Over Powered 15-LP2 (TONGFANG GK5CN6Z) benchmarks + temps

I've done a couple of these mini-reviews on the Dell XPS 9570, 9575, 9560, 9550, and Lenovo X1 Extreme so I figured I would do one on the OP15. This is by no means a complete review, just something I wanted to put up for those people considering the laptop and if undervolting/repasting/adding memory is worth it. These are all synthetic benchmarks which is never a real substitute for real world apps/games.

Specs of my OP15:
CPU: i7-8750H
GPU: 1060 6GB
Ram: 16GB DDR4 2666MHz (single stick)
SSD: 480GB ADATA SX8200
Screen: FHD 144Hz

I've organized this post a little differently than the past, I'm going to stick to excel charts to show performance and temps. If you want a link or screenshot of a particular benchmark, I can post it here.

Settings for benchmarks:
Stock - cloned windows 10 install from stock SATA SSD, Gaming center fans set to Gaming and monitoring window set to Gaming mode, Windows power slider at "better performance"
Repaste+UV - same as the above settings but with the CPU running with a -135mv undervolt, MSI Afterburner with a 150MHz core increase/350MHz ram increase, and after the repaste with Kryonaut
Modded - fresh install of Windows 10 and all drivers, adapter set to 180W, Gaming center fans set to Gaming and monitoring window set to Gaming mode, Windows power slider at "better performance", CPU running with a -135mv undervolt, MSI Afterburner with a 150MHz core increase/350MHz ram increase, and after the repaste with Kryonaut, additional 16GB of 2666MHz ram, and finally increased power limits to 75/65 in Throttle Stop.






Thermals
Testing for the thermal section is done with a variety of tools. I am using Prime95 29.4B7 to test the CPU, RTHDRIBL as a light GPU load, and RealBench 2.56 as a heavy workload on both the CPU and GPU.



Undervolting
The CPU in my OP15 is mediocre bin wise. I was able to undervolt it by 135mv and it is 4 hour RealBench, 10 hour Prime95 Small FFT, and 8 hour AIDA64 system stress test stable. I am not concentrating on a how to for this but can add more detail if anyone requests it.

I also undervolted the GPU by increasing the core speed by 150MHz with MSI Afterburner. This not only provides more performance but causes the GPU to run at a lower VID. It's also much easier than messing with the voltage table.

Repasting
Some how OP managed to apply more paste to the OP15 than Lenovo on the X1 Extreme, no small feat mind you. Removing the stock paste and applying some Kryonaut yielded the results above. Not a huge decrease, but worth it in my opinion. I may take the heatsink off and check to see if it is straight as I have 3 cores that are 4C higher than the others.

 

Here is a fun quick and dirty against my Dell XPS 9570 benchmarks and temps both stock and modified:





Obviously this is far from an apples to apples comparison but I thought it was fairly interesting. The OP15 with the fans in gaming mode is LOUD compared to the XPS. I am bummed that I didn't notice that HWinfo64 doesn't show CPU/GPU fan speeds or I would have included them in the comparison. I am thinking about ordering the bigger battery for the OP15 to see what kind of battery life I can get out of it. With the stock install I was getting around 100 minutes in PCMark 8 Home Battery Conventional, after a fresh install I was able to get that up to 130 minutes. For comparison my X1 Extreme gets 280 minutes.

 

Reserved for requested benchmarks/info/whatever

Breakdown of 3DMark GPU/CPU Scores as requested:

 

Could you post on those 3dmark scores the GPU score and CPU score seperate to the total score?

Otherwise really nice performance benchs

 

For any particular benches/setups? I am happy to break them out, but not super stoked to do ALL of them, lol.

 

Normal Firestrike, Timespy and maybe 3dmark 2011. Rest aren't that important and aren't usually benched.

 

Done, see post 3

 

Did you have any issues with the repaste?

I repasted my OP15+ and I'm kind of regretting it now since the MasterGel Maker is pumping out.

When I first applied the paste I got 74°C Max after 40 mins of aida64.

Now after just 20 mins of aida64 max temperatures are up to 82°C.

I almost feel like repasting was a mistake since the stock paste only got up to 84°C Max.

It also seems that the OP15+ benefits very little from the repaste unlike your XPS15 in your thermal comparisons, which leads me to believe that the heatsink is the limiting factor for the OP15+.

 

I didn't have any issues with the repaste although I really should do it again since I have some un-even core temps. I'm wondering if these heatsinks are really true. Repastes (even with LM) aren't going to drop your temps a ton typically, but 2-4C is good. My idle temps are down quite a bit which means the fans no longer turn on very often if at all. I may pull the heatsink off of mine and see if it's straight.

 

Do you have any issues with the Kryonaut pumping out?

My MasterGel Maker has already pumped out after about a week and temperatures are getting up to 95°C under a combined CPU/GPU load.

Just a CPU load gets it up to 88°C and I've already undervolted by 140mv.

For reference just a CPU load started at a max of 74°C just last week.

 

I've never used MasterGel Maker before so I can't comment on the "pumping out phenomenon." I can tell you that I just ran a quick 5 minutes of Prime95 small FFTs just now for you and temps never went over 73C.

 

I'm just leaving my OP-LP2's OEM paste-job the Hell alone. Don't need the grief, or the regret...especially if I ended up buggering a couple of heatsink screws. Which often happens - the misadventures with them are legion - just read some of the posts here.

 

How did you avoid stripping the heads of the heatsink screws? I hear that they're really tricky to back out...kinda like a weird "2-stage" process...almost like the threads of the screws hit a detent (a "click"?) when they're halfway out, and then you have to really bear down on them to get them out. And then it's a crapshoot if they go back in correctly.

 

I didn't do anything special. I have a good screwdriver set (Wera) and chose the appropriate sized bit (which sadly I don't recall right now). You don't have to muscle down when you turn but applying a good amount of downward pressure will help you avoid stripping them. Really it's just a matter of having decent tools and paying attention to what you're doing. I've been working on laptops/computers for 20 years though and cars/electronics for much longer, so I do have some experience in that.

 

Much appreciated, custom90gt. Thanks!

 

Hello can you add nvme m2 drives like 960 Samsung??

 

Yes, there are 2 slots for NVMe SSDs.

 

Hi guys! I just got this laptop, I really like it. it has very good performance even without the dual channel ram. it runs a little hot though. So tried to repaste it, I stripped a screw on the heat sink, so I want to replace them. does anyone what screws should I be getting and from where? like the thread size, screw length etc. I also undervolted the CPU, things went way better. But I was getting throttled on battery, really throttled, like an 800mhz constant. I also noticed that the XTU app jumped between 55/65 to 48/75 on turbo wattage randomly between bootups on default. On battery, it was 10/10, that isn't normal, right? Well, then I went ahead and removed XTU. but the service ran in the background. However, the service was from OP GC and not XTU. Since the throttling persisted I removed GC too. I reinstalled and still the throttling is there, but it is random, sometimes happens sometimes it doesn't. But when plugged performance is the same as day one, no issues. So now I running stock everything. I will do repaste, once I get the screws sorted out. Also, I want to wipe everything and start from scratch, maybe some XTU settings are left in the bios? how do I do that and keep the windows too?

 

Have any of you guys faced heavy throttling on battery?

 

Sadly I never tried any benchmarks on battery but it's likely throttled because quite frankly high power loads on lithium batteries isn't a great idea.

 

I am talking about youtube stuttering

 

Oh, no I didn't have any issues like that. I did have throttle stop and such. Have you done anything to yours (windows reinstall, throttle stop, etc.)?

 

no, the windows is the one it shipped with. I did mess with Intel XTU before stress testing on the battery, maybe it has done something. right now I am running Throttlestop and MSI afterburner, on AC it works like a beast. On battery though, there is random EDP Other and PL1 throttling with clocks stuck at 800mhz or a few secs then back up. When the battery is below 40% clocks are always at 800mhz. I've tried a lot of things and nobody seems to face this. with throttlestop having a separate profile for battery with some tweaks, the throttling is less than before but still there annoyingly. what do you suggest I do? maybe the latest bios or fresh windows will help?

 

What are your gaming center settings?

 

Guys! I just got the Intel Optane 32Gb accelerator, any ideas how to set it up in this thing?

 

Equilibrium, what should they be?

 

I have an odd one for you now, custom90gt - Open Hardware Monitor no longer shows CPU core temps...weird. Just suddenly stopped working. (CPUID HwMonitor still shows the core temps, tho -). Any ideas?

 

It probably got turned off some how. If you go into settings there is a layout button. You can select restore original order and make sure that it is set to monitor that sensor... Or you can just delete the hwinfo64.ini file and launch it again.

 

He talk about Open Hardware Monitor. Shoudn't be any hwinfo64.ini file in there. And no support for Coffee lake. Or he meant Hwinfo.

 

You're right, I was replying with my phone and didn't read that carefully enough. I've never used or heard of Open Hardware Monitor so I'm no help there.

 

Hey custom90gt - see, people are stripping the heat sink screws on this laptop left and right... I'd like to re-paste my heat sink, but I want to make for damn sure that I'm not gonna chew up the heads of the screws or bugger the threads in the process. Is that set of Wera screwdrivers you have really decent? I mean, if I buy a set, I want to be sure that if I use them on this laptop, they'll work just fine, every time on these screws (provided I use the right size screwdriver(s) and follow your advice to not really sh*t house them...just apply even, steady pressure) In other words, they have to work with these screws, every time - like they're supposed to.

Thanks in advance!

- Trev

 

I really like them, but then again I've had no issue opening hundreds of laptops and working on them with my old Craftsman screwdrivers that I've had for 20 years. The trick is to be sure that you are using the proper sized bit and it's a decent screwdriver (not soft metal). I purchased the Wera because it was recommended by another tech on these forums and I've been really happy with them. I've been fortunate to only strip a couple of screws out of the thousands that I've undone over the years, probably a function of taking my time and paying attention to what is happening. Please note that the paste in the OP laptop is actually pretty decent though, I only had a couple C drop on mine...

 

Noted. I was debating repasting the i7-8750H and the GTX-1060 GPU with Grizzly Kryonaut, but per your recommendation I'm just gonna leave 'em be. The GPU very rarely goes above 66°C anyway.

Whenever I game or benchmark, I always turn the "Fan Boost" on, but dayamn, it nevertheless *still* gets uncomfortably hot to the touch along the metal strip above the keyboard...especially right above the F10 - F12 keys, and the F4 - F6 keys to a lesser degree.

Thanks again for the quick follow-up, custom90 -

-Trev

 

Most laptops get uncomfortably hot above the F keys being how the heat pipes sit directly below that location.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

 

How are you guys so lucky to get a unit that doesn't go over 90 degrees? Mine goes over when playing overwatch! Apex Legends, Anthem. All of them cook my CPU even though I run -0.140v in throttle stop. I stripped a screw. Any tips on how to remove it?

 

How stripped is it? If it's not too bad than the proper sized screwdriver may be able to remove it. If not you may need a stripped screw removal bit. You can post pictures here and maybe we can better direct you.

 

IMG_20190322_114208 by Phoboy604 posted Mar 22, 2019 at 11:42 AM

screw number 7 is all mangled up. the others are starting to fade too. yikes. I need better screw drivers.

 

Yes sadly you do. That screw could go either way. A proper bit may be able to unscrew it, buy you may also need an easy out or something similar. I wouldn't mess with it until you have a lot of time and the proper tools...

 

And he need new screws. No point in put them back afterwards.

 

True, I should have mentioned that along with proper tools... Sometimes you think you don't have to mention the obvious, but you're absolutely correct.

 

You can try to fit a small flat head into the less damaged cross section of the screw. Or grab the top head of the screw with small locking vice grips (or needle nose pliers) if you have them handy.

 

Not sure if its just me but I have the 17" variant model and I feel that its sluggish on battery power? I have an NVME drive and fresh Windows 10 install

 

My Mastergel has also pumped out in even less time... it was supposed to be dense enough to hold but i guess only ICD does? i dont even know now... even worse, i cant even find ICD in my country so i guess for now ill have to repaste and hope it will last longer