Gigabyte have released their new 17 inch version of the Aero laptop, but does a larger machine
provide better cooling? I’ll be testing out thermals in detail and pushing the 8 core
i9 CPU to the limit so we can see just what it’s capable of.
The new Aero 17 laptop is available in different configurations, my model has the overclockable
8 core Intel i9-9980HK CPU, Nvidia RTX 2070 Max-Q graphics, and 16gb of memory running
in dual channel, so expect different results with different specs. It’s also available
with an i7 CPU and different graphics options, you can find examples and updated prices linked
in the description.
The cooling design is similar to the new Aero 15 I recently tested, on the bottom there’s
a nice large mesh area for intake, there’s also some air intake vents found above the
keyboard and air also comes in through the keyboard. Air is exhausted out of four vents,
two on the back and one on both the left and right side towards the back. On top of that
Gigabyte have stated that they’re using Thermal Grizzly hydronaut thermal paste, so
that should be better compared to many others out there.
In terms of heatpipes we’ve got two shared between the CPU and GPU, and the design looks
the same as the 15 inch model, however the heatsinks look a bit thicker due to the extra
space available with the larger 17 inch chassis.
The Gigabyte control center software allows us to set the CPU between 6 different levels
of power, and the GPU between two levels, as defined here. Throughout this testing I’ve
tested the stock settings with the CPU at level 2 and GPU at level 0 with the fans on
the normal profile. Here’s what the default fan curve of the normal profile looks like,
so we’re not even getting to 70% max speed and expect it to run warmer but quieter as
a result. The gaming profile boosts the fan speed a bit, and we also have the option of
customizing the curve for optimum performance.
You can also quickly set the fan speed to maximum by pressing the function and escape
keys, and when I’ve tested the fan at max speed I’ve also boosted the CPU to level
5 and GPU to level 1 for highest levels of performance, so up to 80 watts on the CPU
and 90 watts on the GPU, thermals permitting of course.
Thermal testing was completed in an ambient room temperature of 21 degrees Celsius, so
expect different results in different environments. At idle it was a little warm, however in quiet
mode the fans were completely silent so this is expected.
The rest of the results are from combined CPU and GPU workloads and are meant to represent
worst case scenarios as I ran them for extended periods of time.
The gaming results towards the upper half of the graph were tested by playing Watch
Dogs 2, as I find it to use a good combination of processor and graphics. The stress test
results shown on the lower half of the graph are from running the Aida64 CPU stress test
with only the stress CPU option checked, and the Heaven GPU benchmark at max settings at
the same time to fully load the system.
I’ll start off by noting that the CPU was thermal throttling at 90 degrees Celsius,
which we can see happening in many of these tests. Personally I think this is a good thing,
Gigabyte are capping the thermal limit to prevent it getting too hot, and as we’ll
see in the next graph performance is still great. There was some thermal throttling on
the GPU while gaming at stock when it averaged 86 degrees, but that was the only instance
and was tested with the normal fan profile, simply swapping to gaming or above would remove
it.
By setting the fan speed to maximum we’re able to improve the GPU temperature despite
the GPU power limit raising from 80 to 90 watts, however this action alone wasn’t
enough to remove the thermal throttling on the CPU. Once we undervolt the CPU no changes
were seen in terms of temperatures while under stress test, however this was enough to remove
the thermal throttling while playing this particular game. As thermal throttling was
the limitation while under stress test I added in a cooling pad, and we saw this drop temperatures
by 6 degrees and remove thermal throttling. The thermals were now under control so we’re
in a place to attempt some CPU overclocking, and as this requires more power more heat
is expected, so the overclock took us back to thermal throttling while under stress test.
While gaming the overclock rose the CPU temperature back up by 7 degrees Celsius, however it wasn’t
thermal throttling under this workload.
These are the average clock speeds for the same tests just shown. We’re seeing the
lowest clock speeds with the normal fan profile as thermals were the key limitation at this
point. By increasing the fan speed we have more thermal headroom, which is why I also
boosted the CPU and GPU power limits here, and this is why we’re getting higher clock
speeds. The CPU undervolt improved performance further, though more so for the stress test
result compared to gaming. The cooling pad made no major difference in terms of performance,
while the 9980HK has an all core turbo boost speed of 4.2GHz I found mine would cap out
at 4.1GHz, and this was hit with the cooling pad both under stress test and while gaming.
By overclocking to 4.4GHz we’re almost averaging this while gaming, so I probably could have
pushed even further there, an excellent result. While under stress test the thermal throttling
was back with the overclock, however I think a 4.25GHz average on 8 CPU cores is an excellent
result.
These are the average TDP values reported by hardware info during these same tests.
We can see the GPU power limit raise up from 80 to 90 watts by going from GPU level 0 to
level 1, as per the green bars. While the CPU is at level 5 it has an 80 watt power
limit, however we never got close to this under these combined CPU and GPU tests due
to thermal throttling. This means that power limit throttling was never an issue in these
tests, so there’s that. The highest I saw was a 69 watt average once overclocked and
undervolted, higher was not possible due to thermal throttling, at least in these workloads.
These are the average CPU clock speeds while under a CPU only workload, we’re able to
get higher speeds than what was shown before as the GPU is sitting idle now. The top bar
is at stock with the highest level 5 limit set in the Gigabyte control center. In CPU
only workloads we’re averaging close to the 4.2GHz all core turbo speed of the 9980HK
in this workload, with over 4.5GHz being hit once overclocked. When we look at the average
CPU TDP we can see at stock we’re hitting the 80 watt limit defined by level 5, however
undervolting the CPU allows it to perform slightly better while using less power. Alternatively
instead of undervolting I could manually raise the power limit further to achieve the same
small clock speed boost, but instead when combining the two I only saw slightly more
power needed for quite a large clock speed boost to above 4.5GHz. More power equals more
heat, so with the overclock under a CPU only workload we’re actually at the 90 degree
thermal throttle limit. Again the undervolt only gave the best temperatures as it lowers
power draw, while more power from boosting the power limit equals more heat.
To demonstrate how this translates into performance I’ve got some Cinebench CPU benchmarks here.
Just for reference your typical i7-9750H seems to be around 2800 in a good machine, while
I managed to push the i7 in the Aero 15 to around 3100 points for comparison. This means
we’re seeing a 35% higher score in this test with the Aero 17 and 8 core overclocked
i9 CPU compared to the i7 in the Aero 15, and I already consider the Aero 15 score as
one of the highest I’ve ever gotten from the i7. The single core clock speed was higher
as the i9 can go right up to 5GHz at stock while under single core workload, thermals
permitting.
So how do these performance boosts actually translate into games? I’ve tested a few
games both at stock and with these custom changes in place to see what performance increases
we can expect.
In battlefield 5 at maximum settings we’re seeing a 6% improvement to both average FPS
and 1% low performance with these changes in place.
In Shadow of the Tomb raider with the built in benchmark at highest settings there was
a larger difference, almost 9% higher average frame rate was happening with these tweaks.
In Far Cry 5 with the built in benchmark at ultra settings there was almost a 7% improvement
to average FPS with the changes in place, though there was less of a difference when
it came to 1% low performance.
As for the external temperatures where you’ll actually be putting your hands, at idle it
was in the mid 30s in the center, just a little above average. While gaming with the fan on
the normal profile it’s getting to the mid 40s in the center, so on the warmer side,
and up to 60 right up the back which was hot to the touch. Simply by setting the fan to
maximum speed the hot spots drop by around 10 degrees and the keyboard was much cooler
to the touch. Here’s what a combined CPU and GPU stress test looks like with the fans
at maximum, but this time with the CPU and GPU power limits boosted, and it felt fine
due to the fan speed.
As for the fan noise produced by the laptop, I’ll let you have a listen to some of these
tests.
At idle with the quiet profile it was completely silent however I could hear some subtle coil
whine, though that vanished with any level of fan speed. With the normal fan profile
it’s actually fairly quiet compared to most other laptops I’ve tested, so you do have
the option of running quieter for less performance, and then the gaming profile rose that up a
bit, but still lower than most other gaming laptops I’ve used. With the fans at max
speed it is quite loud, however I think this is a good thing. As Gigabyte let us adjust
the fan curve with high levels of granularity it means you have the option of customizing
it to find a sweet spot that works best for you, in my opinion, this is an advantage compared
to others that lock down control.
Overall I’m quite impressed with these results, keeping in mind these are essentially worst
case scenarios that we’re looking at. While this is the first time I’ve ever tested
the i9-9980HK CPU, the temperatures were always kept under control regardless of my modifications
as Gigabyte are capping the CPU temperature to 90 degrees Celsius. They could of course
done what Dell did in the G5 and allow it to run up to 100 degrees, and while this would
improve performance a little I’m personally happy to take the hit so temperatures don’t
go above 90.
Even at stock simply by raising the fan speed we’re able to get pretty good clock speeds,
especially considering these were over 8 cores, while some simple undervolting improved things
further. In my tests just by undervolting with raised fan speed even under combined
CPU and GPU stress test we’re almost at 4.1GHz on all 8 cores which I think is quite
impressive when compared against most of the 6 core i7 machines I’ve tested. As you’d
expect, with 8 cores and high power limits thermals were the limitation, so using a cooling
pad was able to help out a fair bit. While I haven’t tested out the i7 in the Aero
17, based on these results I’m assuming it should handle it well.
In the future I think if Gigabyte start undervolting out of the box like we’ve seen Acer do in
the Helios 300 and Razer do in the Blade Pro 17 then it would be in great shape, ideally
if the AI software controlled this dynamically within a known stable range it could make
it much more useful.
The 230 watt power brick that Gigabyte include with the Aero 17 appears to be adequate for
these specs, I was seeing some drain during my testing but it would stop at around the
95% mark which is pretty standard behaviour, it never dropped further.
These differences in performance shown aren’t hard and fast rules, there are different factors
which will vary results, primarily the temperature of the room you’re running in, application
of thermal paste, and even the specific hardware which comes down to the silicon lottery. You
may not be able to undervolt or overclock your hardware the same as me, it depends on
the chip and its specific power requirements, so don’t just blindly copy my settings and
do some testing to find out where your stable point is for best results.
It may be possible to further improve temperatures by swapping the thermal paste, however as
this is a review unit that I have to send back I’m not able to change the paste, otherwise
the next reviewer will unknowingly report different results due to what I’ve done.
We do at least know that they’re using somewhat decent paste here anyway.
Undervolting, boosting fan speed, increasing power limits or using a cooling pad are much
easier for most people to do anyway, and as we’ve seen these modifications did help
improve performance of the new Aero 17 laptop.
Let me know what you thought about the thermals and performance from the new Gigabyte Aero
17 laptop down in the comments, and if you’re new to the channel you’ll definitely want
to get subscribed for the upcoming full review video.