PREMA BIOS MOD Review

It's weird for me... Like when I barely turn on the system, the threshold is 50, but after a game or something intensive and depending when I turn on Max fan, it could be 60 or 70... Even after the I'm done with the application.. and sometimes pulsing will happen in 1-2 second intervals.

 

If I recall correctly 60 and 70ºC (or at least 70ºC) is a threshold value where the fan changes speed during normal operation, so if you are using fn+1 the fan will pulse when crossing these temps.

I will make some tests with prime95 to check where are these threshold values

edit: tests complete...
So it seems the EC threshold values for changing fan speed according to cpu temp are:
~50
~65ºC
~70ºC
~75ºC
~76ºC?<-yeah it's strange but the fan seems to increase a bit at this level compared to 75ºC
~79ºC
~86ºC
~90ºC

and it seems to pulse around these levels, however it's more noticeable at 65-75ºC, probably due to bigger diference between fan speed values programmed at EC and 100% fan speed
Below 65ºC it doesn't pulse at all until it reaches 50ºC, where the fan stops.

 

Hello guily, nice to find you here
And yes you can go back to clevo's stock bios, however you never should downgrade the bios version, for example going from 1.00.04 to 1.00.03, whatever you are using Clevo's bios or Prema's bios, as it will brick you machine...

Also, it seem the newer bios 1.00.04 (prema mod 1.4 is based on this version) causes an annoying coil whine. Since you can't go back to older 1.00.03 bios once you flash it, I woud stick with Prema bios 1.3 (still based on 1.00.03 bios). Try the 1.3 UV version since it undervolts the gpu, resulting in lower temperatures :thumbsup:

 

Reverted back to stop bios and lost the SAGER boot screen... Does anyone have the original latest bioses?

Thanks in advance!

 

THANK YOU! And nice to see u too

But can't you really donwgrade from official to official? Like from official clevo 1.00.03 to official Clevo 1.00.02 or something like that?

ps: Though I don't wanna risk breaking it, as I don't have a programmer and the store is like 1000KM away from the SEA, and costs €€€€ (Madeira to Portugal ).
Keep Cool

 

not from 04 to 03

 

Prema W150ERx Mod v1.3 from stock latest BIOS to Clevo W150ERx 07 & EC 04 is it possible? Did anyone try?

 

You can go from latest stock to latest Prema Mod back and forth as you like, just not downgrade to an older stock BIOS or Prema Mod.
Once you use BIOS 04 / Prema Mod 1.4+ on W110ER you can't go back.
Once you use BIOS 07 / Prema Mod 1.2+ on W150ERx or W170ER you can't go back.
That's of Clevos own making...

 

Okay, I'm telling you the same thing.

I can go from latest stock Clevo W150ERx 07 & EC 04 to latest Prema W150ERx Mod v1.3 or v1.4+ etc. back and forth right?

 

What don't you understand in DON'T DOWNGRADE ?

Yes you can go from stock to mod, and from mod to stock, back and forth how many times you want as long as you don't downgrade.

It's quite simple, I'm a bit surprised a re-seller don't have any basic computer knowledge, I assume/hope you're the commercial guy

 

We do not sell any notebooks on the Prema modded BIOS. Selling with Standard Clevo BIOS. Do not be surprised. A simple question. According to this update do or not do. If you're wondering Monster Notebook have a look at. :thumbsup:

 

You can easily change between prema bios and stock bios, as long you don't move to older bios versions
Here is the list for w150er:
Prema bios 1.1 -->bios 1.00.06 and EC 1.00.03
Prema bios 1.2 and 1.3-->bios 1.00.07 and EC 1.00.04

Once you flash bios 1.00.07&EC, either Clevo's stock or prema bios 1.2/1.3, you can't go back to older bios, stock 1.00.06 or prema 1.1.

So Clevo's bios 1.00.07 <---inter-chageable--> Prema 1.2/1.3
This limitation is Clevo's fault, not Prema's.
Hope it is clear now :thumbsup:

p.s.: the same applies for w110er: once you are using bios Clevo's 1.00.04 or Prema 1.4 you can't go back to 1.00.03 or Prema 1.0-1.3

 

Jeez... Thanks again .

But it SUCKS so bad. On the Asus I can flash it as many times as I want.

Isn't there a way to hack it? Or using an app to FORCE FLASHING BIOS, like ppl use to hack them and flash BIOS on some laptops that don't even support updates...

And using the programmer, you can put the first released bios again right?
Keep Cool

 

People always want to upgrade, unless you tell them it's forbidden to downgrade..

 

Yep, because they don't trust the manufacturers to have solved the last bios' problems without adding new ones in the process. I've encountered this no-downgrade policy with other companies (HP, the Elitebook line) and I regretted having upgraded the bios.

This being said ... Prema, since the stock / mod version correspondence seems to be confusing some people, how about following the stock release numbers in naming your Prema mod releases?

e.g., if you mod the W150 stock bios v07, name your release "Prema Mod v07", even if it's only your second-gen mod.

 

Prema MOD BIOS'es will soon be the standard anyway. :thumbsup:

 

Hmmm PREMA can we not use that boot logo, I am looking for something more professional then a blue vortex when starting up my laptop
Please let me know if we can import our own custom boot logo.
Thanks in advance

 

@ guily6669

We can only downgrade too a complete running dump of the older BIOS and not the old versions that Clevo released, because they are missing certain parts that would otherwise remain from the new versions and cause a brick.

@landsome

All Prema Mod .rar files already contain the Clevo Base in their file name

@Studie

Every Clevo BIOS requires a different type of bootlogo some BIOS revisions won't support the format used in the one before, also the stretch of the screen has to be calculated each time...too much effort.

The logo I use is the Flower of Life:

Flower of Life - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I tried to find something timeless and neither too dark nor too kiddie...sorry if you don't like it.

 

Logo is great. It's geometrically awesome.

 

I just turn it off and view the POST screen.

Are there any major bugs/glitches with this release? I'm liking the idea of lower power usage, but not necessarily that of not being able to revert to another BIOS if something goes wrong. The only complaint people have had is circuit whine, right?

 

The latest BIOS are the best yet. Except the whine which only shows on some systems...

 

Prema,

A bit off-topic, but would you be able to be comment if EFI is working or not? Been trying to boot from a EFI USB with no luck. The "Boot from EFI filesystem" portion of the bios boot section seems to do nothing, so I'm not sure if it's broken or if I'm doing something incorrectly.

 

Thank You PREMA.

How do you mod the bios (hex edit?).

By the way, is there a way for making the laptop to use like 10W or less on idle? (Is there anything you could do on the bios to achieve those results?). Or if you know a good power saving application for windows that really help a lot decreasing power consumption, I will be pleased.
Keep Cool

 

If you use the last BIOS and the right drivers, it should already be below 10w according to Prema.

Also, let me answer your first question for him

 

Thanks!

Humm, so we can have like 7 hours of battery or more?

Alienware with same hardware as W110ER can last near 13 hours, it's so sad the Clevo lasting only like 4h ...

If I use latest official clevo bios and drivers for the W110ER how much time aprox. would the battery last?


I also use hex workshop for ages already, nice APP . I also know the Phoenix bios editor.
Keep Cool

 

Which alienware has the same hardware as the W110ER?

 

Wait, what? What alienware has 13 hours? M14x? Hardly, users are getting like 3-4 hours at best. M14x has 63WHr battery as well, 13 hours would mean less than 5W power draw, which even power sipping Atom based netbooks can't achieve.

I don't buy the 10W either, that's like unheard of 12-13W at best in my estimation. I'll give 305.53 a go as suggested by Prema and check power draw, but I doubt it's less than 13W. That should still give you 4.5 hours though.

 

Well idle time would be the best to confirm, it would give 6+ hours. What's your opinion on eurocom monster's reviews ?

 

That 9-12W was not properly measured as direct current draw from the wall, but a estimate frame the battery meter software which used yo show about 18+ constantly on 03 BIOS. Also as I said screen brightess was on minimum and the woke thing in power saving mode UV BIOS & with Low voltage RAM. Also all other drivers it used to report about 22W+ on idle. But it shows as 9.something after all...I used to get just over 3hours of battery before and now get close to 4h.


EDIT: Sorry guys I just realised that I never uploaded the additional ME update (which works in conjunction with the new BIOS to do the power saving...so we essentially don't use the same BIOS....will do today!

 

I think I missed it, but what "ME" stands for?
Is there anything similar for w150/170?

Anything that can bring up the battery life is welcome :thumbsup:
I am going to test my w150 to see how much does it last with the 1.00.07 bios.

 

EXCELLENT! Look forward to seeing what the ME update does.

I just did a battery drain test last night:

i5-3360m (testing this for performance/power/heat/battery)
nVidia driver 305.53 (as recommended by Prema)
30% brightness
Balanced power profile
4 Firefox tabs open and refreshing anywhere from 1 to 15 minutes
Shutdown at 5%

Total time was 4 hrs 48 mins. That equates to about 13W draw. Compare that with 3 hrs 31 minutes with stock drivers and i7-3610QM. I will do same battery test when I pop the 3610QM back in my machine to see if the BIOS and drivers and ME help with that too.

 

I'm gonna run a few idle test tonight too, before I flash to 04 UV mod =)

 

Seems pretty good..
Don't you guys use clevo control center ?
I'm not sure if it's doing anything else than setting windows power profiles, and (de)activate components.

 

It's similar hardware (not same hardware).

Alienware M11x R3 Gaming Notebook. It runs colder, and with almost same battery as Clevo it lasts near 13 hours.

8 cell battery (63Wh)

"Especially impressive is the battery life when subjected to a low load, minimal brightness, and maximum power saving; the Readers Test from Battery Eater ran for just under 13 hours."

Battery runtime:

Idle (without WLAN, min brightness) - 12h 55min
Surfing with WLAN - 7h 30min (this is really what is enough for everyone's jobs)
DVD - 6h 40min
Load (maximum brightness) - 2h 23min

I wonder why so many difference from Clevo which only last like 4 hours on idle under same idle test as that Alienware (without wlan, min brightness).

Now for the Clevo W110ER (with I7 3610QM):

Battery runtime (62 Wh battery):
Idle (without WLAN, min brightness) - 4h 24min
Surfing with WLAN - 3h 43min
Load (maximum brightness) - 1h 43min

Altough I haven't bought Clevo W110ER for the battery which I don't care, for most people this laptop won't actually be a proper 11.6 laptop, because some require like 6h battery for their jobs (which is where that alienware and the netbooks are and so many other recent laptops can reach those propper needed hours for high portability laptops)...

pretty good? Lot's of laptops nowadays last almost 3x more than this... It's pretty BAD!

"Power Consumption

Although the GeForce GT 650M is only enabled when required due to Optimus, the idle consumption of 14.2 - 18.7 watts is exceptionally high. When considering the good 3D and application performance, this power requirement may not seem baseless, but we expected much lower rates. (around 7watt)"

"We could not determine the reason for this behavior; Optimus and the processor's energy saving technologies were properly active according to different tools."

"Acer's 17 inch Aspire V3 lasted a bit longer in this test, despite a considerably smaller battery and similar components."

"This may indicate that the energy saving features do not work perfectly in idle - a later BIOS update may remedy this as well."
Keep Cool

 

But Alienware M11x R3 has a low-voltage dual-core processor running at 1.6GHz, and gpu is considerably weaker (gt540m)...unless I am seeing the wrong review from notebookcheck.

Would be better to compare with M14x R2 since it also has a quad-core processor and gt650m.

Maybe there is a special bios/EC for w110er, since anandtech reports 400min for idle and 330 surfing internet.

p.s.: but I agree that w110/150/170er battery could be better maybe a future bios can help but I won't hold my breath. Still great laptops for the price.

 

I'm not sure about intel atom, although I believe they're not power efficient at all. That's only what Intel made you believe.
Latest generation may be, since they (at last) are able to make their way into smartphones, with honorable perfs & autonomy..

But I already told you, many notebooks can draw less than 7-8w.
As an example, acer timeline series can idle around 5-6W, and can surf the web around 8w (67wh battery, 10+ under mobilemark productivity test): these are 13-15" notebooks with old generation chipsets & components.
So clevo is definitely not good at optimizing power, they certainly have fewer means to work on that matter (R&D etc.)

The low-voltage cpu sure is to consider, but if the gpu is weaker for sure, it doesn't mean it draws less power. nVidia did an awesome job with the kepler architecture at minimizing power consumption.

While I don't know that test, I assume you're wrong (well the review you saw is wrong, or had outdated drivers/bios) since we can get more than 4h with WLAN on and surfing the web.

I was saying pretty good, for that laptop
Anyway, please stop making stuff up.
You can't find ANY laptop (let alone lots of them) which will last 3x w110er autonomy with a similar battery capacity.
The alienware which you crawl about lasts only 2x more, which is already really good, but as someone else stated it has a low-voltage cpu..

I don't care for completely idle tests with minimum brightness and everything turned off, they are meaningless, surfing the web is already much more representative.

But I guess I agree with you, Clevo did not optimized it properly... yet, there's still hope ^^

 

What's up with that coil whine? Where is it from and how noticeable is it? Does it also occur with stock 04?

I could not live with that at all if my machine did this after flashing. Had a HP, which also hat a silent humming noise to it, when plugged in. It drove me nuts and I hated it for it.

Also I am 100% satisfied atm with PremaMod 1.3UV. It's one millimeter away from perfection. So I don't dare upgrading, knowing I can't go back if anything goes wrong.
Plus battery life doesn't matter to me. I hardly ever have the battery in anyway.
So I guess I wait until it's "safe" to upgrade.

[EDIT]
The Alienware M11x R3 is hard to compare to the Clevo. I did compare them in a German Review I wrote, because I replaced the M11x R3 with the latter.

The M11x had a pretty big battery (63Whr).
Also for it having the same hardware as all these fancy pants Ultrabooks, it also has the same battery life, which is nothing unsual for the Intels ULV hardware. So there is no real miracle about it.

 

Did you do anything special (besides the modded .inf, which I believe is required) when installing those drivers? My normal power usage is ~12-15W when not doing anything intensive, but when I installed 305.53, I got a constant 20+ watts even at idle, as if the dGPU was not shutting off properly. The only drivers I have ever used that do not exhibit this problem are the stock ones from Clevo. Of course, I did not test those drivers in combination with Prema's new BIOS, which was not out at the time.

What is the standard process for installing new drivers on an Optimus system? Am I correct that the nVidia ones can just be installed over the old ones, or is there more to it than that?

 

That is due to the 305 drivers default settings. Do the following:
Open the nVidia Driver Center. In the desktop tab check "Enable nVidia Activity symbol". Now you see in the tray, which GPU you are using - pretty useful.
And also set the Favourite Graphicsprocessor in the General Settings of the 3D Settings to "Automatic". As said, as default its set to nVidia High Perfomance, so its always enabled.

 

You guys are both comparing 10-17W CPU's vs 35W-45W CPU's and GPU with 35W vs 40-45W (M11x & Timeline vs Clevo W110ER). So that's 30W+ difference in TDP alone, which equates into much more power draw and heat dissipation required. The Aspire V3 has a GT 640m which is a 30W TDP vs the 40W TDP of the 650m. The 650m would eat the 540m in the M11x R3 for lunch and the 650m is ~ 25% faster than the 640m.

There need to be some optimizations, I am the first to admit, but you can't compare an M11x R3 with this Clevo. You best compare with an M14x R2 which has nearly identical specs except M14x has GDDR5 video RAM and Clevo W110ER has GDDR3. Their results are about 3-4 hours just like the W110ER. I'd expect about 12W power draw on average with light web surfing, but not much more. It's not possible.

edit: I didn't realize they made an Aspire V3 with 650m. I see this review of the Aspire V3 with i7-3610QM and 650m which gets 4hrs 40 mins IDLE, min bright, no wi-fi. And surfing was a mere 2hr 43mins. Yes it has a smaller battery, 48WHr vs 62WHr, but if you scale linearly 2hr 43mins = 3hr 30min. But if you look there's Aspire V3 models ranging from AMD CPU's to i3 and i5 Sandy Bridge and Pentium, so be sure of the version you're looking at for battery life.

 

You're right about gpu, but this should not matter much when idling or surfing.
Well, as long as nVidia drivers are working fine that is ^^
The acer timeline I was referring to (and as I said, they are not isolated cases) don't use low-voltage cpu though.
Actually I'm using the same one I had on my 4830TG, a sandy bridge 2410M.

It's been 4h20, screen off most of the time, minimum brightness the rest of it, clevo control center set to quiet mode, and my battery still has 1/3 left.. I'd said around 40min real use, with chrome opened (~25 tabs) and a videoplayer on pause.
I'll let it go to 5%, but I assume I can get 6h on idle with wifi on (but again, screen off most of the time and using a not-so-powerful cpu).
That is with old 0.3 bios and latest nVidia beta.

I'll run another test with screen on all the time (is battery eater good at this ?), then I'll flash latest prema mod.

BTW Prema, I hope you don't mind your thread is being battery-hijacked

edit: all good then

 

It's my thread. But it's ALL Prema for the BIOS. He's the genius behind everything here. And it's related to power consumption which is BIOS related anyhow.

 

6h and I have 7% left =)
I'll run a battery eater test before I go to bed, and another one tomorrow after I've flashed.
Forgot to note that uTorrent was on uploading from the beginning, and skype connected, so it's not that bad !

 

Nice. I'll have to try quiet mode. I used balanced mode. I noticed quiet mode puts the system in "power saver" profile. It must change a few other parameters, but you can go into the power saver profile and set the LCD to not turn off. Although I did a test before with power saver and difference wasn't a whole lot. But I think the dGPU was not fully sleeping.

 

OK here the latest official ME (Intel Management Engine) update for the W110ER (for 04 stock BIOS and Prema Mod v1.4)

Edit: link on next page.

 

bump

 

Says its missing fparts.txt file.

I already did the meset.exe, it did cold boot, and fans are at 100%. Afraid to just reboot.

 

I'm assuming that's why the file is set to private now huh

 

Sorry put it together on my mobile and missed the file (my W11 is still a brick and only have a phone right now) will upload new file soon.
@HT: It's harmless, you can just shutdown.

 

Thanks Prema. I shutdown, figured that was fine at least. Just didn't know if booting into Windows might confuse it.