Asus G51Jx Owners Lounge

Are you in the USA? If you are call them up on the telephone! You won't get anywhere using email, they will shine the whole thing on and string you out forever...calling is the only recourse we have when it comes to service. Here's the telephone number: 1-888-678-3688

Have your serial number ready when you call, and tell them that it's happened again, just like to somebody in your notebookreview.com group!

Good Luck, and call now!

 

I have also used a stock downloaded copy of windows 7 to reformat my g51jx because when purchased in Australia no recovery or backup or driver disks are provided at all which was a disappointment.

No biggie though because everything is easily downloaded.

I guess the awesome bag and mouse and extra power cord cut their profit margins a lil thin and left no room for a couple of dvds. haha.

P.s. aww, nobody cares that my lappy is running cooler thanks to ntune
haha

PPS. apparently ntune causes bluescreens with new cards. Is this true? I have had no such issues yet.

 

Mr GMcD, where did you download your copy of Windows from? I am curious because I have been told that it's on the Microsoft web site, and at Digital River's web site also, and yet I cannot find them there.

You would help out a lot if you could source your Windows 7 download for us, thank you very much...

I did note that your G51JX-A1 is running cooler with nTune, the nVidia software suite for Mhz on nVidia video cards. May I ask why you haven't tried EVGA's Precision v1.9.6 yet? It's far superior to the nVidia utility I assure you, and it is infinitely variable for both underclocking and overclocking, so you might benefit from trying it out...

If you prefer nTune please tell us why, if you don't mind...curious?

I have always used EVGA's control panel, since I use their video cards in my desktop computers (GTX-285's and now GTX-480's), it's nothing personal about nVidia's utility, it's simply that I have access to the EVGA utility much more easily...

 

Hey Rex,

Yes I'm certain that I downloaded the software from the Windows site somewhere. Ill look into it again as it was a few months ago now. May be different now. Also downloading from the Australian site may be different.
Either way, we all know of many other sources to get copies of install iso files. Using the registration code on the bottom of your case works fine. You just need to activate using the phone method instead.

Edit: Try this site. Its not exactly where I got it from, but it downloads as a trial which can be fully activated with your serial.

http://www.windows7download.com/win7-windows-7-x64/ouhjaoei.html

/Edit

As for underclocking my gts360m, the reason I use the nVidia suite is because when I attemped what I wanted with EVGA precision 1.9.6 the utility was unable to force the card any lower than about 20% of the typical performance mode clock or memory speeds. Apparently it is unable to switch off 3D performance mode with 2 monitors.
I also tried many other overclocking utilities with no such luck. (MSI Afterburner, Rivatuner, ATI Tool and more)

The nvidia suite also allows me to set profiles, so I can switch between my "super underclocked" state and stock high performance mode clocks.
I have nothing against overclocking, I just have not bothered trying with my G51 yet and probably wont until games begin to seriously cripple in performance
By cripple I mean less than 25fps below 800x600. (I have low standards thanks to the lack of gpu power of my last laptop )

All my drivers are updated and I have a very clean machine in terms of crapware.

 

Allow me:

Home Premium x86: http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65732/X15-65732.iso
Home Premium x64: http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65733/X15-65733.iso
Professional x86: http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65804/X15-65804.iso
Professional x64: http://msft-dnl.digitalrivercontent.net/msvista/pub/X15-65805/X15-65805.iso

Now that MS can centrally manage keys & remotely turn them off, I've heard weird things about certain product keys working only with certain media. This is back in my MSDN Universal subscription days. Those of you that know what MSDN Universal is, I'm sure you lament the new system as much as I do!

The ISOs linked to above (as I understand it) were posted as part of the student upgrade program. I don't know if you need to have a "student specific" product key (or whether such an animal exists), but if what Rexrzer is saying is true then the product key on the bottom of your notebook should validate with these ISOs. Your mileage may vary on this, so maybe take a snapshot of your current install before attempting this. HOWEVER: Don't try your Win7 Home x64 key with anything other than the Win7 Home x64 ISO, ok? (common sense)

Anyway, thanks for the clarification & confirmation.

R.

 

I'm not sure if anyone else had this issue but I have recently found out that my desktop wallpaper slideshow had an annoying habit of forgetting the slideshow and settling on a single wallpaper. I couldn't figure out why it was doing that and it annoyed the heck out of me to keep changing back to the theme I wanted.

I think it is connected to the Power4Gear program/power plans. Whenever I set a theme with a slideshow in one P4G power setting and then switched to a different P4G plan, it reset my theme. However, after setting the power saving/balanced/high power win7 default schemes and switching between them, I have had no problems.

Only difference as far as I can tell is that you can't manually set turbo/extreme turbo, so I'll be using the base options for now (as I haven't found the need to turbo for games yet).

Not sure if anyone else has found this issue but if you have, and have any other solutions (with P4G) let me know. Otherwise, I hope this helps!

 

Mr.GMcD--thanks for all that info! So the nVidia CP allows you to make up profiles and can take the card settings down below 20% of stock timings, which nothing else will do...interesting! I can see why you prefer it for that purpose now, so I've learned something new today, and it's appreciated!! Also thanks for the source for Win 7 ISO/image, as that will or should be posted on the front page or linked there in any case, for those who need such things.

Mr. robbied, you are Da Man! That is exactly what we are looking for, ie the source at Digital River for the ISO's for the various OS's of Win 7...THANKS! You are so right also about the product keys being controlled remotely and indiscriminately by MS these days, so one must be careful...

However the COA on the bottom of our laptops is specific to the G51JX series and issued by Asus per notebook, and that Certificate of Authenticity (COA) should ONLY be used on a copy or ISO or other sourced Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, and no other type of installation! As you wrote it's common sense, but many times people will try to "upgrade" their notebooks to Ultimate or Professional versions with the OEM COA, and that just doesn't work and MS will "flag" the COA, perhaps disable it completely, if you do that sort of thing!

For the record I'll state it one, more time: the COA on the bottom of the notebook is to be used for validating an ISO or Retail copy of Windows 7 Home Premium ONLY, if Windows asks for the COA during a Clean Install session, or any other re-installation during the course of ownership...that is what it is for! DO NOT try to use that COA on any other version of Windows 7 than Home Premium 64-bit, or you will potentially have serious issues using the COA!!

Hmmm, I see, so you are toggling between various P4G settings and having issues with the slideshow on the desktop, yes, that is a problem! It doesn't "remember" much of anything, it turns out, and using the default Win 7 settings does not allow for Turbo or Extreme Turbo at all, that is purely a P4G setting, manually set, and ONLY a P4G setting as it changes the FSB and QPI ratios in BIOS on a one-time basis...any restart or shut down reverts back to standard 1.6Ghz setting (Extreme Turbo=1696Mhz or 1.7Ghz) on all Cores, with single-Core turbo boost up to 2.8Ghz for single Core application use.

Turbo Boost is automatic with the Core i7 720QM CPU, people must understand this...and all the P4G CP does is 'enhance' the Turbo Boost manually by increasing the FSB and QPI settings in BIOS, but on demand without using P4G our laptops can/will respond to heavy load increases on a single Core basis up to 2.8Ghz, and with all Cores (four base Cores and 4 HyperThreaded Cores=8 Cores) up to 1.7Ghz or 1696Mhz...P4G simply sets that ratio as constant rather than "burst mode", and defines it as being Extreme Turbo or Turbo...until you shut down or restart, and the P4G CP reverts back to 1.6Ghz unless manually prompted with Extreme Turbo/Turbo command again. :GEEK:

I use Extreme Turbo when I am using the laptop for Folding@Home, which makes the CPU about 7% faster than without using it, on all 8 Cores considering HyperThreading, and that makes a work unit finish quicker than without Extreme Turbo. If I fail to set P4G the most I get out of all Cores is 1600Mhz, as Folding@Home takes all available Cores and pushes the CPU as high as it will go. :wink:

That we have such a control panel is a good thing to me, as we can extract a little extra out of the CPU when we want to, but it never has interacted with the Windows default Energy Saver settings, nor did Asus mean it to, at least that is my take on it. You have two choices, and that is go with manual intervention and get more power and HyperThreading out of the CPU, or leave the system on Windows default settings and be happy with 1.6Ghz top speed, and "burst speed" up to 1.7Ghz and 2.8Ghz only.

The Energy Saver settings, along with everything that goes with that including the "slide show" are Windows settings, not P4G settings, and P4G will never be sophisticated enough to include such things as Asus only meant it to be an extra boost for those so inclined, not a replacement for Energy Saver settings...and we should all understand that up front when using the CPs. :yes:

UPDATE:

As an aside I've done some testing on my laptop since I added the 16GB RAM into the system, and the laptop now starts up in 17 seconds from a cold boot, and restarts in about 12 seconds! Compare that with about 27 seconds with 8GB RAM for cold boot start, and restarts about 22 seconds, and you can see how snappy things have become. I have a noticeably quicker laptop in all respects, launching programs, sustaining multiple programs with multiple open windows and ongoing programs being about 50% quicker responding across the board, plus I have a vast reserve of available RAM vs having 8GB loaded, literally twice as much...with PS3, iTunes playing music, Google Chrome with approximately 20 tabs open, FAHome 'On', and various other systems working including P4G, Real Temp Beta 3.30, CPU-Z, Windows Task Manager, I am using just about 14% of available RAM, that is all!

I am going to do some bandwidth tests with Everest Ultimate later tonight, and we'll see just how heavy the throughput is now vs 8GB RAM, but it should literally just about double itself with 16GB RAM loaded. I am extremely pleased about this "upgrade" and endorse it 100% for anybody with the means and the need for doing it, bar none. There is no such thing as too much RAM!

Have a good evening...

 

Rex,

Yes I'm in the US. I called support and they had me reinstall the intel chipset drivers, Wireless console, reset Bios, system restore...all didn't work. Now they want me to do a full system recovery to bring it back to original factory software and settings, so I'm going to wait until the weekend here to try. I don't have a lot of confidence in this, however, but we'll see and I'll let everyone know

 

Rex,

How much did you paid for all of that 16GB of RAM?

 

I agree and also found it odd. I am much happier now with idle temps the low 60's rather than low 80s. Its really a big difference and I highly recommend performing the underclock it to anyone else with a dual monitor setup who wishes for their machine to last as long as possible.

Ps. Anyone know whether a 3x monitor setup would work? Hdmi splitter or something? (Would probably only duplicate the desktop anyway. Not really interested in anything like triple head2go, just curious.

PPS. I feel outdone by robbied with the links

 

THAT is so dumb! God Dang Asus Tech Support! You have, plain Jane Simpleton, lost your BlueTooth by the BIOS update, JUST LIKE I DID! They are just wasting your time and their time, and your notebook will have to go in for service just like mine did, unfortunately, and they will probably lie to you too about "how they fix it", telling you some such drivel like they told me...."we reset BIOS, loaded Defaults in BIOS, and BlueTooth came back", and the unit tested 100%, or so they told me. Bah Humbug!

I wish you some good luck dealing with them, but they seem to be incapable of admitting that the BIOS is bad JuJu for laptop BlueTooth, and in fact that it destroys BlueTooth capability. Maybe they will give you the time of day once you perform the Recovery operation, and nothing happens from it!

God Dang those people, they are so arrogant, you know? I have no respect for them any more, even if they did fix my laptop eventually, after some 10 days of work on it, apparently...and then they told me "the big lie", yah? I don't go for any of it, and God only knows how they actually got my BT back!

Good Luck, and let us know how far out it gets before they admit what has happened in your case...I KNOW what happened, it's just a matter of proving it that is all... :rolleyes2:

Are you serious? Here's the URL for the memory that I scored to bring mine up to 16GB RAM, and it's the cheapest this RAM has ever been fyi! Multiply the cost of one of those SODIMMs x 4 and you'll get the total I paid...I paid no tax and free shipping, as my company has Amazon Prime and we get free 2nd Day Air shipping on anything and everything we buy there...nice, huh? :yes:

Amazon.com: Corsair 4 GB DDR3 Laptop Memory CMSO4GX3M1A1333C9: Electronics

Robbied did snow all of us on those links, didn't he Hah-Hah! :laugh:

As for your question about 3 monitors, there's an ABC laptop computer on this page:

USB 2.0 Graphics Adapter (UGA-2K-A) | Plugable

that is running 7 monitors! How about that? :laugh:

Anything is possible, just ask, and the Lord will provide, Hah-Hah!

Seriously though, you would need 3 of those switches, one per monitor, and then you would simply plug each monitor into one of your USB Ports on the laptop and BAM! Instant 3 monitor setup!

See, I told you not to ask me about that!

Have fun, and let me know if you do such a thing, as I could be interested in doing the same with my laptop also...

 

Hi- first time posting. I have one of these laptops and every time I hibernate it and wake it back up, the laptop hangs at the "Republic of Gamers" boot-up screen (you know that screen that makes the explosion and the booming noise). Do you know what could be wrong with it? I need to turn it off and turn it on again-- it boots up correctly after I do that.

 

Are you still @ BIOS v204? If you are go up one notch to BIOS v206, the good BIOS, and see if that cures what ails your machine. If you are already @ v206 BIOS I have no idea what is wrong, but suggest my standard Clean Install remedy, which cures practically everything about this laptop's bloatware, crapolaware, and wasted-space-ware (aka Express Gate=350MB of junk you'll never use)...and most other common problems. :yes:

Have you ever used a Registry Cleaner on the laptop? You might try that for a cheap shot at fixing it, if you have never done it before, and the one to get free is Glary Registry Cleaner, which you can Google and find easily.

If you want the best Registry Cleaner it's by PC Tools, and it's called Registry Mechanic, which is $29.99 a year for the privilege of using it on all your computers, no matter how many (unlimited license)...your Registry could be all tweaked out and full of problems, unless you use such a tool presently, and that could explain things hanging up like they are doing. :wub:

Other than those suggestion, which are all shots in the dark by the way, I have no idea, as that is truly strange!

Good luck, and hope that I've helped somehow...

 

Thank you! I'll try the Glary Registry cleaner. I really appreciate your help.

 

Hey, I'm not sure if this has been posted yet, but its an application to monitor Intel's Turbo Boost.

Intel® Turbo Boost Technology Monitor

Here's a picture of it in action, it's in the top right: http://i.imgur.com/ITB8a.jpg

 

Dammit - I flashed 208 and have no bluetooth. Wish I had read a little bit further through these forums.

Dang - just bought another 2x2G to bring it to 8G. Ah well - probably more than enough for my needs at this point, although I haven't opened the pkg yet so could send 'em back and get 2x4Gs. 12G would more than cover me.

Funny thing about that link - they are charging $94 for 1x4G sticks, or $194 for 2 of the same 4G sticks. "If you buy 2, we'll charge you MORE!" I know this happens, particularly with RAM, but I just think it's funny when it happens because doing as Rexrzer did and ordering 2 or 4 of the single sticks is cheaper for him, but more of a pain for the retailer.

Question for you smart guys out there: Is there any way to disable some or all of the Fn keys? That Fn+F1 key is too close to a macro key I use a fair amount (CTRL+F1), so I've put my machine to sleep more than a few times by accident. I wish the volume wasn't a soft key or I'd disable them all, so I guess I'm hoping I can disable (or reassign) them one by one. Any thoughts?

Oh - just for your smile of the day, I thought I'd share this little email I received from Asus tech support after asking what disc I could use for a clean install (I've bolded & highlighted my favourite part):

P.S. Thanks for the kind words on the links. Just some creative googling. I will try the clean install from one of those ISOs on the weekend and report the results. What benchmarks would you like me to run on my "factory" system and the "clean" one (assuming it works) to show any delta?

 

Lest you all think I'm crazy or some kind of techno-junky that just has to have the damndest, craziest hardware in everything he owns, I want to post up some graphics from Everest Ultimate v5.5.8x.x (I am a registered owner of Everest and my copies are paid for, not trial copies that won't do the tests I am putting up tonight) that shows just how good laptops can perform with the right kind and quantity of RAM/SODIMM memory on board.

Stupid me I didn't do 'before and after' tests so you could see just how much better this laptop is working with 16GB of RAM vs. 8GB of RAM, but I do hope that these graphics will give you an idea of just how powerful 16GB of RAM actually is....because the graphics/graphs themselves have nothing but top-echelon hardware being tested and my little laptop comes out waaaaaay HIGH up there in the standings with 16GB of RAM.

Throughput is measured in MB/sec with RAM, and when you see throughput that is higher than computers that are running full loads of RAM with CPU's that are 3Ghz and higher you must be doing something right! And the computers that I have better throughput than are many, many quad and high Mhz CPU's that *should* be performing better than this little Asus G51JX-A1 is doing, but I handily outpace them in all the important tests, and not just by a little bit, but if you take a little time and read which computers I am beating with my 16GB of RAM it's pretty much an eye-opening situation...

Check it out, and then call me crazy... Everest Ultimate's test for RAM throughput is recognized as "the standard" to judge other computers and setups, so I am 100% HAPPY about this performance that I witnessed last night with this G51 laptop with 16GB of RAM on board...the laptop is faster than sin on the Bible right now, it just couldn't be better than it is, and my purchase is justified because I actually do use the notebook for RAM intensive applications and it saves me a bunch of time and energy to be able to complete assignments quickly, certainly much more quickly than when I had 8GB RAM.

EDIT: Looks like I can't post any attachments!
I will go back through my old attachments and REMOVE some of them so that I can post further...then we'll let you see about the RAM performance...sorry about that!

 

Here are those graphics as promised!

 

So, just RMAd my lappy due to updating the BIOS and losing the bluetooth. Not sure how long it will take to get it back, but they said it was the only way to repair it...ugh.

BTW, this forum is awesome! I really have found so much helpful advice and better support here than with Asus support,

 

WOW they are great scores Rex. Seriously though... thats huge bandwidth.

 

Did you already send it off via FedEx, or is that tomorrow? Depending on where you live (I live in SouthernCalifornia, and Fremont, CA 94538 (NorthernCal) where Asus Tech/RMA Support lives, is 2 UPS Zones away, so it takes just 1 business day from there to my place, and back) and what type of service (FedEx) they gave you? Did you get FedEx Next Day Saver like I did, or Ground? :wub:

Once they physically get the laptop it goes quickly there, if all the paperwork is in order of course. Give them 3-4 business days to check it in, diagnose, repair, then 1 business day for shipping/packing, so about 1 week *inside* Asus plus transit times of FedEx is a good general outlook (positive) on service at Asus Tech/RMA Support. :wink:

How did you come to RMA it? Did you try the Recovery and it failed (most likely, I would guess because mine failed miserably, and I have a fresh backup at all times with Paragon Drive Backup giving me daily backups)? Were they finally *nice* to you, admit the BIOS frucked up the laptop? That Supervisor who helped me sure told me a bunch of stories as he did my paperwork, about the 3 other laptops like mine he handled with BIOS updates/BT failures, named Sadiq and a very nice guy, but in the end he didn't follow up well with my paperwork...The 1st guy I talked to apparently got the serial number for my UL30VT-X1 into the mix somehow, and the Super used THAT serial number for my laptop's RMA! ==BIG MESS UP! Fiasco in fact, resulting in my laptop sitting idle for 3-4 days while we got that straightened out.

If you don't have any issues with paperwork being bad, like I did, it should be short and sweet to fix yours. I'll bet that they replace your BT module, like they did on mine... I've disassembled mine and found a new Broadcom BT module and new motherboard, yessir I sure did! I'm just too curious about it when I know I'm being lied to, as they did to me about "flashing the BIOS, loading defaults and all was well"...their story to me. BS!!

I knew something was up because the CPU seal was missing when I opened mine up to reinstall all my hardware when I got it back, so two nights ago, I was bored, and I just tore it apart and found the new parts and pieces upon inspection--it is an easy laptop to tear apart and work on, luckily.

I think you'll find that they probably lie to you too, so call them on the repair and ask what they did to fix the BT module? Ask them if they replaced any parts? Ask them why it failed? Ask them why don't they REMOVE the BAD BIOS off the web sites? You of all people should be unhappy about what happened, even with my warnings, still, BIOS v.208 is bad along with v.207 and they are still UP on the web sites, big as the rising sun! :cry:

I just will never trust them again, and will NOT be updating my BIOS for any reason whatsoever, as long as the laptop continues to work fine it STAYS like it is right now, with BIOS v.207, the new BT module and MBoard, and all is well in China! Hah-Hah!

Beware Asus Tech Support, they LIE to you! Bad JuJu from BIOS is a cruel thing to get, you know that? I wonder how many have bricked their BT and don't even know it because they don't use it? Hah-Hah! (wicked laugh!) :yes: :yes: :yes:

I am on board with them for the full 3 years--bought the Global Asus 3-Year Warranty w/Accidental Damage when I got the laptop--it was only $129 for the whole deal when it was new, but still, I will never, ever trust them again, not since this episode has gone down. If they told me the truth I could swallow what they did, but they lied about it and I don't go for that BS!

Great laptop though, and Thanks to God they fixed it right...I got lucky again and got a good technician, it seems, just like when my UL30VT-X1's RAM died, and they had to replace both modules with new 1333Mhz SODIMMs, Nanya brand it is, which I was using one of in the G51 before I installed the 16GB of Corsair 1333Mhz RAM...I long ago installed 8GB of 1066Mhz RAM in the UL30VT-X1, so that nice, fast Nanya RAM was sitting idle...until I got this one and it needed 2GB RAM to make 8GB RAM happen.

I am glad you got yours into the shop quickly, sooner than later! Good for you! :rolleyes2: Now just see if they tell the truth about how they fix it, and chances are they won't considering they still have bad BIOS up...bad JuJu!

Good luck in any case, and I hope yours gets back to you quickly, and in good shape...

 

Yes, you must have read them thoroughly Mr. GMcD! I am pretty stoked about hitting almost 11K MB/sec in Read speed, over 10.5KMB/sec in Copy Speed, and finishing no worse than 8th amongst all those Big SERVERS and dual quad cores, plus the Core i7 965 @ 3333Mhz, and those Xeons were not that far away either...even latency wasn't bad @ 62ms or so, finishing 8th there...so yeah, that was an awesome display of lots of RAM doing its thing!

Note that it was pegged at 1420Mhz RAM speed, so that is good RAM, since it is being overclocked and not faltering once, not yet anyway! :yes:

I just think these are fantastic mobile HM55 boards and the 16GB RAM loadup sure is being used well, when you analyze all those scores and see at least 10K MB/sec except for writes, which is 8900+MB/sec, then in PhotoWorxx it hits 22,000+MB/sec, a real display of RAM power... :smile:

It was fun doing all those tests, honestly, even I was surprised at the results...my Core i7 920 desktop server with 24GB RAM was jealous, Hah-Hah!

Everybody can say I'm nutz... but at least the certification is a good one!

 

I couldn't resist giving my Core i7 920 server a crack at those "other" computers in the Everest Ultimate tests, so check out *THESE SCORES*--Hah-Hah!

Everybody gets WAXED here, there is no mercy, I win!

This is my server down to just 12GB physical RAM, as I have had to return 12GB, a whole set ( 3 x 4GB DIMMs) because one went South on me, and this is G. Skill "Purple Wonders" 1600Mhz DDR3 SDRAM DIMMs, the finest overclockable RAM on the planet, even better than the revered Corsair Dominator....which I gave up to get this stuff.

Enjoy!

 

Ridiculous scores right there

How on earth can you afford all that ram haha.

Edit:

Is it possible for the old model g51 back plate to fit the newer g51jx? I have seen some of the airflow mods that have been performed on the "subwoofer" or large circular area on the bottom and was possibly thinking about performing my own. Not on the original backplate but one I would purchase. I have nothing wrong with idle around the low 60's, but lower is always better. Also summer is a coming in Aus, and ambient temperatures of 30 deg plus without aircon doesnt really help when the graphics is running hot

Edit Again: I think I answered my own question. Really good looking mod. http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus/411871-asus-g51-cooling-mod.html

 

Just wondering if I have a good paste job... I'm topping out at about 86-88 degrees on my GPU and roughly 60 degrees on my CPU.

I have IC Diamond 7 compound.

So... is this good/bad/ugly? Seems high, but not sure what to expect from this compound/gaming laptops. I haven't used either before this one.

 

Those temps are right where they should be under stress...couldn't be much better unless your ambient temperature is sub 60F.

 

sweet thanks!

 

Rexr

I live in Washington, DC and it's going to Jeffersonville, IN. Sent out today, Friday, FedEx Express Saver, so not as fast as what you got. I made sure I filled out all of the paperwork just as requested, and made copies.

They had me do several steps, from dl Intel Chipset software to reinstalling the Wireless console and uninstalling BT then trying to reinstall it (which failed as it doesn't show as even installed in the device manager). Did a system restore...failed, then a complete system recovery...failed (no surprise there). I told them about this forum and got a supervisor on the phone. I said, couldn't I just downgrade the bios? Nope he said, there was nothing more I could do and had to RMA it. Didn't tell me they would replace the BT module, but I'm sure that's why they couldn't work with me and needed it back in the shop. I'm using an old Dell lappy that chugs along like a snail, but at least I have something.

I will call them once I get it back and question them. I'll have to look at the extended warranty, but don't want to drop too much change on that one. Makes me think twice if I would ever buy an ASUS lappy again.

Anyway, appreciate all of the help. I'll report back on here with what happens...

 

I just got one of these (the X3), and I'm planning on doing a clean install; does anyone have Microsoft's official download link for the Windows 7 iso so I can burn a recovery disc? I've found a couple files and some of them vary in size so I'm not sure which is the correct one.

 

Look back a page or two.

 

Is it just me or this laptop (G51Jx 3D in my case, with Atheros AR9285) loses a lot of speed (bandwidth) if the WiFi signal isn't the best?
I mean, I'm in a place where the WiFi signal is about 30-40% I get usually 6Mb/s or so at speedtest (sometimes it's higher - almost 8Mb/s, other times it goes so low that I start lagging in the game that I play). The weird is that sometimes even during those very low speed times I check speedtest on my iPod Touch and I get like 8.2Mb/s.
Most of the times, checking the laptop and the ipod almost at the same time (not really at the same time, I'm not crazy!), the ipod gets a higher speed like 95% of the times.
In this place, where I have the laptop, I've already checked speedtest with the iPod Touch and a HP crappy laptop, and my notebook is the one that performed worse. I've already tested it in some other places with almost the same signal percentage, and the got the same comparative results (Asus [6Mb/s] < iPod [8.2Mb/s] < HP [8.75Mb/s - the same I get in my desktop which is connected by a wired connection]).
If I go to a place where it gets 60% or so, then I can get the 8.75Mb/s.
I also tried using it at my living room (with one floor between it and the floor where the router is located) and surprisingly it was able to find it and to connect to the internet, while the HP was able to find it but was having some trouble to connect to it and my iPod Touch wasn't even able to find it.
Is it normal that it's being beaten by the iPod Touch when the signal is moderate? I mean, a laptop with those antennas failing against the iPod Touch with that little antenna.
Oh, and I've also noticed that sometimes the signal varies (usually increasing) by like 10-20% when I close it (the signal value takes some time to update, so after leaving it closed for a bit, I open it and it still shows the value as if it was closed for a little time before changing to the lower value).
Btw, I've already tried various drivers of the Atheros WiFi card and all seemed to have this performance. The one I'm using now is 9.0.0.173 and I'm using the latest BIOS (208).

 

That really depends on what you are calling "topping out", ie what application/game etc you are using. I wouldn't call the IC Diamond good or bad JuJu until I'd run 20X iterations of LinX 0.6.3 @ full tilt boogie and *then* see what temps you are getting. Are you using Real Temp v.3.30 or better to get temps, or Hardware Monitor? I recommend using Real Temp vs. Hardware monitor, as it actively uses the built-in sensors on the laptop vs. "interpreting" data from the sensors like HW Monitor does.

You can also monitor Load with Real Temp, and if you don't see 100% Load like you do with LinX you aren't truly, honestly testing the stress level of that laptop. If you need a source for LinX let me know and I'll post it for you...I am hosting it myself at my .Mac web site in case you don't have it.

LinX is the best true test of all of the "stress testing" apps, and it's the basis for many such as OCCT and others, ie they use the LinX kernel and modify it, but there's nothing like the real thing. Pass 20X iteration of LinX, using the "All Memory" setting and you'll know how good that thermal paste is, whether it was worth the price of admission. FYI if you are getting 88-degrees C "topping out" with games and the like, LinX will push that CPU to more than 100-degrees, and you will see "throttling" going down if it goes higher than 100-degrees C, if you know what that is...it's the CPU actively cutting its load by shutting down Cores until the thing cools off a bit!

That is my suggestion, not to dampen your party, but you aren't stressing it, not really, unless you use LinX and/or PRIME 95, or both, to test it...that's the bottom line. FYI mine tests @ high 80's Celsius on the CPU at 100% Load using LinX 0.6.3, 20X iterations, using maximum RAM setting, hyperthreading 8 Cores, and the GPU I have no idea about...LinX stress tests the CPU, RAM, and loads it all up at once and tries to *break* the computer, simple enough explanation I guess, in fact if you have never tested a computer using LinX you ain't seen nothin' yet, that I will write!

Again, let me know if you don't know where to get LinX and I'll post my URL for my .Mac Public Folder and you can download it from there. I don't mean to upset the apple cart at all, but if you really want a stress test that's the method, and the only real method there is...

 

Man, you asked a LOT of questions about WiFi!! Zowie! The Atheros 5985 card is a moderate performing WiFi PCI-Express Mini-card, and you are getting average to good numbers from it, so don't stress yourself out over nothing! The Atheros card is two (2) antennas, while the laptop has three (3) antennas built in, and I suggest a simple Mod for you if you are that critical about the WiFi: go to the WiFi chip that I use, and you will gain two ways: 1) you gain dual-band sensitivity and 2) you gain high bandwidth.

Here's a white paper on the Intel Ultimate N-6300 WiFi card and how/why it performs like it does. The Atheros card is 2.4Ghz *only* while the Intel card is 2.4/5/8Ghz both, and simultaneously both ways to boot (inbound and outbound at the same time!), so you really gain a LOT of bandwidth with the Intel card. In addition it hits up to 450Mb/sec while the Atheros 5985 is limited to 150Mb/sec, a HUGE difference!

http://download.intel.com/network/connectivity/products/prodbrf/323017.pdf

I never used my Atheros card, just installed the Intel N-6300 Ultimate system when mine was brand new, so I don't even know what the Atheros card performs like, but I have had other laptops with those WiFi cards in them, and they are limited in effectiveness for certain, that much I will write. I have a netbook with an Atheros card in it, and it does fine for its uses but I can't stream effectively with it, while the N-6300 is quite effective at streaming media.

I have an AppleTV and I can stream directly from the ATV to my laptop using my Home network, which is a Linksys/Cisco 3000L router, the newest, best router you can get these days which has 2.4/5.8Ghz banding and constant 300Mb/sec speed, with burst speed up to 600Mb/sec (!), and I have no issue viewing an ATV movie or video at full 1080P on the G51 laptop, and I also have never seen it drop a channel when doing multiple downloads at the same time (!), something you can do at your leisure with the Intel card, impossible with an Atheros card...there are other things it does well also, ie read that PDF and you will get the whole spiel on the N-6300 WiFi card.

The N-6300 can be bought for less than $40 if you look around (amazon.com, and other retailers/etailers have it right now), and the install is painless and simple: just two little screws, remove the antennas and take out the old card, insert the new card, click the antenna's onto the new card, and reboot, install the drivers off the CD ROM that comes with the card, or download the latest from the Intel web site (which is what I did), and reboot again, and BAM! You are handled...

If you like high speed WiFi that's the ticket, and I hope this primer has helped you out some...

ps welcome to the group, and see you around here!

 

My replacement laptop came in Friday/03
They won't give it to me... why? because the packaging box no longer has the Serial Number (and Barcode) because it was cut off for the $100 mail in rebate... Instuctions specifically said to cut off the serial number and send it to ASUS.. WHY the would they tell me to do that IF I WAS GOING TO ING NEED It to return my DEFECTIVE product


They should of said something like dont send in that mail in rebate yet just in case your laptop breaks>>>>>>>>>>

$1,600 laptop that BSOD's when gaming, have done a clean install... only to find out some of the drivers don't install and the camera stops working, so I wiped again and restored it to default settings (Used the driver disc) all the drivers are on and I'm still BSODS

I can't even ship to ASUS becaause dont have the original packaging serial.... (TECHNCALLY THEY HAVE IT) All I can do is take the trip up to Toronto, and drop it off but when am i going to find the time for that!?


If ANYBODY ELSE has had a problem like this and has fixed it then please QUOTE THIS POST on what you did....
More information... the CPU idles at 57 degrees Celcius
the GPU idles at 55 degrees celcius
The CPU runs at 70 - 80 degrees celcius when gaming
The GPU runs at 80 - 95 degrees celcius when gaming
The BLUE SCREEN HAS ONLY OCCURED WHEN GAMING for usually a few hours
(no minidump files wiped out all temp files)
Any Help is Appreciated

 

Ooops, the Indiana tech facility...gosh I hope that they do a good job for you...if it was coming out here to Fremont I'd have no worries, but I have heard that the Indy place is spotty quality-control wise, so say a prayer or two for the laptop! Oh you betcha they are going to replace the Broadcomm WiFi module, that's what they do to fix these things...there is no substitute, as the bad BIOS flash renders them dead as doornails, kills them dead 100%.

It remains to be seen if they replace your board, too, but it's pretty easy to check out once you get it back. There are a couple places where there are seals and tabs that get *broken* when you disassemble the whole machine, and you cannot avoid it unfortunately (nothing serious, just part of doing a maintenance on them, that is all), and you can see that straight away once you've taken off the bottom cover and/or the keyboard, so you will know...plus the CPU sticker gets scrunched also, and they generally don't replace them as a rule, so that's another tell-tale sign there.

I see that they made you jump through the same hoops I did, including the Recovery or "Backup, Nuke and Pave", which is what I did with mine, as I had a backup from the night before handy when they told me to do the Recovery and see if that brought back BlueTooth to life, and it did NOT! Still DOA, and that is when they gave me an RMA with the fast shipping et al.

It is really a shame that this keeps happening, because it's all about that bad BIOS that is still up on the web page, and people are using it too! I fail to see why they keep it up, it just doesn't make sense...

Good luck with it, in any case---I think that you'd best keep an eagle-eye on that situation with the Indy facility for RMA/Tech Support, as I have yet to hear about a good repair there, they are mostly not good news at that particular Asus Tech Support/RMA place.

If they don't repair it correctly you can always insist on the Fremont, CA 94538 repair place next time...

 

Hi! I already installed an Intel 6300 in a netbook, bud i had to add two antennas.
Are you saying the G51 usually have 3 antennas connectors ready next to the card, so i won't have to remove the screen?

 

I also have marginal performance with the Atheros wifi.
Using the program wirelessmon gives me around 13% reception from my typical laptop desk position.

My main issue is living on university campus and barely getting reception about 5 rooms from the router in the main foyer. I only ever use the wifi for steam anyway, and only to connect at that as all the games work on cable after the initial connection. Weird workings by the IT dept. I know.

I have looked at upgrading my wifi to the same as Rexrzer727 has in his G51JX but talked myself out of it because at the moment my only gain would be a bit of reception for a little bit of gaming. Connecting is as simple as opening a few doors to let the signal filter down the main hallway (Swear to god theyre made of lead )

Sure the wireless n and greater bandwidth would be awesome, but at the moment college cable at 10Mb/s download speeds suite me fine

 

Yes, you are all set with an Intel N-6300, you don't have to take anything apart, the 3rd antenna sits right there on the TOP of the PCI-Express Mini-WiFi card (Atheros 5985 in my notebook), taped down for your pleasure, and all you have to do is un-tape it, and snap it onto the N-6300 WiFi card and you are good to go! Piece of cake install, and no frame-bending removing the screen and all that jazz.

Fendora, take the bottom off your notebook, just for grins, and you'll see how accessible things are, in fact EVERYTHING is so easy to get to it's SICK! The WiFi card is right about at 11PM on the clock, left corner up high in the workspace on the bottom of the notebook, and that 3rd antenna is neatly, carefully tucked onto the WiFi card and taped down there, ready to rock!

Honest, you've got to take off the bottom of the machine and see for yourself, it's a piece of cake to do any mod on this thing, easy as pie-ala-mode!

Have fun!

 

I went to play a game a couple minutes ago, and found that the keyboard isn't accepting certain input combinations; for example, if you hold down shift and z and press x, it won't register the x (though it will register shift + x + c). Shift + z + s doesn't work either. Anyone else experienced this?

Found it, thanks.

 

Thanx rexrzer727, I know how easy to access the g51's components are, but i don't have mine already, i had two g50 and a g71 before. ^^
perhaps this week.

 

Does anyone else's laptop have a short delay between pressing the power button and the indicator LEDs on the front panel lighting up? Mine lags for about 3 to 4 seconds...is this normal?

 

Dang, you had me fooled...I thought you had one!

We'll celebrate a little when you finally get yours then, ok? Have a little online barbecue or something, Hah-Hah!

Good luck, and hope you gets yours soon, they are a blast!

 

Don't think it'll be a barbecue, i modded my G50 (undervolt, overclock, modded case...)... results :
P9700 @ 3Ghz 1.10v 50°c max
9800M GS o/c 9800M GTS @ 0.82v "Extra", 73°c max (Furmark hot like hell, default settings)

I will do the same for the G51j (Not a jx, so it's one with a GTX260M, HOT ^^ ).

I'll o/c the 260 of course.

 

Mine does that too, so I think it's normal. When I first turned on my laptop I thought it wasn't working because of that :laugh:

 

Same here. Sometimes its even up to 10 seconds. I have given up worrying about it

 

Still need help for the appove if anyone can ^

 

Hey rexrzer727, I'm planning to do a clean install on my computer. I read over your guide-- just one question. You've mentioned a list of drivers; are they all on the included driver/utilities DVD that came with the laptop? Or do I have to download each of them individually?

Oh, and I'm planning to install Windows 7 on a USB drive. You've mentioned to remove any sort of peripheral devices. Haha, obviously I keep the installation USB plugged in, right?

 

Thanks for your whole post, rexrzer727. I think I might buy the intel N-6300 (from ebay - couldn't find any portuguese shop that sells it). But I also wanted to ask you if its improvements over this Atheros are also great using a "not very good" router (which only supports b/g and not n).

 

Yes, definitely keep the USB Flash Drive plugged in! I sure hope so anyway...

All those drivers are available either on the web site, or the Utility and Driver DVD ROM that you got with the computer...I indiscriminately picked them off each source, depended on the driver and for the life of me I cannot recall which came from which source after all this time (did that deal in May 2010!)...YMMV, but yes that is where they are from. Good luck, and it really is a bit of a stretch to think it will all go perfect the 1st time you do such a thing so be prepared for a setback or two along the way...but eventually you'll get it all right and things will work much better than with all that Asus crapolaware and filler and games and BS, just tons of it heaped on the poor G51's...best to be rid of it all and start fresh.

You're welcome of course, and if you realllly liked my post give me a rep or two....nobody seems to do that anymore here! I haven't had a new Rep Up since July to be frank about it, and you'd think that the Answer Man here would be gettin' a few, but I don't... sad to say...

Listen that WiFi card is so powerful that any type of router, it doesn't matter really, you'll benefit from installing it with better range and better signal too, which I didn't really mention. Bandwidth is a function of the router and the WiFi card along with the efficiency of your signal, ie where you are in relation to it in the house/apartment/office etc. You cannot go wrong with the Intel WiFi n-6300 Ultimate, it's just a killah WiFi card, so go do it!

Fendora I did sniff out the sinister overclocker/underclocker/undervolter in you long ago, so that doesn't surprise me that you are getting the 'J" model, with the "hot" nVidia GTS-260M video getup, it figures! I have a rich guy friend who has every Asus notebook you can think of, in droves! And he has one of the "J" models with the GTS-260M and considers the GTS-360M a "step down" in terms of firepower, as the pixel pipelines were reduced from 128 to 96 with our GTS-360M video card, in case you didn't know that(you probably do already, but thought I'd let you know I know about that shiet too!)

He has a G73JX-A1, a UL30VT-A1, a UL80VT-A1, and on and on and on...one of them all literally, and plays nothing but games galore on all of them that are worthy of gaming, to the 9th degree, and he does like the fact that I can load mine up with 16GB of RAM but then again, I can't utilize 2 internal (two) HD's like his has either...so he wins on pixel power and HD capacity/utility, I guess!

I dunno, mine is plenty powerful, but never a dull moment also...to wit read my next post below...! What a Day I've Had!!! WOWOW! Crazy!

 

This has been one HELLUVA DAY, and it ain't over til the Fat Lady Sings, apparently...today I've:

1) Lost my OCZ SSD to the winds (absolute failure out of the blue, no warning, it just DIED DEAD AS A BOAR IN THE ROUGH SHOT THROUGH THE HEAD!) so no SSD for my G51 until OCZ replaces this sorry-arse thing, DANG! DAMN! Ding! Dong!

2) Clean Installed my OEM 500GB Seagate 7200RPM HD, out of desperation because I had no alternative SSD to use, and man what a drag that is!
These things are slow, slow slow!

3) Received 8GB of replacement RAM from Amazon.com, and they sent me the 8GB 'kit" since they were out of the individual SODIMM RAM modules (for an RMA, as I suspected I had a bad DIMM, and I did...) Saturday Red Label FedEx shipment, arrived @ 9:24AM today, and the hits haven't stopped...

4) Been fighting a heavy dose of BSOD's this evening when I hit the full power and Extreme Turbo setting, and I mean my machine just croaks! BAM! BSOD to the max, with four to six lines of coding for a source code on each one, so they involve RAM, the CPU, and the busses all...so I am trying to figure that out right now as I write this...perhaps the RAM they sent me is not matching up with the single module DIMMs from the 1st batch, I dunno...I am about worn out figuring things out right about now...been at it since 1PM PST...

5) LinX 0.6.3 is running right now 20X iterations @ Maximum RAM, so it's doing fine, not too hot, and the stability is fine, the RAM just doesn't like Turbo Boost/Extreme Turbo Boost! I am scratching my head right now!

That's the story, and I'll tell you all more as I know and find out more, like I am going to test each DIMM in another CPU to make certain they are all good, one by one,and I'll be up all night doing that failing a revelation

Say a prayer for me, I am burned like the neon night lights in a Bordello right now, but determined to find out what is causing the BSOD's in my machine, and they are Lights Out BSOD's, have to Load Defaults in BIOS to get the machine back, it is NOT pretty!!

Later people...I will tell you more when I know more...