That many issues?

Sorry, but in my impatience of waiting for my new Sager NP9150 to arrive, I have been reading these forums a LOT. All I seem to see is complaints either about the 7970m drivers sucking so bad you can't play, fans being too loud, and temperatures being too high.

Are these more complaints of "I wish it were better at this, but its still does a damn good job and is the gaming laptop I would recommend to anyone", or are people actually regretting purchasing their machines?

Sorry I just have a bit of buyers anxiety from reading these forums, but I would rather cancel the order before it ships and is too late, if people are actually regretting purchasing them.

 

Just test it out yourself when you get the machine

 

Ya, but if it really is so bad I would rather not lose the $200+ in shipping costs.

 

i too had lots of concerns about the 7970m

i cant speak for others but the first few days i wanted to exchange it for a 680m, but the hassle just wasnt worth it.

The Fans can be manually switched of, i made a thread about it: http://forum.notebookreview.com/sager-clevo/677519-possible-solution-high-idle-fan-rpm.html
Enduro does suck, but all games play perfectly smooth without any issues. the exception here is BF3 multiplayer, it isnt unplayable, but can be unpleasant at some times due to fps drops. here is where the overclock comes in, i you have to play bf3 then overclock your card and 80% of the maps work fine, btw single player runs perfectly.
As for heat issues, my 950/1375 overclock runs at just 75C, so you will be fine unless you get a bad paste job.

so kept my card

hope this cleared some doubts

 

the majority of happy customers never post on forums.
you might have read 20-30 complaints on here but compare that to the many thousands that are sold around the world then you only have a small %

im still going for the 680 though

 

I love it, the complaints will be there about any system. Most people are not having issues or they are non-issues to them. What you see is a small percentage of the user base.

 

this is what I would say. Enduro drivers are still young, although unless you play BF3, gaming is fine.

Temps only rise really high in Furmark/Kombustor, although for gaming it doesn't break 80-85 C for me, even after around 2-3 hrs of single player BF3. I have had almost no problems at all except for what I've done wrong.

There might be a couple of problems that are laptop-specific (I haven't had any), but in the worst case you can send it back and get a refund

 

The majority of customers (you don't hear from in these forums) don't have a clue, don't know any better, or are domesticated by their resellers who reassure them that this is just how things are, and how things must be. Of course there are issues that are non-issues to other users. But if one has specific needs and notices a number of red flags poping-up concerning those aspects they value when doing their research, then: Buyer Beware!

People who DO come to these forums tend have a good idea what they are looking for, what features they value and probably have some feel for what aspects they may be sensitive to if the product doesn't meet expectations. They are trying to educate themselves and do some due diligence before blindly jumping into a purchase. These individuals are the most likely to be disappointed with their purchase decision if they took advice from others who downplay the design, performance and usability issues in these systems (aspects to which they most likely attribute no relative value and consideration for their personal needs and expectations).

Individuals researching these forums for information on certain aspects should definitely consider what is reported in these forums as an accurate sample of what to expect from the product. People "not commenting in these forums" about those aspects are probably not senstive to those aspects or are unaware that the functionality of their product may be impaired with respect to those aspects, most likely due to lack of experiences with alternative products (or instead chose to consult with their representatives instead of the internet because they are not comfortable assessing and troubleshooting issues themselves).

Fan noise, upgradability, best-in-class integrated components, good build quality and full control over hardware performance parameters is what I expected from a P170HM when I purchased (although with limited research). I was disappointed in all these aspects. So far, the EM series sound the same or worse in all these aspects. I may buy another clevo in 1-2 years time, but only if there are significant signs of improvement with their design quality and flexibility.

 

Mine works great!!! I love it.

 

Wait... you were disappointed with the integrated components and build quality? Yeah clevos are know to sound loud due to the amt of power it has, and the bios isnt really oc friendly. But to say that they do not offer the best in class integrated components and good build quality... can u give me brand names that offer a better product in this 2 category?

 

I've had no problems with my P150EM really. All my hardware works and everything, I just have a rather crappy Tab-Q area on my keyboard, but a new one is already on its way to replace this. The fans are not overly loud, and my laptop never gets over 89C. I even suspect a suboptimal paste job since my idle temps are mid-low fifties, high forties at best. Really this isn't an issue though, since the laptop never overheats.

 

Toshiba and Sony, my experience, for both categories. Although their quality has been fading of the last few years, and this is part of the reason why I came to consider Clevo. However, I think Clevo is still behind in overall build quality.

The build quality of Clevos should be self-explanatory through reading these forums. Way too many critical details are missed and not addressed from one design iteration to another. I have never seen a laptop with that much flex in the display and chassis. I'm scared to move that thing around too much. This beast is just begging for hardware problems. I can lift a corner up at least 5mm with the other three corners flat. I can barely reach 1mm with my other 16" and 17" laptops.

As far as integrated components are concerned, I must admit, I'm not sure whether some issues are due to limitations of integrated components, or because Clevo did a poor job integrating these components, but:

- I have never seen such cheap and loud fans in a laptop. While I have not got my hands on a similar spect fan to compare with so far, Clevo could have contracted a fan manufaturer with higher standards.

- Fan management issues: Poor embedded controller or poor firmware developer, or poor thermal design, or all of the above? I never had to "think" about what an embedded controller was before I used a Clevo...

- Keyboard issues: Poor choice of keyboards? poor choice of embedded controller? or poor choice of developer? or all of the above... I can't personally comment on the keyboard issues though, I rarely use it: I dock my my laptop where I happen to be working with external monitor, keyboard and mouse. The touchpad feels terrible and I couldn't see myself tolerating longterm use of that thing. But I never used a laptop where I actually had to wonder if perhaps I forgot to peel a sticker or something off the touchpad.

- I must admit I can't really comment on the quality of the integrated audio, as I couldn't drive my earphones from the 3.5mm jack to get acceptable sound (yes I have tried every solution proposed in these forums). Same with driving external sound system using analog outputs. It's a laptop, if it can't drive earphones, then its integrated audio solution is useless for mobile scenarios. On that measure alone, I get better sound from all laptops I have used in the past decade. Something is just not right with the analog outputs here... maybe they just forgot to put drivers on the analog outputs?