Wife switching from Mac to Windows, video editor & graphic designer

General Questions

1) What is your budget?
$1600-1800
2) What size notebook would you prefer?
17"
3) Which country will you buying this notebook?
USA
4) Are there any brands that you prefer or any you really don't like?
a. Like: MSI, Clevo
b. Dislike: Acer, HP, Dell, AlienWare
5) Would you consider laptops that are refurbished/redistributed?
No
6) What are the primary tasks will you be performing with this notebook?
Intensive video editing and graphic design, also gaming (WoW, ESO, perhaps a few AAA titles)
7) Will you be taking the notebook with you to different places, leaving it on your desk or both?
Yes, must be nice a portable
8) Will you be playing games on your notebook? (If so, please state which games or types of games?)
Yessir (WoW, ESO, various AAA titles)
9) How many hours of battery life do you need?
As many as possible, but not the biggest concern
10) Would you prefer to see the notebooks you're considering before purchasing it or buying a notebook on-line without seeing it is OK?
W/o seeing would be fine
11) What OS do you prefer? Windows, Mac OS, Linux, Chrome OS, etc.
Switching from Mac to Windows, so a bit unsure
Screen Specifics

12) What screen resolution(s) would you prefer?
FHD is fine
13) Do you want a glossy/reflective screen or a matte/non-glossy screen? (See further below for explanations.)
No problems

Build Quality and Design

14) Are the notebook's looks and stylishness important to you?
I don't want it to be ugly...
Notebook Components

15) How much hard drive space do you need?
At least 1TB SSD, but willing to replace a smaller drive if necessary

Timing, Warranty and Longevity

16) When are you buying this laptop?
Within the next couple months (June 2019?)
17) How long do you expect to use this laptop?
3+yrs
18) How long could you afford to do without your laptop if it were to fail?
As long as is necessary to replace/fix it, have a desktop that works great as well.
19) Would you be willing to pay significantly extra for on-site warranty, or would it be acceptable to you to have to ship the laptop to the vendor for repair with perhaps a week or more outage?
Shipping the laptop is a little less than ideal, but not really problem, would be fine with that.

So my wife is a videographer and editor for a continuing education course for dentists. She also handles graphic design for all of the clients who work for the company and therefore, needs to be around her laptop all the time. Her SSD is starting to fail as she's constantly filling and erasing it as the videos she has to edit are all 15+GB in size. Mac used to be a good option for her, but it's too pricey for what she wants. I've also gotten her into gaming and she uses my brand new desktop I just built while I use my MSI GS65 1070 max-q laptop.
Recently I've discovered the Clevo/Sager/HIDevolution brands of computers and have become very interested in the 17", light and thin 2070 max-q models they have, the NP8977 or the NP8972. I have no desire for the 9th gen i7 over the 8th gen as there is minimal speed differences between the two (8750h vs 9750h).
I've visited several websites like Sager, XoticPC, GentechPC and HIDevolution. I personally am leaning towards HIDevolution as they seem to have a few better warrantee-type options such as the 2 year perfect panel/no dead pixel guarantees.
I would like to know if it is worth it to go for a laptop online like that, or to get another MSI like mine, just 17", for an extra $600+?
Who has delt with these people in the past and what are your experiences?
Does anyone have this particular laptop, and if so, how strongly would you recommend it?
If we like this laptop enough, I may sell my current MSI to get one as well, I love the idea of a 17" screen, I'm studying to be a programmer, and I currently work heavily with 3d modelling via various CAD softwares so the extra realestate might be nice.

 

I'd never recommend, or purchase, a BGA turdbook with Max-Q, but the SAGER NP8977 aka EVOC (CLEVO) P970RF is interesting in that the chassis is metal. That is a first for Clevo as far as I know. The keyboard also seems like maybe it has individual-key addressable RGB lighting, which I think may also be a first for Clevo. The HM370 chipset is locked, so there would be little or no opportunity to overclock the CPU. If you don't care about any of the negative things mentioned above, and like all of the positives, then maybe visit on the phone with @Donald@HIDevolution at HIDevolution to see if they have any details on whether or not the thermal management is good, or as poor as what one can typically expect for thin and light gaming notebooks. It is aesthetically appealing and the chassis seems to be well made as far as I can tell from looking at the photos.

 

Thank you for your quick reply, I will definitely try to get in contact with him when I get a chance. I was curious though, what do you mean when you say BGA turdbook? Are you referring to the max-q graphics card? From what I understand, the 2070 max-q is the same card as the 2070, just clocked %30 slower for the sake of cooling in a slimmer laptop. Or are you talking about something else?

 

He means CPUs and GPUs that are soldered to the motherboard, which is what 99% of laptops have.

 

Oh interesting. What other options are there. I understand there are whitebooks/barebones, however even those seem to come with at least the CPU soldered in. I'd been open to other suggestions. I've built a few desktops in the past but never tried my hand at a laptop.

 

Clevo has numerous models with desktop CPU and MXM graphics. They are bigger, heavier and can be more expensive to a slight degree. (In some cases they are less expense compared to popular overpriced options.) But, they are also more powerful, more affordable to repair and generally have better cooling.

Max Q and BGA CPUs are what they have to be to accommodate thin and light. They are clocked lower, have lower TDP limits and lower performance. Even so, the form factors most of them get shoehorned into have thermal management issues in spite of the lowered performance and reduced power limits. That's simply because you can only cram so much into a small space and they're trying to cram as much as they can into that tiny space.

 

I know at least the P960 series units TDP throttle and can't handle themselves well. I don't expect the P970s to fair much better.

The Clevo PB50 series units seem to be the thinnest that function well. They need a cooling pad though because the feet actually suffocate the fan intakes... I haven't seen anything that poorly implemented before (the feet cut off all air from the rear and sides of the machine) but when I tested the unit flat vs lifted it was thermal throttling at 97C flat, and in the mid 84-86C range lifted. The 55W PL1 8750H and 2070 Max P are also really good in a 15" chassis (Microcenter also has it for 1499 in store(!)) So it's a best as long as it can breathe.

There are also the TongFang GK5 and GK7 series units. You can get them from Eluktronics as the Mech 15 or Mech 17 with their new "Eluktroboost" feature which is just a raised tdp overclock basically (a 115W 2070mq or 2060 is much better than 80W).

HID also carries them now as the Evoc 16KG5 and 17GK7. They're pretty thin and cool, better than most of the other stuff right now.

Otherwise OP if you're dead set on MSI or Clevo thin and lights only get an HID treated GS65 to try and help it cool well enough to hold temps.

It's just his favorite phrasing for any laptop with non socketed processors heh. You have no options for socketed parts if you want a thin laptop, they're all bulky relatively speaking.

 

Yeah, if I had no option but to go BGA, those TongFang models with the metal chassis are probably the best value out there. Good suggestion as an alternative. Brother @B0B has some good reviews of them on YouTube as well.

It's really a shame that just about all laptops now have thermal management problems. Some are worse than others, but none of them are actually "good" in the truest sense. There is no acceptable excuse for that, especially when the performance has already been crippled to accommodate the thin and light form factor. But, the general public seems to value form over function and the manufacturers only do a half-assed job of engineering cute-looking products that will let them get by just barely, by the skin of their teeth.

 

I saw the eluktronics laptops, however, they do seem pretty big. I'm 6'7" and have awful back pain and bad scoliosis, when I carry heavy things it makes it worse and causes migraines XD, so I'm trying to go for the thinnest & lightest with the most amount of power, plus I travel every few weeks for work and every day to and from University...

That's curious, I've never noticed throttling on my laptop, perhaps the gs65 is just good with cooling. When the CPU and GPU get over 85c I've set the fans to go berserk and that generally will get them back down to around 70-75 or so, if not lower. Super loud but... I don't get too bothered by loud computers.

 

Intel TDP of 45W was never really true until 8th gen, where 45W isn't even close to enough. So most manufacturers either over heated or underperformed. Hopefully that'll straighten out eventually as more new chassis designs come out. To hold max turbos 8750H can need like 70W which manufacturers have never designed for on cpus.

Despite the strange feet problem I still recommend the PB50 completely if you can stomach the thickness being a little over an inch. It's still pretty small footprint wise from the smaller bezels.

The only other thin and light that comes to mind is actually out of left field from Acer... The Triton 500 seems to have a strong 2060 and decent cooling... Which was pretty surprising. The TDP I don't think is known under heavy combined load of the cpu though...

It's about .1" thicker but it's actually a lighter laptop. The Eluk is .86" at 4.4lbs. The Sager/Clevo P960 is .78" at 4.6lbs. That's partially because the TongFang from Eluk is actually narrower because it's a 15" screen with narrow bezels vs the Clevo which is either 15" with large bezels or 16" with no bezels (the P950 vs P960).