Yeah, in my dealings with the team they have always been a very reasonable bunch, as long as you have reasonable expectations of them in return.

No harm in asking and trying your luck, though.

Well, coz some time a bit before I did the same exact thing lol, ordered and went overseas and only took delivery a month afterwards. Good times.

But that one is old story ler.

Muh Onyx in da house ya all:



Currently setting up and benching. Will update more later.



This post has been edited by Eiraku: Apr 29 2018, 02:00 PM

Primarily BattleTech, which doesn't really need high specs at all lol, but I'm sooooo addicted to it right now.

Also FC5, Wildlands and I probably gotta get around to finishing Wolf 2. And of course, Fallout 4... once I find time to reinstalling ALL the mods I want for it (too many lol).

In the future? Ace Combat 7, Mechwarrior 5, Metro Exodus woooo. Also Cyberpunk 2077 whenever if gets released, hopefully I can at least get it to run decently at "High-ish" with the 1060.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: Apr 29 2018, 05:29 PM

Nope, TongFang "barebones", and a review of a similar device (the XMG Neo 15) should be up on Notebookcheck as soon as XMG finishes tweaking their unit, which is pretty much just an Onyx with slightly different keyboard caps and a sandblasted metal outer finish (we've got a brushed metal finish).

Also, in China there's the Mechrevo (which is simply TongFang's retail division) Z2, and the MechNike F117 Break: both silver-coloured versions of the Onyx (and both not available outside of China, hence expect Chinese-language reviews only).

Plus, my own full review is OTW.

As for ambient temps I believe I measured the external temps of the Illegear display unit running Furmark with a IR Thermometer already a few pages back. Short version, nothing beyond 50c back OR front. Will do it again for my unit but I don't think there's gonna be much deviation.

As for proc CPU/GPU internal temps, I'll get back to you later once I'm finished with my review.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: Apr 29 2018, 07:43 PM

Considering that the Onyx/Z2/Neo 15 is probably TongFang's most high profile unit yet, I really do hope that NBC likes it.

Well, we never know *wink wink*

That said, it's a shame that we lost him in the first place though, he was such a talented modder TBH. But working so hard for nothing is sure going to test anyone (hence why even Android modders don't hang around long nowadays).

Well, the things in the spoiler are just rumors I heard floating around anyway... so yeah, pinches of salt for everyone.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: Apr 30 2018, 05:07 PM

Just for anyone still wondering about internal temps for the Onyx, just finished a few rounds of NBC-style Furmark + Prime 95 combo torture test.

A continuous 45-min run yielded CPU temps of 80c max and GPU 82c max. No sudden CPU or GPU throttling either, but of course there's room for UV improvement.

And yeah, my initial input regarding temps stand for the most part. Re-measuring the torture tested Onyx yielded a max temp of 50c at the bottom and 45c on top, with an average surface temp of 38c on top and 40c at the bottom - which is honestly not that much different from my previous findings pun.

And all of this is with an ambient temp of 28c.

So yeah, not bad Onyx.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: Apr 30 2018, 08:57 PM

Will try with the UV soon, once I finish stock measurements for my review.

As for fan noise, at full (albeit synthetic) loads like this, it understandably got LOUD. Like 50-60dba AT LEAST, maybe more.

One thing to be clear about though, while the I didn't see any sudden or heavy throttling during the "Torture Test", I never saw the proc go Turbo either lol.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 1 2018, 12:21 PM

Eyeballing it I'd say 20+cm (including the rubber feet) at the thickest point seems about right, but I haven't had time to measure and confirm yet. I know it's thicker then the S5X/P950HR, at least (and to that end, thicker then the GS63 series), but not by too much.

That I can answer already: Not long.

Say 4h30m max if you turn off the RGB KBB, lower the screen to 20%, undervolted by a bit - and even then this is for mostly office apps and light surfing.

However you slice it, a 43Wh battery ain't gonna take you very far, unfortunately.

Well, the Onyx is getting about the same results as the Coffee Lake Zephyrus when I run a 30m Cinebench Multi Loop-test (1050-ish points average, no drops), so yeah at least it's not underperforming.

BTW, anybody have any idea what a good starting point for CFL-H UV is? My last 7700HQ easily took -125 to core, cache and iGPU (and probably more, though I couldn't really be bothered to tweak)... and all my searching is only turning up one guy saying -120 over at the GS65 thread in NBR (which is what I'm gonna start with, just because lol).

I'm well aware of silicon differences in terms UV (hell, I'm extremely vocal about how UV settings are pretty much something that only really works on a per-proc basis), but a good starting point does simplify the slog of trial and error lol.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 1 2018, 02:04 PM

You're on the Onyx too? Well if you're on the 8750H, be content in the knowledge that it might not just be you, as Intel might have just crammed a bit too much crap in there that it might not even UV as well as the 7700HQ anymore lol.

Do take note that you might NOT want to run the same UV value across the board for all the 3 parts though. Sometimes the core/cache takes a lot more UV then the IGPU can handle. Just in case you didn't notice.

Buuuttt, I haven't tried myself though, maybe in a bit.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 1 2018, 09:10 PM

I'm had just finished setting up UV with ThrottleStop (-125mv CPU, - 125mv Cache and -55mv iGPU, BD Prochot off; I'm using offsets rather then direct voltage adjustment BTW), and I'm now going all FurmarkPriming on it again.

I'm already a third through the 45m run, and things are looking a helluva lot better already. For one I'm seeing sustained peaks of 3.6GHz now, interspaced with lows of 3.2GHz (and a few dips of 2.8Ghz) - though I still have 2/3 of the run to go.

Temps so far is at 84c CPU and 80c GPU, about the same as before, and ThrottleStop is actually telling me the whole thing isn't even subject to Prochot limiting (which indicates thermal issues)... it's just hitting the bloody TDP limit - exactly as ZM Fong said it would.

Oh, and in regards to UV again, do take note that your selected UV value is spread across the processor multiplier steps (aka speeds), and what works at... say, 2.2GHz... might not work as well at the other speed steps (ie. 1.2GHz or 3.2Ghz).

Case in point, me UVing my i5U Lenovo Miix 510 (yeah, I UVed a U-class processor lol). It was fine when it was being benched, but every time the load lessened and the proc slowed down, wierd things started to happen to Windows. Thankfully I quickly realised that it was just the system not being able to live with the UV at the lower points of the processor's speed - so I bumped the UV up a bit and everything was fine.

So yeah. Even if your selected UV value lives fine through a benching session, keep an eye out for weirdness once the load lessens.... and vice versa.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 2 2018, 03:25 AM

So, 45m over. What have we learned from our UV session?

- After about 30m, seems that the situation above has been reversed, and we can see peaks of 3.6Ghz interspaced with valleys of 3.2Ghz... both of which is STILL a lot better than the average of 2.8GHz we were seeing pre-UV.

- The drops to 3.2Ghz is due to the proc hitting the 45w TDP limit more than any form of heat throttling, as Prochot was NEVER engaged (as temps never hit 95c). So yeah, blame Intel lol.

So yeah, the takeout is, UV works quite well to increase the processing capabilities of the Onyx. That said, I did see ONE weird thing happening with the UV set to 125/125/55 - a folder containing only God knows suddenly appeared out on my desktop for no apparent reason (and yeah, sometimes UV doesn't even crash anything, it just makes wierd things happen lol).

So yeah, stepping a bit down to 120/120/55 now, just in case.

And, I just realised you're adjusting voltage direct jrlogger Any reason why you're not using the Offsets to adjust UV instead?

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 2 2018, 03:28 AM

Benches: If I'm in a hurry, the one built into TS. There's also Furmark + Prime95, together or seperately. But again like I said, not just benches. You need to check not only high load stability, but med load and idle stability as well - something you seem to have found out on your own (Benches, games and Chrome).

Ah, just a bit of an ehhh moment because you were mentioning the end Voltages (and not the value of the UV offset used). If you're following the NBC's guide you should be golden. Don't worry.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 2 2018, 08:33 AM

Re: the Hinges, mine (also the left one) does exhibit a very slight creak, but normally its only there if I'm pulling the lid from an off center position.

It should loosen a bit over time with use, but if the creak is loud, consistent and doesn't lessen at all, check back with Illegear.

I'm not keen on using XTU to be completely honest (don't like the weird things it likes to run stealthily in the background). Also I actually think that that it's actually an EC limitation.

I wonder if you can tune PL1 with ThrottleStop though.

EDIT: Apparently you can. But, the TS author (UncleWebb) also says this (though to be fair its actually in regards to the old Haswell HQs):


So yeah, if the thing HAS built-in EC PL1 limits, it will probably screw me over anyway even if I reset PL1 in ThrottleStop. I MIGHT try though, just to see if it works.



This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 2 2018, 10:38 PM

Nah, it should loosen in time, no worries.

As for the 3rd update, hopefully it's the one with the...

... because apparently that one is pretty good *wink wink*

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 3 2018, 01:38 PM

Mine's OTW, just need to finish up pics and the last section. Also look out for reviews coming soon on Notebookcheck about the Schenker XMG Neo 15, which is essentially the same machine (with minor cosmetic differences).

In the mean time, here's a glamour shot of the Per-key RGB KBB to tide you over:



And yeah, we'll probably gonna need a "proper" owners thread on the Onyx here soon.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 3 2018, 02:07 PM

Maybe, if nobody else volunteers for it...

Anyway, I'm do wish too that the new EC/BIOS would help tame the erratic fan curves, but it seems that TongFang is rather on point at churning out updates (they have pushed out a couple already for our Chinese cousin the Z2) so I'm not entirely worried.

At the rate they're going (right now they seem even more active at releasing FW/BIOS then even Clevo lol), they should get a lot of those little niggles fixed pretty soon. Well, hopefully anyway.

And I know for a fact that our boys (and girls) at Illegear are very quick, hard workers as well (even if they're actually just a small team relatively TBH, which people tend to forget sometimes) so that's that.

This post has been edited by Eiraku: May 3 2018, 03:56 PM