Is buying an used and pin-modded P870KM1-G a good idea?

Hello community,

I am seeking for help 'cause I am considering buying a used P870KM1-G (GTX1080) with carried out Coffee-Lake mod.
In addition, the seller flipped the panel to a 144Hz g-sync FullHD one and it comes with a delidded and isolated 8700K aswell.
Its about 2 years old and has, according to the crystaldisk screen, an operating time of round about 250 hours.
Price would be around 1400€, whats still alot of money, especially with no warranty left, but i know, that the specs are awesome.

So in particular im very interessted in 'long time' experiences according to this pin mod. I read about a higher powerdraw from the 6core CPUs, that maybe could affect the mainboard components which are made for 4core CPUs.
Do you think, that the estimated lifetime of such a machine could differ from a non-modded one?
Any other tips or what i should check for? Ive seen a lot of benches and temperatures, all values look fine.

Would you recommend this buy?

thanks in advance and sorry for my language,

Gonzberg

 

I’d say go for it. That is a powerful machine. And you could always swap it to a TM1 motherboard in the future for really cheap if need be. You have all of the basic components already. You can also undervolt that 8700K and pull very low power under a 100% load. The 144Hz panel is a nice option, and the cooling in these P870’s is really good so they still fetch a premium price.

Seems like a decent deal to me. But I do think $1,200 would be more reasonable on something like that. But really, it has very modern components and will run anything at its 1080P/144Hz resolution.

if it runs good then go for it!

 

Thanks for your response and evaluation!
The price is fixed, so I can take it or leave it.
My main consideration ist about buying this used machine or a brand new N970TF with RTX2070 and a 8700 which ist roughly the same price, but it is lacking the gsync panel.

Could you explain to me what this TM1 thing ist about?

Thanks very much!

 

The TM1 is pretty much the newest P870.

The P870TM1 Z370 chipset laptop.

Companies sell these barebones on ebay, that is pretty much a gutted out P870TM1. No cpu, no lcd panel, no keyboard etc. etc. Then you could move all of your components over.

But, obviously only if something happen to yours.

If that laptop is working fine, then go for it! People run 9900K processors in them without issues. So i’m sure the 8700K will be just fine.

 

Well thanks for your explanation, but a new TM1 barebone would cost like 1250€ inkl. shipping so this would be a write-off if anything happens to it. But thats why iam asking about long time quality.
On the other hand, beside one broken RAM module I experienced never any hardware malfunction during the last estimated 20 years.
Would the N970TF with 8700@65W and a 2070 be an alternative for the same price or ist the P870M1 superior in all respects?

 

The P870 will be the faster laptop. Faster CPU, and faster GPU especially for 1080P gaming. And both of these components would run very cool too inside the P870 chassis. The N970TF is a great option too though, and I am pretty sure you could drop in a i9 9900 non K 65TDP CPU in there as a future upgrade option.

This is really oranges and apples though.

The P870 is fully upgradeable, with a removeable desktop CPU, and desktop power equivalent 200 watt GTX1080 MXM.

The N970 is a lighter, thinner chassis limited to 65 watt desktop processors, and it has a soldered embedded RTX2070.

The P870 will be faster obviously. And it has room for future tinkering and or growth. A member on here installed a 9900K and a RTX2080 inside of his P870KM1.

I would say buy the N970TF if you are going to be carrying the machine around frequently.

Tough choice. I wouldn’t worry about hardware failing. That is extremely uncommon I think.


I own a Clevo P750TM1 8086K with GTX1080 144HZ 1080P gsync panel. it has been extremely reliable! I am constantly tinkering on it or tweaking performance. it is practically a desktop to me. The GtX1080 is still blazing fast, and outperforms a lot of the RTX2080 options or matches their performance. I can upgrade my GPU or CPU if I want to in the future. I am happy with it so far. It is the smallest of the Clevo laptops with removeable MXM video cards and desktop class processors.

 

Cool, you seem pretty convinced by this machine, good to hear!
Iam looking for desktop replacement as well, for mobile purposes I own a N957TP6.
Sold my desktop when my son was born in 2017 and bought a Acer Predator 17 with 6700hq and 1070, but I sold it a week ago and want to have somehting more powerfull.

 

What could get new for that money in your area GPU wise?

 

As I said for the same money of the used 870KM with 8700K I can get a new N970 with 8700 and rtx 2070.

 

So gaming will be similar, it comes down to weight, warranty and modding potential.

 

Yeah, that's really it.
Weight or mobility is no point for me as I want a desktop replacement..but these two psus are a true handicap in my opinion. Might one be enough without oc?
Iam not sure how the N970 will perform in cooling and loudness respects as its thinner and has a less potential cooling system, on the other hand it has to deal with less tdp.

 

One can be used with a single 1080 and normal settings basically. It's not recommended but it should be fine.

 

Thanks for all your help, guys, that really helps me out.
I have one last question regarding graphics performance. As far as I know, the 1080 can pull 200W. What clocks does ist usually reach and how will it perform against the 115W 2070?
I watched some reviews of Bob on YouTube about the N970 and the build in 2070 hits around 1600Mhz, what is pretty decent.
Can u push the 200W 1080 even further fps-wise or are they even?

 

You can OC the 190W 1080 to around 2GHz, which should push it past a 115W 2070 at that point.

 

Is there any review that reveals the performance differences at roughly the same clocks?

 

As you can see, at the same clock the 2070 is generally a little faster, but it uses more power. But those are desktop cards. In a laptop when you’re comparing a severely powered gimped 115W 2070 versus a 190W 1080 that can clock much higher, I’d expect the 1080 to be the overall winner.

 

Wow, thanks for this helpfull comparison. I counted all the frames and got an average of all games 99 (1080) vs 106 (2070), so thats roughly 6% better performance at same clocks and almost same powerdraw, what is actually pretty poor.
So keeping in mind that the 2070 @115W will only clock @ around 1600Mhz will lead to a decent advantage for the 190W 1080 @ presumingly 2000Mhz.

 

A constant 2000mhz needs either voltage curve adjustment or power modding.

 

According to the seller the 1080 runs at a constant 2Ghz with voltagecurve adjustment and pulls 188W.
Sounds pretty solid in my opinion.

 

Sounds about right

 

I have a GTX1080N 200 watt and it is very powerful in my Clevo P750TM1-G. The memory is not overclocked in that above video, so you will see the GTX1080 match that 106 FPS average you calculated especially at 1080P

It usually runs at 1,911 with 0.925V Core with my memory at 11,384Mhz. I am limited by temperature. As I tend to stay around 77C, and I cannot overclock more unless my GPU could run cooler.

RTX2070 laptops cannot match the performance of my setup. Most RTX2080 Max Q laptops are even drastically slower than my current setup.

GTX1080, with a blazing fast 8th gen intel cpu behind it really eats up 1080P gaming.

BFV is always around 120-130+FPS on 64 player maps with ultra everything on. My minimums are usually like around 90 and very rare. My FPS stays above 120 almost all the time.

 

It's very powerful, there is just that weight, noise and battery life sacrifice. Warranty too in this case. For most people it would not be worth it, but for the enthusiasts it certainly can be.

 

Hey guys I finally got my hands on it and did some testing the last couple of hours.
Major downside in my opinion is the noise level, Iam really disappointed by that. Delidded CPU, undervoltet@around 1,1V@stock clock gives my temps at around low 80s Celcius, but paired with a noisy fan.
In addition, CPU does not go idle, always at around 4,4-4,GHz.
OC-adjustment besides voltage tweaking has no effect in the Clevo Control Center. I can type whatever clock, it doenst exceed stock clocks - 4.3GHz allcore in BFV or cinebench e.g.

Its a dsanke bios version 1.05xx I think.

Can some1 help me to apply oc clocks in the BIOS? I cant find the right submenu for Core voltages and clocks.

 

Throttlestop man my Internet profile clocks are max 3.6 GHz and fans don't even turn on if I won't start gaming.

 

Yes sure, I can use throttlestop profiles, but why does the CPU not behave like at stock, downclocking and undervolting when in idle state?
Is this affected by the CoffeeLake-Bios(es), is this normal when modded?

 

What are your cstate settings and power plan?

 

thank

thanks for you reply,

I am currently @work and cannot check my settings, but now you are asking, Iam quite sure I set the Windows Power Plan on high performance :/
Not too sure about the c-state either, what should it be set to? Ill check the settings when I am back @home.

Does loading default settings on the modded bios lead to any problems or can it be set to default as any other (non-modded) bios?

 

High performance will lock the CPU to a higher clock.

 

CPU still not clocking down:

What I recently did:
- load BIOS defaults
- set windows powerplan to balanced
- set minimum cpu state to 5%
- uninstalled Clevo Control Center

CPU still idling at 4.6-4.7@~1.15V

C-States like in the added photos.

 

Who really cares if it doesn’t downclock. Mine did this too. It somehow fixed its self after like 3 months of owning it. Just let it run full cpu speed during idle. This will not hurt anything. My CPU will downclock now, but I leave it in high performance mode so it doesn’t downclock at all.

 

Windows reinstall finally did the job for me.

 

It can make it a bit loud just sitting on the desktop.

 

I would suggest a Windows 10 LTSC Enterprise. That is what I run. Maximum performance, no garbage or bloatware junk
running in the back ground.

I think you made a good choice going with the pin modded Clevo P870. That is what I would have gotten too.

You can upgrade the GPU too.

 

For you my friend

Inside Intel's Secret Overclocking Lab: The Tools and Team Pushing CPUs to New Limits. Intel's engineers explain oc'ing, voltage etc..

PAGE 7: 'Safe' Overclocking Voltages and Techniques

But Ragland has some advice: "As an overclocker, if you manage these two [voltage and temperature], but especially think about 'time in state' or 'time at high voltage,' you can make your part last quite a while if you just think about that. It's the person that sets their system up at elevated voltages and just leaves it there 24/7 [static overclock], that's the person that is going to burn that system out faster than someone who uses the normal turbo algorithms to do their overclocking so that when the system is idle your frequency drops and your voltage drops with it. So, There's a reason we don't warranty it, but there's also a way that overclockers can manage it and be a little safer."