New Laptop Ordered. P770DM-G W/ 6700K

Whohooo, Laptop arrived. Ordered at around 2pm west coast time on Monday, arrived here eastern time zone on Wednesday at 1231... Off the grid for unboxing and setup... later!

 

Well Damn. Also got my stuff from Amazon for the build... The frikin Samsung Pro 950 is missing.

The box has the packing slip and cushion material, but other than that its empty....

I have the second 950 PRO coming through an ebay seller, today, but won't be able to setup RAID 0..

Bummer.

 

what the heck! how can the box be empty? I've only had such a scam from eBay when I ordered an 840 EVO mSATA 1TB SSD and it arrived not working, when you plug it in and try to format it, Windows says RAW DATA error but the reseller refunded it although I had to pay for shipping so I got screwed since I am in Dubai.

But getting an empty box is just crazy

 

Hey that wasn't by chance me was it? Lol That would be crazy if it was. I sold that exact thing, it went overseas and the guy that bought it couldn't figure it out so I refunded. I checked it out when I got it back and re-sold it (thedoors1999 on ebay)

The issue was I removed it from a RAID array and the drive just needed the "CLEAN" command run in diskpart to work properly. I did that before I sold it the second time.

 

wow!! that was you indeed!! I was called the Matrix Leader back then! Thank you for working with me and giving me a hassle free refund. Not your fault but I got screwed due to expensive shipping charges from Dubai. Glad the SSD was ok I didn't think of it being in a RAID array before which caused it not to be able to format properly.

 

Yeah, the Samsung box wasn't empty, just the Amazon shipping box, there was no Samsung box..

At least I have 1.

As for my GTX 950, apparently Canada Post had an issue scanning the package and processed it by hand, which has put it at least two days behind.

So along with no RAID, my first Benchmarks will be with a 970, then I'll still have to re-install/restore to the RAID when or if I get that setup.

 

ahhh that would tick me off! having to do the same thing twice Please don't try the method where you can configure a RAID configuration to a standard AHCI installation. It may work but has performance impacts and bugs here and there.

 

@Porter

I don't remember but I hope I did change my negative rating to a positive one after that incident. If I didn't, let me know so I can change it.

 

I can usually work on things and figure them out, but trying to help someone troubleshoot over phone or electronic means is hard for me. My ideas come out in random order. Sorry for the trouble, if I ever have a chance to make it up to you I will.

Now back on topic, randyre good luck on getting that missing drive replaced.

Amazon has been pretty good to me except for one return I did a while back, They still owe me $115, admitted to it several times, promised I would get it back several times, but they never followed through with it and I got tired of weekly going through the entire thing all over again after a couple of months. The next time t hey double ship something to me I will consider it payment for what they owe me.

 

Guess I should change my signature... at least temporarily Nahhh

@Porter Yeah, they've been pretty good to me, if they ever miss a ship date they have given me a credit or if I paid for upgraded shipping they have refunded it.

So we'll see how well they respond to this. I did call them within seconds of the package arriving..

Update... Amazon said they would refund me. As soon as the refund is finished I'll order another, unless I get a smokin deal on eBay again. The eBay one I paid $255 and its supposed to be new.

 

Small suggestion for your signature bro as it appears as 3 lines and the 3rd line is just the Pro x64 from Windows 10, looks weird

Clevo P770DM-G (Pro-Star) - Intel Skylake i7-6700K @ 4.6GHz | Kingston HyperX Impact 16GB 2400MHz DDR4 | GeForce GTX 980 | Sound Blaster 3D Audio | 2x Samsung 950 Pro 512GB SSD (RAID 0) | TravelStar 1TB HDD | Killer Wireless-AC 1535 | 17.3" LG LP173WF4-SPF1 IPS FHD Matte Screen (G-SYNC) | Logitech G900 Gaming Mouse | 330W AC Power Adapter | Windows 10 Pro

 

Fixed... Thanks.

 

Wow.. what I nice laptop. The box is plain vanilla, kind of scary when you spend that much money and your used to MSI, ASUS and AW boxes. Looks like they spend the money where is counts though.

Going to delve into in now, weather here has turned to crap, so no chance of catching a flight and interrupting my build. Off I go....

 

I think putting money into the specs rather than a fancy box makes a lot of sense

 

Hang the weather and enjoy the toy. Let us know what you think of it!

 

Thank you for looking out for your customers. Rep added

 

So far so good. Going to install windows, then going to try a restore from my old system.

Noticed that you have the "enable/disable logo" locked out in BIOS Nice to see you're proud of your company and product. I usually disable, I know what I've got, but no big deal.

 

Please go to BIOS and enable FlexiCharger in the ACPI settings, then set the start charge at 80% and the stop charge at 90, this will prevent the battery from being overcharged and thus degrading it's performance in no time

 

Thanks, is that the recommended setting for someone who really never unplugs from the wall? I treat the battery as basically a UPS.

The only reason I even have a laptop is I can't bring my desktop with me. Since I work away from home on a 14/14 schedule, and am rarely at the same base two hitch in a row, using a standard laptop for 50% of my life just doesn't cut it, I need a true desktop at both places. This is as close as I can get and still take it with me.

 

That is exactly what it is.

For someone like you and me, who just treats this laptop as a desktop and is always plugged in, but wants it to be able to move easily should the need arise, you want to keep your battery as healthy as possible.

Heck, if you rarely use the battery, I would set the start charge at 70% and stop charge at 80%

The reason I said keep the stop charge at 90% initially for those times if you want to use your laptop on battery such as me when I go to a cafe, I want to have a bit more juice.



After doing this, unplug the AC Adapter for a while so the battery would drain to the level you want (ie. 70%) then plug it in. You will notice in the power icon in the taskbar in Windows, it says plugged in (not charging) which is what you want

 

At least the locked it out! My BIOS shows the option but I see the logo regardless of setting. I wish they would have just greyed out the option and saved me an hour of troubleshooting and googling it.

Yeah this, set it where you think it makes sense for you. I think I currently have mine set for 60-80%. My thinking is I almost never use it on battery, and the few times I do its for something quick or just moving the notebook between rooms. I just need a few mins maybe 30 at most. On the rare occasion I want 2-3 hrs I would just need to charge it to 100 beforehand.

 

@Porter

That's what i was saying, its greyed out, But at the enable setting. Not a huge issue.

DRAT, blocked again. Got out my backup drive and the boot CD, plugged everything in sat down in anticipation ..... oh no... I don't have a CD-Drive.... last computer that i had without one was my M11x... Oh My.

Not only am I on duty so couldnt leave anyhow, but nearest store that might have an external drive is 40 miles away. Going to hunt around the base, maybe the Med-Crew's laptop came with one... Heres hoping.

Update *** Nope*** going to see if I can make bootable USB.

 

Bootable USB FTW

NBR Windows 10 Clean Installation Guide

 

+1, Multiboot USB is even better

 

So, guess what I'm writing this on? Ha! My New super, cool super fast, sexy laptop. !

The 128GB NVMe drive that came with the P770DM, for free I might add, ( THANKS @Prostar Computer ), was too small, and without the Samsung Pro I decided to just add my old SSD and HDD to the computer and see what happened.

BINGO !! Other than a couple complaints about not being able to run a couple MSI specific programs like PowerBoost it came right up, all the important drivers were already there, everything seems good.

Should make migrating to a SSD RAID really easy as I can use Samsung's migration tool.

I know not doing a clean install is usually a no no, I figured I'd give it a try and if no flaky issue pop up it will save me a ton of work. So far so good.

I'll keep this updated as I continue the build.

Thanks for all the responses and encouragement so far.

Randy

 

Thanks! If you'd like the logo gone, we can take care of that, but it would require a reflash with the stock logo. In either case, hopefully things go swimmingly with your OS and all else. Be sure to reach out anytime you need us.

You're most "soitenly" welcome.

 

I'm quite happy with the computer. I don't mind the logo, sets me apart from the rest of the crowd. In fact on your website I didn't see any branding on the lid of the laptop. Glad to see that there is some there, in fact kind of wish it was more flashy, it's actually very subtle.

 

Glad you are enjoying it! I opted for the 770DM-G as well. The SLI big brother was a bit too flashy for my tastes. After having an old ROG laptop with flashing lights and lightning bolts on the lid, I really wanted a nice understated laptop.

Mythlogic has a nice simple branding on the lid as well. They save their flashy logo for the boot screen.

Thank god they don't plaster that gargoyle on the lid of the laptop.

 

@randyre can you post a full review of your experience with Prostar in the reseller reviews section? This will allow people to make better choices when deciding who to buy a laptop from.

 

Will do.

 

That option is to toggle the Legacy boot logo, not the UEFI 'BGRT' logo.
You can change that only directly Windows...
Otherwise You could try to enable CSM in order to toggle it despite using UEFI.

 

So, laptop is purring along. Finally ironed out all the Windows bugs from porting over my hard drive from the MSI. it did require me to purchase a new copy of Windows and the MSI had the key built into BIOS and MS reported that it was tied to another computer so it deactivated it. Found a key for Win10 Pro x64 for $29 and activated without a problem.

So on to system tweaking. Got the system stable at 4.5ghz, Ram at 2400mhz with slightly reduced timings and CPU temps max at 89 during stress testing. That's with stock thermal paste from ProStar. looks like I got lucky and got a good CPU.

 

*cough* repaste *cough*

 

ICDiamond should be here today..

 

Good choice. The viscosity of ICD makes it a little difficult to eject from the syringe, but it's pretty easy to work with still.

 

Put it in a waterproof bag, and dip it in warm water (110-120F ish) for 10 minutes, softens it right up for easy working.

 

That's what I do too, works great!

 

I've never hand an issue but maybe I just have strong fingers (I did play violin and piano growing up ;p )

 

Are you Korean?

 

lol both Piano and Violin? If you were Asian, you'd be the kid down the street that makes everybody else feel bad about themselves lol...

 

Dude, 99% of my Korean friends are amazing Pianists or Violin Players or drummers, etc etc you get the drift. And here all i get to say when they ask me what do you play.. errmm.. umm.. Squash ?

 

lol... My parents used to do that to me. "Bird, why can't you play a piano like the Chinese boy down the street". Response is usually, "ma, I can make furniture out of salvaged wood, and my hands are too big for that delicate stuff. Tell you what, you shut up about it, I'll redo your bathroom to whatever you like this year."

But I dont know any asian kid that still plays their instruments, because according pretty much all of them, they didn't want to play, they played because its expected of them. Just so that their parents can say "my kid plays [insert musical instrument here]".

While to this day, I still make my own furniture and renovate my own house. Getting harder to do these days, I left all my tools in Florida lol, and buying power tools is a colossal PITA in Europe. They also don't use drywall, or wood for building houses, now that I think about it, they don't really have all that much in terms of Lumber. Tried to pick up walnut the other day, it was like 10X the price, in Euros and its pretty terrible in quality. Sigh...

 

English through and through. My Dad's and engineer and my mum was a teacher (focused on music but most subjects too) so i dabbled in everything. Choirs, bands, rugby teams, hobby electronics etc.

I was ok at playing instruments but never had the passion/drive to continue with it. I mostly went for singing instead with some music theory thrown in

 

lol, I did woodworking growing up. Then moved onto Ham radio, then electronics repair, then "redesign" (mods, mods a galore) . Then for some reason premed (talk about a wrench in the works). Then moved back to engineering. Premed was the second worst decision of my life lol, first one of course was the crazy Asian chick I dated for a number of years. Dodged a bullet there lol.

EDIT: Not saying that Asian women are like that, its just that one, that one was nuttier than a squirrel turd.

EDIT2: Anyways, back on topic. IC diamond vs Liquid Ultra... I was thinking of getting some liquid ultra and see if I can repaste one of my Precisions. May be worth while since those Quadro cards are constantly getting annihilated.

 

If you do get the liquid metal just respect it as the conductive aluminium eating substance it is.

 

Yeah. But why run only 4.4 GHz? 95% is also mediocre http:// www.3dmark.com/3dm11/11223309

 

Just an update. purring along, no issues whatsoever. Rock solid, great performance, almost wish there was a good docking station available and I'd ditch the desktop at home.

Almost... My desktop now has a GTX 1080...

 

Awesome to hear that it's looking good. We've been asked about docking stations before on various models. It would be great to see some emerge, even if for only a select few systems.

 

You could create your own kind if dock with the thunderbolt port.

 

Indeed, this is now an option