ASUS N71JQ Owners Lounge

Congrat's and welcome to the club,

I did not bother doing the restore disks. You are just backing up all of the orignal crapware they stuffed on your c: drive. You can download a trial version of Windows 7 HP and use the COA on the bottom of the laptop along with the driver disk and you will have a better restore than those 4 DVDs. There is a restore partition on the primary HD too.

I removed the primary HD and set it aside in case I need warrantee work. I do not trust anything from seagate. Go back through this thread and you will see what I mean. Look in the device manager under drives, if the model number starts with a ST then it is a seagate.

My only complaint about my new toy is that it came with Segate HDs.

Best of luck with your new lappy

Dave

 

well, my primary is an intel SSD. and my external is a seagate free agent go (had it with my dell) and the secondary is a seagate, too.

had xotic burn a recovery disk for me. uninstalled a lot of asus utils. loaded it up with my stuff already for the most part.

the Opicatl drive still has the blu-ray label, but it is a dual layer DVD drive. I downgraded there while upgrading wireless card and and primary HDD to a SSD.

I may not notice the fans since i do have a cooler running.
but overall the thing is rather nice. quite the step up from my 2 year old dell inspirion 1525.

 

Sorry,

It sounded like you were burning restore DVD as prompted by ASUS utilitity when you first boot a new machine.

I upgraded the primary HD to a SSD as well, my HD Tune score doubled from about 75 to 140 mb/s. My windows HD score went from 5.9 to 6.9. Needless to say it was a worthy upgrade.

Have fun

Dave

 

MY windows HD score is a 7.7. 6.7 for graphics, 6.9 for CPU and 5.9 for memory.

wondering if others got similar scores?

 

My Windows numbers are the same as yours, with the exception of the SSD. What model is your SSD?

Dave

 

I got the Intel 80GB G2 X25-M.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=6056598&highlight=ram#post6056598

 

Edit: I spoke too soon. What I wrote below seemed to work and my fan ran fine all day, but now a few hours and a reboot later it's back to the constant 8-second cycling again. How freakin' weird. And no Dave, Power4Gear has not been installed at all this time. I dunno what to think. I'll leave the post below as I wrote it:

Today I reinstalled Windows from the recovery partition (F9 at startup). Before I had tried reinstalling from the recovery CD, and the fan was still constantly cycling on/off. But now that I've used the install from the recovery partition, my fan problem is solved. (Yes, there are differences between the stuff that gets installed from the CD and the partition). Now, the fan runs mostly continuously, at a low speed. Every now and then it will stop for a few moments (not often at all), but I'm getting none of that on/off/on/off stuff I was getting before. Not sure if the fan is SUPPOSED to be running continuously, but I could definitely get used to this. As other people said, that might just be the norm for a notebook with these specs. It's really pretty quiet honesty.

Not sure if this will fix the problem for everyone but it's worth a shot if the fan is bugging you like it was me.

 

Did you install Power4Gear? I think that is where the problem is.

Dave

 

I am interested in purchasing the ASUS N71JQ-A1 from xoticpc. For the hard drives, they offer Seagate or WD. Which one is better???

"The standard drives they will be Seagate. The only WD drives that we stock now are the 640GB 5400rpm drives"


Do the stock units come with Seagate? Should I even consider the WD 640 5400rpm?


Thanks!

 

Supposedly the WD 7200 rpm generates more heat.

For all N71JQ ownders, what hard drives does your n71JQ laptop have?

 

I have the intel SSD and a 320 gb seagate 7200rpm. which is the stock drive it comes with. (from xotic)

 

Guys have any of you tried updating your Power4Gear?

 

Finally, my N71 (from XoticPC) is out for delivery today.

So as I understand, I'm supposed to make up the recovery disks the first time I boot it up?

Also, my first Win7 system in the house!

 

I am still debating if I need a blue ray player. I do want the ASUS N71JQ-A1 since it has 2 hard drives. But do I really need a blue ray player so that my laptop is future proof?

I plan on using this laptop to play one game -starcraft2, multimedia, and some light web designing.

Would it be best to purchase the ASUS N71JQ-A1 and have xotic replace the blue ray reader with a 8X DVDRW? Or am I just stupid for even thinking about this. (...it would save me a total of 96 bucks)

Thanks

 

I didn't find a need for the BluRay drive so i took the downgrade and then swapped out the primary HD for the 80 GB SSD and upgraded the wireless to the intel 6200.

I think bluray is a personal choice. I also figured since the screen wasn't 1080p, it wasn't worth getting the bluray, even if HDMI out is 1080p.

 

Go with the stock drives, because that is not the WD drive of choice, 5400 rpm vs 7200 rpm means lower performance. Be sure to keep anything that matters on both drives, because they will not both break at the same time. The odds are that they will not break at all, but there is a chance they will. I have read that ASUS will let you remove defective drives and send them in for replacement rather then sending the hole laptop.

You may want to get the SSD upgrade that jbermi got for the primary, it makes a big difference in performance.

If you want to know more about the Seagate drives search on ST9320423AS. Look at the reviews on Newegg. Seagate has a much higher fail rate than WD. As far as heat is concrened 7200 rpm drives produce more heat than 5400 rpm drives, but it does not very much between manufactures.

Don't let any of this scare you away from this laptop it is an outstanding value.

Dave

 

I bought my lappy at J&R.com. Here is the review I posted there.

ASUS N71JQ-A1 Review

General Info:

The actual dimensions of this unit have been misquoted on many web sites so here they are. (16.50" x 11.25" x 1.90")
This laptop comes with 2 320 GB 7200 rpm HDs (mine came with Seagate ST9320423AS), there is no RAID controller.
Connectivity 1 USB 3.0, 3 USB 2.0, 1 HDMI, 1 eSATA, 1 VGA, 1 Giga-Lan Ethernet, 1 Express Card Slot
4 Gigs DDR 3 1066 Memory, you may get 1333 depending on what ASUS had available

Pros:

Excellent build quality, This laptop is a beauty, It looks black unless you look close or have it outdoors. I love the keyboard, some have complained about the shorter shift key on the right side, it is a nonissue for me. Some pics show the backslash key on the left side of the keyboard. Not true; it is above the enter key where it should be. Touch pad is great, but I use a Logitech Anywhere wireless USB Mouse.

The 1600 x 900 Display is good for a TN, but it would be much better if they had used an eIPS panel like the Dell 2209WA. I am glad I spent a little more and got the higher resolution screen, Blueray Drive, and 2 yr warranty (mail in the warrantee card within 60 days after purchase and get a second year of Accidental Damage Warranty)

Very good performance Windows 7 scores (6.9, 5.9, 6.7, 6.7, and 5.9). This laptop is exactly what I was looking for fast and QUIT, There has been some controversy about the fan cycling on and off in short bursts. If you have this problem uninstall the Power4Gear software and wait for ASUS to update it. You do not really need it anyway. When the fan is running it is not very load.

Cons:

Crapware what else. This can be removed with a little program called Decrapifier. When the laptop boots for the first time it will ask you to build a set of 4 restore DVDs. I feel that this is a total waste of time and it takes forever to run. Just download a trial copy of Win7 and use the COA code from the bottom of the laptop. Then run the Drivers disk that comes with the laptop and you will have a good clean install when you need it. Or you could image the C: drive with something Arconis True Image.

I mentioned above that my unit came with Seagate HDs. I personally do not trust anything from Seagate and was disappointed in ASUS for using them. I listed the model number above google it and see what you find.

I upgraded to an Western Digital SiliconEdge SSD primary HD and a Western Digital Scorpio Black 320GB 7200 RPM secondary HD. The SSD really brought this thing to life and it supports TRIM for long-term performance.

For lots more info on this laptop go to: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=457176

Conclusion: Add to cart and buy this thing now, you will not be disappointed. It is a steel at this price, especially with Accidental Damage Insurance.

Dave

 

Hey guys I'm new here and from Australia found this thread to be ever so helpful though just a few questions.

With the bluray drive how quick is it For burning audio CDs? Is it a slow burner?

Also am I actually able to run a SSD as primary and have a 7200rpm 500gb as storage? I got a bit confused with the HDD config of the notebook.

 

not sure about the blu-ray, but i would assume it burns as fast as your standard 8x dual layer DVD burner. (i have the dvd burner in mine)

and yes you can get it configured with SSD as your primary and a HDD as secondary. I have an intel 80gb x-25M SSD as my primary and a 7200rpm 320 GB as secondary.

depends on the options offered by reseller, or if you swap out the drives yourself after purchase.

 

Ok, this is getting extremely annoying. I have the N71JQ-X1 & every time I leave my computer for 20-30 min it locks up. I'm running windows 7 HP 64bit on high performance plugged in.. any1 else having this problem?

 

Thanks mate well I hope the burning is fast though 8x to me seems relativley slow???

Also Ill be purchasing it cash over counter at a very reliable comp store, though with the HDD I'll probably change
it myself, is it just a matter of pull them out and plug in a SSD and another HDD?

 

there are versions that only have one HDD, you may have to look back in this thread if they were able to add another drive to the models with only a single drive.

8x is the DVD burn speed. not sure of the CD burn speed. I am sure its 48x+.

 

Great stuff..

Thanks mate.. Though going thru all the 55 pages again is unberable specially on my iPhone

the model they sell is this at both stores

"Asus N71JQ-TY022X 720QM 1.6GHz 640G 4G ATI5730M"

will it take 2 HDD's?

And what's the deal with recovery disk (or recovery hdd)?

Why do you need this for? Can't u just format it all and do a clean install?

 

640g = 2x 320gb hard drives

I guess the recover disks and recovery HDD is for the common users who do not know how to or want to buy a copy of Win7. Plus it contains all the drivers that Windows 7 wouldn't have.

 

Great so it comes with 2x hdd then?
If I do a clean install of win7 pro ultimate 64bit can't I just pop in one of the CDs I get with the notebook to install the drivers windows 7 doesn't pick up?

Sorry for all the questions..

 

Yes, that is exactly what I did and it worked out cleaner and simpler.

Dave

 

No; mine wakes up with no problem. Before and after I reinstalled Win7.

Dave

 

Check with the vendor, it can come with one or two. If it is one it will be 5400 rpm rather than 7200 rpm.

Dave

 

Great stuff I just hope it's fast for Photoshop and everyday Internet and multimedia stuff!!

Does it actually run at 2.8ghz or a crappy 1.6ghz

 

I didn't find the answer to this on here, but it might be because I am just drain-bamaged tonight. Is there any way to replace the N71JQ-x1's DVD drive with the Blu-Ray version? If so, where can I find this drive?

*edit* I have sent an email to service@xoticpc (dot) com to get information on this swap. I had contacted sales and they referred me to service.

 

Hi Guys

4th day of ownership and this is a powerhouse! I'm a console gamer mainly but downloaded the Crysis demo (it ran fine at 1280x720 on my older HDX18) and I was blown away when I was able to run it fine at the native resolution with HIGH settings! Now I'm thinking of picking some older PC games so I can enjoy them.

Anyway, I like the speakers but find them too 'bassy'. Any there any settings I can tweak to get the maximum out of the speakers?

Thanks

 

I would contact Xotic PC, because they are doing down grades and should have the drives laying arround. You could probbubly put any drive in there, but you need the form fitted face plate. You might be able to use the one on your current DVD drive. they are pretty genaric other than the face plate.

Dave

 

I downgraded. and they left the same faceplate on it, (xotic) so it says blu-ray on it. and yes they sell blu-ray drives for laptops there, i think they are $135.

 

For those of you who ordered your N71JQ's with the 80 GB SSD primary drive, besides the increase in performance, do you think that this would have any noticeable effect on the amount of heat and/or fan noise generated by the notebook? Might there be any other benefits?

 

hi all,

its my second weeks with this new baby and I love everything about her except the fact that is a fluke in either Asus' add-on software or i might of accidentally deleted something that may required that i do a clean slay which i'm trying to avoid.

The issue:
Has anyone experienced that while typing, in a middle of the sentence the cursor jump on you to a different location, primarily backward. Sometime, it behaviors strangely from randomly highlighting everything or even deleting a paragraph if you type too fast. This is very annoying while composing a email or writing this right now. I have tried everything. From reinstalling the keyboard driver, to shutting off the touchpad. If can't find a solution, I will reformat and proof its a hardware issue. Please let me know before while prepare for that route.

 

^ Does it happen when u use an external keyboard attached to the laptop?

 

Happens my N61 too.

 

greatt.. just placed an order for the N71JQ-A1. This worries me ... first im hearing keyboard flex, heat issues and now this? makes me wonder if i should cancel my order.

also, whats up with the DVD recovery disks?
Do I need buy a few DVDRW to burn some recovery disks when i get my laptop?

 

Speaking from my 4 day experience with the N71. While the kb does have some slight flex, it's not as bad as my previous HP HDX18. I'm not much of a gamer so haven't run into any heat issues yet.

I made the recovery disks myself and it took 4 DVD's (I'd say around 90 mins or so in between).

I really like the laptop though...the speakers itself is a nice upgrade from my previous speakers. I hooked this up to my 42" plasma in my bedroom last nite (hdmi) and watched some 1080p MKV's and it was perfect.

I have a question as well. Are there any after market keyboard skins I can buy for my N71? My toddlers use my laptop quite a bit and the kb/touchpad's already got oily finger stains on them

 

Keyboard flex is overrated, I do not notice it at all on my N61. Heat well, the N71 is bigger and I do not notice any issues on my N61. The single biggest concern is the quality of the LCD. It has poor viewing angles ( unless the N71 is significantly better but I doubt it ) and poor colour reproduction.

The build quality is superb on mine.

 

I don't experience anything like this. May try to disable touchpad while typing. It could be that you are touching the touchpad and it is causing your cursor to jump.

 

I don't notice much keyboard flex on my N71JQ. I think the N61JQ has more flex especially on the number pad side.
I have also not got any heating problems so far in the 1.5 months since I got it, but I did not try any games on it until now.

I don't find the screen bad at all. The color reproduction is not that bad. The horizontal viewing angle is better than the vertical viewing angle.
If I am not mistaken then I think the the N61JQ has a screen from different manufacturer than the one on the N71JQ. My N71JQ has LG Philips LP173WD1-TLC1 screen.

 

HEY GUYS!

Well i picked up my asus n71jq few hours ago!

Just did a clean install i installed some of the things on the driver CD. but i think i added some crap that i dont even need?

What is the best things to install? And also im bit of a program NEAT freak when it comes to my computers and i want to know how to have NONE of the crap load up in the task bar where the clock is?

Thanks guys.

Basically just want to know what are the MOST IMPORTANT drivers to download? cause i want the minimal installed but have all the obvious things installed, like bluetooth USB 3.0 etc etc

 

i have very little flex. not noticeable to me. I am a light typer, I guess.

I had xotic burn my recovery disc, they got it onto one dvd, not sure how, gotta ask Joseph, he also said its set up to do a clean install if I want to, too. He would email a walk-through.

as far heating issues, I have a cooler, so not an issue.

viewing angles are fine for me at my desk, I don't intend on using it elsewhere. pain to move USB hub and all the cables that I have neatly hidden on my desk.

as far as color reproduction, I think its fine for me.
my screen is an AUO LCD, i think?

 

HEY GUYS!

Well i picked up my asus n71jq few hours ago!

Just did a clean install i installed some of the things on the driver CD. but i think i added some crap that i dont even need?

What is the best things to install? And also im bit of a program NEAT freak when it comes to my computers and i want to know how to have NONE of the crap load up in the task bar where the clock is?

Thanks guys.

Basically just want to know what are the MOST IMPORTANT drivers to download? cause i want the minimal installed but have all the obvious things installed, like bluetooth USB 3.0 etc etc

ALSO: How come when i plugged in my external HDD and DIGITAL camera into the USB 3.0 slot the transfer rate was SLOW AS ANYTHING???

the driver is installed apparently so dunno what is up with that?

 

consult the bloatware guide. http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=380681 I got rid of most of what came with the computer, it will still be on the drivers and utilities disc if you want to re install something later. I am still figuring out what I would use and whatnot and have uninstalled what I know I won't use.

driver wise, I am sure you will need them all. otherwise won't work correctly.

there is realy nothing running in my taskbar other trend micro, there pinned icons for my external drive, and a few control panels, that's it. only programs in the startup menu are bluetooth software and the SRS sound software.

USB 3.0 will run as 2.0 until you have USB 3.0 supported device, which to my knowledge no present camera, drive, etc is USB 3.0 compatible.

 

This key flex is annoying as hell and sometime it even kick me out of type mode as i'm responding to this thread. Unfortunately I don't have a USB keyboard to test out that theory but will definitely try...i don't want to do a clean slay...so much work and all the programs installed I've learned to find it useful.

I have tried shut down the touchpad and flex is still there and I think it "may" occurred less. I tried re-installing the keyboard driver and the multi-finger software. So far...its symptom is still present. I have been messing with the registry and deleting MS 2007 trial, maybe there's a correlation.

I'll post my result once I tried with a external keyboard. As for the heating issue..heat rejection is concentrated on the left side. Its really nice that the base does not get hot at all however, kinda worry if its sufficient cooling for the hard-drives located at the palm rest. What kind of specific heating issue does this model imposted? Otherwise, I will run a laptop cooler just in case and still fairly cold weather so doesn't bother me as I called my winter fingers/drinks warmer.

 

How did ya find the exact model? I only know mine is by Samsung and a generic model number by checking with Everest.

 

On mine Everest displays the exact model number.