*** Official Clevo P157SM-P150SM / Sager NP8250 Owner's Lounge ***

Nothing happened before getting this issue. Not even a blue screen.

I haven't tried re-installing the drivers, but I am thinking it's not drivers related since it beeps as well when I go into BIOS? I mean I can try re-installing the drivers or even the whole Windows, but just curious to know.

 

You could remove the card and clean the contacts and connectors.

 

I tried, but that didn't work.

Edit: I didn't realize my CPU clock stays at 3.5 Ghz until just now. It no longer steps down / up the frequency according to the load. Seems like the BIOS / EC has ran into problems? Is there any way I can flash the BIOS ever though it beeps whenever I get into BIOS / the command page to flash it?

 

Hey there,

Curious if anyone managed to make 980m work in P150SM? I've upgraded to a 980m but it doesn't recognise the card :/
I've read about a modded bios from @Prema but couldn't find it on his site.
Any suggestions on how to make it work?

 

by right it should accept 980M without any problems. I bought a P150SM-A way back in dec 2014 with a 980m pre-configured.


If rumours are right, you can even install a 1060m without any bios modifications. The 1070m however, requires a lot of mods. If I hear the rumours correctly.



By the way, i'm just curious. Like REALLY curious. Is there a way where we can install larger heatsinks? I don't mind cutting through some of the panels / etc. I'm a little frustrated because I accidentally dropped the laptop, and the bottom case looks like a wreck, like it was bent (its very visible bent if you put it on a flat surface, like the laptop curved from one end to another (think of a smiley face)

 

The 1060 has been a success for a fair few systems yes. The 1070 is more down to shape and is a lot more power hungry.

 

BTW, may I ask here (because i'm very sure no one mentioned Liquid Metal in this thread)


Is it advisable to use Thermal Grizzly Conductonaut Liquid Metal, or any "liquid metal" in general, for the GPU and CPU repasting?

just asking because the liquid metal seems to be very good at its job.

 

Only if your contact is perfect and you are aware of the dangers.

 

It's possible, and if you are really careful it will have better results, but I will stop short of advising it on laptops.

 

Thanks for the heads up!

I think i'll try something that's non-liquid metal. Since I don't know about the dangers, and I think i'll err on the cautious side, by sticking to non-conductive thermal pastes / thermal pads.

Apparently the stuff on the VRAM (at least at the GPU side) ... I don't know how to call it. Thermal pads? Thermal sponge? Its blue in colour, and its from the factory. Its kinda fluffy and crumbly. Like its cracking and breaking off. I think that's also what is impacting performance, but I don't want to open the thing up without replacement products (and might as well replace the TIM for GPU and CPU too while at it).

Thanks!

 

Correct thermal pads, the thinner ones are easy to replace, the thicker ones are a little more tricky.

 

Does anyone have a reputable recommendation for replacement batteries for the NP8268-S? I have tried several different aftermarket batteries, from Tanch and a couple other places on Ebay and Amazon, but they all have the same weird issue. They will appear to charge to 100%, but will not keep themselves topped off. It will continue to display 100% but if I unplug the laptop say a couple days later, it will immediately drop from 100% to 80% or something like that. Also strange - none of these aftermarket batteries have shown or developed any wear or reduced capacity you would expect from use and age. They remain at 0% wear level and full capacity. Every once in a while the aftermarket batteries will not be recognized by the laptop and I'll have to restart a few times to fix it.

My original battery does not suffer from this strange behavior, and it does properly show wear % considering its age and use, so ideally I'm looking for a replacement of the same quality and functionality as the original.

Unrelated - is there a recommended type/brand of thermal pads to use for replacement on the heatsinks?

 

Resellers can offer OEM batteries usually. Worth checking if any local ones have any stock.

 

Just got my old P150SM-A back. Did a repaste with Gelid and it's cool as ever!

But it probably needs @Prema magic, if he is still around...

Planning soon to upgrade the VGA to nVidia 1060, now it has 880M. Also badly needed, SSD...

 

The SSD would be my priority, say no to spinning rust for the OS.

 

I don't think I have any local laptop builders but I checked with XoticPC and they're looking into whether or not they (I guess Sager/Clevo?) have any batteries on hand.

XoticPC also told me that they can't send me thermal pads but I could send my laptop in to have it serviced and they could replace them. I don't think it's worth the time without use of my laptop and money to have to ship it in to do something I could do myself in 15 minutes.

Any thermal pad of the appropriate sizes should have satisfactory performance as replacements though, right? Anyone ever tried thermal paste as replacement for pads?

 

I use thermal grizzly pads, easy to work with a work well enough.

 

Hi folks.

I was using the laptop, then it died. I booted it up, and this screen popped up.

Can anyone help me?

Pictures in imgur

Need help P150SM-A boot problem https://imgur.com/gallery/XHTi9Zs


What I have done: removed all except 1 had (which used to be an optical drive) then boot up again.

But still same message about media test failure check cable and exiting pxe Rom.

Any advice would do. I'm desperate for help.

*****

Addendum:

For some reason in boot part of the BIOS:

Boot option 1: can only select P3: ST2000, cannot select others (the other is related pxe b05 d00)

Which means for whatever reason, I can't use the other 3 (1 HDD, 2 SSD) to boot? Or am I missing something here?

 

Are you using the +/- keys to change the options?

Try moving your boot drive or only having the boot drive in.

 

THANK YOU! Problem solved, read addendum below



******
I'm not sure if I did this right, but I removed all drives, except for the boot SSD.

The bios recognizes it, at least it says SATA PORT 5: crucial_ct256m

Still doesn't boot into Windows.


As the error changes into

"Reboot and select proper boot device or insert boot media in selected boot device and press a key" .


The only place I could do a change with the + / - keys are in the Bios boot options, and I've set the boot SSD in the top order. I tried booting with the SSD only and also with every other drives removed, and with all drives removed but msata location swapped.

Any other ideas?

Sent from my BBF100-4 using Tapatalk




********

ADDENDUM:
Problem "magically" / "mysteriously" solved itself.

What I did:
- I re-seated all the drives (again, for no reason)
- I double checked the bios settings so that the msata boots first
- went to use media creation tool, and it says cannot install due to GPT <--- keyword?
- went back to bios, and set the UEFI to enabled (since it was disabled, for whatever reasons)
- booted (forgot to press the f7 button) and somehow managed to boot into windows.


Looking back at what happened, and what I've recorded (including pictures and whatnot), I don't know, but the only thing I can point out was the BIOS got changed, because the clock and time was reset to way back in 2013, and the clock ran for about 11 minutes or so, which probably was the time I spent looking around in the bios after repetitively trying to boot up.

Not sure, but for some reason, setting UEFI to enabled, allowed me to boot back in.

But I've not been able to pin-point the exact damned cause.

Again, thank you!

 

Yes this generation of system defaulted to nom uefi IIRC so likely the source of your issue.

Glad to see you are sorted.

 

Can anyone confirm that their subwoofer is working on Windows 10?

 

Mine does not... Haven't figured it out yet either.

 

Hello, I can confirm that I got my subwoofer working. It sounds.. Ok, I thought it was going to sound better. You have to have the Soundblaster XFi MB3 software to run the subwoofer. Even then, I don't really care for it really. The Soundblaster XFi MB3 software even makes your headphones sound different.

 

On another note, I just bought this laptop. It has the stock bios and I am not very happy about the power throttling that's going on. It seems as the admins of this fourm keep deleting all of the important posts with the fixes.

 

@Savage.exe

More details on this would be great... Is your PC running Win 10 x64? What version of XFi MB3 are you running? Driver version?

Technically, I have a Schenker XMG P503, but it's really just a re-branded Clevo P150SM/P157SM

I have BIOS version 1.03.05 (fully unlocked all hidden menus/settings) and KBC/EC version 1.03.01 TR
AFAIK that's the "newest" version for my machine.

Not sure what is being "throttled" on your machine, but I don't have any noticeable issues with my machine after updating to the newest Firmware.

If it's your CPU being throttled, apparently " ThrottleStop " works with this PC/CPU... Google it and see if that might be of any use to you?

Before updating the BIOS/EC there were too many issues to list, but the main one ( for the wife) was the RGB backlighting not being able to be set to any custom colors... ( " It HAS to be PINK!!! " )

After updating this machine PROPERLY everything now works as it should...for the most part anyway.

When you eventually update yours, MAKE SURE you run meset.exe, laptop will reboot, then flash the KBC/EC firmware, machine reboots again, then flash BIOS LAST!!!

For some reason... if you flash BIOS before KBC/EC Firmware things don't always.work correctly...

If you can tell me the make & model of your laptop, I'm sure I can show you where/how to get the BIOS files.

 

My CPU is being EC Throttled, the GPU was getting power limit throttled before I modified the vbios. The 970M is supposed to draw up to 122W or something like that(I googled it), They had it power limited to 65W. I was able to get the CPU to stop EC throttling, I did this by under-volting the CPU and locking it a max frequency of 3.2 Ghz with ThrottleStop. Before this I tried to use Intel XTU, but it wasn't working as well as ThrottleStop worked. I was using version 1.0.0.4 of XFi MB3. I just now uninstalled it because it would cause the headphone jack to not work sometimes.
Edit: I am using Bios Version: 1.03.11RNS1 and KBC/EC Version 1.03.08

 

Edit: Mine is also a P157SM-A. Idk what the difference is.

 

@Savage.exe

The P150/157SM- A is a slightly different board with slightly different parts in it.
Supposedly some people have had success running an "-A" BIOS on a non "-A" model... (the " -A " BIOS' are newer)
I haven't had the time to sit and actually compare the structure and contents of them against each other, myself, just yet though.

So you know, if you modify your BIOS so that the Chipset menu is visible, all of these ( ↓↓ ) options (and much more) can be made available to you...

• AC Brick (Charger/Adapter) Capacity - (charger wattage) - Mine is 180w, factory sets to 90w...? lol
• AC Brick (Charger/Adapter) Input Current
• PCH-FW / PCH-IO Configuration
• USB 2.0/3.0 Configuration
• Advanced Chipset Control
• LCD Panel Settings (type, scaling, backlight, color depth, etc)
• Energy Saving/Performance Features
• System Agent (SA) Configuration
• Wake on Lan
• Advanced Boot Settings
• PCI Subsystem Settings
• ACPI Settings
• SATA Mode and Advanced Settings
• Acoustic (drop detection, etc) Settings
• Enable/Disable Webcam, WiFi, Bluetooth, and 3G at BIOS level

• Memory Timings and Thermal Configuration

• CPU Features and Configuration
  • Overclocking lock
  • CPU C-States
  • CPU Power Limit
  • CPU Speed (min/max)
  • Frequency
  • Multipliers
  • Voltages
  • Limit CPUID Maximum
  • Execute Disable Bit
  • Turbo Mode
  • Hyper-threading
  • Intel Virtualization Technology
  • Memory Power and Thermal Throttling
  • Memory Frequency Limiter
  • And a lot more...

• Onboard (iGPU) and PCIe (dGPU) settings
  • Hot Plug
  • Max TOLUD
  • PCIe Speed
  • Primary Display
  • GT (iGPU) Power Management Control (iGPU overclocking settings)
  • Some vBIOS Settings
  • and a lot more...

And SO much more!!!

I can show you my modified BIOS, explain to you how to unlock it, and/or point you to someone that I trust that can help you with it if you like... Just ask

I'm curious about the EC and/or vBIOS mod you did...what exactly did you do, and how...?

 

If you mean -a it's official support for the second msata slot iirc.

 

I bought the laptop like this and didn't do any modifications to the bios under my ownership, I can't say for the previous owner. I bought this laptop off of eBay from a seller who buys and sells laptops I think. They didn't have it listed correctly.

 

@Savage.exe

*** Added more stuff to my previous post. ***

What I was getting at is that if you DO modify your BIOS, then you can control EVERYTHING.

CPU, GPU, Memory (Timings, frequencies, voltages, fan settings)...everything in my last post and WAY more.

ThrottleStop, Intel XTU, can do very little. Much more can be done in the BIOS!

If you cannot see "Chipset" in your BIOS, then it is " hidden" and will need to be modded to get it to show... A modded BIOS will allow you to control much more than any manufacturer ever intended.

 

@Meaker@Sager

Not that it's needed, obviously, (and likely different between re-sellers?) but do you know if a key-press BIOS unlock method exists for the AMI Aptio IV / V BIOS' ?

 

@Savage.exe

You mentioned that you modified the vBIOS...that's what I am curious about. What did you do and how?

 

There's a key press bios unlock for Apito bioses? My computer has an Aptio bios. I only did a vbios mod to the GTX 970M it's self, I didn't touch the bios on the computer. I used maxwell bios tweaker to change the power draw limits with help from a friend on discord.

 

No key press combination I am aware of, no.

 

@Meaker@Sager

Thank you

 

@Savage.exe @Meaker@Sager

I have not been able to find any key-press BIOS unlock method for the AMI Aptio BIOS' and nobody else I have spoken with, so far, are aware of one either...

I have MBT, but never bothered looking at over/underclocking my dGPU...

I would like to know what is involved in upgrading the dGPU though...

Apparently "Hot Plug" may or may not need to be enabled,
max TOLUD might need to be changed,
vBIOS might need modifying,
and many various other changes...

Would be nice to know exactly what needs to be done to be able to upgrade the dGPU...


Yes the P150SM/P157SM runs an American Megatrends Aptio IV (4) BIOS.

​

Spoiler: A few photos of my (partially) unlocked BIOS...

***CLICK PHOTOS FOR FULLSIZE***
This is only partially unlocked, so nowhere near all options are shown in these photos...yet

• ↓ BIOS BEFORE Modding - Chipset Hidden ↓​

​

​

• ↓ BIOS AFTER (partial) Modding - Chipset VISIBLE ↓​

​

• ↓ System Agent (SA) Config Menu ↓​

​

• ↓ Chipset - GPU Config Menu ↓​

​

• ↓ Chipset - LCD Control ↓​

​

• ↓ Chipset - Memory Thermal Settings ↓​

​

• ↓ Chipset - Memory Settings (Timings, frequencies, etc)↓​

​

• ↓ Chipset - Memory Settings Continued ↓​

​

​

 

What card are you looking to install, it varies on a card by card basis.

 

@Meaker@Sager

Assuming the board is a P15SM running Win 10 x64,
BIOS 1.03.05, KBC/EC 1.03.01TR,
and originally came with a "Clevo" GTX 770M 3Gb...

What cards should be able to be supported without changes/mods (IIRC up to a 980) ?

What if I wanted to cram a 1060 / 1080 / 2080 in it? What modifications would have to be made ( BIOS, EC FW, vBIOS, driver *.inf ) ?

What is the max card that can be supported by the mainboard/BIOS ?

UNRELATED - Do you know if there is a newer BIOS or EC FW that would be (or might be) compatible with this machine?

ALSO UNRELATED - Are there any simple methods that exist to disable IME on this machine?

 

If I am not mistaking, I believe there has been some success with installing 10 series cards into this laptop.

I've heard of someone installing some 10 series card, not sure which one it was. Probably one of the 'normal' mxm layout cards. I read about how they have to have a shim installed over the GPU die, but then another source says you don't have to modify the cooling at all for 10 series cards. so Idk.

 

I found a link to where someone installed a GTX 1070
http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/clevo-p157sm-a-880m-to-msi-1070-upgrade.821153/

 

Where can I get a modified bios? I want to have full control to how much power I can draw/ I modified a 230w HP power brick to be able to work on this computer. I thought I fixed the issues by modifying the vbios but i am still getting power limited when I test it with furmark.

 

Don't test with furmark, you don't want limiters disabled for that, it will kill your machine.

 

@Savage.exe

You could ask someone that I consider an authority on the subject, very politely, for his assistance unlocking it for you.

Check your inbox as I'm not 100% on the rules regarding posting certain things relating to this topic...

Don't want to upset anyone here.

 

So I had my P157sm-a for about a month now. I was able to fix most of the power issues without having to modify the bios. But yesterday, I rebooted my laptop and the bios corrupted its self. I don't know how this happened, I didn't attempt the modify the bios in any way. I tried reseating the CPU, Graphics card, RAM and nothing. Pulled the CMOS battery waited for 10 minutes, still nothing. Pressing F2 on bootup doesn't work, there's no output. I even removed all of the drives out of the laptop thinking it was trying to boot from the SSD.

 

@Savage.exe

Oh no...that sucks!
Do you have an old (4gb or less) USB stick?
You should be able to use the FN+F2 BIOS recovery method to get your BIOS running again with the BIOS files on the USB drive.
If not, a cheap ($3-$5) programmer would be your best option... I can show you what you need if you like.

 

Something like this, with the SOIC8 test clip...

https://www.aliexpress.com/i/32300047786.html

 

Hmm, I don't have a USB drive, I do have an external HDD I have used to install windows with rufus, maybe I can use that. If it's so bricked, I might have to use a programmer. I don't have money right now to buy a programmer. I guess if FN+F2 works, I could get a modded bios. Or maybe I'll just flash a stock one for right now.

 

@Savage.exe

AFAIK It will need to be done with a FAT32 formatted USB 2.0 flash drive (USB stick) 4gb or less!!!

It MUST be an un-modified (stock) BIOS of the same version you're currently running!!!

Are you sure it is the BIOS, and your GPU didn't die from the mods you made to the vBIOS?

If it turns out to be the latter warranty will, likely, not be honored as it would be deemed user error...

Try removing the dGPU and see if the laptop will complete POST (Power On Self-Test).