©ASUSTEK COMPUTER INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

HalcyonLeuthcor · ‎05-11-2012

Just purchased a G74SX-NH71.
Haven't really done anything with it yet aside from getting things settled for when I hit the road. I've even got an awesome backpack. 🙂

I had completely forgotten that I bought an ROG Crosshair V last year. Of course, turning around a year later and buying a gaming laptop sort of defeats the purpose, aside from the whole "hey, its mobile" thing.

I've got a few questions about the G74:

1) I am aware that changing out memory and harddrives is part of the game, and that will not void my warranty. Will swapping out a video card void my warranty?

2) Will overclocking void my warranty? (I am aware this is actually a silly question, but better safe than sorry).

3) Can someone tell me the difference between these two drives? Because all I see is the price difference and difference in reviews:
Seagate Momentus XT STBD750100 750GB
Seagate Momentus XT ST750LX003

4) Is it possible to eventually upgrade the ROM drive to Blueray, and again..does that void the warranty?

5) I've read in several places that the 560M that is in this machine is not as good as the 470M that was in others. That doesn't really make sense.

Hi 😄

Zygomorphic · ‎05-12-2012

Swapping video card will void your warranty, if you can do it at all. @Marshall, isn't the G75 using a custom video card, rather than the MXM standard? :mad: Overclocking will void your warranty, especially if you do anything to the BIOS.

Careful overclocking, provided you don't touch the voltages, should be safe, but then again, you probably won't get great improvements. If maximum performance is important, build/upgrade a desktop with that Crosshair V that you mentioned you had.

The former of your two hard drives is a hybrid. That is, it caches are certain portion of commonly-read disk space onto an onboard SSD. It boots Windows much faster than a regular drive. I would highly recommend purchasing it. It makes a huge difference in performance, and allows you to have a lot of disk storage without breaking the bank.

Upgrading the CD/DVD drive is hypothetically possible, and it will probably void your warranty. If you are careful, you can simply put the stock drive back to verify that the problem is not your after-market optical drive. If the new drive is responsible, that isn't ASUS' fault. Otherwise, ASUS should still repair it.

The GTX 560M in the G74 is the 3 GB (192-bit) variant, which is quite good. As I recall, ASUS never sold any GTX 470M 😞 variants. The GTX 560M 2GB (128-bit) version (in the G53SX) is slightly slower than the GTX 460M 1.5 GB (192-bit) version (in the G53SW). The560M isn't the best card available, but it is certainly quite powerful. Game on, ROG'n, mate.

I am disturbed because I cannot break my system...found out there were others trying to cope! We have a support group on here, if your system will not break, please join!
http://rog.asus.com/forum/group.php?groupid=16
We now have 178 people whose systems will not break! Yippee! 🙂
LINUX Users, we have a group!
http://rog.asus.com/forum/group.php?groupid=23

HalcyonLeuthcor · ‎05-12-2012

Yeah, my desktop is already on par with my G74 despite being older.
AMD Phenom X6 1100T 3.2Ghz native, Thors Hammer cooling tower
Crosshair V mobo
3x Nvidia 470GT or GTX (or whatever, can't remember) SLI'd
2x ssd's raid 0 OS, 3x standard drives raid 5 for storage
16GB ddr3
28" HD screen
1500W PSU with APC backup

It's pretty nice. I don't believe I'll need to replace it for at least six years, which was the plan. (My last desktop lasted the same with no problems and its actually now my server.)

fostert · ‎05-12-2012

HalcyonLeuthcorps wrote:
J
1) I am aware that changing out memory and harddrives is part of the game, and that will not void my warranty. Will swapping out a video card void my warranty?

You simply can't swap out the video card: the GPU chip is soldered right onto the mainboard (and not socketed) and so are the DDR3 memory ICs. Even trying to get it off involves taking a soldering iron to your G74 which will will soooooo void your warranty, yes!

HalcyonLeuthcorps wrote:
J
2) Will overclocking void my warranty? (I am aware this is actually a silly question, but better safe than sorry).

Because of its ridiculously simplified BIOS and the fact that the QM series of core i7 CPUs are multiplier locked the G74 CPU/Uncore, memory bus and PCIe bus cannot be overclocked. However, people(including myself) do overclock the GPU routinely with great results since the G74 has one of the best cooling systems ever put in a notebook. Technically I'm sure any overclocking of the GPU or the memory voids the warranty of NVIDIA, so do at your own risk. I am not a gamer but have overclocked my 560M as far up as it wil stably go, which has pushed my WEI 2D and 3D scores from 7.2 to 7.4 each.

HalcyonLeuthcorps wrote:
J
5) I've read in several places that the 560M that is in this machine is not as good as the 470M that was in others. That doesn't really make sense.

Nor to me. Check out:
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-470M.35971.0.html
and
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-560M.48313.0.html

Seems pretty close (depending on the benchmark one either beat the other) but clear that the 560M is better for games (PCMarkVantage Gaming scores).

--
G74SX-CST1-CBIL, i7 2630QM 2GHz
32GB DDR3 RAM @1333MHz
GTX560M 3GB DDR5 (192 bit)
17.3" LED 1920x1080
Sentelic TP, BIOS 203
Debian Linux Wheezy (Testing) Kernel 3.2, NVIDIA 295.40

HalcyonLeuthcor · ‎05-12-2012

Soldered into the board?
I was looking at a G1S that was a couple years old. It had a replaceable video card. :s

I was expecting the same things.

chrsplmr · ‎05-12-2012

Nice V. There is tons of room for future upgrades on that .. Fx, SteamRoller ... not that the 1100T needs upgrade. and 1500psu..yikes.

I am curious .. not that I have anything at all against the G74-
But what factors led to you purchasing the G74 instead of going for the G75?
Price ? Availability ? Timing ?
And if you were thinking ahead about GPU's and HD's ... additional expense ..
again why the G74 and not the G75 with 3gb killer 670, blu-ray, ssd .... ect.?

Welcome Back to ROG ... u r right .. that is a great backPack.c.

chrsplmr's Links

HalcyonLeuthcor · ‎05-12-2012

The G74 I bought was a great price, has everything I actually need, and of course it's a great machine.
I avoided the whole Blu-Ray bit because it adds another $200 to the price, and I don't use blu-ray. I use netflix. Until they start packaging games on Blu-Ray, I probably won't have a Blu-Ray drive at all. Hell, my last laptop didn't even have a cdrom drive (HP Elitebook 2740p).

The other aspect is that I never buy anything that is "brand new." I mean, I'll buy new stuff, but I don't buy first generation releases. They cost far more than a generation behind, have only a % of benefits over their predecessors anymore, and I haven't bought a truly CPU/GPU destroying game in quite a while.

For $1450 shipped, what I received is awesome.

I am having an issue with this thing though.

Seems that I have to go back and type in letters twice. Its like the keyboard sensitivity is set really low, or the more likely aspect is that it was designed with gamers in mind who feel the need to SLAM THE #!%*( out of their keyboards. I'm used to gentle touch typing, and I'm having to practically slam these keys in order to not have to go back and redo words.

Is this a known issue? Is this common? Do I have a bad keyboard? I mean it works and all, but SLAM SLAM SLAM SLAM SLAM.

On my V, the 1500PSU is far more efficient than the 850 Corsair that preceded it. Ironically, I bought the 1500 because my wattage meter was reading upwards of 1350 when I did my benchmark tests. Not good for the 850. So I bought the 1500, and then did the benchmark and wattage tests again. Barely hit 1000 watts. A couple of times it hit 1010, but mainly stayed in the 990 range. That's a big difference. Silverstone 1500W PSU is a good buy.

And thanks about the bacpack. The only downside is that it is not airport security friendly.

chrsplmr · ‎05-12-2012

hahahaha .. "airport security friendly" ... hhahahhaha ... what is ? thats funny .. hahahhaa

I have seen many threads and posts about the G74 .. good reading.
(... is exchange for a G75 a possibility ? .. with the specs .. same price ?)
G75 is the 'patch'. That's the way i look at it.c.

chrsplmr's Links

HalcyonLeuthcor · ‎05-12-2012

Not something I'm worried about. When and/or if this computer actually fails to run something due to not having enough "umf," then I'll think about buying another. In all honesty, that is not likely to happen any time soon. I have a tendency to take great care of my toys.

fostert · ‎05-12-2012

HalcyonLeuthcorps wrote:
Not something I'm worried about. When and/or if this computer actually fails to run something due to not having enough "umf," then I'll think about buying another. In all honesty, that is not likely to happen any time soon. I have a tendency to take great care of my toys.

Good choice. Buying the G75 right now is buying all the bugs and unknown problems that it will inevitably present. With the exception of the lack of a numlock toggle, the G74 problems have been pretty much solved by the collective experience of owners on this and other forums. The G75 is not a major advance, and I'm not even sure I'd call it a minor one: it still throttles down inexplicably, and trades accessibilty of the fans for inaccessibility of the RAM slots. IMHO more like a trade of old PITA issues for new. But then again I'm not a G75 owner.

--
G74SX-CST1-CBIL, i7 2630QM 2GHz
32GB DDR3 RAM @1333MHz
GTX560M 3GB DDR5 (192 bit)
17.3" LED 1920x1080
Sentelic TP, BIOS 203
Debian Linux Wheezy (Testing) Kernel 3.2, NVIDIA 295.40

Old ROG'er, new here.