Where's the W650SR/NP6652 love?

I realized this are brand spanking new and may not be in anyone's hands yet, but I don't see much mention or threads about this model (at least when I skimmed and searched). Of the budget Haswell gaming laptops that have surfaced this is one of the models I am most interested in (MSI GE40 being the other). I have a couple questions as I have never owned a Clevo/Sager before...

Since these are used by main resellers, it appears they are designed to be easily upgradeable... So if I went stock on a few things (i.e. HDD, Wireless/Bluetooth, and DVD drive), would it be easy to upgrade later?

What are some of the better resellers to get this model from? I've "customized" at a couple sites and the prices are fairly similar, but I believe ibuypower may have been the cheapest so far. I take some have better support/return policies than others?

Is there something I am missing about this model which would explain the lack of interest in it from these forums?

Thanks in advance!

 

We've had pretty good sales interest in this laptop, and yea everything but the GPU will be easily upgradable. Why is there a lack of interest on this forum? Don't know the only guess is that people around here love the more powerful GPU wise laptops

But yea, we like the model and its been doing well

 

I just bought one to replace my dying work laptop. I needed a beefy cpu and a screen that was easy on the eyes that won't give me a headache after coding for 12 hours.

I'll let you know how it is after it arrives.

 

Also, you're right about the level of support in how it varies. It's a good idea to head over to www.resellerratings.com or skim over other sites to see what the consensus is from consumers.

We haven't had a lot of traffic for the w650sr yet, but I've played with the new models and I actually really like this one by comparison.

 

What particularly makes you like this model by comparison? And how is it compared to the W650SZ?

I'm very interested in this model as I never really play any games but still want an awesome CPU. Thanks in advance!

 

It ran smooth, looks sleek, and - as you mentioned - has a great CPU. Aesthetically, it's identical to the W650SZ; the key difference is the GPU offering. And as always, the screen looks very good (as is the case with Clevo)! I find either model to be quite good for the price, and Unigine ran fairly well on the GTX 750M.

 

My W650SR from Xotic just came in. It's not much and I don't have photos, but here's my impression of the laptop:

1080p IPS Panel: 80+ degrees viewing angle vertical + horizontal with minimal color/brightness shift. The backlight is extra bright at highest settings, so 0% brightness is more than enough for indoor use. This also means that it should be no problem taking this laptop outside. There is some backlight leaking from the bottom and edges of the display, but only visible with a black screen and a very dark room. Very nice contrast despite the matte finish, but I can't comment on color accuracy. Like most laptop IPS displays, it lacks the performance of stand-alone IPS panels. With a 35ms gray-to-gray transition time, it will ghost and you will see it.

Keyboard: Fairly shallow keyboard travel. I am missing some keystrokes but I think it's because it's my first time using a chiclet keyboard after using Thinkpad and mechanical keyboards for ages. Flexes noticeably if you push down on the keys, but there's no reason to do that.

CPU: I opted for the i7-4700MQ. Super fast compared to my old laptop's Penryn Core 2 Duo. Not much to say. 60C temperature at 28% load in a room with 21C ambient temperature. No cooling pads, laptop flat on desk. Internally, the CPU is on the far end of the long cooling pipe. Not sure how that's going to work out at full system load.

GPU: Nvidia hasn't released 750M drivers, so you'll have to make do with Clevo's modified 311.14 drivers. Optimus works as expected. It's a DDR3 mid-range card; don't expect miracles, but it plays LoL and older games fine at 1080p. Idles at 43C.

System layout: Like any Clevo laptop, the backcover slides right off once you remove a few screws. You can see the internals on any website, so I won't go into detail, but a few things I noticed:

Heat pipe goes up towards the GPU and then loops down onto the CPU. The extra pipe length could dump more unwanted heat into the laptop chassis.

The mSATA and mPCIE slots are in a corner without ventilation, as are the hard drives. As a result my mSATA SSD is hovering around 72C under light use. Not really good for a healthy drive but Intel rates to them to ~70C so it should be ok. I hope it lasts the life of this laptop at least. A fan option for the ODD (ala the ultrabays in Y510p) would be nice.

Edit: I had the directions wrong. It's the SSD + wireless card making the touchpad area toasty. The CPU is under the keyboard and insulated.

Construction: It's plastic and lightweight for its size, so it flexes noticeably if you lift it up by one corner.

Installation: W8 is helpless for the wireless driver and display drivers. Use the driver CD.

TL;DR:

Pros: Powerful and good value for what you pay. IPS display.

Cons: The touch pad and right palm rest double as food warmers. The mSATA slot gets toasty, too.

Edit:
Chassis temperatures (mSATA, palm rest) go down when the system is loaded, so I guess that's something.

 

I just seen and commented on the video of ProStar showing off the W650SZ. Looks a lot better in the video than in pics. Look forward to purchasing one soon!

Thanks for the info! Do you think theres anything that could be done for the palm rest and mSata getting toasty?

 

Another quick question: is the mSATA port a SATA II/3Gbs or SATAIII/6Gbs?

Sent from my XT897 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

 

In my quick review, I was dumb and forgot that I flipped the laptop vertically when I opened it up. Basically, it's the wireless card and SSD dumping heat into a nearly closed area and cooking each other. I've experimented with replacing the wireless card with an older, lower power version and the temperatures dropped by 10 degrees. So it's partially the crappy default wireless card's problem because it uses so much power. I've ordered an Intel 6325 because I heard that they're optimized for lower power use.

Even with the wireless card fixed, it was still hovering at 63C. I am ordering a very thick (6mm) thermal pad that I will stick onto the back panel. When it's closed, it should make contact with the SSD/WLAN and transfer the heat out into the bottom instead of stagnating into the touchpad area.

You also might want to upgrade to the 1TB 5000rpm HDD. The 7200rpm HDD uses more power and produces more heat which is palpable when doing extended writes (like downloading).

The mSATA is SATA III 6gb/s

View attachment 97696

 

I asked the nice guys at Mythlogic to check into this for me, but wanted to see if anybody knew the answer right away...

Can this laptop power 3 displays simultaneously? (ie. 2 externals + the internal)?

 

Some updates on the heat issue:

My new wireless card and the thermal pads should be in soon, the toasty touchpad issue should be resolved soon. I hope.

I also experimented with the Intel XTU that allows me to adjust turbo and voltage on the CPU. For the time being, I undervolted it by 120mV which actually allows the CPU to turbo higher due to more thermal headroom (+100 MHz in Prime95). Temperatures during 100% load is about the same due to higher turbos, but idle temperatures have dropped by almost 10C. In light workloads, the laptop is silent now.

The keyboard is still giving me trouble though. The chiclet keys requires that you hit dead center on the key for it to register, more so for some keys than others.

 

It looks pretty good for a budget 1080p media laptop but the keyboard sounds like a mess.
Just as myth said, I guess we simply expected more especially since there are so many 15" ultrabooks coming out with at least 760m and full HD panels.

:|

 

Are you sure you're not confusing C with F in those temperature readings? .

The CPU and SSD/HDD seem really high for light load use / idle use. Shouldn't they be around 32 C for the SSD and 39 C for the CPU? The GPU looks where it should be.

Why does the CPU temp suddenly jump up to 60 at 28% load? It should be staying around 40-50 at least.

Is the cooling system for this laptop the main culprit for the CPU? I don't want to say the same about the SSD since mine idles at 32 C and is completely closed off (it's not mSATA though).

 

Idle temperatures are 40C CPU 35C GPU after undervolting. The main cause of the spike at low load is the long heat pipe and the passive fan policy. Even at 60C, it's only 10W CPU TDP so the heat generated is still low.

The mSATA SSD and WLAN card share a pocket of dead air under the touch pad. The laptop doesn't have a good means of extracting heat from that area, but I expect to solve it by attaching thermal pads to the bottom cover.They will contact the SSD and sink the heat into the case.

 

Thanks Maima for your experiences, I'm currently looking at W650SR or W230ST for purchase and your insights are useful. Let us know how the thermal pads fair.

 

hows the battery life when not gaming?

 

Just got my laptop and yes, it can actually power 2 externals (1 VGA + 1 HDMI) and the internal laptop display simultaneously for a total of 3 displays.

 

Saying that the GPU is not easily upgradable, is it still possible to upgrade it? I just bought this laptop, and I really want to make sure.

 

No it isn't upgradeable, soldered ot the motherboard.
Most laptop GPUs are that way.
Only a select few models offering replaceable GPUs...and they are usually the thick and big variety.
Sager's 8230and up offer replaceable GPU.
Everything below that have permanent GPUs.

 

Oh I did not know that. Thank you very much!

 

Is W650SR have VT-x / VT-d capable?

 

The hardware is, yes. Here is a list of compatible CPUs for virtualization: Intel® Virtualization Technology List

You also need Windows 7/8 Pro, if I recall correctly.