necessarily like it
Thanks for the reply StormFalcon. I do know about Optimus and iGPU, dGPU but I still think that having a utilization of 40-50% vs 98% is too big to be attributed to just Optimus. My FPS results are about 50% lower than when connected to a monitor. The Witcher 3 (I'm running on Ultra as well) shown in the video has a difference of 3-5 FPS and 6% overall. I know a friend with MAG-15 2070MQ and they have 95%+ utilization on the laptop screen as well. I request anyone here with the 1660Ti version to please test TW3 or any other modern title, to check if utilization and hence FPS is 50% of what it should be?
I've researched Nvidia optimus issues for YEARS and I know that dip isn't due to Optimus. Id recommend HWinfo64 and see if the GPU/CPU is power limit or thermal limit throttling. If the CPU is having issues especially, the CPU won't send commands fast enough to the GPU which might be leading to your dip.
UPDATE:
So I managed to "fix" the problem. I completely removed the iGPU and dGPU drivers and uninstalled the games. Reinstalled everything, restarted and now I'm getting the 98-99% utilization in TW3 and some other games. Somehow though Dying Light still has the same problem, but since the other games are fine, I now think that game itself has something weird going on which I am unable to figure out (I searched around for hours on Steam threads and Reddit but didn't find a similar issue). Thanks to this forum and in-particular to eddi3x3x3 and StormFalcon for their suggestions on this.
I installed RDR2 and man, that game looks amazing. Many of the graphics were preset to Ultra (others a mix of High/Med) and I get around 45-60 fps depending on the environment. For TW3, on Ultra I'm getting around 70-80 fps which is great. For Dying Light, I get 40-50 fps on laptop screen and 100-120 fps when on an external monitor. All the results are using MSI Afterburner and 75C TL on the GPU. GPU clocks around 1700-1800 MHz and CPU 3.8 - 4.0 GHz with temps around 80-85C
I haven't tried ASUS GPU Tweak II yet, but I read that maybe it doesn't work on BIOS 64? Is that true?
I can confirm this issue for my unit as well. With SoundBlaster enabled there is no separate channel for headphones and speakers like on my Dell laptop; it only says "Speakers (Realtek(R) Audio)" even if I have my headphones plugged in.
In my experience, the GPU seems to be power limited as soon as it goes over 75C, so even with Asus GPU tweak, it's not really possible to go past 75C on either eluktroboost or benchmark mode. That being said, I was testing with furmark, which seems to make weird things happen, so it may actually work on a normal game
New option to reduce minimum fan speed in Idle and low-load situations
Default value is 30%
You can now select 25% in BIOS Setup
Includes an option to continue running fan at 25% even at very low temperatures
The option is called "Disable passive cooling mode"
If you enable the option, the fans will not turn off at CPU temperature below 40°C anymore. This will make sure that skin temperatures are kept down in Idle and sudden on/off ramping of fan speed is avoided
This feature still has a little bug. Please check known issues below
Introduced new CPU and iGPU Undervolting mechanism in BIOS
Allows CPU Core Voltage Offset
GT and GTU (both iGPU) have no effect yet and are stuck at positive (+) values
The offset only allows safe negative values (no Overvolting)
The maximum voltage offset is -150mV. This is deemed to be safe as to not cause any reboot loops or security issues. A typical sweet spot that has almost zero chance of causing any random Bluescreen issues would be -80mV. If you ever encouter an issue, just reduce it in steps of 10mV until you find your safe level. Factory Default is -50mV.
Uncore (Cache) Voltage is supposedly set automatic 1:1 in Coffee Lake, thus does not need to be set manually in BIOS anymore. This explains why Intel has left it out.
New mechanism to manually adjust maximum battery charging level
Can be set either in BIOS Setup or Control Center
Supports 5 presets: 60%, 70%, 80%, 90%, 100%
For example: if you select 60%, the battery will not start charging if the current capacity is above 60%
This applies in real-time without reboot if you set it in Control Center
FnLock for F1 to F12
First, enable this feature in BIOS Setup or Control Center
Second, enable/disable FnLock on-the-fly by pressing Fn+Esc
FnLock will not operate during BIOS POST. This means, no matter if you have FnLock enabled, you can still reliably hit the F2 key to get into BIOS setup, without holding Fn
Performance Profile can be selected in BIOS Setup (Battery Saver, Balanced, Performance)
Update to BIOS 0114 by following the instructions in the PDF file, included with the download
Uninstall your current Control Center via Windows "App & Features"
Install the new Control Center
You can also do this in the reverse order (CC first, BIOS second), no problem
Please don't forget to Load BIOS Setup Defaults and re-enable Fast Boot after BIOS Update
You can install this update on any laptop based on Intel QC71, not only on XMG
It is reasonable to assume that your system vendor will also post these updates on their website soon
Known issues
The reduction of minimum fan speed still has an issue: the BIOS setting is overwritten by the Control Center. Current workaround:
Open Registry (regedit)
go to HKLM\SOFTWARE\OEM\GamingCenter\Features
Find "EnableFanDutyCycleReduction". It's probably at 0, change it to 1.
Reboot, go to BIOS Setup, change to 25%, Save and Exit
Reboot, finished
BIOS 0114 still shows an issue with the USB-C/DP adapter that we shipped with every XMG FUSION 15: the adapter does not connect if it is plugged in during cold boot or reboot. You have to unplug and replug it in order to make it work. The last workaround for this issue was in BIOS 0062. Intel is not going to include this workaround in future BIOS releases because they have determined that the problem is in the hardware of the USB-C/DP adapter itself. We are now communicating with the vendor of the adapter to see if they can fix this issue in future batches. Also, we are working on creating a short list of alternative adapters that don't show this behavior with BIOS 0114 and beyond.
Upcoming updates
Intel has confirmed that they are working on improving DPC Latency stability on a future update. From what I've heard, they already have implemented new solutions that are still being tested.
I actually think that BIOS 0114 already improved DPC Latency on my unit, but this might depend on your individual system and software/driver configuration.
To further discuss DPC Latency and Audio production on XMG FUSION 15, please move on this new thread
Previous major updates
Previous update from April 17, 2020
Thunderbolt 3 Driver v60 and Firmware v56 Update
This update is very important to fix some critical issues with Thunderbolt Devices and Power Delivery
It is strongly recommend to install these updates if you plan on using any Thunderbolt devices
The full solution was provided on April 17, 2020 with Firmware v56
So the checkmark under the fan mode means to keep fans always on. At least that's what I am seeing because the control center gives zero information on this button...
This is correct. It keeps the fan on at 25% or 30%, depending on your preferred setting in the BIOS-Setup.
You caught me in the act.
It's not broken.
Previous upload of Control Center had a few empty strings in the translation files and some of the blue ON/OFF buttons still looked off. If you have downloaded before 9:45pm CEST (German Time, June 3), please download again and reinstall.
Hi everyone i hope you are doing well, i just bought the qc7 from cyberpower since im from canada it was the cheapest option !
I was wondering if you guys could give me your opinion about drivers and bios which one have the best between eluktronics and xmg i plan on flashing my laptop so far xmg looks to be the fastest to update and has more features?
Some extended impressions (nitpicks) after several weeks of ownership:
I was messing around with MSI Afterburner's Voltage/Frequency curve editor, and after using the OC Scanner it suggested a ~200MHz OC. I tried that, but for some reason after that point my CPU power draw went from around 25-35W to 45-50W, which of course meant a corresponding increase in temps from around 75C to 90C. I'm not sure why that would happen or if it was directly related, but it was something I noticed. The OC itself seems stable so far. Benchmarked with Time Spy and Fire Strike Graphics and got 6372 and 16985 which is in the top 99 percentile for the notebook 1660 Ti and actually above average for the desktop 1660 Ti. Although with that aggressive an OC and the CPU seeming to draw much more power it did hit the thermal limit of 87C much faster.
I had an issue with the AX200 wifi card dropping connection at random; one workaround was to manually set the channel for the 5GHz radio band on the router instead of allowing it to switch automatically.
Monitoring and tweaking software like MSI Afterburner and Asus GPU Tweak II feels laggier than other programs. I think it's been mentioned in this thread previously, but it's not such a huge deal that I feel compelled to dig around for a resolution.
After several weeks of use, I do think that the keyboard has some objective flaws outside the scope of normal user break in. I vaguely remember this being mentioned in this thread before, but far too often the space bar doesn't register key presses. If I press the space bar lightly enough on one of the sides, it's pretty easy to actuate the switch and feel the tactile feedback without the action being registered. And overall the registration of key presses doesn't feel quite as reliable as with regular chiclet keys, even if the action of typing does feel nicer than on other laptops.
I've also noticed that the touchpad double-tap disable function on the top left gets activated far too easily from incidental palm contact. It's a fairly minor annoyance in the big picture, but it has occurred to me multiple times while gaming.
I also came across the issue where the laptop will awaken itself after several hours of sleep. After looking into it it seems like the problem is with transitioning from sleep state to a hibernation state. Because of that, I found the battery drained by 40% overnight when I left it unplugged. I disabled hibernation and will need to test if that allows the laptop to sleep properly overnight.
The touchpad also feels like there's a bit of play when you tap it, as if it isn't quite secured in place tightly enough. A minor detraction from the overall strong build quality impression, but still one nevertheless.
After downloading the audio drivers and Sound Blaster, I noticed that the audio output doesn't differentiate between headphones that are plugged in and the speaker. In comparison, on my old Dell whenever I had my headphones plugged in I could choose whether I wanted audio to play out of the headphones or the laptop speakers. That isn't an option here, meaning that whenever I unplug my headphones I need to remember to jack the sound all the way up on the speakers and vice versa for plugging them in.
After setting up the audio drivers, the microphone quality is also pretty bad in apps like Discord - this is bewildering, because the notebookcheck review points out how good the microphone sound quality is.
MSI afterburner lags when you use it in idle state of GPU, because its waking the GPU up and optimus is making it sleep again. This causes afterburner to lag and your power drain to increase. Those applications should only be used with GPU load, so while games.
XMG and aftershock have been the fastest to release control centre updates. XMG has been the clear leader in BIOS updates. Is there something about Eluktronics updates that makes them better?
Side note aftershock recommended XMG as a service centre in Europe for the vapour 15 pro and thanks Tom for posting.
I tried the non-Eluktronics Control Center and I didn't see a benchmark mode option - which I usually check when I jump into a more-graphically intense game. Not sure if the other control center implementations handle that sort of thing another way or if that sort of extra boost is a feature Eluktronics bakes in to their implementation.
we sometimes get reports on long'ish times for 'Wake from Standby' and Cold Boot.
I assume most of you have enabled "Fast Boot" in the BIOS Setup. From our FAQ:
Enable “Fast Boot”.
Enabling “Fast Boot” in BIOS is a requirement to use Microsoft’s “Hybrid Boot” technology which saves a lot of time on Cold Boot. Before shipping, we always enable “Fast Boot” in all XMG laptops – but it might get disabled by user operation. On some models, it might also get disabled during BIOS Reset. To make sure, you have “Fast Boot” enabled, follow these steps:
Reboot and enter BIOS Setup [F2]
Open [Boot] menu and enter [Boot Priority]
Find [Fast Boot] and set it to [Enabled]
Back in [Exit] category, select [Save Changes and Exit], Reboot
Clean Install
Now, to create some reference data based on latest updates, I did a clean Windows install on my XMG FUSION 15. My system is from the first mass production batch from Q3 2019.
My configuration:
i7-9750H
RTX 2070 Max-Q
SSD: 1TB Intel SSD 760p (PCIe/NVMe)
RAM: 2x 8GB Samsung M471A1K43BB1-CTD DDR4-2666
WiFi: Intel AX200
BIOS 0114
Install Procedure:
After I updated to BIOS 0114, I downloaded the latest Windows Install Media which includes Windows May 2020 Update, aka Windows 2004. With the Media Creation Tool I created my installation media on a USB 3.0 thumb drive.
During Windows install I deleted the partitions on my SSD. I created a 700GB partition for Windows and a 300GB partition for backups.
During Windows install, I disabled all Privacy-related options including CORTANA Voice Assistant.
During Windows install, I did not connect to my WiFi and I did not use any Microsoft account for Windows Login. Instead I created a local "XMG" account without any password.
After Windows install, I connected to WiFi and manually checked for Windows Updates. It took a few retries and reboots but eventually I got all drivers and updates there were available from Microsoft.
The Windows Updates put me up to Version 2004 (OS Build 19041.264)
After this I manually installed all drivers from our download portal.
After this, I installed HWiNFO64 and Steam. In Steam I only installed PCMark 10. I enabled the "Hibernate" option in Windows Power Settings.
After this, I disabled all items from "Startup" in Task Manager except those there are related to essential system drivers. Only these items remain 'enabled':
OEM
OSDTpDetect
Realtek HD Audio Universal Service
Clean Install Boot-up Times
Now, in this fresh and clean condition, I measure the time from pressing the power button to the first time I see the Wallpaper of the Login Screen. To be sure, this is not the Windows Desktop
yet. This is the first time the black screen (with boot logo) makes way for a full screen color image.
Reference Table
Fast BootOperationPlugged-in (seconds)On Battery (seconds) Disabled Cold Boot 27 -
Enabled Cold Boot 15 20
Enabled Boot from Hibernate 15 20
Enabled Wake from Standby 6 6
Further parameters:
My battery was at or close to 100% battery capacity during these tests
I was using the default 'Balanced' performance profiles during all tests
I was connected to WiFi, but enabling Flight Mode made no difference either
I was running the standard Factory Undervolt setting of -50mV CPU Core Voltage Offset, but setting it to 0 made no difference either
For Cold Boot and Hibernate, the first 7 out of 15 seconds are spent on a black screen before the XMG boot logo appears for the first time.
The 'seconds' values are taken with a stopwatch and generally rounded up
Analysis
Standby Wake-up at 6 and Boot from Hibernate at 15 seconds are not stellar but moderately acceptable. I have shared my latest results with Intel and asked them whether they can improve this on the current or future products. Considering that almost half of the boot time is spent on a black screen without XMG boot logo, it is reasonable to believe that there are some potential savings in VBIOS (Intel, NVIDIA) and BIOS/POST initialization.
Your Feedback
I know it's inconvenient, but if you have any boot times that are wildly longer than above reference data, please consider a clean Windows installation. 'Clean' means deleting the system partitions on your SSD in the first step of the installation procedure. Before you do this, you should backup all important data on external storage.
If you have a clean install and you still get much longer boot times between Power Button and Login Wallpaper, feel free to copy my table and share. Please also include all relevant data about Windows Update level, whether you installed our drivers manually, BIOS settings and installed 3rd party apps. If you want me to share your case data with Intel, please create a report from
Intel System Support Utility. Use the default settings without 'third party' logs. The utility will create a text file, which you can upload to
pastebin or any other
similar service and send it to me via PM.
If you have any other tips on how to optimize or analyse boot times (e.g. Windows Performance Analyzer), feel free to discuss below.
The switch is located in this Registry folder:
Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\OEM\GamingCenter\
At launch we didn't take this "Benchmark" function seriously because it the only thing it does is running the fans at 100% speed. But after we gathered feedback on how some users use it in certain games, we might just bring it back in next update.
We also try to lobby with Intel to bring this function a nice hotkey, for example on Fn+1.
Thank you for the info,
@XMG / tom! I didn't use benchmark mode until a conversation a few pages back seemed to uncover that benchmark mode did more than run fans at 100% - it also tweaked the power draw. From
@Sven Motz "In Benchmark mode (with 87C TL) it will run @90-115w". The conversation is at
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...fusion-15-mag-15-vapor-15-pro.830272/page-174. Would you be able to provide some clarity on this? I feel I do see enough increase in performance that I'm compelled to enable Benchmark mode when I think it would help. Being able to toggle that on would be awesome. But, If Benchmark mode does increase the power, is there a reason it can't be included in a mode that allows the laptop to ramp up to use it - not sure if that makes sense. Anyway, thanks again!
I received my replacement Aftershock Vapor 15 Pro (QC7 chassis) in the same state as the pictures in the website but all it took is to have the cover lock into place so that the gap they pointed out closes.
Hello everyone,
I have some questions with my Aftershock Vapor 15 Pro (32gb Ram, 512gb + 1Tb SSD, RTX 2070maxq.)
I have updated TB3 firmware to v56, driver v60, BIOS v64, Just asking any problem with the TB3 port with these firmware/ drivers? Because I don't want to send my laptop back to Aftershock to fix the TB3 another time.
Is there any way to run the fan in lower speed? It has been continuously on even when I did not open any application. The Aftershock control center does not have Quiet mode unlike Eluktronics CC. When I work night time, the sound is really distracting. According to Aftershock CC, the fan goes around 2600RPM
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.
