Purchase of a Clevo P170SM-A barebones

I am about to purchase a 170SM-A barebones from R&J.

I plan to order it without processor, RAM or SSDs as I can do better on my own. The 980M I plan to get from them as I can't find a better price than the $705 they are charging.

1. What other required options would you say I should get that would be nearly impossible to find aftermarket?

2. How is the Clevo OEM 802.11?

3. There is no option for a larger power supply. Is 220W enough for a 4940MX and single 980m?

4. I assume the heatsink piping is one unit and I will need to repaste the 980M to install the processor, right?

 

1. RAM you wouldn't be able to do much better typically. Maybe a few bucks. You also run the risk of bad sticks doing yourself.
2. Definitely get a wireless card. Whatever your preference is between Intel and BF but mine is Intel.
3. 220w would be enough but you'll probably run into throttling in benchmarks or intensive use if you start maxing out that CPU.
4. Haven't seen pics of the heatpipes to say one or the other. I'm sure someone else will chime in though.

 

Hmm, perhaps this isn't what I want then. Throttling defeats the purpose of the more expensive faster parts. Perhaps I want to look at the 770ZM. How do they keep the desktop CPU cool sufficiently?

 

You can plug in the 330w unit if you want to go crazy to either system. The 220W will be fine for stock voltage tweaking.

 

I think 220W is way enough, a 47W proc + 980m is sightly throttling, you will have 30 more watts and a 10W increased max consumption, it should be fine .
Also, like always, full usage is very rarely used ^^
For the 770zm , they use things like this : http://i.imgur.com/2wTjfom.jpg

 

Yes the desktop cpu is tamed just about. It only gets a little slower than a stock desktop chip in the heaviest of loads and some tweaking helps get it over the line. In games it will have no issue keepin at full speed.

 

I think you are good as far as specs go. Be sure to invest in a good compound; IC Diamond and GC Gelid-Extreme are good compounds for low mounting pressure.

It does its job well enough. A Bigfoot Killer or an Intel card would be a good upgrade from the stock card (usually a Realtek, but it varies).

As others mentioned, 220W should be fine. Only in extreme circumstances may you notice any throttle.

You can use the stock compound, but a repaste (with a good quality compound) is highly advised.