GT70 2OC Upgrade from 770m to 970m

[purecain]

hiya tpu,
disclaimer
Most laptops can not be upgraded! I just want to make it clear that those laptops that are advertised as upgradable, will need a professional to complete competently imo. there is no way I would of risked bricking a £1300 laptop if I wasn't sure I knew what I was doing... make sure you feel the same way before following anything you read in this thread. also there is a very large upgrade thread on another forum. you might want to read everything on the web you can find and then come back. if you dont fully comprehend any of the processes that are mentioned. good luck!


so its that time... I upgraded from a 1tb mechanical drive to a Samsung evo 1tb ssd a few months back when the price drop hit… the machine boots into w10 in literally 4 or 5 seconds, its impressive.
I havnt upgraded the cpu as I intend to pay svet for an unlocked bios. from what ive read, he's offering this as sort of an unofficial upgrade. I studied the process myself but I honestly can not be 100percent sure, that what I end up with will be a working bios. and its not a procedure I'm likely to repeat so asking one of the community that has, just makes sense.
so after the install, I will unlock the bios and see how close I can get to the top haswell cpu the 4940... its equivalent in desktop terms would be the 4790k. so the performance is still decent and definitely worth spending a few hours tuning, and the cost of unlocking the bios...

at this time I have updated the bios following msi's instructions up to the latest which is E1763IMS.51D.
I also updated the EC firmware up to 1763EMS1 ver5.17
I updated both after updating to w10. so if you are wondering if you need to have w8.1 or even w7 to install any of the latest bios for this machine. you can rest assured it will work after the upgrade to w10...

next I upgraded the ram up to 16gb of 1600mhz low profile ddr3. normal laptop memory is not supported by this chipset btw... so make sure to buy low profile...

this has brought me to the next vital upgrade (if I want to keep this as a viable gaming machine).
the 970m(which will give me 1050ti performance, remember gaming rez on this laptop is only 1920x1080).

as you can see, the cards already arrived and simply needs installing.

for this part your going to need a couple of things;

remember safety first, you dont want to end up in the hospital with a doctor digging shards of metal out of your pupil... I was once a metal worker and I can tell you. the head vice is no fun at all.
so first of all your going to need safety glasses. (for when your modding the heatsink)
a Dremel multitool to mod the heatsink.
some ARCTIC - Thermal Pad 145 x 145 x 1.0 mm Thermal Compound. (you can cut this to the correct shape) im still waiting on this, just realised its going to be Monday before its delivered...
and some thermal paste... im just using mx-2.
a decent screwdriver and were away!
i'll update the thread with pics or a video of the actual upgrade!
if anyone has any advice before I start, please give me a heads up...

 

[purecain]

So ive installed the clevo 970m and basically. the latest driver/bios/firmware does not allow for installation of any brand... infact I dont really know which brand this card is. im merely going on the colour (blue) and the fact it came with a heat sink. apart from that I couldn't find any info.
so I need to get the modded inf drivers to install the card so I can mod the bios.
unfortunately it isnt as easy as just performing certain actions as these laptops are extremely finicky.... with thousands of these gt model latops being bricked every year.

I dont want to add mine to that list so ive sent Sve7 an email and it looks like I might be able to employ his assistance (if im lucky)….

and of course if you know anything that might assist me in this process, please post...
managed to get the card to show up under hidden devices... still stuck trying to install it properly...
vender id - \VEN_10DE&DEV_11E0&SUBSYS_10E81462&REV_A1\4&2e95f799&0&0008
*couldn't add to previous post*

 

[eidairaman1]

I forgot laptops use whitelists, so yeah you need a mod bios

 

[purecain]

your not wrong. theirs literally soo much out of date info on this upgrade. you dont really modify your search to find all the appropriate info until
you've personally hit a wall, then you can start to problem solve your newfound difficulty. because I didnt see any of these problems coming and I read thousands of topics on this laptop since ive owned it for years...

ive issued nvidia with a request for a modded driver. i'm also running my progress by Sve7... hopefully he sees my emails from tonight and tomorrow there are some suggestions... im getting there but what a ball ache this whole process has been.

 

[Caring1]

View attachment 102171So ive installed the clevo 970m and basically. the latest driver/bios/firmware does not allow for installation of any brand... infact I dont really know which brand this card is. im merely going on the colour (blue) and the fact it came with a heat sink. apart from that I couldn't find any info.

and of course if you know anything that might assist me in this process, please post...
managed to get the card to show up under hidden devices... still stuck trying to install it properly...
vender id - \VEN_10DE&DEV_11E0&SUBSYS_10E81462&REV_A1\4&2e95f799&0&0008
*couldn't add to previous post*

Going by the device I.D. you have shown, it is a: GK106M [GeForce GTX 770M]
So basically it shows your old card?

 

[purecain]

Going by the device I.D. you have shown, it is a: GK106M [GeForce GTX 770M]
So basically it shows your old card?

this isnt shown under hidden devices any longer. it simply will not install the card... I need to learn how to mod the drivers to get it working...(im struggling with the modded drivers as im not sure which 970 I have. im still no closer to retrieving the bios from the card so I can flash it with another, so that it works on my board... its an absolute nightmare of a job....

 

[dorsetknob]

Most Laptops that have "a Discrete Replacable Graphics Card" Don't make it easy to Upgrade
tho they get Sold as Upgradable (JOKE ) Few actualy make it possable
My Opinion is that they are only for replacing Borked Graphics Sub systems.

 

[purecain]

I state this 'upgradable not really meaning upgradable) at the beginning. this is doing my head in. im quite knowledgeable and earnt a living repairing this kind of thing. but for some reason all of the instructions are out of date and are not current in any shape or form. they are convoluted to the point of being impossible to keep straight. there are over 6 different models with the same name and mulitple mainboards needing different firmware etc.... even finding a tutorial for just creating modded inf files and a clear description took hours to decipher... and that is not complicated at all. all in all im feeling pretty pissed.
once I have finished this upgrade I will make a new tutorial so no one else has to go through this same rigmarole.

its easy to see why people have given up. those in the know want to profit from this specialised knowledge... dont know how I feel about that. if someone can comprehend the instructions I would just hand them over. or create a thread making them accessible.... but then thats me..


ok the only way to benefit from the card being a dud, would be if we could all agreed. that if you install the card on your msi laptop and the card doesnt appear as an adapter in device manager(or anywhere else for that matter). that the chances are that your card is faulty.

when I installed the 770m it was immediately recognised by the machine and prompts to install the vga adapter were coming like they would on any desktop build. I got non of this behavior from that card. I literally couldn't get any sort of reading. so those that have upgraded and msi gt70 with any other card can confirm that the card should of at the very least shown up in device manager or somewhere. I think we can probably save ourselves 100hours of misery. which is roughly the time ive put into trying to get this card to work...

now if anyone reads what ive put and thinks 'no thats normal you just needed to do this or that, please post. as I wont be able to say weather it was normal or not until my next card arrives, and I witness the behavior of another mmx gpu… then we can formulate what should be considered a normal response when others upgrade and boot their pc for the first time....

sve7 considered the card to be a dud and im pretty much in 100percent agreement. it behaved nothing like my working 770. there was literally no reaction from my gt70 from the phisical install....

will update with pics etc when my new card arrives...

 

[purecain]

ive put this on the shelf while I sort out my desk top gpu. I have a Titan V arriving on the 27th.