Razer Blade Owner's Lounge

I have succeeded in installing Voyager 12.04 on the Razer Blade, a linux distro based off of ubuntu 12.04. So far sound and the webcam works, still trying to get the nvidia non-free drivers to work. Sucks cause I got an official invite to beta test the linux version of steam. Might try a vanilla version of ubuntu tomorrow and see if I can get the nvidia drivers squared away. I had gotten it working on another setup but I can't remember if it was on Linux Mint or Ubuntu.

 

I don't know what I did but bumblebee is working. got up and turned on laptop to check e-mail and bumblebee indicator was activated in the panel's notification area. Tried running some apps via the bumblebee indicator and all is right in the world. Now to see if I can get Synapse 2.0 to run in wine.

 

I have just found a form that Razer has setup specifically for the SwitchbladeUI App Development! And I have also downloaded the SDK for the SwitchbladeUI. So I will start making some apps soon! I've wanted a more touch optimized email app and a calculator. Keep your eyes on this form around mid to late December I just might have some apps ready.

 

Dude I will paypal you money to make some for me!

Link to the forum to download the SDK?

 

The drives in question had pre-production firmware and Samsung has affirmed that none of the current drives were shipped with this firmware. So all 840 Pro's sold should have firmware that's free from the defects that affected Anand and the other reviewers.

 

Speaking of drives, I got a new samsung 830 512GB SSD from Newegg, popped it into the Razer Blade and re-installed Windows 8. Install went smoothly except for the msata caching program won't install. Anyone have any success re-installing this program?

 

There's no point in running the mSATA caching program because it would likely slow things down slower than the Samsung 830. Just set up the 64GB mSATA drive for swap file, for scratch files, temp files, etc.

 

Quick question for any 2nd gen Blade owners - does it have an SDHC / SDXC card slot? There was no info about this in the specs listed on the Razer website.

Just to make sure, I should be able to replace the factory 64GB mSATA drive with this one, correct?

 

Sadly, the mSATA, sdram and cpu aren't easy to get to without removing the whole motherboard. Not a do it yourself project in any way. Well it is doable but there's a lot of little cables you have to be careful with. Not something for the inexperienced to attempt. I can field strip a pc and put it back together blindfolded but after popping the cover off of my RB, I wouldn't even think of going further than I already have. Don't need a $2500 paperweight.

 

Come on, where's your sense of adventure?

 

Nope, no sd card reader. I wish it did though. I can live without taking along an optical drive but having to remember an sd card dongle all the time is a pain

 

No SD card reader? Didn't think of that. Serious oversight IMHO. I personally hate taking anything extra along with my laptop, just something else to get lost, stolen, or broken. Oh well, sure it will be in Blade v3.

 

If I were to upgrade to the 2nd gen Blade from the laptop in my specs, anyone have a rough idea how much faster the i7-3632QM might be compared to the i7-820QM?

And how much slower it would be compared to an i7-3820QM available in other laptops such as the dv6?

Agreed, I'd much rather have an SDXC slot than the switchblade UI gimmick

 

Okay guys quick update on my throttling issues.

It's not the cpu. The cpu in this thing will never go past 80 degrees Celsius even after hours of 100% stressing. It's looking like it's the GPU, has anyone else experienced severe throttling even when playing at reduced quality and resolution?

 

Haven't noticed any GPU throttling myself yet

 

I have not noticed any either...

Check this link out ( Setting "Power management mode" from Adaptive to Maximum Performance) and see if it can make a difference.

 

Haha after messing around with my settings I noticed throttling Leaving them at the stock settings nvidia has is whats working for me

 

Hey so I overclocked the gpu +135 on the core clock and +300 on the memory and im getting a solid 40-50 fps on far cry 3 at "very high"; before i was getting 20-30 fps without the oc so this is a HUGE improvement

However the gpu temp maxes out at about 81 celsius; is this too high??

 

Wish I saw gains like that in WoW lol - Probelm with it is the CPU is the bottleneck. No way to OC the CPU yet. But glad you got such a large increase!

81c is fine. That's to be expected in a chasis this thin. Until the Video card BSOD's you, you're running at a temp thats fine. Of course the lower the better to save the lifespan of the card, but 81 on THIS laptop is okay.

 

Ahh okay okay thank you for the reply! What do you think is the maximum safe temperature for the gpu?? I may have to downclock a little bit as Ive seen a couple spikes to the mid-high 80's

 

The GPU is designed to handle temps up to 95-100. Keeping it in the 80s, as long as you're not seeing any artifacts or crashes, shouldn't pose a problem.

 

Well, technically speaking, computers now-a-days are smart and any temp you're not BSOD'ing at is "safe". The card will stop it self from over heating to unsafe temps by shutting down before it happens. There was a person on the ROG forum that said when he was able to trial a blade gen 2 he saw temps up to 93c and it was still going. Now, I wouldn't want my card running that hot because the more heat, the shorter the life of the card usually, but mid 80's is fine. Usually though even if you're running at high temps like that all the time you're definitely going to have the fans go out before your card does...I had an old X600 ATI card that ran 90c all the time, fan went out before it did.

The only time that temp ever matters is if you're trying to OC a card agressively and you don't have much thermal headroom to go higher, or if you see artifacting or your computer keeps BSOD'ing.

For instance, anyone using a 660m on a G75 can do a more agressive OC than we can due to them having a much larger cooling system on their rig, now with that they'll see lower temps than we will too at stock clocks, but it doesn't matter. The card doesn't run any slower due to running hotter, my MSI afterburner charts are proof of that. The only time you shoudl ever worry about temps is if you're computer keeps restarting/BSOD'ing after you start playing a game, or if you're in the middle of a long game session. Otherwise as long as you can boot up, play for 5 hours straight and not have a single reboot or any artifacting, your temps are fine. As a friend told me before, heat is the enemy, and heat lowers the life of your card, but its been my experience the hardware on the cards (the fans) are much more likely to fail long before a card will.

 

The newer Kepler cards are known to throttle performance on the fly to keep temps low. They will just reduce performance temporarily until temps cool down.

 

I must have a real trooper of a card then, last night I was out on my dining room table with 3 other of my friends playing WoW, and it gets hot quick in that room, temps went up to 91 on my card but I never saw any throttling, GPU usage ranged between 97-100% the entire time with the temp ranging 89/91. This is with a +135/300 OC for the record

 

Hello ive just had time to install windows 8 on my first gen razer blade. anyone else have issues with the switchblade UI? none of the buttons show up, or they don't work? ive changed the settings and nothing happens, and nothing shows up in the switchblade keys they are all blank. help? thanks

 

Is there a way to disable this? Mine is doing it far too much, I can hardly get 10 minutes out of it before it starts throttling!

 

If temps go too high, then it's unavoidable and may just be a bad thermal paste job. Then you'll either have to void your warranty and repaste it or send it in for Razer to fix/replace it.

At stock clocks 660m should not exceed 80C in any situation beyond Furmark or Kombustor stress tests.

 

Uninstall and reinstall synapse

Huh. Interesting. Granted I don't use stock clocks, but I was going over 80c even at stock IIRC. It's all about your ambient temp where your computer is mostly. As stated before I've peaked at 91c in a worst case scenario (really hot room) and I didn't see any kind of throttling through MSI, still showed my core clock at the consistant 1085 with no real dips in GPU usage.

Up here at work, just played a BG on WoW, Highest temp was 87c, and the ambient up here is cucking fold. this is with my 135/300 OC, I bet without it, I might see temps at 81 or so. 80c isn't bad for the Blade with its small chasis, for a G75 or an M17X thats high, but I think it's just average for this.

 

Even with those temps, were you getting any dips in fps? Or were they fairly consistent? Also, how hard were your fans going? because mine will kick in about 30 seconds and be going full ball non stop and still the system slows down.

Really want to get to the bottom of this so I know whether I need to send it back. Might anyway just cos I don't want a faulty system in any regard.

 

Hi guys, I've been lusting over the Blade for quite sometime now, and have finally saved almost enough to get on the cusp of buying one. Before I do, where's the best place to buy one online? Like is there a discount coupon or free giveaway in some shop I don't know about?

Or even better, is there a way for some of you guys who own R1s to transfer their 500 USD discount to me (wishful thinking but who knows? ). Thanks!

 

Hi guys,

Quick question, should there be 2 hard drives displayed or just the one?

I have a C drive which is 450gig.

Shouldn't there be a 64gb SSD somewhere?

Or is that 64gb hidden or? Thanks

 

you can buy it on XoticPC for about 75$ off, a free razer mouse, and no sales tax.

 

64GB is a cache drive. It works automagically with Intel's drivers. It basically reads and writes to the SSD which then writes it to the HDD so you get the full benefit of the SSD. I can't remember, but you should still be able to see it in the disk management utility, however.

 

Frames were consistant, standing around in WoW it would be a steady number, maybe it would change every 10 seconds and stay at one number, then go switch back to the other one and stay there for 10 seconds, rinse and repeat. FPS was not cosntantly dropping and I didn't notice any difference in performance as the night went along. I mean hell, when I LAN with my buddies the thing sits on a wood dining room table all night and the highest temp I had was 93c the other night, and it still chugged through everything like a champ. Fans are always audible when I'm playing games. When my temps get up in the 80's those things are spinning like theres no tomorrow. I only ever here them not at that speed when I play a game that isn't taxing the card/cpu that much, like CS, or SC2. When I play SC2 the GPU usage is pretty spikey, like the card is offloading some of the work to the CPU when it can, kinda weird. When I play WoW the GPU usage is very consistant. I'll post some screenies to you can see what I'm talking about

It really all comes down to Ambient Temp, and how taxing the game you're playing is. I like it cold, so I keep my house at 70 most of the time, sometimes lower...Now these dips in FPS, are they gradual, or are they like a roller coaster and your FPS is always going up and down while you're standing still in an area of the game you're playing. If it keeps fluctuating while you're standing still, make sure you make some changes to the nvidia control center, like only using high performance GPU, etc etc...

Not saying that it's not probably there might be something wrong with your unit, but I think more so you're probably just use to seeing lower temps and quieter fans from other laptop lines. Not the case with something this thin, the fans will be loud and proud, and the temps will be high. Not really a way to avoid it when you don't have the real estate to put a bigger cooling system in.

Run some benchmarks, like 3d11, you should scroe 2500-2600 at stock clocks. If you're anything lower, then your computer is definitely throttling due to temp.

XoticPC is currently the best place to buy it, 3% cash discount plus a free Razer Orochi mouse when you order.

Don't try to do the R1 discount thing, you're not likely to find someone that'll let it go for free, plus the coupon code is in their name, ergo, the PC is ordered through their name, so if you ever RMA it that'll be an issue.

There is a 64 Gig SSD, it's just a cache drive though. New data is stored there and then transfered to the SSD, and supposedly your most active items are also stored primarily on the SSD. /shrug

But no, you won't see it as an actual drive on your computer under the My Computer screen, it's hidden.

 

Thanks for the reply, in Skyrim I'll set resolution to 1600x900 all settings at high, water reflections down, AA and AT off and it'll be 60 for the first ten seconds, then as the system and the fans start to heat up then things start to go downhill, by the time its peaked it'll be between and 10 and 30 depending on busyness of the area. BF3 is the same. Planetside gets to like 1 fps even on low quality, Hawken was 100% unplayable. Even programs like Maya get the gpu hot and loud and starts to lag. maya is one of the least gpu intensive programs I have... I need install a temp monitor and I'll run 3d mark sometime to compare.

 

Awesome, thanks for the xotic tip guus as always it always pays to ask

 

Well that doesn't sound good. I've definitely not noticed anything like that in any of my games. Even after doing all kinds of stuff in WoW, going into SW (The most intense area) I've never noticed a huge drop in performance if any at all...

Have you tried messing around with the Nvidia settings? Always perfer higher performance GPU, there are some others to change to but I can't remember them at the momemt, someone posted about them a few pages back though, so they're here somewhere. What drivers are you on? That could be the problem aswell, I've seen first hand what crap drivers, or botched driver installs can do to performance of a GPU. There's a thread on this forum of how to do a "clean" instlal of the drivers, but really all I'd do is download the drivers again, maybe the beta ones if you'd like to try them, and when you go to install go to the advanced setup, there's a check box for a clean install, check that, and install them. Computer should restart after the drivers are removed, and again after they're reinstalled, then try everything out and see how it runs.

Definitely need to run a furmark test before you RMA it. Knowing the Temp, seeing your GPU usage, etc, will go a long way in diagnosing whats really wrong. Do 3Dmark11 and MSI Afterburner, run some tests back to back and see what happens.

 

If I run 3dmark11 Advanced extreme test (1080x1920) what score should I expect to see, what test were you running to get the scores you mentioned on the previous page? I'll download Afterburner now.

 

don't do extreme, do the 720p test, that's the standardized benchmark for everything

 

AAAAAAAAAAWWWW SHIIIIIIII...

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660M video card benchmark result - Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-3632QM CPU @ 2.20GHz,Gigabyte Blade score: P868 3DMarks

Yeah... something's wrong.

In case the linked failed, It didn't do , it did abysmally... P868... !!!

 

You probably have the Intel GPU selected in the Optimus control panel and not the 660m. Also if you're running on battery it will likely default to the integrated GPU. Also check to make sure the power profile is set to high performance.

 

Hey everyone,

I just got my R1 today from amazon refurbished. Everything works great and I've upgraded to windows 8 successfully except for my wifi.

Wifi doesn't work, nor did it work when I was briefly running Windows 7. I didn't think much of it then, but now that I've installled the drivers, I'm getting nowhere. What's weird is, this isn't even showing up in the device manager, its like the card isn't even there. Do I need to open her up and look at the wifi?

I've seen this problem mentioned before, but it went unanswered. That poster posted again not much later so it seems as though there was a fix. Help would be very appriciated!

 

I would either return it, exchange it, send it in under warranty (assuming refurb comes under warranty), because opening it up will void any warranty you have, at least Razer's warranty.

 

Thanks, guess that's the only fix. Bought another one refurbed from amazon, really hope I don't run into the exact same problem....

Speaking of, this unit is down to $1384 refurbished on Amazon. I feel like its a heck of a deal.

 

Uh...868?? WOW. Yeah something is up... http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/5280927 - Just ran my test for you, stock clocks.

Like he said, check nvidia control center make sure nothing is selected to default to the the CPU for anything, high performance GPU on eveyrthing.

Also, this unit does not default to intergrated when on battery. You can battery life, but you can play any game on battery with the same performance/FPS as you can on battery.

I accidentally unplugged mine from the wall and had no idea until the PC dinged at a 10% left notification popped up!

1384 compared to what it originally launched at definitely is a heck of a deal

I think I started experiencing these wifi issues last night, I was downloading torrents on my dining room table for a bit and the speeds seemed fine, but then later that night I was downloading a java exe and a downloading a game, neither would go above 40kb/s - tf?

Will try to replicate this again when I get home, hopefully it was a fluke!!

 

I'm supposing there isn't a way to buy this in Europe with support?

 

It was plugged in, and I have changed all the settings. The tests show that it was 660m being used so its quite clear that I have a faulty chip on my hand.

 

Hello guys, so I took the plunge, ordered the Blade R2 from xotic. But they didn't have it on stock (!!). They apparently don't know when stocks will be replenished. Any idea if this happens often with xotic? Because I'm willing to wait if it's not THAT long, the price difference between amazon and xotic plus the free mouse is too much to give up.

 

yes this happened to me. idk what their deal is, but they dont seem to be getting them too fast. i canceled my order and got it off of amazon.

amazon or tiger direct are the best places to look. look at amazon first tho... dont get caught buying a unit from TD that isnt in stock. they do purchase authorizations there, i was stuck waiting for my money back from TD for a week because they didnt have it in stock..

 

Damn that's tough. I can live without the mouse but the price difference is killing me.. Anyone have experience with backorders from xoticpc?

Would it be worthwhile for me to wait for stocks or am I juat better off buying from Amazon?