*** Official Clevo X170SM-G/Sager NP9670M Owner's Lounge ***

Not yet. Still in the "Parts/Products order (Preorder)" stage. Ordered in late June

 

I just talked to HID about mine. They have the computers but don’t have the 10900k in stock. We’re waiting on those.

 

I can't wait. It must be a holiday today at HIDEvolution, or something. There is no "Chat" option available and nobody is answering the phone or emails. Anyway, I plan to make this into a dual boot so I got the Win 10 re-installation media. I want to do dual-boot the right way, as I have heard there are many wrong - or less right- ways to do it. Can anyone recommend a resource for setting this up? Thanks!

 

Get the Intel WiFi card so you dont have to deal with BS Killer software..
And what do you want to dual boot windows 10 with?
You can just make a usb drive install media using Media Creation Tool, no need to pay for a install media with a version of windows 10 that will be old in 6 months.

 

I had a hackintosh and windows on my last p870dm3. It was a lot of work to get working and I eventually stopped doing it because things would break after any update. If you’re going to run windows on different drives then the biggest thing is to disable or don’t install the drives while windows is being installed. Also it’s super easy to make your own install media usb. You just need a usb and the installer program which you can download from Microsoft for free.

 

Thanks for the advice! So the Killer WiFi has drivers that don't play nice with ubuntu? I thought the install media would allow more flexibility, such as installing again if the drive dies. Is this mistaken?

 

You can just make an install media pen using any random 8GB drive and using Media Creation Tool from MS.
Yes, just use a native Intel WiFi card, less hassle down the road.

 

You can also make an image backup of your system. I use macrium reflect. It’s come in handy for me many times.

 

Interesting. I just spoke with Shane at HID. When I asked if any of the parts to my system were not in stock he said no. I also got the 10900K. Wut.

 

He probably meant no, they are not in stock.

 

That second benchmark seems like what this machine should perform.

CPU score is normal for 10700K .
However that GPU score is a bit high, it is clearly overclocked, it should give around 28k, not 30k.
I hope the reason why we see good score here and bad scores from the 2 "reviews" is not because Clevo messed up the voltage/gpu clock curve which is causing unexplained performance drops however fine if the gpu clock is hand tuned.

 

Can I ask why you got the 4K display? I'm not trying to start an argument; I'm kind of on the fence between that or the 240Hz FHD at the moment.

 

Same I don’t know if a 2080 super can output enough o play 4K games on high setting and get good fps. Guess I will wait to see what people think. I have a friend that swears even on lower settings 4 k is far superior to 1080p ultra. Still hoping for the best for everyone that gets one of these excited to see some benchmarks


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I have read anecdotes about how the 4K makes single player slower-paced games more immersive thanks to the greater detail. That said, this is a 17" laptop screen, not a VR headset or a 30" ultrawide...

I do have another thought of just getting a 144Hz internal display and then later on getting a 4K external display a couple years later.

 

I would never take such a question as starting an argument, LOL.

To answer your question: I work with my computer all day doing scientific programming and results-processing and such. I have had a p750DM-G (6700K) for the last 4 years with a 4K screen. So first, I am used to this screen. Second, I wanted to know if I could go back to a 1080 screen again so I looked at some plain text on my wife's 15" 1080 with my reading/programming glasses and I could see the pixels clearly - especially with a text editor (i.e., a coding interface). That would drive me nuts, so I am stuck with 4K. I would go crazy looking at the blocks around the text when coding. I don't play games, so I don't care about refresh rates as long as I can't see it refreshing.

My only complaint with the 4K screen on my current machine is that not all programs scale well and so some (like remote desktop) have fonts that are too small to read well. Of course I have heard that Win 10 allows the user to set the individual scaling for each program in addition to a universal scaling, unlike the Win 7 OS I have been using for the last 4 years. I will take full advantage of that.

 

Can anyone recommend a monitor that will pair well with this laptop? I'm currently using a HP ZR2740w ( https://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c02974836) and figure it's time for an upgrade.

 

With text, sometimes it's hard to tell intentions

(delete)

Never mind, HID's sold me on the 4K. I think I may like the higher PPI since I do use an iPad regularly

 

Anything you're looking for specifically? Higher refresh rate, larger size, larger resolution, etc. etc.

 

I'm guessing that was targeted at me. I'm not really sure what I'm looking for to be honest. I've been away from the gaming scene for like 3 years now and am hoping this new laptop brings me back.

I've tried a 34" curved ultrawide with a 3440x1440 resolution and it was just too much screen so I prefer 27" as far as size goes. Resolution/Refresh/Features really depend on what the laptop will support. I mean there's no point in getting a 4k display if it's going to drop the framerate considerably. I'd rather higher framerates at a lower resolution. I googled "gaming monitors 2020" and am overwhelmed with the results.

 

When I gifted my SO a new desktop gaming rig, I bought her the Legion Y27gq-20. It seemed like a decent balance of specs, resolution, features and physical size. She's had zero complaints about it, though this is her first dedicated gaming rig.

 

Well I got the laptop and configured it with my usuals, except heavy programs , my internet isn't that great, so I guess tomorrow I'll be able to do some more complete testings.
Config is 10600k , 2080S , 2x8gb 2666mhz ram, 250gb 970 evo and 1 tb ssd.
So far so good, laptop looks and sounds great, especially when coming from an N970TD, though still kinda coming from the bottom so it doesn't breathe much if you will.
I was happy to find the psu holder included, though I was told it wasn't.

 

For me personally, 4k looks really good. The detail is incredibly crisp.

Unfortunately there is no graphics card in existence that can push 120 fps at 4k in newer AAA games currently (that is, AAA games released 2015 and after), so I'm stuck with 1080p for the time being. However, that doesn't really bother me, because choppy laggy games at 60 fps pisses me off a lot more than seeing pixelation/aliasing on the edges of objects. I'm a 120 fps guy. I cannot game at lower framerates because everything starts to look choppy under 110 fps (yes 110 fps, that's my tolerance limit), and then looks slow under 90 fps, which makes them not enjoyable.

Having said all of that, you can get most of the way to 4k-like detail through a properly antialiased 1080p image. It still doesn't look as good as 4k, but it's about 70% of the way there.

If you don't care about high refresh rate gaming and a standard 60 Hz monitor suits you fine, go for that 4k panel instead. The difference between 1080p and 4k is really overstated by marketing who wants you to believe 1080p is pixelated as crap (which it's not), BUT there is indeed a significant increase in detail going from 1080p to 4k. Antialiasing is no longer needed at 4k as an increase in resolution is effectively its own type of antialiasing.

What you get should suit your needs and wants. There is no one size fits all solution because which screen is the best is subjective based on your preferences. There is nothing wrong with wanting either a 4k 60 Hz screen or 144 Hz 1080p screen.

I will say one thing about 8k panels though. 8k is super stupid. There is a laughably small difference between 4k and 8k. I almost did not notice a difference, and probably wouldn't have if both TVs at Best Buy that I looked at hadn't been labelled. I wouldn't even have looked for a difference.

 

8k is more for large monitors for sure. 17.3 inch is ideal at 1440p imo.

 

Mine is apparently built and "in testing" so hoping I'll get it Thursday or Friday if the stars align correctly.

 

What companies are the ones shipping already? Also sounds like there’s no ssd only m.2 slots so what s a quality m.2 that has a lot of space reliable but not to expensive


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I ordered mine from sagernotebook.com at the end of last week and it arrives tomorrow.

It has 4 m.2 slots and you can use either sata or nvme drives. There are no 2.5" drive bays. Below are the go to NVME drives based on how much you wanna spend (according to Reddit). I went with the Evo Plus.

Adata SX8200 1TB $140
Sabrent Rocket 1TB $150
WD Black SN750 1TB $150
Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1TB $180

 

I ordered mine through XoticPC on the 31st of July (last Friday) an here's the current status for mine:


Thanks for reaching out to us.
From what I can see, Sager is still in the process of working on your build, though they should be finishing that up this week. One thing to note though: you selected the Fujipoly thermal pads which Sager does not offer or install, so getting those added will require Sager to ship it to our facility so we can get those installed for you, but that shouldn't take long at all since it's just one thing. But with that in mind, you should likely get your machine early to mid next week.
Let me know if there's anything else I can help you with today.

 

Where did you order from, and did you get the i9-10900K CPU?

 

I guess I am one of the few who got the 2080S/4K/60Hz variant. I made the order about 12 hours ago now, fitting it out with a delidded i9 and extra thermal controls through HID.

The way I see it is that I probably will always be indecisive about this, so I figure I'll go with the higher PPI screen given that I'm already accustomed to Apple's HiDPI on their MacBook and iPad.

It also helps that I've never used anything with a refresh rate of greater than 60Hz

 

PC Specialist. I went with the i7-10700K. Already have an 8-core ryzen desktop machine that i'm happy with, so I figured i'd save the money.

Also the 10900K was out of stock. I may put the 10850K in it later if I want the extra cores.

 

I can neither confirm nor deny plans for PCIe 4.0 support for Z490 + Rocket Lake in X170SM. It's just too early to tell. While some Desktop mainboard vendors claim to have implemented it for Rocket Lake, Clevo (in my experience) is not known to go rogue beyond the official support of their vendors (in this case: Intel).

Probably a mistake. Clevo does not offer anything beyond the current 4K/60Hz IPS-type screen.

No. The 1000 nits Micro-LED that was shown on CES has been cancelled because it wasn't stable enough and the supply situation would have been atrocious.

Keyboard Disassembly / RAM Upgrade

XMG ULTRA 17 has 4 memory slots: 2 on the mainboard side, 2 below the keyboard. For the purpose of Dual Channel, the memory channels are paired next to each other:

• Use only 2 modules? Assemble the two paired slots on the mainboard side first
• Want to use 4 modules? Add 2 additional modules below the keyboard

You do not need to remove the thermal module in order to remove the keyboard. Please follow these instructions:

• Remove Li-Ions Battery and Power Supply
• Remove 2 screws as marked on the picture. Both screws are engraved with a keyboard icon if you look closely.

• Flip the laptop by 90°, open the LCD lid by 90° and let the laptop stand on the left or right side
• Use a long tool (e.g. screwdriver) to push the keyboard out of the chassis
  • The right hole in our picture is engraved on the chassis with the “push keyboard” icon. But we actually recommend pushing through the left hole (marked in pink) – this will make the keyboard notches come out easier
• Do not rip the keyboard out of the laptop. It is still connected to various cables with the mainboard!
  • Gently remove the keyboard from the notches and flip it forward.
  • You do not need to remove every keyboard ribbon cable. Just make sure to flip it away to gain access to the RAM slots
• One RAM slot is covered by the RGB LED daughterboard. Remove 2 screws to get the small PCB out of the way, so you can access the RAM slot
• After inserting your RAM, attached the RGB LED daughterboard again and check the connection of every ribbon cable.
• When assembling the keyboard, attach the bottom notches first. The side and top notches can be pushed in after assembly, but the bottom notches must sit tight before you start attaching screws.

Thank you for reading.

Interesting.

From what we understand, the benefit of Liquid Metal is greatly diminished at large Die sizes. When investigating Liquid Metal in XMG NEO series, our ODM came to the conclusion that it does have a good benefit on the CPU, but no benefit on the (RTX 2070 SUPER) GPU.

The video recording of this "Dave Nup" stutters from the get-go. He is either using a really buggy phone or he made a mistake with framerate conversion when putting his footage through the video editing software. The stutteryness of the Chinese Youtube video does not reflect the real-life results. X170SM does not stutter.

The screen info is solid. When buying from a professional reseller, you will get the screen that is advertised.

Looking forward to your user review! Please also check out the XMG ULTRA 17 thread on Reddit.

Clevo cannot cheat on GPU names. The GPU name is derived from the VBIOS which is supplied *by NVIDIA* to the ODM.

Full data on the GPU from AIDA64:

[ GeForce RTX 2080 Super ]

• Device Description GeForce RTX 2080 Super
• Adapter String GeForce RTX 2080 Super
• BIOS String Version90.4.97.0.7d
• Chip Type GeForce RTX 2080 Super
• DAC Type Integrated RAMDAC
• Driver Date 04.06.2020
• Driver Version 26.21.14.4331 - nVIDIA Detonator 43.31
• Driver Provider NVIDIA
• Memory Size 8 GB
  
• Hardware ID PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_1ED3&SUBSYS_77141558&REV_A1
• PCI Device NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Super [10DE-1ED3] [NoDB]

We are currently having a review unit at a German YouTube reviewer and we will comment further as soon as the video is online.

This is correct. When setting a RAID 0 on the three M.2 drives that are located next to each other, you can still use the 4th M.2 slot as a single SSD drive.

Cheers,
Tom

 

You'll never be able to go back to 60 Hz displays if you do .

@XMG Thanks for the great and very detailed info. You guys rock!

 

All the better! I'll save spoiling myself for a few more years down the road!

Does this mean that it would be less optimal to fill the two modules below the keyboard first? When I ordered mine, I requested 32GBx2 to be inserted below the keyboard so that I can buy 64GB in a few months and have an easier time adding them then.

 

It won't be less optimal. It's just recommended for most users to insert RAM modules into the slots under the main cover first for ease of installation. A lot of people don't install over 16 GB of RAM, and even less people install more than 32 GB of RAM in their machines, which means they will probably never touch the 2 slots under the keyboard.

The good part is that it's much easier in Clevo DTRs to install modules underneath the keyboard as the keyboard essentially acts like a door. A complete disassembly is not required to access those other two slots unlike most other laptops I've seen that have 4 slots.

In the future, 64 GB of RAM in a gaming system may be the norm, but that won't happen for quite a long time. 16 GB has been enough for gaming for the past decade, and still is enough. It probably will still be enough for at least a few more years.

 

Appreciate the reply.

I have borderline butterfingers, so if I'm paying for extra services, I might as well make this particular request. I know that I'm going nuts with RAM from the get-go, but I figure that two free slots that are much easier to access would be one of those nice have-it-but-not-need-it kind of things.

 

So far I was able to run some benchmarks in Shadow of the Tomb Raider with everything except dlss and smaatx4, only x2, so basically everything , except a dancing leather jacket man, and it ran 78 FPS with G sync and worst temp seen was 87C on cpu package. (Stock settings - no undervolt, custom fan profile , 90% at 80C)
Doesn't mean much, but personally am very pleased with it. Yes latest drivers and everything.
I do not own a bought copy of 3dmark benches so I suppose I could only run a simple timespy bench.
I will further test with XTU and the power limits , though I will reset it when running cinebench.
N.B. : ambient temp is around 24C with 55% humidity, for whom it may concern, the laptop breathes fine of course, and performance mode

 

Also, forgot to mention, it seems the lightbar is resilient to my attempts at shutting it down via control centre ( made sure it was updated ) and there is no "cpu overclocking" menu in it either despite it being mentioned in the manual.
Cinebench R20 ran, max fans, 3476.
The demo of TimeSpy ran in the same stock settings plus max fans, obtaining 10359 combined, 11035 Gpu and 7692 cpu

 

This had furmark running too, and max fans, undervolted and reduced PLs

 

Thank you for this

 

Hmmm...the lights not being able to be turned on and off via software is a problem. Hopefully thats not the case and there is some way.

 

A note on the larger GPU dies liquid metal is extremely sensitive to fit so quite often unless you have the fit just right you loose the benefit of the TIM.

 

Judging by your stats, I'm assuming you got the 1080p?

Also, do all resellers with the 4K model use the same 4K panel?

 

Yes indeed to your first question, 1080p 144hz, apologies for missing out on it beforehand

 

No worries; just simple process of elimination going by your report.

The second question was more directed at the general audience than you specifically.

 

Thank you @XMG for the answer.

Thank you @Joe4zio for the TimeSpy benchmark.
Did you get 78fps in sottr with max ray tracing setting ? If yes then that's pretty impressive.
That CPU temp seems a bit high with only 86W tdp during stress test. If it was a 10700k that goes over 130W then I would say it's normal, but for 86W it's not.
Did you repaste it? PCS is not always using high quality paste like Kryonaut and instead uses a much cheaper and less efficient alternative since they buy it in bulk.
If it was a 8700k then the reason behind the high temp would be the bad paste under the IHS however since Intel is using solder which has almost the same thermal conductivity as liquid metal, it is not the cause of the high temp.
Also, are you running your 10600k at stock 4.5 GHz all core turbo settings ? If yes then you can add some more undervolt , by my experience with 8700k and 9900ks it should be able to go down to at least 130mV, if you are lucky maybe even down to 150mV.

 

A few minor questions:

1. Is the 4K display the AUO B173ZAN03.0 across all resellers? Or are some shops using different variants?

2. Anyone know what kind of keyboard this model has? Mechanical, membrane, scissor, hybrid, etc.?

3. Would you say taking up on the screen calibration service by (some) resellers would enhance my overall viewing experience across all activities?

 

respectively : yes , no, the total power consumption was 360watts, so the cpu was definitely eating far more than 80 90 watts, did not repaste it ( yet ) but intend to do so, the cpu is running with its stock settings, especially because I just went looking in the bios, and the overclocking support menu was disabled, so now i do have access to it in the control centre, maybe that was also why intel XTU was also pretty resilient to my changes. Thus I will have to test it further, I will also look into msi afterburner, tuning the voltage curves and all, to save me some thermals. My bad for the thermals, I wasn't aware of the bios option, also, the bios is indeed very limited

 

My build just got updated. Parts being pulled for build.

 

did you order from HID? whats your spec?

 

Maybe not all but most are using the AUO B173ZAN03.0 since this is the main one Clevo is shipping with the chassis. It is a vibrant, screen!

The keyboard is a non-mechanical N-Key Rollover RGB Per Key illuminated full size keyboard with numeric pad that has a good solid feel.



Please excuse the dust on it
Getting your screen calibration done can optimize your overall experience with a 4K screen like this many have said.