15.4" Acer Dual Core Laptop with 2GB RAM, Dual Layer DVDRW, & X1400 GPU!

[waxking1]

Originally posted by: KnightFall

Originally posted by: kitkit201
so what is the battery life after the usb fix posted by Anand and MS?

First u don't need to fix it, 'cause it's already fixed...
Second, it is completely depending on your usage, usually most people getting 2.5-3.0 hours.

Well it comes with the current bandaid fix, but not the real fix. It is still being worked on.

http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/02/14/micro...e_patch_for_power_drain_bug/index.html

 

[KnightFall]

Thanks for the info
How about the DVD Burner's brand? Which company, I am reading some negative things about dvd burnin' in that burner...

 

[waxking1]

DVD burner is a Matshita DVD-RAM UJ-845s. I haven't had a problem with mine yet. I used it for the initial restore backup. I also backed up a DVD movie to a single sided disk. Other than being slow it worked fine. I have a desktop that is much faster so I won't be using it that much for writing.

 

[Ichinisan]

I noticed that the display model was extremely hot in the touchpad area. After purchasing mine, it's the same way after operating for a little while.

I can't imagine what component would be located underneath the touchpad and generating so much heat. Has anyone else noticed this problem?

 

[TheSiege]

Originally posted by: Ichinisan
I noticed that the display model was extremely hot in the touchpad area. After purchasing mine, it's the same way after operating for a little while.

I can't imagine what component would be located underneath the touchpad and generating so much heat. Has anyone else noticed this problem?

yeah, its especially hot if you leave the screen down,
so does anyone know if there is room for a second HDD?

 

[Nab]

Does Aspire come with a lot of extra stuff like the Dell laptops do? I hear its better to reformat and clean install for Dell, should I do the same for this laptop?

 

[KnightFall]

Originally posted by: Nab
Does Aspire come with a lot of extra stuff like the Dell laptops do? I hear its better to reformat and clean install for Dell, should I do the same for this laptop?

Off course every company install lots of crappy programs...
Its always better to format and clean install the winXP

 

[Nab]

Originally posted by: KnightFall

Originally posted by: Nab
Does Aspire come with a lot of extra stuff like the Dell laptops do? I hear its better to reformat and clean install for Dell, should I do the same for this laptop?

Off course every company install lots of crappy programs...
Its always better to format and clean install the winXP

After I do that, is it going to be hard to get drivers or reinstall any of the acer stuff? I'm not familiar with laptops, as this will be my first purchase. I read earlier in this thread that all the drivers are available on their website, is it as easy as download and double click?

 

[mrVW]

I've had mine for 4 days and using it full time... I'm a full time laptop user, my other is a Thinkpad T42 that is about 14 months old. I need the new CPU for a project (Xen Linux) so the acer seemed like a good choice...

Problems so far:

1) if you put the lid down while system is running (you have to turn off the "suspend when lid down" setting) the lid actually HITS the mouse button. I often just close the lid and walk across room with my laptop to relocate... and it is annoying that it beeps constantly as the lid hits the mouse buttons if you hold it on the front.

2) The Synoptics mouse (touchpad) driver has crashed twice on me forcing a reboot with keyboard commands. I think #1 contributes to this...

3) it does get very hot under the touchpad even when not busy but left on for many hours... like overnight. Is the CPU or GPU right under the touchpad?

4) It has crashed a couple times while just folded up and left running overnight... wouldn't turn screen on when lid lifted, etc. Not suspende, left running.

5) I am getting random video corruption onscreen during dvd playback (using build in Acer Arcade and VLC PLayer) and on normal Windows desktop 2D stuff. I wonder if my video card is overheating or bad RAM on it.

The ACER website seems to have no BIOS updates or new video drivers...

 

[imported_chuckey]

Originally posted by: Nab

Originally posted by: KnightFall

Originally posted by: Nab
Does Aspire come with a lot of extra stuff like the Dell laptops do? I hear its better to reformat and clean install for Dell, should I do the same for this laptop?

Off course every company install lots of crappy programs...
Its always better to format and clean install the winXP

After I do that, is it going to be hard to get drivers or reinstall any of the acer stuff? I'm not familiar with laptops, as this will be my first purchase. I read earlier in this thread that all the drivers are available on their website, is it as easy as download and double click?

You need to grab the drivers from Acer's PanAm or European site.

I picked up one of these puppies and its working great for me. I'm getting about 2.5 hours of battery life (75% web surfing, 20% perl programming and compiles, 5% guild wars )

Now I got sick of the pc being filled with the standard acer crap (i had a hellulva time getting stuff off the missus' ferrari 3400), so I went ahead and did a clean install of XP Pro.

NOTE: This is for the Compusa version, I believe the european version comes with a tv tuner and remote.

Pre-install:
--D/L'ed all of the drivers onto D:\temp and extracted them. It took about an hour for me to grab every single one of the drivers.

Panam Site (you must enter in Aspire 5670 and hit submit):
http://www.acerpanam.com/synapse/forms/...rPanAm.com&pupv=pu&formid=3394#results
European Site:
http://support.acer-euro.com/drivers/notebook/as_5670.html

--Formated the HD to NTFS using the windows cd. This was a big deal for me, FAT32 is great and fast for smaller sized HD's, but with a 50gig partition full of music and video, NTFS is the king. I did a clean format of C: with the SLOW format of NTFS (its executes chkdsk which is decent for finding and HD weaknesses)

Install Process:
--Installed windows xp pro onto C:
--Enabled IR
--Installed the following drivers:
1. Intel Chipset
2. ATI VGA Driver
3. Intel wireless (I got this from the Acer European site)
4. Conexant Audio drivers
5. Conexant Modem drivers
6. Broadcom 5789E LAN drivers
7. Bluetooth drivers (I got this from the Acer PanAm site)
8. CCD Drivers (webcam)
9. FIR (Fast IR, the CIR is for the remote which we don't have )
10. Touchpad drivers
11. 6in1 Card Reader
12. Acer ePower mgmt (VERY IMPORTANT, this puppy is much better than the default windows power mgmt).
13. Acer Launch manager (For the quick launch buttons in the top right hand corners and media buttons on the left side)
--Installed the following OPTIONAL software
1. Acer Empowering Framework (necessary for everything below)
2. Acer ePresentation (easy to use tool for setting up on projectors)
3. Acer GridVista (multi-screen utility)
4. Acer eSettings

Post-install:
--Firefox

You will lose the *nifty :roll:* acer screensaver that uses the webcam.

Hope this helps out! I love my acer lappy, but I do wish it came with a better case colors (I miss the glossy red finish on the ferrari 3400). It runs smoothy and the X1400 video card is about the equiv of the old ATI9700 mobility.

You can't beat it for 1300 bucks after rebates, with a free printer and router and $100 food coupon!

 

[Nab]

Originally posted by: chuckey

Originally posted by: Nab

Originally posted by: KnightFall

Originally posted by: Nab
Does Aspire come with a lot of extra stuff like the Dell laptops do? I hear its better to reformat and clean install for Dell, should I do the same for this laptop?

Off course every company install lots of crappy programs...
Its always better to format and clean install the winXP

After I do that, is it going to be hard to get drivers or reinstall any of the acer stuff? I'm not familiar with laptops, as this will be my first purchase. I read earlier in this thread that all the drivers are available on their website, is it as easy as download and double click?

You need to grab the drivers from Acer's PanAm or European site.

I picked up one of these puppies and its working great for me. I'm getting about 2.5 hours of battery life (75% web surfing, 20% perl programming and compiles, 5% guild wars )

Now I got sick of the pc being filled with the standard acer crap (i had a hellulva time getting stuff off the missus' ferrari 3400), so I went ahead and did a clean install of XP Pro.

NOTE: This is for the Compusa version, I believe the european version comes with a tv tuner and remote.

Pre-install:
--D/L'ed all of the drivers onto D:\temp and extracted them. It took about an hour for me to grab every single one of the drivers.

Panam Site (you must enter in Aspire 5670 and hit submit):
http://www.acerpanam.com/synapse/forms/...rPanAm.com&pupv=pu&formid=3394#results
European Site:
http://support.acer-euro.com/drivers/notebook/as_5670.html

--Formated the HD to NTFS using the windows cd. This was a big deal for me, FAT32 is great and fast for smaller sized HD's, but with a 50gig partition full of music and video, NTFS is the king. I did a clean format of C: with the SLOW format of NTFS (its executes chkdsk which is decent for finding and HD weaknesses)

Install Process:
--Installed windows xp pro onto C:
--Enabled IR
--Installed the following drivers:
1. Intel Chipset
2. ATI VGA Driver
3. Intel wireless (I got this from the Acer European site)
4. Conexant Audio drivers
5. Conexant Modem drivers
6. Broadcom 5789E LAN drivers
7. Bluetooth drivers (I got this from the Acer PanAm site)
8. CCD Drivers (webcam)
9. FIR (Fast IR, the CIR is for the remote which we don't have )
10. Touchpad drivers
11. 6in1 Card Reader
12. Acer ePower mgmt (VERY IMPORTANT, this puppy is much better than the default windows power mgmt).
13. Acer Launch manager (For the quick launch buttons in the top right hand corners and media buttons on the left side)
--Installed the following OPTIONAL software
1. Acer Empowering Framework (necessary for everything below)
2. Acer ePresentation (easy to use tool for setting up on projectors)
3. Acer GridVista (multi-screen utility)
4. Acer eSettings

Post-install:
--Firefox

You will lose the *nifty :roll:* acer screensaver that uses the webcam.

Hope this helps out! I love my acer lappy, but I do wish it came with a better case colors (I miss the glossy red finish on the ferrari 3400). It runs smoothy and the X1400 video card is about the equiv of the old ATI9700 mobility.

You can't beat it for 1300 bucks after rebates, with a free printer and router and $100 food coupon!

oo thanks, just what i was looking for, i should be receiving mine tomorrow or monday =)

 

[Hulk]

Don't flame me, I don't have the time to read through the whole thread.

Can you upgrade the processor to a faster Core Duo model at a later point in time, like when the 2.13 model is nice and cheap?

Can you get to the processor and remove it without too much difficulty?

 

[fbrdphreak]

Originally posted by: TheSiege

Originally posted by: Ichinisan
I noticed that the display model was extremely hot in the touchpad area. After purchasing mine, it's the same way after operating for a little while.

I can't imagine what component would be located underneath the touchpad and generating so much heat. Has anyone else noticed this problem?

yeah, its especially hot if you leave the screen down,
so does anyone know if there is room for a second HDD?

No! I already answered this

 

[fbrdphreak]

Originally posted by: Hulk
Don't flame me, I don't have the time to read through the whole thread.

Can you upgrade the processor to a faster Core Duo model at a later point in time, like when the 2.13 model is nice and cheap?

Can you get to the processor and remove it without too much difficulty?

It won't be easy, but it will be do-able.

 

[fbrdphreak]

Originally posted by: chuckey
You will lose the *nifty :roll:* acer screensaver that uses the webcam.

You can probably copy this off before reformatting if you want.

 

[ViviTheMage]

I wish the res was a little higher, but I am learning to deal with it!

I have been playing WC3 TFT, CS 1.6 (actually played my last CAL match on here because I had no time to go home!).

Great laptop, great specs..cant wait to throw VISTA on here when it comes out.

 

[Mordak]

what about the gpu?

 

[ViviTheMage]

Originally posted by: Mordak
what about the gpu?

runs just about as good as a mobility 9700, if not better. ( I think it does, I have had a 9700).

 

[fbrdphreak]

Originally posted by: ViviTheMage

Originally posted by: Mordak
what about the gpu?

runs just about as good as a mobility 9700, if not better. ( I think it does, I have had a 9700).

Its two generations newer than the MR 9700, definitely better performance.

 

[Nab]

Anyone have a problem of the CD drive not opening? how can i fix this??

 

[agrall]

Originally posted by: Nab
Anyone have a problem of the CD drive not opening? how can i fix this??

Read back through this thread.

 

[Nab]

Originally posted by: ViviTheMage
Just started to play with the laptop...I cant get the DVD drive to open....anyone else have this problem? Any idea why its doing this :S

EDIT L I AM RETARDED HAHAHA, its a SLOT loader :X.

excuse my dumbness.

GREAT LAPTOP so far

(me too)

 

[Nab]

I reformatted the hard drive by installing windows, but i'm getting a dual boot screen on start up, how do i get rid of that? I installed win xp pro, but i'm still getting the option to go to win xp home, but errors if i pick that.

 

[Threader]

use MSconfig to remove Dualboot in Bootini tab.

 

[fbrdphreak]

Originally posted by: Nab
I reformatted the hard drive by installing windows, but i'm getting a dual boot screen on start up, how do i get rid of that? I installed win xp pro, but i'm still getting the option to go to win xp home, but errors if i pick that.

Control Panel-->System-->Advanced-->Startup & Recovery-->Settings and uncheck "Time to display Operating Systems"