Clevo P157SM-A 880m to MSI 1070 upgrade

I upgraded my Clevo P157SM-A graphics card to a MSI 1070 finally got tired of the 880m GTX.
Here are the 3DMark 11 after and before pics I ran the 1070 with +200 core clock then with +220 core +100 mem in MSI afterburner (The 115W power limit is my bottleneck). When playing games I have to lock the voltage to 800mV due to power limit with core at 1506MHz. The 880m GTX picture is from 2014 at that time I had IC diamond thermal paste which I later replaced with Kryonaut then Conductonaut liquid metal.
3DMark 11 benchmark scores.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=17MdI2tJ6IWKkgQfz1vxTzAU7Uj97ACke
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1sFofCYYTDXZYvbVlvuFRrQNIMnY4zch6

Fire Strike score after modding vBios to 140W power limit and raising boost throttle temp from 54C to 91C with Core +189/Mem +520. Fire Strike Score

The card I got was a MSI 1070 MXM 3.1 hardware rev 1.2 with SLI connector missing/removed from eBay.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1LOjNKRrQr08g0Spdx8M5Ap2QqRog7-Lu

I had to remove some of the bottom case like in this example picture. What I did is in the second link.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1sWjJVUgG4cZ5LT87vWtncBvShCl5OEbh
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1HbNaq2ZOV9um3bHU5enxutaUGIPBenUE

The heatsink required a little work but if you test fit it'll be pretty easy to figure out. I used liquid metal since I was concerned about heat but so far the temps are better than the 880m which also used liquid metal, don't forget to protect the GPU chip with Super 33+ electrical tape or something similar. When I was doing 3DMark 11 benchmarks I didn't exceed 70C. Idle temp is 35C and after running Mass effect Andromeda with maxed out settings in 1080p for an hour at 800mV (core clock dropped from 1506 to 1493 at either 70/72C) temps didn't go over 80C with a 24C ambient at 80% fan.
GPU-Z pictures.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1PEeONv56hXl2PniGJsrOwzFMo8AFjvet
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Hi0ibOY1WTwDF8Hh7nhBdMIfObIVaxUY

Operating system is Windows 10 64bit with UEFI enabled, bios is Prema Bios 1.03.11PM v2. Also tested with Bios/EC 1.03.03, Bios 1.03.05, EC 1.03.06, Bios 1.03.08, EC 1.03.07, Bios 1.03.09, Bios 1.03.11, EC 1.03.08 and Eurocom Bios/EC 1.05.01. BIOS/EC 1.03.03 gave me the best GPU performance while Prema Bios 1.03.11PM v2 has better CPU performance but is power draw capped at 216W (188W with 87% efficient AC adapter).
When installing Nvidia driver 398.36 (also works with 399.24) I had to copy and modify this line
%NVIDIA_DEV.1BE1.65A3.1558% = Section086, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_1BE1&SUBSYS_65A31558
to this
%NVIDIA_DEV.1BE1.5281.1558% = Section086, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_1BE1&SUBSYS_52811558
along with adding
NVIDIA_DEV.1BE1.5281.1558 = "NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070"
to the [Strings] section of the nvcvi.inf file.
I think the line I used was for the Clevo P650HS maybe?
I had to reinstall the driver and change the Section number 4 times I believe before I found one that worked with this card. You can try using Section046 which also worked.
Pictures of modding driver INF file, make sure you know the hardware ID of your card.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1HdQPmqDdJDB7ujjYN3L8mlYVE8Nlsc9u

Picture of everything else that came with card.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1qP8vqssI0kspS1JyXOIZmFjSn52idFjR

Some interesting things to note:
Bios doesn't show card just says "Unknown" it does however display the GPU vBios 86.04.42.00.04.
1070 uses slightly less power (maybe 5 watts less) at 800mV/1506MHz full load than 880m did under full load.
Kill a Watt power meter showed that I could use a 180W AC adapter assuming I don't try to run CPU at full load with turbo on or overclock GPU (which I can't at the moment due to power limit) and limit number of active hard drives. Increasing core/mem with MSI Afterburner didn't increase GPU power usage.

Adding pictures to show what happens when MSI 1070 115W power limit is reached, core clock fluctuates due to reaching limit. GPU-Z doesn't show it but voltage dropped to 756mV.
Kill a Watt power meter showed power draw from wall was between 185-190W.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=13BJ0UxX_24kQ3cXfiOUZKq1aoFHq4UoO
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1FHKdxRqwenrO5P0qbMAzNSDfvhbo8MZf

Adding pictures of torture test. Max temp was 85C with 100% fan at 30C ambient. Due to power limit voltage dropped from 800mV to 756mV and core clock fluctuated between 1250Mhz and 1443MHz.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1sB-jjhetkYQGdn6tzy_zUQQRpCsXkwUe

After some more testing I've decided to use 800mV with core at 1481MHz(-24MHz) on MSI Afterburner. When I lock it at that setting voltage drops to 792mV which is the lowest value I can currently lock at. Lowering it further had no effect. At the moment I don't plan on raising power limit since I'm happy enough with the performance but that may change given enough time. When I ran a 3DMark 11 benchmark I got a graphics performance score of 21500.
After modding vBios by increasing power limit to 140W and changing boost throttle temp from 54C to 91C I don't need to do this anymore.
MSI Afterburner 4.6.0 beta 10 has a larger voltage range starting at 700mV up to 1250mV if you need to lock voltage. OC Scanner suggested I run at +132 core average.

Thanks to the information I've found/read on this forum and other places I was able to do this with minimal difficulty.

 

Could you post your 3dmark benchmarks?

 

Good job !

 

I've thinking about ordering a GTX 1070 off ebay for my P157SM and want to do the same thing you have done. I was just hoping if you could shed some light on the heatsink:

"The heatsink required a little work but if you test fit it'll be pretty easy to figure out."
​

What exactly did you mean by this? Did you use the heatsink that originally came with your laptop, or did you buy a special heatsink your new card and install that? I do see at this Eurocom page it states that for a GTX 1070 86x105mm MXM 3.1 (like the one you bought) a special heatsink is required:

"GTX 1070 card has been fully tested and working. You will need to purchase a modified heatsink for this to function."
​

Is this really required?

 

It isn't required they just do most of the needed work for you, such as making sure the thermal pads are in the right spots, making sure the thermal pads are the right thickness and making sure the heatsink will fit properly over the VRAM. Thermal pad thickness varies between .5mm to 2mm in the VRAM area.
It would help to add a picture of your heatsink since more than one type could be used.
The one I had was a one piece heatsink for both the GPU die and VRAM.
Like in this hyperlink.

Spoiler

They also can be two piece one part goes on the GPU die while another piece goes over the VRAM.

Spoiler

The part that goes on the GPU die fits fine just make sure the white tab that is used to remove the heatsink doesn't get in the way, keep in mind my heatsink was one piece not two.
Test fitting was for the section that goes over the VRAM since the components are different in that area when compared to a 880M/980M. Got to make sure the thermal pads are contacting the MOSFETs, inductors and memory chips. While test fitting you may need to sand/remove some material from the aluminum section that goes over the MOSFETs, inductors and memory chips. Sanding/removing only applies to the two areas in the picture below.

Spoiler

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1ykMiXu7B5jLM-7ebfLHrzLd3g5prbWeZ

Hopefully this was helpful

 

Thank you so much, your explanations and labelled pictures are incredibly helpful. I don't have my screwdriver set on me to take a picture right now, but I'm fairly certain from the last time I repasted my CPU/GPU that I have the 1-piece GPU heatsink like you do. So it indeed appears that as long as I can fiddle with some aluminium in the case then I don't have to purchase a special modified heatsink. When my GPU arrives I'll be following what your post very closely. Again, thanks so much for posting what you did here in such detail.

 

you will need a shim, otherwise your temperatures are abysmal.

 

Another question - I only have American Megatrends 1.03.1 stock BIOS and vBOIS. I currently have a GTX 780M with the latest drivers installed on Windows 10. If I simply replace the GPU with the 1070, am I correct in assuming I should be able to boot into Windows normally? Would I be able to install the latest NVIDIA drivers normally, or would I a) Be restricted to a certain old driver or b) have to edit INF files to get things to work? As I currently understand it, installing a certain old driver/editing INF files is only required if you are using Prema's BIOS/vBIOS to unlock extra permissions on the GPU, is this correct?

In the end, I ordered a GTX 1070 MXM 3.0b, not 3.1 like OP, so hopefully I can just replace my GPU with minimal physical modifications to my laptop. Given this, do you think I will still need a shim to get decent temperatures?

 

You will have to edit the NVIDIA drivers, but it will boot normally into the system.
Yes you will need a shim regardless of which pascal card you purchase. the pascal die's are lower in height, hence they don't touch your heatsink as well as it should.

 

I'm having trouble finding information about the exact measurements Kepler and Pascal dies, which I would need to figure out how thick the copper shim should be. Does anyone have any suggestions?

What's your opinion on using liquid metal? I've had good results with it, but perhaps using it on both sides of a shim will make the risk of spilling in my laptop too high, so I may go with regular non-conductive thermal paste with the shim.

 

Usually shims are in the 0.5mm or 1mm range. You could try a couple and see what the pressure is like.

 

Thanks Meaker. Originally I found about 6 potential sizes and it would cost a lot to order all of them, but luckily I found an assortment pack on eBay so I can test a few thicknesses. Do you have any opinions about using liquid metal on both sides of the shim in a laptop? I've done liquid metal between my CPU/GPU and heatsink before, but adding the shim for some reason gives me extra fear that the liquid metal will spill over inside my laptop. Do you think that fear is warranted?

 

soldering the shim to the heatsink is much better, also it's important to note that using liquid metal does next to no difference when compared to high quality thermal compound such as PK3, GC Gelid etc. The reason for this is the limitation you will be facing because of your mass and fan well before the actual thermal interface material.

 

Thank you so much for your post!
I was able to install 1070 kepler gtx 3.0 into my p150sm,
The issue im having is that when i test the graphics card by any kind of Video game or Heaven benchmark, it crashes on.

I am not able to figure out why. I am thinking that maybe i have the heatsink on wrong and the vRam is overheating ? but the card does not seem to be overheating.

Also i am not able to find any prema Bios mods to download. i am running stock 1.03.05 bios.

Any ideas ?

 

What type of crash?

 

what?

 

I am guessing he got the core code names confused

 

Hello, can you tell us what GTX 1070 version you have first??
Kepler is only GTX 6xx, GTX 7xx and GTX 8xx cards. GTX 1070 is pascal.

You can just post a picture of the card, then we know what you have exacly.

 

I've decided to use stock Bios/EC 1.03.03 instead of Prema mod v2 Bios 1.03.11 and EC 1.03.08 since it allows me to draw 252W of power when both GPU and CPU are under 100% load. I've also raised power limit of 1070 from 115W to 130W along with changing boost throttle temp from 54C to 91C. I wanted to try Prema mod v1 but I seem to have lost or deleted the Bios and EC.

 

Do you want to push it further for long term use?

 

I do for the CPU since it's capped at 57W even with throttlestop using BIOS/EC 1.03.03. When using 3 cores it runs at 3.8GHz but drops to 3.3GHz when using 4. Prema mod v1 would allow me to fix that if the BIOS/EC allows me to draw over 250W from wall. A BIOS/EC after 1.03.03 and before BIOS 1.03.11/EC 1.03.08 might also work IDK. For the GPU no since under full load for over an hour it gets to 84C at 20C ambient with a notebook cooler.

 

I'm more worried for the VRMs rather than core temps long term.

 

Not entirely true, the P157SM-A has terrible VRMs for the CPU. If you start drawing more it will trip the VRM's

 

Is the VRM concern on the MSI GTX 1070 MXM 3.1 itself? Is it power or heat or both that's the concern on the VRMs?
The power limit raise on the GPU vBios was because it would power throttle before it reached default clock speed of 1443Mhz when at 120W/125W I could get to 1443MHz.I chose 130W because average power is in the 120W range. When I checked max power I was running Prime95, FurMark, max fan speed and doing file transfers with 4 hard drives. On average power draw is 210W-220W while gaming.

When I was using a 180W AC adapter and the CPU would use over 60W during a max power check it would trip over current on the AC adapter. I was using Prema Bios v2 and all 4 cores were running at 3.5/3.6GHz, now at least with 1.03.03 It's capped at 57W by default.

 

No was sorely talking about the CPU vrm,s the GTX 1070 is overspecced, VRMs easily handle the card.

also my non modded 1070 beat the snot out of your TDP modded 1070, so you may want to check your card as well. 130TDP should score around 20.5k in fs.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/mobile-pascal-tdp-tweaker-update-and-feedback-thread.806161/
If you look at @Coolane graph for TDP versus Fire Strike Ultra GPU Score you'll see that at 125W you should score around 4507. I scored 4483 with same +189 core and +450 mem, I then checked Fire Strike and scored 18900. I'd say my card is fine.

 

https://www.3dmark.com/fs/17273376

115W TDP.

 

Hi @donovan20055 ,

I've finally got a hold of the same MSI GTX 1070 you have and I have the same one-piece heatsink as you in my P157SM. I'm planning to try to install it tomorrow night. I was just wondering a few things before I opened it up, if you could help me out I would be very appreciative.

1 - Do you happen to have a picture of your heatsink/thermal pad arrangement? You say it varied between 0.5mm and 2mm, did you need any 1.0mm and 1.5mm? (I'm trying to decide what thickness pads I need to order).

2 - Danishblunt said here that I would need a copper shim to improve GPU core temps. Could you just confirm that you didn't add a copper shim and your temperatures were acceptable?

3 - What tools did you use the remove the centre brace and cut the screw mount? I have never tried any metalwork before

4 - My GPU didn't come with a metal backplate like the GTX 780M in my laptop currently has. Did yous come with a backplate? If not, did you modify your old one to fit the new card, or did you not use it?

5 - Regarding your picture with the 2 red rectangles showing the sections which might need some sanding to fit the heatsink - I can't tell which component the rectangle on the left is looking at. Is it the small black piece on the left of the MOSFET (pieces with R22 on the top)? Also, I can see how the MOSFET which is a row below the others is a little higher than the other MOSFETs. Do I need to sand it down to the level of the other MOSFETs? Did you directly sand the top surface, e.g. with sand paper?

Thanks for your help!

 

Hopefully this helps with questions 1&5. The yellow areas will hit against components on the card if not sanded down to be flush with the rest of heatsink. This is based off my memory since I didn't take pictures.

2- I didn't need a copper shim if you can't keep temps at 85 degrees or lower under full load then you might need a shim. If using liquid metal be sure not to use too much it's better to apply a little and have to redo/add more then having too much.

3- I used a brand new razor blade and some sand paper for sharp edges. BE VERY CAREFUL I almost cut my motherboard because the razor went through the plastic fairly easily with some force I didn't expect it to cut through so easily so it caught me off guard.

4- This is how the back of my 1070 card looked.
If I remember correctly that backplate is screwed into the X bracket if you unscrew it off it would look like this at least that was how it was with the GTX 880m I had.

Hopefully this information helps you.

 

So I've modified the bottom case and fit the card.... But as soon as I try to boot my fans go on max and the computer repeatedly beeps (I think it would shut down on its own if I didn't shut it down first). I was told before this was called "EC panic" but I thought I wouldn't have that issue with this card...

I have Prema BIOS 1.03.04v2 which I think installed my EC 1.03.01. I'm wondering if I need a newer EC to stop the beeping problem.

This thread says to never install EC separately to BIOS, and the latest EC it has for P157SM is 1.03.01. Euro seems to have some EC files (separate to their BIOS files) for my laptop here: Eurocom Downloads. I wonder if I try to install P15xSM_EC04.zip whether anything bad will happen to my laptop or if it will fix the issue with the new GPU.



EDIT: Extra info - when I entered BIOS setup, for GPU it says "N/A". My adapter is the stock 180W. Is the issue that the GPU and CPU are asking for more power than it can supply? Although they shouldn't be demanding so much power just to boot.

 

Ok. So EC issues seem to be resolved, no more loud fan or beeps. But... card is not detected by the system at all. In BIOS --> Chipset --> dGPU --> dGPU : Not detected. Nothing in Device Manager.

I thought for a moment the issue was that I didn't have Windows in UEFI mode. I installed a UEFI Windows, but same issue. Card not detected at all.

 

Have you got a vbios programmer? The BIOS will always report n/a with the card as it did not exist when the machine was in production.

 

Thanks for your help Meaker. I don't have a VBIOS programmer unfortunately . I thought that although the original BIOS wouldn't recognise the card since it didn't exist when the machine was produced, updating to Premas 1.03.04v2 BIOS would have addressed to that. I thought I could flash the vBIOS with NVFlash as well, but I can't do that if the card isn't detected at all.

So the card needs a specific vBIOS to be detected by my machine? Perhaps I can pay someone with experience in vBIOS programming to do this. I suppose I'll search around.

 

Maybe, part of me wonders if some tweaks to the prema BIOS may impact this? Any idea @Prema ?

 

I made him a special EC so that the system won't shutdown. But I think that the GPU is not OK if it doesn't report to OS at all...

 

Yeah I'm wondering about a faulty GPU at this point.

 

That's disappointing I'll return this card to the eBay seller and go for a more reputable seller. Does anyone have any recommendations for where I should buy an MSI GTX 1070 for my P157SM? Thanks for your help everyone.

 

Cards can die in transit so it's not neccessarily on the seller. Also there could be some freak condition stopping it from working.

 

I understand cards can be damaged in shipping so I was pretty disappointed that my card came in such poor packaging. It seems it was ripped open at a customs port which didn't help matters.

As a last ditch attempt, I noticed some grey marks on some of the connector pins. I'm going to buy some 99.9% isopropyl alcohol tomorrow and see if that grey stuff is anything that can dissolve off and hope that fixes the problem.

 

It's going to be something quite fundamental if it's not showing at all in windows.

 

Fundamental with the card hopefully and not my laptop . Given that someone has managed to get the MSI GTX 1070 into a P157SM-A, it should be able to work in my P157SM I would hope.

 

Usually on the motherboard causes other issues, I am not saying that it can't be the culprit but it's rare.

 

In my case when I screwed up editing the vBios on MSI 1070 my PC still turned on and I was still able to login to windows. Device manager told me my MSI 1070 was disabled due to a malfunction. After fixing vBios it worked properly again.

Here is a more detailed step by step from what I can remember doing maybe it'll help maybe not.

Spoiler: Step by step

1. After installing Windows 10 with UEFI enabled I made sure secure boot was disabled then shut down.
2. After modifying the back cover I reinstalled 880m turned on PC to check that everything still worked. I made sure Nvidia drivers were uninstalled then restarted in safe mode.
3. I ran display driver uninstaller for Nvidia drivers after which I restarted by holding shift key and clicking restart via start menu. I then selected troubleshoot then advanced options and lastly UEFI firmware settings pc should open bios after restart.
4. In bios I reset to defaults and then checked secure boot was disabled then saved and restart.
5. After restart I got an error saying boot device not found that's normal because when I reset bios to defaults it disabled UEFI, I shutdown PC after that.
6. I removed 880m installed MSI 1070 turned on PC it turned on then shutoff and turned back on at which point I went into bios via F7 key. Here I noticed VGA card listed vBios of MSI 1070 so I knew it detected card. I went to boot tab enabled UEFI for Windows 8+ then saved and restart.
7. For me it booted in safe mode so I opened msconfig unchecked safe mode saved without restart then held shift selected restart via startmenu selected troubleshoot then advanced options then startup setting and restart.
8. After restart I selected option 7 disable driver signature enforcement via F7 key.
9. After restart I installed edited Nvidia display driver then restarted.
10. At this point everything worked but I noticed I was getting a power throttle issue. It happened when GPU was under load and CPU was in turbo. What confused me was it happened at 165 watt power draw not 180 watt. I disabled turbo and undervolted CPU which resolved that issue. I decided to try an earlier bios/ec just to see what would happen in my case bios 1.03.03 and ec 1.03.03. In bios VGA card is listed as unknown, power throttle now happened at 180 watt and I was able to run GPU under full load and CPU at 3.1GHz but had to disable turbo mode. I decided to get a 230 watt ac adapter so that CPU could use turbo mode and give me room to increase MSI 1070 power draw from 115 watt to 140 watt.

 

@donovan20055 Thanks for your detailed steps . I'll keep them in mind when I get my new card in 2-3 weeks.

 

@donovan20055 Is it necessary to use premamod bios ,to run 1070 on 157sm-a?Or it's working with 1.03.09?

 

No modified file required as far as I understand.

 

Thank you for answer!
Can i use this guide on my 177sm-a ? (I have read that 157 sm-a and 177sm-a are same)

 

There are subtle differences but should be the same for this.

 

Check Device ID in GPU-Z it may be different than mine when following the part about editing nvcvi.inf file for Nvidia driver.