**OFFICIAL W860CU/NP8690 Owners Lounge**

a friend of mine curious if his w860cu can be upgraded to the Nvidia GTX560M or not? so any information for this card?

 

Unfortunately, that machine cannot take the 560M card. If he has the USB 3.0 port, it is motherboard revision 5 which can take up to the 470M, I believe. If it is revision 4 of the motherboard, the 285M is the best card available.

 

Go for a AMD 6970M it will smoke the 470M and 560M by around 30% faster. Also motherboard revision is irrelevant. Any w860cu can take one.

 

How did you install 6GBs of RAM onto your laptop? Is that something to do with the 920xm which some people have? Also, is one able to upgrade to the 940xm on this laptop? Please help me I am a new user and do not know how to ask my questions outside of this post.

 

To install 6GB of RAM, you will need one 4GB & one 2GB memory modules. RAM modules are available in 1GB, 2GB, 4GB & 8GB. 920XM is a mobile processor. See King of Interns's signature. He have 920XM¹ processor. So, you can upgrade to 940XM¹ processor on this laptop.

¹ XM stand for extreme edition processor. XM processor have unlocked multiplier which allow you to overclock.

 

Thanks for that man... i was just sort of scared that the chipset the W860CU uses might not for some reason support more than 4GBs (when I bought my system, the seller on eBay claimed that it supported a max of 4GB.)

 

In theory the laptop can use any CPU which is compatible with socket type G1, correct?

 

Nope you could put up to 16GB in there! However single 8GB 1333mhz DDR3 sodimms are VERY expensive still!!

I advise against the 940XM. Quite a bit more costly than the 920XM and will not net you any extra performance due to both being completely unlockable through throttlestop.

Also unlike some other laptops the w860cu is a little sensitive on the power side of things concerning the CPU. Running higher than 2.6ghz all all 4 cores and with a tdp higher than 70W is not recommended unless you want a dead motherboard on your hands. Talking from experience here!

The 920XM can easily hit these clock speeds so you would be wasting your money on the 940XM. Also 2.6ghz x 4 with hyperthreading can still match a 2630qm if you set agressive turbo ratios. eg 3.2ghz x 3 and 3.5ghz x 2

At these settings I find the CPU loads in the early eighties C at 100% load

About RAM look at my sig. Gskill does good ram

 

Basically you can put any Intel Core i3, i5 & i7 processor on this laptop. <strike>As far as I know,</strike> The maximum supported memory capacity is 8GB. DDR3-1333 is the highest speed supported.

 

you are right about 8GB being expensive ... its more than $100 on this site http://www.shopmania.com/memory/p-crucial-ct102464bf1339-23837463! Being a cheap guy, I'll upgrade just pay $20 for a 4GB stick and make my clevo a 6GB. BTW how do you post specs of your comp on this site?

 

You know for certain? I think not. The w860cu uses a PM55 chipset which means a 16GB kit does work eg http://www.crucial.com/uk/store/mpartspecs.aspx?mtbpoid=1084F9A5A5CA7304

Two issues though currently. Few need this much ram and also it costs too much!

 

I feel cheaper than this <http://www.crucial.com/store/partspecs.aspx?IMODULE=CT102464BF1339> ... I'll just buy one 4GB stick and make my laptop a 6GB. Thanks for the help... one last thing though... how do you post your computer specs?

 

http://www.crucial.com/store/partspecs.aspx?IMODULE=CT102464BF1339 - $130. Seriously?

 

look on ebay etc for 8GB kits. ie 2x4GB

8GB will you better dual channel performance than 6GB

 

You can refer to "Intel® Core™ i7-900 Mobile Processor Extreme Edition Series, Intel® Core™ i7-800 and i7-700 Mobile Processor Series Datasheet". Memory controller is integrated in the processor, not chipset.

 

Datasheets are not always correct and/or are read wrongly. The 920XM supports max 8GB per slot. Here is a link to a thread with someone running the G73jh with 920xm and 16GB ram

Asus G73Jh Benchmark with Intel Core i7-920xm + 16gb Ram 3dmark pcmark - Notebook Help Laptop help troubleshooting

 

Referring to this webpage: http://ark.intel.com/products/43127...Processor-Extreme-Edition-(8M-Cache-2_13-GHz), it seems that even the best processor w/t socket G1 can only support 8GB.

 

i thought I provided proof

Either way I will be upgrading when it gets under 50 pounds!

I will clarify again. 8GB limit per slot means our machine can take 8GB x 2 = 16GB

 

I understand now... I'll just google to figure out RAM limitations from now on... thanks people. Once last question... is there any place where people compare RAM performances with data from memtest or other programs like that? I am hoping to buy a "tried and tested" stick that performs properly.

 

I hope you're correct. I just want to point out, those two notebooks, Dell & Asus, have four memory slot. They actually use 4 x 4GB of RAM.

 

Hey anyone out here can help me out and send me the stock vbios for a gtx 460m? I bought it for my sager np8690 and it says engineering release and will not work with any nvidia drivers. Thanks.

 

Google for a BIOS update... figure out what BIOS you have by looking under "mainboard" tab in CPU-Z. Please clarify your question if this is not what you wanted to know. If I find any links, I'll send them to you.

 

Found the links after a bit of googling..

Download the latest BIOS from over here (I think this should work with your card): http://www2.sagernotebook.com/pages/notebooks/download.cfm?ProductType=8690

Flashing BIOS is simple and safe... even if this is your first time, you should find it easy. Make sure you burn the ISO image correctly; that part can sometimes be tricky. First, unzip the .zip BIOS file and get the .iso file. Then, use free easy cd dvd burner... http://www.koyotesoft.com/audio-software/free-easy-cd-dvd-burner.html. You'll have to go to the tab that says "Copy CD/DVD, choose the option to burn an image file, and then select the .iso file that you have unzipped. Once you have selected this file, burn the disk and restart your laptop and then follow these directions http://forum.notebookreview.com/sager-clevo/445924-sager-np8690-bios-update-walkthrough-help.html to flash a new BIOS onto your computer.

Hope this helps.

 

Well people here goes. Just ordered a 6990M!

 

man....I just ordered a hd6970M, now you go to 6990...well at least someone here will be a star

 

Just got a barebones system yesterday via ups, popped all my parts in, just need a uk power cord now.

 

Fireedo mate my 6970M died I was pushing 850mhz on the core when it died so perhaps it was my fault...

So I am thinking why not step up rather than sidestep. If it doesn't work then at least we know as a community what can and can't be done.

Considering I think all flavours of the 6970M work in our machine and the 6990M clevo/kapok vbios matches the 6970M one exactly I hope it to be plug and play too.

Congrats RanCorX2!

 

Good luck. Hope it works out, dude.

 

it'll work, the place i ordered my laptop from was offering either 6970 or 6990 cards as a choice.

 

Tis comforting news RanCorX2 !! Can't wait to test it. Where did you order yours if you don't mind me asking.

Are they selling refurbed machines as this baby has passed its 2 year bday already!

Btw if you intend to upgrade your cpu to 920 or 940xm do by all means. However keep the TDP no higher than 70. My motherboard blew at 80 tdp and others seem to have had similar experiences.

I have run 67 tdp and 65 tdc for hours and hours folding at 100% load and the 920xm can handle 2.8ghz x4 with hyperthreading! Just my 5 eggs. OC but not too severely haha

I am also thinking of getting a SSD soon. Perhaps a samsung 470 or M4 256gb. Kinda torn on which one and want to wait for the 6990M to arrive first. WIll report back on performance of both

 

I found in the posts that I have been reading here that, as of now, the 6990 has not been made to work properly with this computer. Power supply issues have to be solved before the 6990 can work on this .... I'm pretty sure that if it is possible, King of Interns will manage it, but he will probably have to do a lot of modding... strange you were offered the option to install a 6990 - please post the website that you bought your laptop on.

 

King of Interns,
I hope you dont mind my asking but how are you planning to overcome power problems? You're not going to underclock/use fewer RAM cards, right?

 

I hope it will a success story without underclocking things or using 1 slot RAM
but I thing 180watt PSU will be a limit, if u OC the 920XM and using 6990 I think u should try 220watt PSU...minimum

 

Hopefully your mobo will not make problems for you (short out under the increased current etc)... maybe you can find a way to bypass most of the mobo's circuits and boost power to CPU+GPU. That would be an ideal solution. I don't know much about this stuff, but its very exciting, I would love to try these things if only I had more experience.

 

On the CPU side of things we are certainly limited. Basically to about 70 tdp + tdc. That is motherboard capacitor weakness.

On the GPU side of things I think there is a certain limit (90-100W) however the 6990M should work fine at stock and perhaps even a small OC with undervolt.

The 6990M is set at 100W tdp while the 6970M is 75W-100W tdp. I think though this laptop can just about handle 100W tdp considering how the 6970M can be pushed. We shall see....

I was considering upgrading the PSU to a 220W PSU that the P170HM uses. It would be compatible but I think the power throughput is basically down to the motherboard VRMs up to a certain point it might help but the VRM will limit the power anyway. Still yes it would be a good safety net. If the board tries to draw more than the current 180W can supply that is far more dangerous than having extra juice available

 

got my barebones machine from eurocom via ebay. aka upgradeyourlaptop.

 

Done a little reading it looks like the nvidia cards are better in idle modes where power consumption is concerned however power figures at load are in amd's favour.

It looks like the 580M uses around 25W more under heavy load vs the 6990m.

Using this chart I have worked out : Power Consumption And Battery Life : AVADirect?s X7200: The GeForce GTX 485M SLI Mobile Graphics Giant

A single 485M under heavy load uses 140W of power while a 6970M uses 105W under heavy load.

That is quite a difference.

Based on my readings I would say the 6970 uses least followed by 6990M (probably somewhere bang in the middle between 6970 and 485M) then 485M and finally 580M.

Question is the 485M showed power problems on boot. Firstly does the 6990M consume a little less or barely less lol and secondly were these problems with the 485M bios related. Perhaps a little of both...

I still think therefore 6990M is definitely worth trying!

edit: just found this comparision too which is interesting: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gtx-580m-sli-hd-6990m-crossfire,3022-11.html

The 6970M cf with weaker processor consumes 107W (idle) while 6990M cf with faster processor consumes only 95W (idle) tdp. 16W difference between the two under extreme load which isn't much! Means the 6990M closes gap slightly with nvidia in idle power consumption while also staying I think below the 485M under load.

Lets be positive

 

You did? I can't see them offer any better than 6970M?

 

ATI Mobility Radeon? HD 6990m GPU MXM 3.0 Type B | eBay

 

really peed off right now, finally tried the laptop but the screen is only 1600x900 and not 1080p as described....

I don't suppose it's a software issue? i've already contacted the seller. Hope they can sort it out.

 

You have the famous 6970M w860cu resolution problem. Lucky for you a VERY easy fix!

I had the same problem and so did someone else. This is the guide I gave them and working perfectly! I am 99.9% sure this is your problem as without the below tweaks you can't select higher than 1600x900

1.) Right click on desktop backround to bring up menu

2.) Select "screen resolution" from menu

3.) Go to "multiple displays" and on the pull down tab select "show desktop only on 1"

Now you should be able to select 1920x1080 reso and also things should work better. For example powermizer didn't work properly before but now the card auto downclocks when not under stress to 100/150 at 0.9V.

 

My 6970 card just arrive !!!
cant hardly wait to try this card....hope everything going smooth

wish me luck guys

 

You will be fine. It is tried and tested stuff

I think I will be needing the luck haha!

 

awesome, will give that a go....soon as my power cord gets here, the battery cam pre-charged and i only just realized that lol but now it's run out.

 

That can't have taken long! A 3 cell battery in a laptop with quad core and high end GPU lol

Mine doesn't last 10-15 mins normal usage and it won't boot stably with it lol

 

it ran out shortly after installing windows 7

 

YESSSS!!!
it has been installed and running great on my w860cu barebone system

But after I benchmarked with 3DMark 2006, I think now my system has a bottleneck on the CPU,still using i7 820QM tought, soon will be replacing to the i7920XM

Thanx a lot everyone here....really a fantastic experience








Updated:

I have found this problem(s) :
1. My laptop wont boot if using battery, so I must always remove the battery first everytime i want to use it now...what the hell???
2. I tried to bench with 3DMark 2006 went smooth but when I try to bench it using 3Mark Vantage or use it for playing game it always give a blank screen after about 5-10 minutes and nothing i can do, solution always to turn off laptop then turn it on again.
I check the temperature reading it show that max only around 80-83 C. is there something missing? I try to undervolt it but problem still occur (I have try 0,91v, 0.95v, 0.98v even 1v), any idea?

 

1st question. What power supply do you have? 150W might not be cutting it.

I am looking in to getting a P170HM 220W adaptor to replace my 180W one. If I get it soon you can have my 180W one.

Remember if you get the 920XM DO NOT put tdp or tdc above 70W. I run at 65/67 and can run 2.8ghz with 100% load across all 4 cores with hyperthreading indefinitely. Any more juice and the motherboard will fail!　Still will give a very decent performance boast! Also don't even try to try 920xm + 6970M on 150W lol

 

I still use my default 820QM and I also have read a lot that 120watt will be enough to supply electrical need for 820qm+hd6970m (all default setting)

still the most urgent problem is the 2nd question, why i have blackout whenever playing some game after 5-10 minutes? do I really need ASAP a 180watt power supply?