P170em with eurocom mb - gpu update

Hello everybody,

i was following the topic about gpu update of the p170em but due to some problems with the motherboard (video output to the lcd cocked) i've changed the mb last year to a eurocom one to save my laptop from the bin.

Now i'm struggling to have a stable system with the 7970m card, enduro system and windows 10 without a total freeze in driver update or installation from zero.. seems i've found a stable configuration with some amd software and drivers configuration (not the newest).. but i guess it's time to switch that damn gpu card to a geforce.

For the price i was aiming to a 970m or 980m so that's bring to my question.. i've checked requirement about bios update and what i've now bring me some new chaos in mind.. before doing something very very stupid as brick it with the wrong one i'm here for ask for informations:

my current system bios say:

eurocom motherboard p170EMx
bios rev: 1.02.16
kbc/ec firmware rev: 1.02.12

now my question: i've to change it with prema bios or not in order to make a 9xxm geforce work?
there will be any problem changing it with my current motherboard?

Regards and thanks for help

kei

 

Yes to make the 9xx series work you would need to flash it.

 

eurocom anwer me yesterday

"Your motherboard should have arrived with the newest BIOS available already installed. Any new card you purchase from us will have the correct vBIOS loaded on it. If you are moving from AMD to NVidia, you will need to get a new heatsink."

ok i know i need a different one for the 1070... but for 980m also?.. it's that correct?..

i can even use the 1070 ... for only 1081€ taxes, shipping etc... not cheap ;D.. but it's something

 

1070 is about 100% better than 980m, but 3x price

 

Probably works out cheaper than the desktop cards still at the moment

 

It might be worth noting that your BIOS version looks fairly old, intended for Windows 7 only, I think. That may (or may not) have something to do with the instability in Win 10 you had. IIRC, a 1.05.01 version was released to address Windows 10.

 

9xx may need to use UEFI boot mode. You may need to use modded inf

 

i cleared the crash problem when i face the OC GPU process cuz i remember my 7970m run 920-1400 without any problem (daily use config) with everything standard.. the solution was easy but i forgot totally about it (last time i've reinstalled OS on my 170 was many years ago).. the ULPS it's the guilty.. when u install and run the first start of windows 10 if u give windows an internet connection he automatically install a latest gpu driver for both vga (dedicated and not) and ULPS will make it freeze as f*ck... if u try to install manually the new adrenalin from ati will be the same, it will freeze during installation; u can avoid it disabling ULPS at the first start from registry.

about the bios you're probably right, but i'm using that laptop for daily work also and i'll face the bios problem the day the gpu will arrive. (but only because i solve my stability problem or i'll consider it sooner, by the way the motherboard was shipped from eurocom in dec 2015 and windows 10 was released on 2015 summer.. so it has not the latest firmware at that time?! dunno)

will a 1.05.01 firmware update in my p170 necessary in win10 atm? what real benefit i'll have? win10 it's running pretty fine atm.. no crash or problems till now (after i solved that ulps trick).


sorry for bad english

 

For graphics card advice, I would advise a 1060 card instead of a 980m card unless you can find a used 980m for cheaper (and the vbos for it, and a bios for your board). The 1060 card will preform about 30-40% better than a 980m and is currently $171usd cheaper at eurocom. The 1070 will outperform the 1060 but you will have trouble seeing any real world benefits unless you have the 1080/120hz panel. The 60hz panels are limited to 60fps output which a 1060 can easily do, no optimus configuration can work with vr so vive and rift are out of the question, so unless you are running an external 1080p/120hz displayport screen or 1440p/60hz displayport screen its probably not worth the difference.

For bios, if you have it working right now and decide not to upgrade your graphics card, don't update the bios, no benefit to a stable system with stock hardware. If you do buy a graphics card from eurocom their tech support will provide a bios to flash, it will be the latest prema bios build (they used to be a prema partner and are still distributing his bios, not getting in to this here) and their tech support will also provide an nvidia driver with modified inf. You will likely want to learn how to modify your own driver inf too in the future if you go this route, they tend to not have the latest drivers modded.

Bottom line, a 10 series graphics card will make this feel like a new laptop in games, I found it has been worth the effort
BUT do not think that it will be 100% plug and play like a desktop card, you will have to disable driver signing in windows, flash a new bios, and possibly experiment with other settings and driver versions too. For me, I run a 1070 in a P150em, same gpu heatsink, very similar motherboard and have had to slightly underclock the 1070 to be stable, so has one other user. It also runs quite hot even with a modified heatsink.

 

thanks for the advices, i'm looking for a 980m atm, someone told me the 1060 will have rather annoying throttlingpoint (59c) to fight with so need more work to do to make it work, a maxwell card will be less problematic with my current setting (it will run with my current eurocom 2015 bios) so just need few modifications (drivers and card with vbios), looking myself around i "found" (tbh the owner find me ;D) a genuine clevo 980m in europe cheaper than eurocom 1060, i've this laptop from dec 2012 and its running pretty decent till now, with that gpu will put it in retirement in 2024 if i'm lucky enough ;D

Someone show me a topic where there is a current bug with pascals card and intel drivers too that will be probably fixes in april.. all that reasons plus the lucky found of that card in europe make this 980m a good choice for the moment, it doesent mean i'll not switch for something different in the next times (power it's never enough).

About the 60Hz panel i perfectly agree with u.. i'm aiming at the 60fps stable at maximun graphics without squize too much oc from any component (need it for daily too and fan noise it's not welcome at work)

about the drivers modification i'm curious about it and i'll learn it for sure.. i didnt need it till now so i really dont care about it but if it will be my future choice i've to learn how to to keep up with it.. (dunno if it make sense for u).

i'm not a benchmark enthusiast, i take it as a reference for what my hardware can do or can do more.. recently my "room mate" take a asus rog g752vs with 1070 and it's currently playing my steam account... so i'm looking to some previusly grey and boring games in a new lights... literally...

as always sorry for my bad english and thanks for the time spent, any advice it's always appreciate.

 

The 980M and the 1060 are around 5-10% (assuming you have Premafied card). Also you need to mod the heatsink in order to even touch die GPU die.
Also optimus configs do work with VR. Some optimus notebooks have iGPU to internal screen only but other ports to the dGPU, which makes VR work no problem.
I don't know about the whole Prema/Eurocom thing or not.

I "upgraded" from 980M to 1060, not really noticable. Actually had t whip a hardprogrammer out to fix the card to begin with, since it has it's issues on stock alright.

 

Sorry, should have been more specific to our line, all our video outputs are all through optimus on the P15xEM/P17xEM variants, making vr next to impossible. Our DVI is single link, the pixel clock on our HDMI will not go over 1080/60, our displayport will do 1080/120 (can confirm this, I game there at home) and should have the bandwidth to do a vive but intel drivers will not run that resolution to even test it.

The pascel issue, I will agree that on windows 10, the slight hangs when accessing specific settings and with some programs is annoying, but I could have the same issues with a brand new optimus laptop too so having it here wasn't so bad. There are ways to get rid of it entirely but they drain battery. As for the fix, since intel, microsoft and nvidia can not seem to agree on who is at fault I actually doubt that the next intel drivers will fix it.

Didn't know about the 1060 thermal throttling point, my 1070 thermal throttles at 90c and it is usually in the high 80s even after lapping the heatsink and using liquid metal.

 

Aside from the downright ridiculous 59c limit, the power limit on the card that always blinks up is equally annoying.

Also the pascal might get fixed by intel sometime in april.

 

Looks like they are releasing them with lower power limits so they don't blow up some of the older boards out there.

 

What do the old boards look like compared to the new boards?

 

I'm talking about yours, if you are within 5-10% of the 980M then you are running slow compared to the clevo cards.