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    *** Official X8100 (Sager 8120) Owners Thread ***

    Discussion in 'Sager/Clevo Reviews & Owners' Lounges' started by Miss Malevolent, Feb 15, 2010.

  1. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Not a problem, both still offer a significant step up.
     
  2. borend

    borend Newbie

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    Hi guys, I want to ask is there any possibility to upgrade to 2x 6990M in a Clevo x8100?
    I already have the cards(I bought the second one just to test) +Crossfire X Cable and the cooling (which is made from copper) ?
    Thanks :)
     
  3. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    I am having some VGA card issues. I get Bluescreen problems related to the NVIDIA driver crashing.

    I have a single 285M, I pulled off the SLI a number of years ago and the second card has been sitting in a drawer.

    The problem manifests itself usually while watching youtube HD videos. It's like I can only watch so many a day or something strange like that. I don't think it is truly a heat issue. Sometimes after watching a number of videos during a "day". I can come back a few hours later and open a video and it will BSOD the computer. I know that the more videos I watch during the day, the more "risk" I am taking of getting borked.

    This is a PITA becuase after the power cycle I have to go thru a Disk Mirror sync for like 7 hours.

    So today I swapped out the current 285M for the one I have had in the drawer for the last few years just in case the card is trying to fail. We'll see if this fixes my issue.

    But just in case, what would be a compatible card I could put in?

    I do not Game, but would like to be able to do Photo/Video editing and watch 1080P videos well. Mainly 2D stuff. Interested in cool running obviously. I Love this Laptop and would like to keep it running as long as possible.
     
  4. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Now this is reaching the depths but I seem to remember some Nvidia cards did have an issue where the voltage for low loads was JUST a smidge low and raising it up a step can help. I believe NIBITOR works on that series.
     
  5. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    Thanx for that! If this new card doesn't straighten up for me, I'll try a voltage tweak.
     
  6. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    It's worth a shot since it's free that's for sure :)
     
  7. Alexrose1uk

    Alexrose1uk Music, Media, Game

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    Wow this is going back a bit!
    Semi-surprised anyone is still using an X8100, as most of the people I knew with one were upgrade nutters ^_^
     
  8. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Well some people treat their machine like a classic car :)
     
  9. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    Where do I upgrade too really? I have an 18.4" LED screen, a Quad core i7, 3 HDDs, a Blue Ray ROM, SPDIF Out, HDMI out, I can go on and on.
     
  10. randomrat

    randomrat Newbie

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    I'm still running my X8100 from November 2010 and i'm aiming to not upgrade for at least another 2 years or so.

    This laptop has been an absolute workhorse, taking me through thick and thin. Very very impressed with it. As sad as it sounds, I've gained quite an attachment to it, much like any enthusiast would with their pride and joy I guess :)
    For me this laptop is such a Swiss army knife. The 6 USB ports, the HDMI-in for my AV equipment, the eSATA port for quick backups on my external dock, the blu-ray writer and much more. The i7 940XM was a pointless extra spend, but even to this day it has kept up with everything I throw at it.
    The dual HD5870M's have been a mixed bag however...i'll get to that later.

    Whilst i'm not a fan of the materials used for the chassis, my laptop survived when I fell off my bicycle a few years ago. It was in a very thinly padded rucksack, because well built rucksacks weren't really available in the UK back then. The only damage left was a teeny chip in the corner of the left palm rest. I was so scared that I had shattered the LCD, but I guess luck was on my side that day. I am still using the very same rucksack today which is not a very clever idea, but I don't cycle to uni anymore and I am contemplating on buying an Everki Titan...still not sure though...
    I also dropped the charger from 4 feet high, due to downright carelessness, and it managed to actually put a crack in the floor tile :p the charger itself sustained little to no damage and is still working sweetly.

    Going back to the GPU's. For those running dual GPU's, or dual HD5870M's to be more specific, have you found that when they are being hammered the screen begins to periodically distort? If I play Crysis for example, after 10 minutes the screen begins to shake for a second and then stop. Come another 20 seconds or so, it happens again. The longer I carry on playing the more frequent it gets. Both GPU temps go to about 85-90C when playing, which is hot, but not enough to bring on artifacts surely? I'm thinking it may be more along the lines of power?

    Does anybody use that Dual charger adapter Clevo sells with their X8100? I still have a spare charger in the box, so I'm thinking that one of those blocks may help. The only trouble is that they are very difficult to find. Any ideas?

    I'm way too scared to flash the GPU BIOS - can they be a hit and miss procedure, or will it work fine if I go through all the steps thoroughly?

    GPU-Z is reporting them as:
    012.019.000.015.037180 (BR37180.M21)
     
    Last edited: Feb 25, 2015
  11. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    Yeah I still Love mine. My Battery is practically dead though. There is a replacement in my future it looks like. Can't help with your questions though. I had dual Nvidia 285's and believe Crysis was a strain on mine as well and got some artifacts. I think I have seen what you are referring to.
    I don't know what the dual charger adapter is though.
     
  12. randomrat

    randomrat Newbie

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    The battery currently keeps mine going for about 40mins with the screen brightness half way. Never really noticed a drop in its battery life, I thought that would be the norm with this kind of laptop.

    The "dual charger" device I was referring to is the picture below. I think I was misinforming when I said Clevo sold it *for* the X8100 laptops. I'm not sure if they were actually sold with the X8100. A friend of mine who owns a more recent Clevo P570WM does has one. There's an idea, I might borrow his and see if it fixes the issue. I guess I can report back some time later?....
    [​IMG]
    UPDATE: The power adapter is called an Clevo AC-100
     
    Last edited: Feb 26, 2015
  13. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    It was introduced with the X7200 IIRC for dual 480M action.
     
  14. ZJJXL

    ZJJXL Notebook Geek

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    I just booted up my PSM170 (?) after 3 months in storage and the battery was reading 90%...

    Obviously it was fully charged more than 3 months ago but I'm pleasently surprised. Probably not a true reading though am I right?
     
  15. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Try running it a cycle, but stored in the right conditions that's pretty normal.
     
  16. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    LiION batteries are used particularly for their low self drain. 3% per month show you have a healthy battery most likely.

    Run the laptop down on the battery. That will tell you the health. And realize that percent is a guess by the OS.

    Mine can show 100% and won't last longer than 5 minutes. The battery is shot. I don't think that is your problem though.

    I think they have battery technologies today that can be shelved for 5 years. Gel car batteries are very good. The Military uses these things in their Hummers I think so they can be started after being in storage a long time.
     
  17. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Yes the charge level is pretty simply based off of cell voltage levels which if they are damaged do not follow the expected discharge curve so are not properly predicted.
     
  18. Tulius

    Tulius Notebook Consultant

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    Some guy here in neighborhood wants to sell me for 500 dollars one Clevo X8100, its configuration is 920XM and dual 5870M gpus. I thinks its pretty cheap for this old beast. Anyone here knows if its possible to upgrade the gpu with a 7970M or 680M cards? Is it accepts Dell and Clevo gpu cards? I have a spare 6970M and 7970M Dell cards.
     
  19. Mirkoni

    Mirkoni Newbie

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    Hi.
    My old Clevo x8100 begins new life. Nvidia 5010m from Dell 6600 works perfectively. Status in bios -unknown, but it under Win7x64 is in order.
    Vbios x7200 plus modding drivers.
    Greet.
     
  20. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Yes the quadros tend to work well on the platform :) Happy gaming.
     
  21. zorkx

    zorkx Notebook Enthusiast

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    Same problem here with two 5870 display cards with windows 8.1 and windows 10.
    Any sollution for this ?
     
  22. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    I would stick to windows 7 with the older hardware as there is not much reason to go 10 for them.
     
  23. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    Any Chance of getting the Hotkey stuff to work on Windows 10?
     
  24. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    If it won't work now I doubt it.
     
  25. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    I got it to work along with the lightshow for one boot cycle.

    I set it to run in Windows 7 compatibility mode and rebooted.

    It worked!

    Installed an upgraded Nvidia driver and rebotted and it did not run o_O

    So I may goof with it a bit more to get it working.

    Any suggestions?

    I was smiling while it was working... Below is an actual pixture of me when it was working:

    :D
     
  26. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    Double post
     
  27. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    You will just need to experiment in that case, see if you can use your old gpu drivers and if it works or if the two are unrelated.
     
  28. cjolney

    cjolney Notebook Enthusiast

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    Just a hey there from an 8120 user! Still going strong, lost lightshow capability years ago, tried everything, never got it back :(
    Attempted the Win 10 upgrade but never got both GPUs noticed, gave up and went back to Win 7 64bit.
    Still running compatible games form steam like Talos and Never Alone, even made FarCry 2 look quite good and played well.
    Able to play Witcher 1 EE DC by putting SLI in AFR 1. Overall quite happy with this purchase 6+ years later, really can't imagine giving it up yet.
    Home set up with 2 original Titan's in SLI more than handles my gaming itch, but on on call for 24 hrs, this baby has been there for me!!
     
  29. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    I think win7 64 bit is a pretty good match to the machine given the generation of the GPUs.
     
  30. TheTrueToy

    TheTrueToy Newbie

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  31. AZHIGHWAYZ

    AZHIGHWAYZ Notebook Enthusiast

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    New to this site, but figured I'd throw my hat into the ring. I've owned my Sager NP8120 since July of 2010. It's been around the world with me as I deployed with the U.S. Navy. Kept me out of a lot of trouble because I was in my hotel room gaming instead of at the bars with women. I did enough of that when I was younger anyway :p.
    For the last two years it's seen very little usage as I have retired from the Navy and use my desktop for gaming. However recently I decided to let my 10 year old son use it. I booted it up half expecting it not to work after almost a year of inactivity. It jumped to life like it had just been on yesterday. The battery likely isn't good but I rarely used it without the brick anyway. My son has enjoyed using it lately, but it does struggle with some of the games he plays online with his friends. So I started looking at upgrades. CPU's are dirt cheap now compared to a year or so ago. I picked up a 940XM for under $100.00 to replace the 720QM in there now. I found a deal on two brand new Nvidia 765M cards for less than $100.00 a piece also. Though I've discovered that without some kind of bios hack I won't be able to use the cards. So that's money down the drain :(. I still intend to give it my best effort though because my kid is worth it :D. He's been helping me take it apart and learning about the insides anyway so it's a good experience for us both.
    In the end it's still kicking and mostly relevant after 7 years. Well worth the money spent on it at the time no matter what my wife says ;). Looking forward to getting a few more years of use out of it. If anyone has tips for getting unsupported GPU cards to work let me know.
     
  32. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Back in the old days eurocom offered a 680M package for it:



    If you could find one and double check the heatsink fit (it may need a little work) then it could get it playing modern titles at least.

    It could be fun as a project.
     
  33. AZHIGHWAYZ

    AZHIGHWAYZ Notebook Enthusiast

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    @Meaker@Sager Thanks for the info. Unfortunately I've already spent the money budgeted for the upgrades. At the time I was shopping for them, the cheapest 680M I could find was over $250.00 and that didn't include the dual heatsink set up needed to run the 680M. The dual heatsink was another $160.00 from EUROCOM. I had a little over $300.00 to drop on upgrades I've saved up for. Even set back buying a new desktop rig for myself to do this with my son. The two 765M's I got for $170.00 and they are new. They are 50W-75W cards like the two 285M-SLI I have now. I was hoping to get them running in SLI and have slightly more power than a 680M. Had I known they were unsupported I wouldn't have purchased them :(. Sadly I thought laptops were similar to desktops. As long as the power and interface requirements were met it would work. After reading through the forums only after the purchase did I find out how wrong I was. I'm still holding out hope I can find a work around or solution. I haven't broke the news to my son yet. I did learn a valuable lesson for the future though. Do your research before buying the parts. :oops:

    I also bought a 765M to replace the 560M in my wifes Batallion 101 P151HM1. Not sure if that will work out either.
     
  34. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    Anybody know of a source of good reliable batteries? Mine's toast
     
  35. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    Hey, What did you end up doing with your GPU upgrade?
     
  36. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    I believe the battery is the same as the other similar model chassis, did you ask our support team to see if they had any or could get one?
     
  37. les_garten

    les_garten Notebook Consultant

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    Didn't occur to me that you would still be producing batteries. Do you have the same chassis currently?
     
  38. AZHIGHWAYZ

    AZHIGHWAYZ Notebook Enthusiast

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    Nothing unfortunately. I searched for months for a solution. The only way I could figure to make it work with the 765M’s would be to get a custom bios mod. Sadly I couldn’t find anyone willing or able to do it. I checked the bios mod forums all over the net asking and offering to pay for services but had no luck. Another issue I ran into is the original heat sinks for the GPU’s don’t quite fit the 765M’s. There’s a raised portion on the heat sink that interferes with one component on the 765M and does not allow the heat sink to seat properly. This could probably be eliminated by having the heat sink planed. However without the bios mod it’s pointless.

    I made the attempt with my wife’s P151HM1 also but ran into a similar issue with no support for the card at the bios level. So basically money down the drain and lesson learned. I’d still make the mod if I could find someone to hack support into the bios for those laptops though. Just because I love to tinker with hardware. :)
     
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