Gaming Laptop Sanity Check

[ViceroyNick]

Hi all, just looking for a quick sanity check from those much more knowledgeable that this is a good shout.

About me:
Uses - generally FPS/Milsim end of things (Squad, Arma etc) will a view to playing AAA games. I would also like the ability to go into modding specifically level building for games like Squad but isnt essential.
Budget - this is pretty much at it max but planning on finance (paid off in the year and half down) so a whisker more could work but also any efficiencies are welcome
Monitor - Dont use one

Reason for upgrade - current laptop is pushing 5 years (ASUS RoG, i7-6700HQ 2.6GHz, GTX 960m) and is failing to run games particularly well andnewer games. Ie Battlefront 2 are unworkable. Older games like Squad or Tannenberg will normally hover around 25-30FPS but get nuked if a lot of smoke is used.

Also due to the nature of work/life a tower is pretty much impossible as I travel lot and split time between places frequently so needs to be a laptop

Thanks a lot!


Chassis & Display
Ionico Series: 17.3" Matte QHD 165Hz sRGB 100% LED Widescreen (2560x1440)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Eight Core Processor 10875H (2.3GHz, 5.1GHz Turbo)
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair 2666MHz SODIMM DDR4 (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® RTX 3070 - 8.0GB GDDR6 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1
1st M.2 SSD Drive
500GB SAMSUNG 970 EVO PLUS M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3500MB/R, 3200MB/W)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB INTEL® 665p M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 2000MB/sR | 1925MB/sW)
Memory Card Reader
Integrated Micro-SD Memory Card Reader
AC Adaptor
1 x 230W AC Adaptor
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Battery
Ionico Series Integrated 91WH Lithium Ion Battery
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
Sound Card
2 Channel High Definition Audio + MIC/Headphone Jack
Wireless Network Card
GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® Wi-Fi 6 AX200 (2.4 Gbps) + BT 5.0
USB/Thunderbolt Options
1 x USB 3.2 PORT (Type C) + 3 x USB 3.2 PORTS
Keyboard Language
IONICO 17 SERIES RGB BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD
Operating System
Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00001]
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft 365® (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Google Chrome™
Keyboard & Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Webcam
INTEGRATED 1MP HD WEBCAM
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Chassis
TongFang GM7MG7P (8GB RTX-3070, i7-10875H, 165Hz QHD, Blank KB)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 9 to 11 working days

Price: £1,817.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/ionico-17/0ycRsbM4sr/

 

[Stephen M]

Windows Defender is fine so you can drop the Bullguard, that is also known to cause problems.

Something like Libre or Open Office are free and very good so would save on paying Microsoft after their Office trial is up.

 

[barlew]

My personal opinion which is echoed by a lot of the old sweats on the forum is to steer clear of the Tong Fang chassis at the moment. The last generation of Tong Fang chassis seemed to have a lot of QC issues and recurring faults.

I would look at getting one of the Clevo chassis such as the Elmina or the Defiance.

*edit* this will mean you would have to drop the 1440p display though.

 

[Stephen M]

Agree with Barlew, Clevo have been consistent and reliable over the years.

 

[Bhuna50]

Reiterating the comments above regarding TongFang but I suppose someone's got to be first in trying them LOL. If you are still going to go for the 1440p now rather than wait (to see when the Ryzen/3000 GPU laptops will be here) then the suggestions are:

- switch the Intel SDD for the 1TB PCS one - its £4 cheaper and Intel is not as durable (number of times read / write to it) as the PCS or the Samsung (if you can afford the Samsung then obviously choose that).
- Drop Bullguard - as already mentioned.
- when spending nearly £2k on a laptop, I personally would recommend the GOLD warranty which gives you 2 years warranty on parts.

 

[Macco26]

To the OP:
I am with you with a Ionico preorder. So I might be not in line with the others preceedint me
On reddit / Internet / Youtube reviewers, Tongfang have always had the upper hand, frankly and I'm seeing a lot of improvement with their control center. You should check how this laptop gets sold with other resellers name to get an idea of performance, customizations etc, as the PCS version lacks a bit of publicity in the Internet but it's the same chassis.
At the moment this is the only PCS offer with QHD screen (and also a good one, by watching reviews of it) and I think that's the go-to resolution for 2021 onwards, especially for a beegy RTX 3070 Max-P 125W + 15W the Ionico has.

Besides Bullguard/Warranty you couldn't do a better job customizing the specs IMO. As soon as I get mine (assembly planned for 15th, no earlier) we'll get in touch on our discoveries, maybe.

PS: Check if you can transfer your Windows license from the old computer. Any Retail license, even from Windows7 era would be eligible to activate the Win10 trial PCS installs for testing. You'd save some ££

 

[ViceroyNick]

Thanks a lot for the replied everyone! Really help Ive asked some specific follow on below.

General question though what is the issues with the Ionico chassis? Previously I was advised against the Defiance in favour of the Vyper which isnt available anymore. Cheers!

Windows Defender is fine so you can drop the Bullguard, that is also known to cause problems.

Something like Libre or Open Office are free and very good so would save on paying Microsoft after their Office trial is up.

Thanks a lot the Bull Guard was default so didnt really think much about it.

My personal opinion which is echoed by a lot of the old sweats on the forum is to steer clear of the Tong Fang chassis at the moment. The last generation of Tong Fang chassis seemed to have a lot of QC issues and recurring faults.

I would look at getting one of the Clevo chassis such as the Elmina or the Defiance.

*edit* this will mean you would have to drop the 1440p display though.

Yea when I looked at the other chassis all the components had to be dropped a fair amount not just the resolution.

Reiterating the comments above regarding TongFang but I suppose someone's got to be first in trying them LOL. If you are still going to go for the 1440p now rather than wait (to see when the Ryzen/3000 GPU laptops will be here) then the suggestions are:

- switch the Intel SDD for the 1TB PCS one - its £4 cheaper and Intel is not as durable (number of times read / write to it) as the PCS or the Samsung (if you can afford the Samsung then obviously choose that).
- Drop Bullguard - as already mentioned.
- when spending nearly £2k on a laptop, I personally would recommend the GOLD warranty which gives you 2 years warranty on parts.

I dont suppose theres any idea on when the Ryzen/3000 GPU laptops will start coming out on PCS?

Thanks for the heads up on the SSD I was just going n the speeds but I'll go with the PCS one

To the OP:
I am with you with a Ionico preorder. So I might be not in line with the others preceedint me
On reddit / Internet / Youtube reviewers, Tongfang have always had the upper hand, frankly and I'm seeing a lot of improvement with their control center. You should check how this laptop gets sold with other resellers name to get an idea of performance, customizations etc, as the PCS version lacks a bit of publicity in the Internet but it's the same chassis.
At the moment this is the only PCS offer with QHD screen (and also a good one, by watching reviews of it) and I think that's the go-to resolution for 2021 onwards, especially for a beegy RTX 3070 Max-P 125W + 15W the Ionico has.

Besides Bullguard/Warranty you couldn't do a better job customizing the specs IMO. As soon as I get mine (assembly planned for 15th, no earlier) we'll get in touch on our discoveries, maybe.

PS: Check if you can transfer your Windows license from the old computer. Any Retail license, even from Windows7 era would be eligible to activate the Win10 trial PCS installs for testing. You'd save some ££

Yea despite the issues highlight by other people I'm not really seeing much other options for higher end stuff available as the other chassis also take down the other components. I'm not hugely clued into PC building world (very much a filthy casual lol) so what would be the best way to find about the quality of this new chassis? I'm hopefully not going to be in a huge rush to get it (assuming my current laptop can get fixed lol) so might hold off til end of Feb if theres the chance reviews/opinions will be availble?


Thanks again everyone!!

 

[ViceroyNick]

Currently, I am not aware of any issues with the Ionico chassis...however, it is very new. The main question mark surrounding it is purely down to it being a Tongfang chassis....therehave been major issues with them in recent times such as keyboards being very fragile, systems not doing what they are supposed to do.

The Vyper, as far as I know, has been withdrawn due to it having significant issues when running on battery power and necessitating a lot of returns and refunds....this was a big negative against Tongfang and a major reason why we don't recommend them currently.

Okay so it sounds like the options are to either go for a lower end laptop with a more reliable chassis or hold fire for a bit to see how the new ionico chassis performs?

 

[ViceroyNick]

If you can hold off for a while, then that would be the best option...it is entirely possible that Tongfang have sorted themselves out..not sure they can go much more wrong than the Vyper mind

Okay thanks a lot - just to check am I right in my assessment that you couldnt get a defiance to the same level as what the ionico is? Thanks

 

[Macco26]

Yea despite the issues highlight by other people I'm not really seeing much other options for higher end stuff available as the other chassis also take down the other components. I'm not hugely clued into PC building world (very much a filthy casual lol) so what would be the best way to find about the quality of this new chassis? I'm hopefully not going to be in a huge rush to get it (assuming my current laptop can get fixed lol) so might hold off til end of Feb if theres the chance reviews/opinions will be availble?

Well, as of now, the only partial reviews you can get from latest 2021 Tongfang chassis are the ones with Zen3, but RTX3070, thermals, fan, etc. should be almost the same, so it is the new Control Center.
For get an educated guess check the YouTube channel of Jarrod's Tech which reviewed one in late January (can't give the name of the product, as it's another Tongfang reseller) and Notebookcheck.com which made a detailed review of the same but 17" size (again, with Zen3 CPU). Bear in mind that Zen3 CPU is very impactuful only in productivity tasks (for as large as 10-20%) vs Ionico Intel CPU, but expect to be in the range of 1-5 FPS delta in 1440p resolution, no more.
That's why I preordered a Ionico 17 (as I can't wait for Zen3 availability, nor wait for others to review it first here). Once I get my hands on it (hopefully in a handful of weeks) I'll give some feedback here back.

PS: on reddit other resellers of the same 2020 Tongfang chassis (EU and USA) seems very happy of those machines. PCS forum is the only place where I've seen so much hatred vs the Vyper. Probably everybody wanted to go portable with those 2020 gen laptops and discovered it was pretty much borked under battery operation; plus keyboard engraving isn't extremely durable it seems. Both cases might have be solved by TF in 2021, hopefully, plus I don't plan to use under mobility either.

 

[ViceroyNick]

Well, as of now, the only partial reviews you can get from latest 2021 Tongfang chassis are the ones with Zen3, but RTX3070, thermals, fan, etc. should be almost the same, so it is the new Control Center.
For get an educated guess check the YouTube channel of Jarrod's Tech which reviewed one in late January (can't give the name of the product, as it's another Tongfang reseller) and Notebookcheck.com which made a detailed review of the same but 17" size (again, with Zen3 CPU). Bear in mind that Zen3 CPU is very impactuful only in productivity tasks (for as large as 10-20%) vs Ionico Intel CPU, but expect to be in the range of 1-5 FPS delta in 1440p resolution, no more.
That's why I preordered a Ionico 17 (as I can't wait for Zen3 availability, nor wait for others to review it first here). Once I get my hands on it (hopefully in a handful of weeks) I'll give some feedback here back.

PS: on reddit other resellers of the same 2020 Tongfang chassis (EU and USA) seems very happy of those machines. PCS forum is the only place where I've seen so much hatred vs the Vyper. Probably everybody wanted to go portable with those 2020 gen laptops and discovered it was pretty much borked under battery operation; plus keyboard engraving isn't extremely durable it seems. Both cases might have be solved by TF in 2021, hopefully, plus I don't plan to use under mobility either.

Thanks a lot i'll have a look into that!
On the battery I've always figured it was accepted that gaming laptops are more just moving from plug in to plug with the occasional ability to watch TV or work on battery for a couple hours. Would never expect to play anything beyond Catan on battery.

 

[ViceroyNick]

Am I right in saying that the iconic chassis has a membrane keyboard rather than a mechanical one? Seems like a very odd choice imo

 

[Macco26]

99% of laptops have membrane though. Clevo are no different.

 

[ViceroyNick]

99% of laptops have membrane though. Clevo are no different.

Ah okay good to know - my current ASUS has a mechanical

 

[barlew]

Thanks a lot i'll have a look into that!
On the battery I've always figured it was accepted that gaming laptops are more just moving from plug in to plug with the occasional ability to watch TV or work on battery for a couple hours. Would never expect to play anything beyond Catan on battery.

Can I just clarify, the problem wasnt that people were trying to game on battery it was that you could not use the laptop for the most basic things such as Web browsing or browsing the file system. The laptop literally did not work on battery power and they could not fix the issue.

The reason people are worried about the 17 inch Ionico is that it appears to be built on the same chassis as the Vyper.

 

[Macco26]

Still not my profile of work (so I don't care if Ionico is as bad as Vyper) but I do understand how big of a hassle it might have been for some. For users of Vypers: did you actually try with Intel XTU or Throttlestop to raise the PL1 and PL2 of the processor while it was on battery? Just curious.
Or alternatively to roam around the registry. These days there are a lot of Vypers thread detailing how to modify registry or .ini files just to change keyboard colour or battery optimizer while the Control Center simply couldn't. You should take a look at ways like this, dunno. Better than nothing I guess.

 

[barlew]

Still not my profile of work (so I don't care if Ionico is as bad as Vyper) but I do understand how big of a hassle it might have been for some. For users of Vypers: did you actually try with Intel XTU or Throttlestop to raise the PL1 and PL2 of the processor while it was on battery? Just curious.
Or alternatively to roam around the registry. These days there are a lot of Vypers thread detailing how to modify registry or .ini files just to change keyboard colour or battery optimizer while the Control Center simply couldn't. You should take a look at ways like this, dunno. Better than nothing I guess.

Configure ThrottleStop to temporary fix Vyper 17" battery performance issue.

Whilst tracking this problem for a couple of months it has became apparent that people appear to be having difficulty configuring ThrottleStop to fix the Vyper 17" battery performance issues. It has been suggested I create a guide to show people how to do it so here it is, apologies I have had...

www.pcspecialist.co.uk

 

[ViceroyNick]

Can I just clarify, the problem wasnt that people were trying to game on battery it was that you could not use the laptop for the most basic things such as Web browsing or browsing the file system. The laptop literally did not work on battery power and they could not fix the issue.

The reason people are worried about the 17 inch Ionico is that it appears to be built on the same chassis as the Vyper.

Ah okay yea that is far from ideal.

So assuming the iconio is as unworkable as the Vyoer what would you suggest getting as an alternative?

 

[barlew]

We stopped using that fix

Ah okay yea that is far from ideal.

So assuming the iconio is as unworkable as the Vyoer what would you suggest getting as an alternative?

Honestly right now I would recommend waiting for a Clevo chassis with similar specs to the Ionico.

 

[barlew]

I also want to point out two things. Number 1 you should never have to edit the fundamental configuration of your laptop through 3rd party software to make it work. That just not acceptable

Number 2 the reason PCS could not fix the problem was due to safety concerns. They stated that to fix the problem would mean drawing too much power from the battery which would create a fire risk.

This is why it was advised everyone stop the temporary fix with ThrottleStop.

Make no mistake the Vyper was a horrifically flawed laptop.