1610ftw

I like the cooling concept but on the other hand it does not bode well for my 8TB WD SD for the PS5: It fit perfectly in the Raider 18 HX and it really runs pretty cool so it is a bit of a shame that I may have to get rid of it if I switch to the X580. According to XMG / Schenker it will take 4 double sided drives, I specifically asked for that. So that is good news for those of use that really have 4 double sided NVME drives to fill up all those slots. If you did not have those freezing issues before then it may indeed be because of the memory but there also seems to be something that keeps Schenker / XMG from launching the Key 18 model as it still isn't available for order on their website.

Very good to hear about the audio and the keyboard temps and layout! As you know I have not been much of a fan of the audio of the Raider and Titan 18 as I was still spoiled by earlier MSi and especially the X170. So great news that Clevo again offers proper audio quality. I also have to admit that it did not even occur to me that undervolting and overclocking could be an issue but I am glad it isn't. Is there some kind of control center again where the overclocking / undervolting and fan speed can be adjusted? I hope you can make some progress with memory. If it works out then 4x16GB also has the nice side effect that you have a good amount of capacity for just about everything outside of running specialized memory hungry applications on it. Up to 256GB is a massive amount of memory that is a fantastic option for people who may need it and it would be cool to be able to advertise that. I am really curious if we will have any issues with the new 64GB sticks. With the 4x48GB Crucial I never had any, that was an easy upgrade from 4x32GB.

I really like that you decided to get it so that I do not have to 😄 Great news about the improved cooling and I have to say that those 4 NVME and 4 memory slots look beautiful! From what I recall the keyboard should still be similar to the one in the X170? With the improved cooling really the only criticism that I have is that they have reduced connectivity to a new low. Also 37K CB R23 with 150W is really nice, as is the TimeSpy GPU score! Looking forward to hear what you have to say about the audio as you have a good frame of reference with the many laptops you have owned.

Not interested indeed to be able to push 300W into that 10900K but rather what it can do at about 200W which is where it counts in a (beefy) laptop. Memory temps will most probably be better than in mine as one of the big issues seems to be that the sticks are stacked and I also have 4 x 48GB which doesn't help. The ones closer to the motherboard get a lot hotter, I have seen over 100C for them! I have that pad, too but it is rather uncomfortable when typing and also it does not fit in the same backpack that I put my laptops in so it mostly stays home and currently gets used by my son with his laptop. Oh and my pad has got two big Noctua fans in it - nice and quiet but ugly 🙂

Very nice, looking forward to play with the 10900K 🙂 I also got a decent 10850K by the way but it is just too much for a laptop as it consumes about 15 to 20% more than the chip I got from @electrosoft. Mobile 50x prices are highway robbery right now with MSI, Asus, Razer and others and the Raider with the 4090 will be much better value for money, so I would keep it for a while. As I have rocked the Raider 18HX as my main driver for the last ca. 7 months I can comment on a couple of things even though I have it worse than you guys as mine uses the 14900HX and 192GB memory: I can confirm that it gets VERY hot when not elevated so elevation it a must but then this is true for just about everything out there. Also even with elevation the SSDs, Intel chipset and memory get very hot, especially with the fans turned down which is not a problem for CPU and GPU temps most of the time. This is because until recently all laptops had little to no active airflow over these areas and this is only slowly changing now with first Razer and then Asus adding a center front fan and now Gigabyte one on each side blowing over the other components. Up to more than 100C on the memory and permanently around 60C on SSDs was not what I wanted so I just got a second bottom cover so that I do not care if a few of the plastic noses break off and when not typing on the Raider and with it sitting aside I take it off, takes all of 5 seconds. I do this with most of my laptops that I use for multiple tasks as they all get hot and drop a lot of temps in the SSDs and memory when I do that, also very important for the X170. The difference in memory is as much as 40C and with SSDs I easily see 20C less. Oh and I took off the shield over the memory - no idea how it would be supposed to survive if I retained that shield. Here is what I currently use: Ringke folding stand, it has two height tiers and folds flat when on the road, very convenient: https://www.amazon.com/Ringke-Portable-Lightweight-Anti-Slide-Invisible/dp/B083VT6P7W/ Two Noctua 90mm fans that I had sitting around, just used to move air under the laptop and they can be positioned just about anywhere depending if you type on the laptop or not or if the cover is off or not. Slim 120 x 15mm fans may be even better but I was too lazy to change things. In any case these should just fit under the laptop and in a pinch they can probably be driven directly from the USB-A connector with this: https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B0DDT78NTK/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1 I would still prefer some external power and would definitely do that if these fans run permanently and at home. Fans could for example be two or three of these, they can be attached in a row, no added cabling needed: https://www.amazon.com/ARCTIC-P12-Slim-PWM-Pressure-optimised/dp/B08QDKGCCW/?th=1 and some rubber feet: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07X24NTM3?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title Fans also work quite well for cooling things down a bit when the bottom cover is closed but of course better when it is not attached or when ventilation openings are increased. So if one never wants to take off the bottom cover I would suggest to get a second one and cut some ventilation openings if needed. TLDR: Use elevation and choose one that you can take with you add some airflow that goes over the bottom, maybe cut out some areas with a spare cover check temps for memory, SSDs and chipset - you may be surprised

I want to find out which one needs lower power indeed. Got a GT76, too that could use a better CPU so we will see where it ends up! Your 10900K will be hard to beat as it uses roughly as much or even less power with 10 cores as many 9900K use with only 8. Of course I will also check out how far it can go with 5.2 or possibly 5.3GHz, and if I can still achieve great results at around 200W and maybe up to 220W: https://hwbot.org/benchmarks/cinebench_-_r23_multi_core_with_benchmate/submissions/5619877 Shame that we cannot bin CPUs any more now that it is more important than ever especially for Intel.

I certainly will not go that far plus I want more memory but I will experiment a bit with external solutions and also with higher speed network. Not sure if I want to go higher than 40G but that would be a nice start.

This year will be interesting with TB5 opening up new possibilities with the ability to be on the road starting with a lower performance GPU like the 5070 Ti and then one can increase the performance massively with a TB5 case and a desktop card that will easily surpass even the 5090 mobile.

Same with the Raider 18 HX - CPU only with the internal display and always on dedicated GPU with external displays.

Well you already had the Raider 18 HX so you know the lower part of the chassis minus the vapor chamber heat sink. CP X18 HX does have a nicer more professional looking lid and no more RGB annoyances as MSI (sadly for me) went for an all whitish keyboard. It is still incomprehensible for me that despite being a workstation it only has two drive slots but for me it is the nicest laptop with that chassis due to the color combination and also a high quality nicely understated lid that fits a lot better in professional / non-gaming settings. So if there is an open box model out there that that may be worth a try. Before you do that I would however check with @song_1118 who still uses it to inquire about the iGPU / HDMI port connection and in case that you plan to use it if iGPU mode is a viable option. I can remember that some Titan 18 users reported having to re-register their Windows when switching between iGPU and the two other modes which meant that I never even tried iGPU mode in the Raider 18 HX.

I think it started with the G5 generation which was the first chassis with the new more edgy design - very high build quality and great looks. I had a nice fan curve and undervolt for the Zbook 17 G5 and then came an update and HP destroyed it all - it is hard to not have very negative feelings about a company crippling their product like that. From what I know all subsequent iterations of their flagship workstation have the same "works as intended" annoying fan cycling and undervolting is blocked, too. The only option that I have found to tame those CPUs a bit was to set lower power limits with Throttle Stop which helps them not to ramp the clocks to unsustainable levels but that is far from ideal. I forgot that my last Precision was the 7760 that by comparison had a very low powered CPU (ca. 130W max) which certainly helped. The best workstation I have tested is the MSI CreatorPro X18 HX. It is quite magnificent with regard to fan noise and sustainable performance, too bad that it only comes with a monstrous price tag. I am mainly interested in the new generation of laptops for TB5 and to get more drives so if the CPUs are a sideway move that might be good enough for me. For people who do not need that this is probably a generation they can skip unless they finally want a proper 18" workstation that wasn't available before from Dell and HP.

As a baseline and to see what is happening when you change things you may want to check power uptake when you start a game - if that causes a power consumption spike to 450W I would expect the laptop to shut down but I somehow doubt that is happening. In any case getting a good meter to measure power draw is recommended. Then the first thing I would try is to reset the bios - all kinds of obscure settings could have been fiddled with in a prema bios and you may never get to the bottom of it. That is unless others advise against it but it would be the first thing to do for me with all these settings being exposed. As for running fine on battery this is no surprise at all as total power uptake from the battery is likely less than 100W - not a surprise that this would work.

Uniwill / Tongfang are always interesting and would have warranted a closer look for me if they had gone 18" but sadly they are stuck at 16". Still, if 2+2 memory and drive slots plus 16" are sufficient it would be my choice - love the liquid cooling concept and the split boards. Shame about the HP as their non-defeatable AI Cooling crap together with the rather modest power limit is something that I won't risk buying again. I currently use a Zbook 17 G6 on the side and the stupidity of their "intelligent" fan adjustment that I have also encountered in the 16" Zbook Fury is infuriating for people who have substantial power demands. The up and down of the fans and the throttling is a no-go. Not being able to use third party fan control or undervolt is just the icing on the poo cake for me, so overall very disappointing to see great hardware being sabotaged by bad software and a system that is locked down excessively. But hey, maybe they change their ways, the hardware surely looks tempting including an Asus-style third fan: Still the most interesting 18" cooling concept in this generation is the Aorus Master 18 from Gigabyte with a vapor chamber, 270W TDP and proper internal cooling that cools everything else and not just the CPU and GPU: As you know there are many parts that can get very hot in our laptops these days and temperatures way above 80 degrees for the memory or the chipset are bad news and should be addressed by all manufacturers. Asus was the first company to do that and now HP and Gigabyte are following but with more memory and drive slots. Unfortunately I have not heard that many great things about their laptops nor do I find their design to be very understated but I really would like to see how well this one performs, especially in CPU-heavy loads.

That is indeed a bit of a costly approach 🙂 I switch laptops more often so I have a data and backup drive that I move from device to device and I can even move its Macrium backup routine with it which makes life a lot easier as I do not have to start from scratch each time I move my data. In any case I guess you can splurge a little bit once every five years 🤜 By the way: In case you want / need something external that is very fast then I can recommend this one: https://www.amazon.com/UGREEN-Enclosure-Anti-Drop-Compatible-Thunderbolt/dp/B0CLV3D3H6/ref=sr_1_1? It does not get very hot as it has a fan but also not very loud and it has a silicone protector that is very welcome as it prevents you from accidentally bumping into your laptop and causing nasty scratches. It also helps to make it stay put. I am using it with a TB4 cable and get sustained writes beyond 2 GB/s - at least as long as the SSDs allow for it which sadly is not very long in most cases. They also have a 20G box that is relatively cheap and I got two of those, too as they hardly cost more than the 10G variant but I expect to get to use supported 20G connectors in the future so that will be nice.

Haha, yes you cannot expect a decent quality picture for a $5K + laptop - that would be too much to ask 😄

Great it has arrived! Why did you not just order the Lenovo with one SSD and then reuse the Kioxia as a second drive? I always try to order as little memory and storage as possible unless there is some kind of sale of course that is too good to pass on so I am curious about your reason(s).

How can it be the same when clearly it has less and smaller buttons in the numpad area? The Titan 18 keyboard actually has 3 physical buttons more so not sure if we are talking about the same laptops here ???

When all 8 cores are semi active you may need still need to allow something like 4.4 all core in order to allow the higher clocks in gaming while limiting power via for example Throttle Stop, best to experiment a bit. When my son was using the P870TM for gaming we settled on 4.6 GHz all core as otherwise clocks would go down in gaming even when the game was only using 6 or less cores and in the end the goal was just to stay below 85C for most of the time with even short bursts never exceeding 95C. You could start off with something like 75 or 80W and 4.4 GHz all core clock and see how it goes but I think that even 90W should not be an issue if you do not run it non-stop.

Well the Titan 18 keyboard has a 4 row numpad so it is actually quite different, including the combined Home/End/PG Up and Down keys: https://www.msi.com/Laptop/Titan-18-HX-AI-A2XWX/Gallery#lg=1&slide=3 Clevo still has the edge as it does not "waste" keys for power and copilot. And nobody can say that Clevo is not consistent - looks like the same layout as my P775TM from many years ago 😄

Hmmm - wasn't that the GT77 HX? Anyway, I was really annoyed by the small three row numpad and luckily the new generation has a 4 row version with combined home/end and page up/down keys which is different. Unfortunately it also has a wasted key that now is dedicated to Copilot. Have not yet seen the keyboard of the Clevo but if it has single function keys for all the 5 functions you mention I would be very surprised.

True, the fans were never that great and this is obviously because initially both CPUs and GPUs were not intended to consume that much power. Also the CPU heatsink just wasn't in the same class as the GPU heatsink(s) even though the later CPUs could easily consume as much power as the 1080 or the 2080.

Do you have a pic of the cooling section? All cores have similar temps? Also try a more regular cache like 40.

That is pretty impressive! The CPU of the P870 always suffered from its stock heatsink that was an afterthought compared to the massive cooling that was available for the GPUs. With a decent 9900K I would figure about 110 to 125W at 4.5GHz which in everyday use is pretty sustainable from my experience with the P870TM even when it is not the greatest heat sink.

Are you sure you won't destroy the vapor chamber by doing that?

Yes, sadly this is what it looks like, just be careful not to fry your motherboard. Regarding how far you can go I just remembered that @runix18 had the P870DM-G with the 9700K and he may be able to chime in regarding what he found to be a sustainable power uptake with the DM motherboard.