Mythlogic Pollux 1613 / Clevo P157SM Review
by Jarred Walton on August 30, 2013 12:00 AM ESTMythlogic Pollux 1613 / Clevo P157SM General Performance
I’m not going to dwell too much on the general performance numbers, as they’re all what we’d expect. The 4900MQ is at the top of our charts (for now), sometimes by a sizeable margin. I do love having a 512GB SSD as well, as it allows me to put pretty much everything I want/need on fast solid state storage, and boot times are quick at less than 20 seconds. Here are the numbers. (I didn’t run all of the application tests on the overclocked CPUs, but I can say that most of the results scaled as expected – it appears overclocking only creates anomalies when we tax both the CPU and GPU on the P157SM.)
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Khenglish - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
It is strange that in some cases you had lower performance overclocked than not. Did you raise the TDP limit when you overclocked the CPU? I have found hitting the TDP limit to cause the CPU clocks to periodically plummet on my P150EM, hurting performance substantially.Ex 1:
CPU is set to 3.8ghz, using 55W of power. CPU runs at 3.8ghz constantly, but only 3.5ghz is needed to max out the GPU in whatever game is being played at this time.
Ex 2:
CPU is set to 4ghz which requires the TDP to be over 55W. CPU usually runs at 4ghz, but every 10 seconds plummets to 2.6ghz. Since this particular game only needs a constant 3.5ghz, there is a performance loss.
JarredWalton - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
Yeah, in the BIOS I set it for 67W I believe. I don't know how much that affects things, but something else is clearly going on. GRID 2 in particular is very consistent with its odd behavior.Khenglish - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
Didn't you say that one of the MSIs came with a 4930mx? You could pop that into the P157SM, set the TDP sky high, set the same clocks, and see if it has the same odd behavior.And upon taking off the clevo CPU heatsink you will see that they crush the heatpipes onto the heatsink plate, warping the plate raising temps by 10C+ (I lapped the plate on my P150EM). You can see stress marks in the plate directly under the heatpipes. GPU plate has the same problem. Clevos would have phenomenal cooling if clevo fixed this.
JarredWalton - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
The MSI systems had to go back to NVIDIA (for PAX), so I don't have them any longer. I'm not sure there's that much thermal headroom on the P157SM anyway -- temperatures notwithstanding, the 4900MQ overclocking is clearly hitting some limit that's preventing maximum performance.Moooza - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
I've been seriously considering the P150SM. Any real downsides in your opinion compared to the P157SM? I like the smaller size and that stupid touchpad light isn't present.I have been considering the exact same spec you reviewed (thanks by the way), but with 4x4gb 1866mhz RAM.
JarredWalton - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
If you're okay with the single 2.5" drive, I don't know that there's anything wrong with the P150SM. Given the touchpad and a few other aspects, I'd probably go that route myself if I were in the market for a gaming notebook... well, that or I'd opt for the larger P170SM.cmikeh2 - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
All units of the P150SM I've found only had 120W power adapters. Do you see that as an issue?DanNeely - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
XoticPC defaults to a 180W with the P150SMcmikeh2 - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
My bad I totally blanked there.. You're right. I was conflating P150SM with P151SM1 for some reason.Khenglish - Friday, August 30, 2013 - link
180W is still too weak for overclocking. The 17 models come with a much more appropriate 220W PSU (which also can be too weak with heavy overclocking, but far better than 180W). I don't know why clevo chooses to gimp the 15 inch models with the smaller PSU connector and 40W weaker PSU.