1610ftw

Same here but we also used to think that about the X170KM-G and now it can use the iGPU. Maybe it is the same situation with the P751/775TM1? What is certain is that somebody would have to enable that functionality.

You are a crazy person 😄 Seems like a waste of a perfectly good card to go from the 3080 to the 3080 Ti. I would probably try to wait for a later model 40xx card instead in order to get something that is actually worth the upgrade - the 4080 or something similar. Edit: Just checked and you will gain maybe 5% in performance going from the 3080 to the 3080Ti so that upgrade definitely won't be worth it, better to gain closer to 50% by going up to the 4080 or similar.

Looking forward to what you can achieve with Throttlestop and PTM7950 - beyond 30K should easily be possible in single runs. I was not so much thinking that an aftermarket heatsink would be nice but I was showing them as an example that they were produced with very low volume for a limited market so surely Dell could have taken the time to improve upon the heatsink of the 7780 with its much higher expected sales volume. It would also help numbers if they just went with a single heatsink for all models with a dGPU that is based on the requirements of the top configuration. I am sure that not too many people would complain about too much cooling.

This handling of situations where sustained power is required can only be called pathetic. While it is not only Dell one would think that with all the feedback they are getting and with their Alienware laptop branch they would be willing to at least allow sustained loads of 80W provided that certain temperature thresholds aren't exceeded. And if the heat sink isn't beefy enough it would be easy enough to improve it. There are several aftermarket heat sinks out there for Clevo laptops that show us that it does not take huge sales numbers to do a redesign and if Dell is too lazy they may want to ask one of the guys who designed some of these monsters:

I guess it all depends from where you are coming from as those units are not that old compared to your Alienware 😄 Yes it is not that easy to find them in good condition and at a good price any day of the week but then they are used and at least in the US offers are pretty abundant if you are observing ebay for a while and I am sure there are other places where you can find deals. If you look for something newer that is fully socketed then indeed the X170 is your best bet but it will cost you more and you got to be patient when waiting for a good deal and cheaper ones may have some cosmetic issues. Best of luck getting your GPU or motherboard fixed so that the AW17 R1 will live to game another day.

I also got some branded stuff but I do not even know if it is for real as I have no idea how the branded stuff is supposed to look... So you got some more from ebuy recently and saw an improvement over the no-name stuff?

Do you have a link to the better pad? Looks like I will need some more soon once I am through all of our laptops here 😄

In case you cannot save your Alienware you may want to also look into the MSI GT75 - it is quite old now but it has the works when it comes to options and can be had for as low as 600$ with 4 cores: - overclocking and undervolting with very good (MXM) GPU performance for the 1080 models that can sustain about 200W for a 8000+ Time Spy GPU score, the CPU can sustain south of 100W - very good accessibility as long as you do not have to access anything above the motherboard but that is doable, too I am told but I have never had to do it on mine - very good 1080p 120 Hz screen (4k is rare) but should also take QHD and 4K screens or even an 18" ugprade if you are into putting in another screen - 10G ethernet for the first two generations - no other laptops ever had that - take that puny 2.5G! - 4 memory slots with up to 64GB and 4 drive bays for storage (3x m2 and 1x 2.5") with excellent cooling - very nice mechanical keyboard but you got to be able to tolerate "unique" key placement - excellent fan control options and very quiet in normal use - excellent sound, among the best and also plays quite loud - overall among best in class connectivity And you did not mention them but I have looked at Clevo P775 / P870 prices and they have been going for as low as 600$ it seems with a 1080 so they would be excellent deals for a fully upgradeable and modular platform. That is if you can put up with their subpar keyboard and not very exciting base chassis and buggy software. So you will possibly want to put more work into them but it also means that you CAN put more work into them and the threads in the Clevo section prove it 😄 If you start out with at least the DM3 versions then you can always upgrade from that later with the final options being 9900K, 3080 and even special heatsinks with and without watercooling. The rabbit hole goes very deep... Oh and X170SM-G with 10900K and 2080 Super have been as low as 1100$ lately which was a steal. If you want more drives and 10 cores it will be preferable to the X170KM-G. No comment on recent BGA books but you may get best bang for the buck CPU and GPU performance out of the usual suspects with a 3070 or 3070 Ti, there are even a bunch of good screen options. Pride of ownership you will obviously not get and I will leave it to others to make recommendations there as I have no interest in them.

In theory if somebody did a really good job on your X170 you may not need the PTM 7950 but it is likely you will see some improvement at least.

Hard to say, what temps do you get at max fans in a run of Time Spy or what are your Cinebench CR23 numbers and temps? Any undervolting / overclocking? If you are not into that kind of thing I would suggest to just apply some PTM 7950 if your temps are too high - it may not be the ultimate solution with a CPU heat spreader but it is long lasting so you will not have to redo it if you don't want to.

Good luck and please let us know, looks like it may be a rather tight fit.

Looks like my last PTM 7950 pad application has settled a bit as core temp differences are now down to 5°C from 7°C on the day of the application. Not bad coming from a 17°C difference. I also have used it on the IHS of an 8700K and 9900K where intra-core differences have also come down to 5° and 7°C from over 10°C before. Got my PTM 7950 from Ali Express and will probably buy from them again as so far it has worked extraordinarily well and there is very little guesswork as to how it is best applied.

Thanks - I had seen that one but I noticed that many complained about bright corners with this screen in the Asus G18. Is that an issue with yours, too?

That is some crazy shit on a laptop that is only about 400mm wide 😄 Where did you get it, got a link? I have a bunch of older DTRs here that could easily fit the new panel as they are all at least 415mm wide but I am not sure if they will support QHD with a 240Hz refresh rate - that is a lot more bandwidth than even the old UHD 60hz panels.

With regard to memory for people who do not need 128GB the new 48GB SO-DIMMS may wortk well especially when higher memory speed is a goal while still allowing to go up to 96GB memory. So far over here in Europe none of them have been released but I am curious if maybe they will even allow for 192GB memory in the top MSI, Lenovo and HP chassis.

2560 x 1600 should be a compromise everybody can live with and it also still makes sense for higher refresh rates so I hope we will keep this as a default from now on. My issue with 1920 x 1200 is that it really does not work very well for two side by side windows as the resolution for each window is just too small. With UHD+ I can increase DPI to 150 and get a similar look as QHD+ but if the resolution isn't there to begin with that problem cannot be solved.

Hopefully we will see 18" 3840 x 2400 soon although I have to admit that I prefer 2560 x 1600 and no scaling due to its compatibility advantages.

PTM7950 pads rule! Just did an MSI GT75 that I had never repasted and the difference is quite staggering. CPU core differential went down from 18°C to 7°C and I also managed to get a top 20th place rating out of more than 24000 for its GTX1080 GPU with a litte bit above 8250 whereas before I could not get over 8000. The CPU still stinks (8750H) but at least it has gone down in temperature by more than 10°C. Curing time: about 1.5 hours and about 5 runs each for Cinebench and Time Spy.

Make that 7690 and 7890 - time to move to 18" LED for the bigger model.

Hehe, been there, done that 🙂 Looking at 3Dmark there are probably only a handful of laptops in front of you so this is an excellent result! So I would keep things as is and not risk a fried GPU for a few more benchmark points.

12K Graphics score in sight! 👍

Intel seems like a less controlling company than Nvidia but still they helped neither Clevo nor MSI to allow users to update from Comet Lake to Rocket Lake.

True, but can't be worse than Clevo who could be said to be flatlining for the second generation in a row with the X370 😄

I agree with you assessment of Clevo's stance on this and I think that MSI would be in the best position to do this: They seem to be better connected than Clevo They have done LGA before and only have stopped with Comet Lake so one gen before Clevo. Before that they had three LGA laptop chassis starting with first gen Skylake. They also produce motherboards and separate GPUs so they do not only have contacts with the big three for special laptop chips. That would help implementing a modular solution and getting support from Intel and AMD that is comparable to the support in their desktop motherboards. They have the most elaborate bios options of any laptop these days when it comes to overclocking and undervolting. I have for some time said that next gen CPUs would be perfect for an LGA chassis with Intel processors and a GPU module that is swappable from the outside would be much less of a support nightmare although it may be a challenge to produce a module with built in cooling or alternatively to attach such a module to a unified heat sink that all manufacturers prefer these days.

I am sure there is some power to be saved, maybe between 20 and 40W with the 3080 depending on use case? I guess there is a slim chance that Optimus will bring most of those savings while allowing for less reboots to activate the dGPU so that will only have to be done in certain cases. Depending on power prices and how long the KM-G is powered and how it is used on the difference may not be worth it to do anything as it will just not make much of a difference if the total daily runtime is 6 hours or less or if it consists mainly of activities where the dGPU is preferred.