**OFFICIAL W860CU/NP8690 Owners Lounge**

Take off you heat sink and check if they double layered some thermal pads, which would prevent good contact between the heat sink and memory chips. I found 3 of mine were double layered; they were all in the raised portions of the heat sink. Just remove 1 layer and you should have much better temperatures.

-good luck

 

It should be pretty apparent if the gpu and heatsink have proper thermal paste coverage/contact. When you take the heatsink off you should see a thin even covering of paste on them both in the shape of the die with excess paste around the edge. If you cant basically see both the die surface and heatsink surface through the paste in an even manner something is off.

As check for thermal pads that are thicker than they need to be as mentioned as I had that problem as well. Also many have cut down or bent out the can around the card to allow the heatsink to sit tighter to the card.

Your temps are basically identical to what mine did when I first received the notebook. Now mine idles under 50 on stock clocks and at about 40 at 250/300 while only getting up to around 70 under heavy load.

 

AC MX-2 is pretty high quality. It was the one used by many when the AC MX-3, Shin Etsu, or IC Diamond weren't released to the public yet. I have a lot of Shin Etsu around and I still yet to try that but I doubt there will be a difference since the difference between the AC MX-2 and Shin Etsu in terms of temps would not be greater than 5C.

Have you actually stress-tested your 5870? What is the max load temp you are getting?

When I took off the heatsink, I found thin thermal pastes on the heatsink and the GPU die itself but I see that around 1/8 of the GPU die has thicker thermal paste that seems to not been sandwiched by the heatsink. I was then able to conclude that there was not really good contact there.

At first I didn't monitor the temperature when I ran OCCT and then the computer suddenly just turned off. I guess that's because it was skyrocketing to 100+ C. I didn't break anything with that did I? That's thermal protection for the video card right? How much is the temp limit of the video card anyway before it shuts down itself?

How will I know if some of the thermal pads were double-layered?

 

Where did you get your notebook from?

 

rjtech. I had two w860cu's from them. One with gtx280m and one with hd5870.

The one with gtx280m didn't have this problem.

 

Just look at the relative heights of components on the card and compare it to the thermal pads. You can tell the difference pretty easily.

 

what do you exactly mean relative height? Do you have some pictures to show this?

 

what do you exactly mean relative height? Do you have some pictures to show this?

 

The stock Sager driver is not very good at all. 10.4 is much better.
Download the 10.4 driver from here.
Boot into safemode to uninstall your current driver.

 

Here is what I mean if the memory chips are say 3mm shorter than the square chokes then the corresponding thermal pads should have an approximate difference to match. Just make sure that everything appears to be contacting the same.

 

it arrives 30 minutes ago ^_^
overall, 4 days from when i paid till i receive mine
btw, do you have any clue regarding driver for gtx 280m? i'm running 18x.xx rightnow (stock driver)

 

After 3 days of use, I just noticed I have a stuck/bright pixel in the bottom right quadrant of my screen (just above the taskbar in windows). This is going to drive me bonkers!! I didn't get the zero dead pixel warranty, as I didn't have a problem with my first two sagers from xotic. Although, it's only noticeable on an all-black screen.

Does anyone else here have experience with dead/stuck pixels recently? I know it's not possible to get rid of dead pixels, but I've heard of people fixing stuck/bright pixels before, just curious.

I'm trying to avoid completely returning the system and re-ordering another...which may be my only option...

Other than that, I have no complaints. SRS Sandbox seems to help with the sound quality and it's passed every benchmark I can throw at it (with respect to my own desktop performance).

 

@ kevindd992002

Did you try what I mentioned? I had same problem with my video card. I got my notebook from Sager, which should be the same place where RJtech gets their notebooks. RJtech just doesn't brand it.

Use Hwinfo to monitor your temperatures if you aren't already. You will notice that the gpu cores are not hot. It's the memory that has the very high and load temperatures because there isn't sufficient or no contact between the top row of memory chips.

 

just wanna share my insights

i underclocked my GPU to 250/300 and after watching some videos online (youtube, NBA.com) my computer began acting up (flickering, black/white screen)

im trying 300/300 now to see if is more stable. The temps are definitely lower, about 10degrees. I saw some people having stable 250/300 but ill see what 300/300 does

 

Can anyone comment on the overall build/feel of the 8690? The plastic construction really makes me nervous since I was considering the M15X before this, which is made of magnesium.

 

just feel it for yourself when it arrives, it's built like a tank.

 

Agreed. It is a very solid machine. You won't be bending it or anything.

I can get mine down to 200/225 (Hardware accelerated movies will stutter however.) You Tube uses hardware accelerated flash which is your problem. You can optionally clock up when you watch those videos or just keep the thing at a higher clocks. 300/400 still runs cooler and should play those types of clips.

 

How do you exactly check if it is double-layered?

I'm using HWMonitor to monitor temps. How did you able to conclude that it's not the GPU core that is getting hot when HWMonitor and Furmark dictates that my temps are closing to 100C?

 

HWInfo32 Will show you the GPU and Memory Temp of 5870.
Keep in mind, since the same copper plate cools the memory and GPU whatever component is warmer will heat the other one. Usually, if they are the same temp that means the heatsink has contact with both.

If the pads are double layered they will be twice as thick in some areas than they are in others.

 

Yeah I saw that my "thermal diode" and "memIO" temps were almost always about the same.

I still don't understand how do I know if they are double-layered. The thermal pads on mine seems to be of the same thickness all over the heatsink.

 

oo thanks, yeah i had a suspicion that youtube was the issue

anyways, im clocking at 300/300 now and so far no issues. I put it back to stock clocks 700/1000 when i play games and everything is fine.
This seems like the ghetto version of ATI's powerplay haha since we're doing it manually.

Anyways, is there any issues changing the clocks over and over again? This wont shorten the life span of the GPU will it?

 

"thermal diode" displays the highest temp out of the other 3 (DispIO <== GPU core temperature sensor, memIO, shader). Since you said your memIO/thermal diode is hitting 100C on furmark, I'm going to guess your thermal pads aren't having a good contact with your memory chips. I had a similar problem with my video card.

Furmark only displays the highest temperature out of the 3 sensors.

All of your thermal pads should be at a height of 2mm. Since you said that all your thermal pads look like they're the same height, you could try trimming down the aluminum cage. 3 of mine in the indented sections of the heat sink were at 2mm+2mm, so they were to high and restricted contact on the other chips. I've also trimmed down the aluminum cage by about 2mm.

 

Oh no issue at all. Powerplay and Powermizer (Nvidia) change the clocks on the fly. If anything, your card will last longer as it is staying cooler.

 

Well, I've checked the thermalpads by eyeballing them and they look pretty much having the same height to me, yes.

Would you mind taking a detailed pic of what you've done with yours, that is if it wouldn't be bothersome to you.

Thanks.

 

An easy way is too look at the pads when you pull the heatsink off, they should be imprinted with the shape of whatever chip they are supposed to be making contact with.
The pads in the recessed areas should still be as thick as the other pads as those areas sit over chips that are taller.

 

Good info on HWInfo32 and Furmark temp readings. There has been much confusion about it. +Rep.

 

can i ask about modding?
in this forum, what part of the notebook that can be modded via software?

all i now is a mutitouch for touchpad, anything else?

 

Got my tracking # late last night from PowerNotebooks.com! Can't wait for it to arrive but I'm also thinking if I should return it and wait till July to see if Clevo updates the 15.6" like they did with their 17".

 

can anyone confirm the softness of their W860CU keyboard's spacebar in the left and right edges where somtimes it doesn't register a spacebar key press when pressed on the left or right edges?

 

i'm not. maybe it's just a unit defect ?

 

Users like BakedBread have confirmed that it is a common problem with W860CU users. I'm wondering why you don't have that problem.

It is not a major problem though, it's just when you are very keen on things that you will notice it.

 

well, i've been trying to find out if that problem exist in mine, but seems like my spacebar is doing just fine

 

as in even the slightest touch in the left edge of the spacebar, it will register the spacebar press?

 

yups, at even slight touch in both edge

 

That's weird.. Here's where BakedBread elaborated his problem: http://forum.notebookreview.com/sag...official-w860cu-np8690-owners-lounge-317.html

 

well, maybe i'm one of lucky ^_^

btw, where should i'm searching for nvidia forceware for notebook GPU's?

 

NVIDIA & Laptop News | Latest NVIDIA drivers and related news | laptopvideo2go.com

 

the spacebar failure is a common problem even here in italy with w860cu. we think it refers to a bad delivery of keyboards. just ask your reseller for a substitution.

 

Ohh ok. The only problem I'm seeing is that RJTech, my reseller, won't ship it directly to me here in the Philippines because I think they just ship replacement parts to the US, that's what I don't like about them too.

I just emailed them about the issue and I'm still waiting for their response. This is not my fault so I think they should ship me a replacement keyboard.

 

As mentioned in the Asus G73 Thread, but GPU-Z now reads the MR5870 and is available here (No Install Required).


Also, lackofcheese spelled out exactly what the sensor readings from HWInfo32 are in an Asus Benchmarking thread:
"Indeed, it's relatively clear that DispIO = Display I/O which would be the display controller, MemIO = Memory I/O which would be the memory controller, and Shader would be the actual processing elements on the chip."

 

thx a lot

just wondering, if you guys gaming for, say , about 4 hours,
when you plugged in to the ac, do you remove your battery?

 

same here, need to hammer the space bar.every sentence has one or more spaces missing.

 

Have you done anything about it? But when you press it in the center it's very responsive right?

 

not yet but considering it. Lets say 1 cm from each side does not register a key stroke. Only if I press "through" it registers, ieyou feel it clicking but approx 1 mm needs to pressed additionally to do it. Other keys no problem.

 

Kevin, small question...
You live in the Philippenes, your ambient temperatures are almost like mine (35C~40C average )
How are your temperatures holding up? 85C while gaming?

 

Where do you live?

I'm not yet sure about my gaming temps because what I have done is just synthetic benchmarks and temps with the 5870 aren't good. Are you following my thread here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/sager-clevo/483543-w860cu-hd5870-overheating-problem.html ? I have a big hunch that after I finish modding the thermal pads and aluminum can that I will have better temps.

This is my second W860CU. My first one has a GTX280M and was topping 92C with Furmark at about 25mins. My second W860CU with the 5870 seems to have thick thermal pads and some more issues that are explained in the thread I've linked above. I'm looking into this now and I will update you after I finish.

Hope that helps.

 

Bump... Anybody got any feedback on the two partition requirement? Is this a Sager thing or a Win 7 thing?

Thanks,

S.

 

I've been following all your posts, and they are helpful, I +repped you in anothoer topic... where you said your temperatures average 35C; I live in Honduras, and that's my ambient temp as well... Nice to see that You get controlled temperatures; w860cu has a good cooling system

 

Thanks for the rep man. I hope you can make your decision soon about which vidcard are you getting for your next lappy.

 

looks like my spacebar get into that problem too
i didn't realize it, because usually i press the upper side of the space bar

actually, i found out that part of the spacebar that didn;t respond with slight press is lower left and right ( as you said, 1 cm from edge)