HP Elitebook 8570W - is it still good ? Hardware modifications

[Mashcar]

I started similar thread back on notebookreview forum, but it was closed in few months. I would very like to share some knowledge with everyone. I remember there was one person that tried same thing, but I don't remember name of thread, nor I could find it.

So..

 

For starters, my laptop is HP Elitebook 8570w. Very very long time ago I had bought 8770W, it's 17'3 inch big heavy laptop, I liked playing games on it but my back didn't like carrying it. I sold it.. and until recently, I bought 15'4 version of same laptop. But 8570w doesn't even pack a punch for older games. I though to myself, maybe buy some MSI or Alienware..

 

But..

 

I found auction of very cheap Gtx 980M, though "why not", repaired it, tried it with laptop... WORKED 😮
Then I found 8560w with Dreamcolor LCD.  Gtx didn't liked that LCD, DC screen didn't liked that GPU either. But it started working together after flashing MSI vbios (no optimus) and using 389 version of nvidia driver. Pure UEFI and GPT is must.

 

I made some mods like upgrading VRM of GTX and custom heatsink. But I wasn't that much proud of it like I'm proud of more recent work.

 

I had bought Quadro P5200M very cheaply, it works charmingly with my HP, with only one thing not working - fan control.

But I'm on way to fix it in few weeks.  I think it have been incorrectly working programmer or not exactly fully compatible vbios.
Problem is very clearly seen in HW Monitor: motherboard i2c SMBUS sensor for GPU is stuck at 85 degrees. CPU thermal diode and GPU's correctly show exact temperature of cores. But I think there is a conflict - wrong registers or something. I'm still waiting for better chip programmer to come.

 

Specs:
Intel i-7 3740QM

Nvidia Quadro P5200M 16GB 120W

16GB DDR3L 1866 Mhz (4x4GB)

Samsung Evo 870 1TB

 

I made that HP work faster and better than his bigger brothers! Yay!

Meanwhile, let me show you some pictures. You can also ask me directly and freely, I will try to help you out!

And if you have some Quadro P5200 vbios, you can share : )

 

BTW, myths I though that are true..

1. Weak CPU limits GPUs power.   <--- Nope! When I checked with benchmarks, mine Quadro is as fast as those in original notebooks it cames from (ex. hp 17 zbook g5 or dell precision 7730). PCI Express have same speed, so.. myth busted!

2.NVMe SSD are waaaay faster <--- When I checked last time loading your game 6 seconds faster is not that much difference for everyday users. Maybe it is for ex. in movie editing.

3. No need to update dreamcolor edid for newest nvidia driver to work in 10 bit mode. I downloaded newest one and it works flawlessly.

 

To be continued..

[Eban]

13 hours ago, Mashcar said:

 

 

I made some mods like upgrading VRM of GTX and custom heatsink. But I wasn't that much proud of it like I'm proud of more recent work.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

@Mashcar I am interested in this line.

I have one of the cheapo aliexpress 980m cards and crappy vrm's has always worried me.

Can you point me in a direction of how to ID and replace the mosfets, etc . 

 

I am novice at electronics but I can do very basic micro soldering. 

Thanks 

 

[Mashcar]

3 hours ago, Eban said:

 

@Mashcar I am interested in this line.

I have one of the cheapo aliexpress 980m cards and crappy vrm's has always worried me.

Can you point me in a direction of how to ID and replace the mosfets, etc . 

 

I am novice at electronics but I can do very basic micro soldering. 

Thanks 

 

You have to use hot air station and buy some mosfets - preferably 6 if you want to be perfectionist (I'm not sure what mosfets are used on your GTX).

 

From my older thread:

"Above two big inductors there's added 220nF capacitor, two other red circles are added 3 additional mosfets 87350D - one for every phase. "

Mosfets you can buy; capacitor you can find on practically most laptop motherboards after Core 2 Duo era (220 is written on them).  Check for correct position ofc and have fun : ) For standard 120W vBios it's more than enough - it makes VRM run more efficiently, stably and cooler.

 

[Eban]

@Mashcar

Thank you for that!

I have a hotair station. I will pull the card next weekend and see what we can see 

 

 

You did a nice job on HP BTW 

[Mashcar]

Recently added second fan to cool vga heatsink. I used fan from 17' inch HP 8770w. Will show pictures later! Additional fan is controlled as original fan. There is already big improvement and I'm very happy : ).
I have received Zbook 17 G2 recently with dreamcolor screen. Mine heatsink parts are mainly from zbook 15 because they are almost fully copper. I will test out them both how they compare in torture test with same graphics card.

[S_Abel_1157]

Hello there, @Mashcar!

I think I need your help, I`ve recently bought a T1000 (quadro), and was surprised to find it didnt work. I also have an HP 8570W, and no DreamColor screen. Sadly I found out after the purchase that I`d need it. Do you think I could get this card working if i had an eDP screen? currently I have the base model LVDS.

 

Cheers!

[Mashcar]

On 3/5/2023 at 4:45 PM, S_Abel_1157 said:

Hello there, @Mashcar!

I think I need your help, I`ve recently bought a T1000 (quadro), and was surprised to find it didnt work. I also have an HP 8570W, and no DreamColor screen. Sadly I found out after the purchase that I`d need it. Do you think I could get this card working if i had an eDP screen? currently I have the base model LVDS.

 

Cheers!

You should try out on external monitor first, try connecting monitor to display port for checking it works for sure.
For changing to external monitor after logging in windows use Windows key + P and then click once arrow down then Enter.
If VGA is not correctly working then you will hear fan going 100% from start. If VGA is working then fan should make one test turn and work accordingly to temperatures or go 100% after 10-15 seconds.
I had also though about RTX Quadro, model 5000, but there is not even one on auction site in my location. Also full height cards have different mounting points.
You can at least try, if you're careful you won't damage anything : ) It will be many times faster than those original mxm cards.
After you're sure it works at all, then I can encourage you to look for other parts.


EDIT.: You can find some information here

 

[mlecule]

I too have a 8570w that's been collecting dust. I'm thinking about upgrading to the gtx 980m. My problem is that anytime windows automatically installs the driver for the k1000, it fails and screen goes blank. Tried to stop the driver install by selecting do not install drivers automatically but it always does and i'm back to square one. Is there a custom bios I need to flash for the gtx 980m to work? I'd like to get this thing up and running again. 

[mlecule]

On 3/7/2023 at 8:34 AM, Mashcar said:

You should try out on external monitor first, try connecting monitor to display port for checking it works for sure.
For changing to external monitor after logging in windows use Windows key + P and then click once arrow down then Enter.
If VGA is not correctly working then you will hear fan going 100% from start. If VGA is working then fan should make one test turn and work accordingly to temperatures or go 100% after 10-15 seconds.
I had also though about RTX Quadro, model 5000, but there is not even one on auction site in my location. Also full height cards have different mounting points.
You can at least try, if you're careful you won't damage anything : ) It will be many times faster than those original mxm cards.
After you're sure it works at all, then I can encourage you to look for other parts.


EDIT.: You can find some information here

 

I too have a 8570w that's been collecting dust. I'm thinking about upgrading to the gtx 980m. My problem is that anytime windows automatically installs the driver for the k1000, it fails and screen goes blank. Tried to stop the driver install by selecting do not install drivers automatically but it always does and i'm back to square one. Is there a custom bios I need to flash for the gtx 980m to work? I'd like to get this thing up and running again. 

[myroslav]

Hello, @Mashcar
Thank you for sharing your bild! Mine 8560w is upgraded with much less powerfull k2200m, but your thread gave me a hope.
Can you share the details on the power brick that were using with 980m? Were the temperatures with the stock 8570w heatsink too critical? And how did you manage to install the second fan from 8770w? Thank you in advance!

Hi, @mlecule
Weird issue, maybe try disabling through LGPE: Click the Start button on your keyboard -> Copy gpedit.msc and paste it into the search box at the bottom left corner -> Open the Local Group Policy Editor -> Click Computer Configuration ->  Navigate to Administrative Templates> Windows Components -> Scroll down to Windows Update -> Navigate to Do not include drivers with Windows Update and double click -> You should see three options: Not Configured, Enabled, and Disabled. Select Enabled and click on Apply -> Click OK. Hope it helps!

[Mashcar]

On 4/4/2023 at 12:40 PM, mlecule said:

I too have a 8570w that's been collecting dust. I'm thinking about upgrading to the gtx 980m. My problem is that anytime windows automatically installs the driver for the k1000, it fails and screen goes blank. Tried to stop the driver install by selecting do not install drivers automatically but it always does and i'm back to square one. Is there a custom bios I need to flash for the gtx 980m to work? I'd like to get this thing up and running again. 

When I used GTX980 I had same problem, try to disable group policy for automatic update of drivers. Also you can try to use NVflash (I used "override certifications" version) and try other vbios. Mine card was G-Sync one, I used non-gsync bios from clevo or msi and it worked flawlessly. If you're not modding heatsink, try setting low power mode in drivers to not damage card.
 

 

17 hours ago, myroslav said:

Hello, @Mashcar
Thank you for sharing your bild! Mine 8560w is upgraded with much less powerfull k2200m, but your thread gave me a hope.
Can you share the details on the power brick that were using with 980m? Were the temperatures with the stock 8570w heatsink too critical? And how did you manage to install the second fan from 8770w? Thank you in advance!

Thanks ! 🙂 Power supply was rated for 230W, it was enough for 120W of power used by card + 45W CPU and other components. I used it for a while with stock cooling and tried not to stress it too much. And when I used benchmarks, CPU temp was way worse - about 100 degrees. GPU was about 85-88. Safe temperature for GPU is about 85 degrees when using it for long time.

For second fan I just used dremel tool to take out fan from HP 8770w and connected 5V and GND to nearby trace and PWM to Tacho on my main fan. Will show pictures later.
For now...
I couldn't stand damaged heatpipe from job before and had to make it all better =] Will explain later, for now... pictures!

[mlecule]

On 4/7/2023 at 2:01 AM, Mashcar said:

When I used GTX980 I had same problem, try to disable group policy for automatic update of drivers. Also you can try to use NVflash (I used "override certifications" version) and try other vbios. Mine card was G-Sync one, I used non-gsync bios from clevo or msi and it worked flawlessly. If you're not modding heatsink, try setting low power mode in drivers to not damage card.
 

 

Thanks ! 🙂 Power supply was rated for 230W, it was enough for 120W of power used by card + 45W CPU and other components. I used it for a while with stock cooling and tried not to stress it too much. And when I used benchmarks, CPU temp was way worse - about 100 degrees. GPU was about 85-88. Safe temperature for GPU is about 85 degrees when using it for long time.

For second fan I just used dremel tool to take out fan from HP 8770w and connected 5V and GND to nearby trace and PWM to Tacho on my main fan. Will show pictures later.
For now...
I couldn't stand damaged heatpipe from job before and had to make it all better =] Will explain later, for now... pictures!

Thanks for the response. I assume the stock cooler can't keep up with the 980? Is there a certain wattage I need to set it on to prevent damaging the card? 

[Mashcar]

On 4/10/2023 at 8:07 PM, mlecule said:

Thanks for the response. I assume the stock cooler can't keep up with the 980? Is there a certain wattage I need to set it on to prevent damaging the card? 

Yes, GTX980 is rated between 80-120W of power, stock cooler for gpu only 50W. Card will throttle.