Official Clevo X170SM-G Thread

[reallango]

Sorry I vanished for a little bit. Had to ignore the laptop for a little while as it had me too frustrated. Decided to look back and see what was said before I try anything else.

 

Love the look of that water cooled heatsink but can't see myself spending 400$ all in on that currently. Maybe if I can get it working decently enough to feel like a nice upgrade would be worth it.

 

Was thinking I would order some new thermal pads before pulling everything back off. Any suggestions on what would be a good brand? Like the idea of a multi-size pack so I can make sure I get the right size in there.

 

[wilpang]

Hi guys

 

Honest opinion would this at the current price (discounted) be a worthy upgrade over X170SM?

 

https://www.scan.co.uk/products/173-msi-ge76-raider-12ugs-421uk-qhd-240hz-i7-12700h-32gb-ddr5-1tb-nvme-ssd-8gb-rtx-3070ti-tb4-win11

[Clamibot]

12 hours ago, wilpang said:

Hi guys

 

Honest opinion would this at the current price (discounted) be a worthy upgrade over X170SM?

 

https://www.scan.co.uk/products/173-msi-ge76-raider-12ugs-421uk-qhd-240hz-i7-12700h-32gb-ddr5-1tb-nvme-ssd-8gb-rtx-3070ti-tb4-win11

 

Depends on if you have the top end config or not and what your use case is.

 

If you have a i9 10900K and RTX 2080 Super, then not really. It won't be a worthy upgrade unless you're doing something that requires significantly higher single core performance.

 

If you have one of the lower end configs, then yes it could be a worthy upgrade.

[wilpang]

What's the best way to get access to the fans to give them a clean?

[Clamibot]

If you want to clean the fans, the only way I know of to get access to them is to remove the heatsink, as the fans are screwed into the heatsink. The bottom fan covers are part of the heatsink themselves.

 

Once you remove the heatsink, you can unscrew the fan cover screws, which will allow you to detach the actual fans from the heatsink. The fan cover screws are the smaller screws located on the edges of the fan shrouds.

 

The fans are self cleaning, so it shouldn't be necessary to clean them yourself. Upon booting, the system revs the fans in reverse at max speed to shake out and blow out dust that has accumulated on the fans. Obviously this doesn't get everything, but it should be good enough.

 

If you would still like to clean out the fans yourself to get them squeaky clean, the above instructions will help you achieve that.

[electrosoft]

On 5/3/2022 at 3:04 PM, wilpang said:

What's the best way to get access to the fans to give them a clean?

 

I'd remove the entire HSF and clean it with isoproyl + q-tips and compressed air / air vac. While it is off, hit the rest of the unit with some compressed air too.

 

 

[wilpang]

9 hours ago, Clamibot said:

If you want to clean the fans, the only way I know of to get access to them is to remove the heatsink, as the fans are screwed into the heatsink. The bottom fan covers are part of the heatsink themselves.

 

Once you remove the heatsink, you can unscrew the fan cover screws, which will allow you to detach the actual fans from the heatsink. The fan cover screws are the smaller screws located on the edges of the fan shrouds.

 

The fans are self cleaning, so it shouldn't be necessary to clean them yourself. Upon booting, the system revs the fans in reverse at max speed to shake out and blow out dust that has accumulated on the fans. Obviously this doesn't get everything, but it should be good enough.

 

If you would still like to clean out the fans yourself to get them squeaky clean, the above instructions will help you achieve that.

Ah yes I've had that setting turned off, now turned back on. Had excess dust on the grills.

[electrosoft]

Popped my old WD SN850 500GB in my X170SM-G and it keeps borking out after installing chip drivers in W10 regardless of what version I install. W11 works fine but I don't want that.

 

Popped my old 256GB stock SSD in there and no problems. Popped a 1TB 980 Pro in there as a test and no problems. Popped an SN750 in there no problems. It just doesn't like the SN850 500GB for some reason. The SN850 works fine on my Z690 and Z590 motherboards.

 

 

[wilpang]

Is it worth upgrading the BIOS?

 

I'm currently on 1.07.03 is 1.07.04RTR1 required or useful?

[solidus1983]

@wilpang If your system is working fine currently then just download the bios for safe keeping and not update. I agree though it makes it hard when there is no officall change log to work from to make a informed choice on this matter.

[wilpang]

12 minutes ago, solidus1983 said:

@wilpang If your system is working fine currently then just download the bios for safe keeping and not update. I agree though it makes it hard when there is no officall change log to work from to make a informed choice on this matter.

Apparently XMG have another BIOS to come not sure what it will bring though!  But I get your point if it ain't broke...

[Bidelloman]

Hi there, I'm another nomad from the old forums, I also own an x170sm g ( 1600k, 2080s)

I have a few questions:

1) in the old forums we had a guy posting a modded bios ( not prema), did he post it here as well?

2) sound blaster atlas doesn't seem to recognize devices capable of using its services ( tried everything, drivers, ddu, clean installs, etc), can anyone please help ?

3)

I have no idea what these are, as far as information goes, the only thing I did was unplugging the led strips on the back and sides, rest is all connected etc.

Thank you

[Curtis_Hew]

Hello All, just wanted to know if the XMG bios is compatible with all X170SM-G?

 

Also does the 5th Slot support m.2 or just m.SATA?

(I have tried different M.2 & M.SATA on the 5th slot but it doesn't seem to show up in the bios, albeit being warm)

 

From the manual it shows:-

Slot 1 for Combo WLAN and Bluetooth

Module

Slot 2 for SATA or PCIe Gen3 x4 SSD

Slot 3 for SATA or PCIe Gen3 x4 SSD

Slot 4 for PCIe Gen3 x4 SSD

Slot 5 for SATA SSD

 

 

[wilpang]

7 hours ago, Curtis_Hew said:

Hello All, just wanted to know if the XMG bios is compatible with all X170SM-G?

 

Also does the 5th Slot support m.2 or just m.SATA?

(I have tried different M.2 & M.SATA on the 5th slot but it doesn't seem to show up in the bios, albeit being warm)

 

From the manual it shows:-

Slot 1 for Combo WLAN and Bluetooth

Module

Slot 2 for SATA or PCIe Gen3 x4 SSD

Slot 3 for SATA or PCIe Gen3 x4 SSD

Slot 4 for PCIe Gen3 x4 SSD

Slot 5 for SATA SSD

 

 

You could message XMG via Reddit, I believe Tom replies the most often to see if he has any insights!

[Clamibot]

18 hours ago, joe4kyo said:

Hi there, I'm another nomad from the old forums, I also own an x170sm g ( 1600k, 2080s)

I have a few questions:

1) in the old forums we had a guy posting a modded bios ( not prema), did he post it here as well?

2) sound blaster atlas doesn't seem to recognize devices capable of using its services ( tried everything, drivers, ddu, clean installs, etc), can anyone please help ?

3)

I have no idea what these are, as far as information goes, the only thing I did was unplugging the led strips on the back and sides, rest is all connected etc.

Thank you

 

1. That BIOS you speak of is called Dsanke BIOS (courtesy of brother Dsanke). I think some of the members from NBR who have flashed it onto their own laptops have joined NBT (this community), but I still haven't done a head count of everyone I knew from NBR who has joined this forum. The thread from NBR you're thinking of is this one: https://web.archive.org/web/20220125230413/http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/x170sm-unlocked-bios-here-plus-all-drivers.834740/.

 

One of the direct download links for the BIOS is this link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GYY2EqzkIX_beeYs9L9bT8efRsWk4ObD/view

(courtesy of brother JCordero31 from NBR, I don't think he's joined this forum yet)

 

The instructions for flashing the BIOS are included in the thread archive link I mentioned, but I'll post them here anyway.

 

1. Run the Unlock.bat file with administrative rights
2. Answer the one question it ask with yes
3. Let it fully run its course it will take a few be patient. When its done it will notify you
4. Restart go into bios and reload defaults go back into bios after restart again
5. Unlock everything (whatever options you need) and boom enjoy

(also courtesy of brother JCordero31)

 

2. I couldn't get Sound Blaster Atlas to work on my machine either. I ended up using this awesome tool called EqualizerAPO to manually tune the audio myself. You can create your own equalizer profiles using the configurator.

 

3. I think those unknown devices have something to do with Intel's dynamic platform power management framework. I made a digital copy of the driver disk that zTecpc gave me with this laptop. This should contain every driver you need. I have uploaded the driver suite to google drive and you can access them here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1v78phYDqCq5vTxhHbmmrmIYonU9cBv8B/view?usp=sharing

[Bidelloman]

2 hours ago, Clamibot said:

 

1. That BIOS you speak of is called Dsanke BIOS (courtesy of brother Dsanke). I think some of the members from NBR who have flashed it onto their own laptops have joined NBT (this community), but I still haven't done a head count of everyone I knew from NBR who has joined this forum. The thread from NBR you're thinking of is this one: https://web.archive.org/web/20220125230413/http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/x170sm-unlocked-bios-here-plus-all-drivers.834740/.

 

One of the direct download links for the BIOS is this link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GYY2EqzkIX_beeYs9L9bT8efRsWk4ObD/view

(courtesy of brother JCordero31 from NBR, I don't think he's joined this forum yet)

 

The instructions for flashing the BIOS are included in the thread archive link I mentioned, but I'll post them here anyway.

 

1. Run the Unlock.bat file with administrative rights
2. Answer the one question it ask with yes
3. Let it fully run its course it will take a few be patient. When its done it will notify you
4. Restart go into bios and reload defaults go back into bios after restart again
5. Unlock everything (whatever options you need) and boom enjoy

(also courtesy of brother JCordero31)

 

2. I couldn't get Sound Blaster Atlas to work on my machine either. I ended up using this awesome tool called EqualizerAPO to manually tune the audio myself. You can create your own equalizer profiles using the configurator.

 

3. I think those unknown devices have something to do with Intel's dynamic platform power management framework. I made a digital copy of the driver disk that zTecpc gave me with this laptop. This should contain every driver you need. I have uploaded the driver suite to google drive and you can access them here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1v78phYDqCq5vTxhHbmmrmIYonU9cBv8B/view?usp=sharing

you sir are awesome, yes I am already running that bios and my experience has been excellent with it.

 

yeah I asked the partner I purchased the laptop from and they can't seem to get it to work either

 

thanks a lot for those drivers!

[Curtis_Hew]

17 hours ago, wilpang said:

You could message XMG via Reddit, I believe Tom replies the most often to see if he has any insights!

Thanks, I'll message them via Reddit.

 

[electrosoft]

9 hours ago, Clamibot said:

 

1. That BIOS you speak of is called Dsanke BIOS (courtesy of brother Dsanke). I think some of the members from NBR who have flashed it onto their own laptops have joined NBT (this community), but I still haven't done a head count of everyone I knew from NBR who has joined this forum. The thread from NBR you're thinking of is this one: https://web.archive.org/web/20220125230413/http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/x170sm-unlocked-bios-here-plus-all-drivers.834740/.

 

One of the direct download links for the BIOS is this link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GYY2EqzkIX_beeYs9L9bT8efRsWk4ObD/view

(courtesy of brother JCordero31 from NBR, I don't think he's joined this forum yet)

 

The instructions for flashing the BIOS are included in the thread archive link I mentioned, but I'll post them here anyway.

 

1. Run the Unlock.bat file with administrative rights
2. Answer the one question it ask with yes
3. Let it fully run its course it will take a few be patient. When its done it will notify you
4. Restart go into bios and reload defaults go back into bios after restart again
5. Unlock everything (whatever options you need) and boom enjoy

(also courtesy of brother JCordero31)

 

2. I couldn't get Sound Blaster Atlas to work on my machine either. I ended up using this awesome tool called EqualizerAPO to manually tune the audio myself. You can create your own equalizer profiles using the configurator.

 

3. I think those unknown devices have something to do with Intel's dynamic platform power management framework. I made a digital copy of the driver disk that zTecpc gave me with this laptop. This should contain every driver you need. I have uploaded the driver suite to google drive and you can access them here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1v78phYDqCq5vTxhHbmmrmIYonU9cBv8B/view?usp=sharing

 

That's a killer write up @Clamibot. I'm going to link it in the launch page.

 

 

[Bidelloman]

has anyone tested the water cooler diy option for this laptop?

[electrosoft]

On 5/26/2022 at 8:43 AM, joe4kyo said:

has anyone tested the water cooler diy option for this laptop?

 

I know a few users had tried it on the other P870 and P775/0 series models but I can't recall anyone giving it a whirl on the X170 series.

[electrosoft]

Zen and the art of binning aka why silicon quality counts in constrained laptops

 

5 10900k's.

 

2x off the shelf

1x ZtecPC binned

1x LTX Golden Limited Edition SP96

1x Silicon Lottery SP101

 

After much testing on the desktop to quantify and qualify them:

 

 

EVGA CLC 360mm AIO + KPx TIM used for all desktop testing.

 

The two garbage chips off the shelf had their stock lids. They weren't worthy of a delid

The ZtecPC Binned was re-delidded and re-lidded by yours truly so real world temps may have been a touch higher if stock lid.

The LTX was already delidded so I cleaned it up very professionally and relidded it with a BartX so real world temps may have been a touch higher if stock lid.

The Silicon Lottery CPU still has its stock lid and has never been modified

 

On the desktop, the Ztec, LTX and SL all could reach a full -0.130 uV and pass a 10 min CB23 (water equalized) run no problem.

Desktop uV != Laptop uV since they run much hotter so laptop uV will always be lower.

 

With NO delid, the SL ran cooler and pulled the least even with the Ztec and LTX being delidded.

 

Testing in the X170SM-G:

 

Measured center dollop of Nanogrease Extreme (using gram scale) for equal weight.

 

Randos:

 

I knew what the results were going to be with the off the shelf randos in my X170SM-G but popped them in there anyhow.

Both immediately thermal throttled and couldn't handle > -0.055 uV without Bsod during a 2 run CB23. Poor silicon will have you falling behind right out of the gate in DTRs.

 

ZtecPC binned 10900k:

 

The established baseline binning criteria set by @Mr. Fox for ZtecPC shows why as with a min requirement of 5.1/1.35v or 5.0/1.31v V/F curve and -0.090 uV requirement they could pass CB23 at stock but temps did creep into the 90s. I'm sure if you went LM you could bring that down even more (as ZtecPC did sell it with this option).

 

LTX 10900k:

 

A clear step above the ZtecPC binned 10900k and closer to the SL as temps were in the high 80s during runs and could be done with ~ -0.100 uV

 

SL SP101:

 

The king but the LTX was right on its heels. Able to sit in the mid 80s with a ~0.100uv for CB23 run. I'm sure with a delid it would run even cooler/better but it runs so well as is and it is a rare 10900k that right from the factor core temp differentials are 5c max which is rare. I don't feel a need to delid it.

 

Conclusion:

 

LTX 10900k is a worthy competitor and clearly bests all the other chips but that SL SP101 is magic. If I didn't have the SL chip and just the LTX I would be just as happy with it they are just that close enough. On the desktop one thing I noticed is the LTX really stabilizes under Vdroop when benching and didn't fluctuate as much as the other chips. I'm so used to staring at the Vcore under load and watching the fluctuations that to see it sit there and barely fluctuate but lock in much better was odd. Maybe that was part of the Intel binning process for those chips? (less transients).

 

@jaybee83 @Clamibot

 

 

 

[jaybee83]

2 hours ago, electrosoft said:

Zen and the art of binning aka why silicon quality counts in constrained laptops

 

5 10900k's.

 

2x off the shelf

1x ZtecPC binned

1x LTX Golden Limited Edition SP96

1x Silicon Lottery SP101

 

After much testing on the desktop to quantify and qualify them:

 

 

EVGA CLC 360mm AIO + KPx TIM used for all desktop testing.

 

The two garbage chips off the shelf had their stock lids. They weren't worthy of a delid

The ZtecPC Binned was re-delidded and re-lidded by yours truly so real world temps may have been a touch higher if stock lid.

The LTX was already delidded so I cleaned it up very professionally and relidded it with a BartX so real world temps may have been a touch higher if stock lid.

The Silicon Lottery CPU still has its stock lid and has never been modified

 

On the desktop, the Ztec, LTX and SL all could reach a full -0.130 uV and pass a 10 min CB23 (water equalized) run no problem.

Desktop uV != Laptop uV since they run much hotter so laptop uV will always be lower.

 

With NO delid, the SL ran cooler and pulled the least even with the Ztec and LTX being delidded.

 

Testing in the X170SM-G:

 

Measured center dollop of Nanogrease Extreme (using gram scale) for equal weight.

 

Randos:

 

I knew what the results were going to be with the off the shelf randos in my X170SM-G but popped them in there anyhow.

Both immediately thermal throttled and couldn't handle > -0.055 uV without Bsod during a 2 run CB23. Poor silicon will have you falling behind right out of the gate in DTRs.

 

ZtecPC binned 10900k:

 

The established baseline binning criteria set by @Mr. Fox for ZtecPC shows why as with a min requirement of 5.1/1.35v or 5.0/1.31v V/F curve and -0.090 uV requirement they could pass CB23 at stock but temps did creep into the 90s. I'm sure if you went LM you could bring that down even more (as ZtecPC did sell it with this option).

 

LTX 10900k:

 

A clear step above the ZtecPC binned 10900k and closer to the SL as temps were in the high 80s during runs and could be done with ~ -0.100 uV

 

SL SP101:

 

The king but the LTX was right on its heels. Able to sit in the mid 80s with a ~0.100uv for CB23 run. I'm sure with a delid it would run even cooler/better but it runs so well as is and it is a rare 10900k that right from the factor core temp differentials are 5c max which is rare. I don't feel a need to delid it.

 

Conclusion:

 

LTX 10900k is a worthy competitor and clearly bests all the other chips but that SL SP101 is magic. If I didn't have the SL chip and just the LTX I would be just as happy with it they are just that close enough. On the desktop one thing I noticed is the LTX really stabilizes under Vdroop when benching and didn't fluctuate as much as the other chips. I'm so used to staring at the Vcore under load and watching the fluctuations that to see it sit there and barely fluctuate but lock in much better was odd. Maybe that was part of the Intel binning process for those chips? (less transients).

 

@jaybee83 @Clamibot

 

you, sir, are a man of your word 😁

 

but this quote right here: "I don't feel a need to delid it." is just wrong! DO IT! 😛 including a follow-up, of course 😉 

[Clamibot]

13 minutes ago, joe4kyo said:

I seem to have an urgent problem

My x170 does not turn on, or rather, lights go on, fan cycle starts, but no screen activity, not even bios.

I simply opened it up for regular cleaning / change of LM( I checked, no spillages, I think it wouldn't turn on at all)

I reseated ram and unplugged replugged cmos battery, still nothing.

Mods of note : bios is the dsanke one, used it for months with no issues, used xmp profile and modded 1 of the stock clevo profiles ( so that the cpu would run cooler, simply lowered total watts)

 

If anyone can help me I would appreciate

 

Check to see that you haven't tightened the CPU screws down too much. There's a weird issue where overtightening the screws makes the laptop not boot. The screws should at most be hand tight plus an extra quarter to half turn.

 

Did you try swapping your RAM to different slots? Sometimes that helps.

 

I still have the original RAM that came with my laptop, which runs at a different speed than my current RAM, so if you have extra RAM lying around, you can perform a hardware change to give your laptop that swift kick in the butt it needs to start working again.

[Bidelloman]

15 minutes ago, Clamibot said:

 

Check to see that you haven't tightened the CPU screws down too much. There's a weird issue where overtightening the screws makes the laptop not boot. The screws should at most be hand tight plus an extra quarter to half turn.

 

Did you try swapping your RAM to different slots? Sometimes that helps.

 

I still have the original RAM that came with my laptop, which runs at a different speed than my current RAM, so if you have extra RAM lying around, you can perform a hardware change to give your laptop that swift kick in the butt it needs to start working again.

It was just the bios, needed a few reboots and another clear cmos to start

 

Way to give me heart attacks lol

[jaybee83]

16 minutes ago, joe4kyo said:

It was just the bios, needed a few reboots and another clear cmos to start

 

Way to give me heart attacks lol

sweet, always good to see a blackscreen event turning out well 🙂