Asus UL30VT FAQ / Official Owners Lounge redux

You missed my point, it's the CPU/Intel usage vs video quality not the overall bit rate...and 4 bits makes a nibble

 

Hey guys, i am new here and just got my ul30vt 2 days ago. On my 2nd use, the HD started to making "clicking" noises when idle, and I am trying to upload a screen shot by HD Tune.

Can anyone help me with the # show, esp. on the raw read error rate. Thanks a lot!

 

I'm pretty much completed the undervolt set up. Big thanks to Romir for getting my interest up and the screen shots.

My only snag now is that my hard drive runs hotter. Not having the fan run as much, longer battery life and cooler running CPU is well worth the drive running a bit hotter Not a problem.

cheers

 

I guess I should be a little bit clearer :

a) yes the video is being played through an LCD with adequate resolution.

b) the youtube clips that are labelled as 1080 all have varying bit rates. When you look through the UL80vt and UL30vt threads, you can see that some people have success viewing 1080 and others do not.

Daggah has hit the nail on the head. I don't have a bluray drive and I don't want to download a 50gb avi file. But I do want to :

a) determine whether or not my ul80vt can play a true untouched 1080p movie clip (on intel and/or nvidia graphics); and
b) find out if other people's ul80vt or ul30vt can do the same.

At the moment, I suspect that my laptop cannot play these clips smoothly, yet they play fine for others. But I am struggling to confirm this.

 

Those numbers look fine. While the loud clicking sound isn't normal for a new HDD, this particular seagate model is particularly prone to clicking. Chances are, it will fail within a year of normal use and even if you RMA your laptop, Asus would most likely replace it with another Seagate drive of the same model. I remember having the same clicking sounds with my drive in my UL30VT but I replaced it with a SSD. For me, the clicking sound started as being only annoying, but later it would freeze my system and a hard shut-down was required.

 

This clicking sound problem is well-known for the seagate disk. My ul30vt got the same problem and I know there are quite many users with seagate harddisks in their ul30vt have the same clicking sound problem.

Be careful of the data in the disk since the disk will most likely mal-function after a period of time...

 

I followed the guide at this link and seem to have perfect playback in the blu-rays I tried.

Nvidia screengrab with stats from the high bit-rate Avatar on a 1080p panel.

I haven't connected the Intel graphics to a 1080p display through VGA but it seemed to handle full screen blu-rays on the laptops lcd just fine.

Intel Avatar screengrab with stats at 1366x768

 

Well I can play SOME of the 1080p files, no problem. The streaming part of the equation does not come into play as long as the download speed greater than playback, right?

What I find is that I have to have CPU maxed out to watch about 70 percent of the FLASH clips, smoothly, without any hint of skipped frames. Edit: I mean CPU in performace mode, not any of the other power saving modes. I still get best results @ 1900 Mhz.

 

thanks a lot for the help guys. I will try to exchange for another one to see if i still get the clicking.

i have another question, for the turbo33 thingy, P4G is the only place to do it right? after it restarted, how can i check if it's been OC to 1.7ghz?? the computer property still shows 1.3ghz. Thanks in advance again.

edit: nvm.. d/led cpu-z and found that out...

 

I hope its OK to ask pricing/vendor related questions, but any idea why Amazon increased their prices $30 and more on the UL30VTs they sell? I was just about to buy a UL30VT 1A, then wham. I still want to buy, but I would have expected prices to go down over time, not up...

 

As Dave said; but I’m fishing for more information myself

The included Seagate smart report show why I RMA’d back to Asus. If you have a problem you should have seen the yellow triangle. The errors were not increasing but I have sent a WD drive back for same reason.

My Seagate’s show a lot of smart info as raw data and included WD smart report, for reference, shows info differently but not exactly plain English either.

Were these loud clicks or soft faint clicks? I ask because I noticed several of my drives do this while performing housekeeping or indexing or other.

I can only add that Seagate makes free Seatools that have a several checks to help you feel good about your drive.

 

Edit: I was too late with CPU-Z thingy. I'm taking way too long to put together one post


As for Seagate HDD, I also hear quite loud clicking noises, but I don't think it's defected.
Here are few of my arguments:
-They must have quality control, so it's just impossible that everyone's HDD is trashed as there are countless reports of clicking.
-This laptop's cooling is very silent and it's case is very thin which makes the noise more audible.
-Seagate is known for it's loudness according to other forum users.
-I've owned 3.5" drive that started clicking. It was nothing like this. Clicks were loud and constant, even when reading, writing, or booting. HDD's preformance was compromised.
-I've heard this drive properly clicking 30min ago.

You might not believe me, couse it was rather stupid, but I was looking at my S.M.A.R.T. data, when I saw "G-Sense Error Rate" with data "8", on the list. I wanted to see if I can get that number up, so I violently shook my laptop, which ended in loud (louder than "idle") clicking at about 2Hz. I nearly pooed my pants and quickly turned off PC by holding power button. After restart everything seems to work OK. Phew XD
Maybe reading S.M.A.R.T. interferes with some of the HDD's functions. I sure hope so...

What I think is causing idle clicks, is OS. Windows 7 is constantly messing about with it's indexing, defragmentation and possibly other stuff like virus scan. Because it clearly doesn't want to disturb you while working, it just waits for idle to do some work.

Just my 2 cents. Your case might really point to a defect, so take this as a guideline not as a rule.

 

Run the long test in Seatools. Let us know what you find.

 

Did yours fail? I have read MANY reports that these drives click with Dave saying it locked up his computer and failed

If this clicking is indeed a hard fault then I want to know as well. I'm a bit hard headed here. I can only say that I have Seagates and WDs that "click".

Has anyone called Seagate?

 

Have you gotten around to taking a pic of this yet? I am very interested in seeing how the screen is like with a matte screen protector. Also, would you mind providing the link to where you got it? Thanks.

 

the clicking sound like a robot is constantly working with a "chik chik, chik chik" noises, usually 2 "chiking" in a sequence. They are not really loud but def. noticeable in a OK quiet environment, doesn't need to be super quiet. NOt sure if they are the said soft faint clicks.

 

Seatest - Long DST: Pass
It took over 2h :\

My HDD behaves exactly the same. For several months now.
I'm convinced that it's just a loud drive and Windows doing some moving on it.

 

But they are so annoying. I am exchanging for a new one next week or so, and i will report back if it's having the same noise. I will just leave it as it is if the noise is there, or swap to another HD in the future.

 

Yeah I agree, the clicks can get annoying in silent environment.

I'm looking forward to your report.

 

I'm getting a new one Monday from Asus. If this is another bad run for Seagate then I hope they act on it from all the reported returns. Lots of drive competition is good for us, no?

 

Thanks for the owners' lounge, added to the Info Booth and to the Reviews and Owners' Lounges Index thread.

E.B.E., ASUS forum moderator

 

Yesterday I started with CPU undervolting.

Cpu genie found 0.900V to be stable setting @1.7GHz, but Prime95 returned errors right after starting "In place large FFTs" test. I raised voltage to 0.912V and preformed test again. Now I'm almost 3h in w/o any errors, so it seems that 0.912V is the lowest stable voltage I can get.

Core temperatures at 0.912V are 56°C in comparison to 61°C at stock. Fan runs faster at stock also.

Prime95 doen't seem to heat up CPU that much, but it reports errors long before crashing the system, so I hope it's good tool for this kind of evaluation.

I'm doing more tests now and will report back later.

 

thanks wisse

 

That's it, 5h of testing returned 0 errors. I'm locking voltage at 0.912V according to Romir's instructions.

Core temperatures during Prime95 testing:
Small FFTs - 56°[email protected] vs 61°[email protected] (stock)
In-Place large FFTs - 58°C vs 64°C
Fan runs noticeable faster at stock, as hydra already reported.

Thx Romir!

 

Wisse, did you run the long test with CPU Genie? I ran the final for an extra 2 hours.

hmmm, maybe I should run 95 prime to be safe. I'm still at .875.

 

I chose 3min tests from wizard. First time I did it, I found Windows frozen (screen was off) when I came back to check the progress. After that I ran the test again which listed 0.9V as stable w/o crashing. One last thing I did in Cpu Genie was manual 3min test at .875 which surprisingly passed. I noticed the 2h test but decided to try Prime95 instead.

You might be ok with your voltage, because you could have better piece of silicon. For example my testing with Prime95 always reported same core to produce errors while the other one kept going w/o problems.

 

Well so far so good after 90 minutes. I wish I had a way to log CPU current as the peak has only been 56C. Genie had it up to 62C but that could be ambient variations. I'll run another 2 hours then call it good. This is the most I would push it gaming

I would say this gives the nod for GPU genie long testing?

Yep, understand on the chip variations, btdt on past machines.

 

You should try both test I did in Prime95. Only "In-Place large FFTs" returned errors for me.
I have no basis to disprove or approve CPU Genie's test, but 2h should be long enough to uncover problems for regular user.

Prime95 doesn't seem to work CPU that much. I guess it's stressing floating point part the most. I might try more tests in the future (Romir mentioned one from Intel), but I'm quite happy and reassured for now.

 

Slaps self in head, yep i ran the wrong test. I'm running "In-Place large FFTs" to see what happens. Wow, the temp are already hitting 58C..

I used to use TAT but that quit working with the Penryns. Flipfire turned me on to another program which dang if I can remember after two years, i'll search later.

Let me know what you come up with.

..and got errors in 2nd core after 15 minutes. Odd that it's the second core as you. Oh well, let me see what happens at .900.

Good .900V went for three hours so I quit it. I'll use .875 for internet use and battery; .900 for games.

 

Hi,
Has anybody been able to get the media controls, ones on the arrow keys to work with itunes and/or windows media player? Everytime I push Play, it'll open media center.

 

You can use autohotkey to change the function of those key to make it compatible with itunes, media player or media center or anything else.

 

Well, I just got my UL30VT...

Man that was a lot of bloatware. But there was no Amazon Kindle app on it, so either I got one that had been sitting on the shelf for a while (not likely since J&R was backordered) or they haven't started putting the app on their laptops yet.

My Intel and nVidia stickers left residue when I pulled them off...I put them back on for now. That was my mistake for trying to take them off immediately; the laptop was cold to the touch when I pulled it out of the box. I don't have access to Goo-B-Gone out here, so getting all that residue off is going to be fun I think.

I am going to have to do some research into what the best power settings are. Right now my laptop says 96% charged, 5:33 left on the Power4Gear Battery Saving mode. Looks like I got some research/work to do.

 

daggah, just use the stickers themselves to remove the glue residue.. dab the sticky side onto the residue repeatedly. It'll be gone in 2mins.

 

Daggah;6352142]

As clandestino said..man some of those stickers are just that..stuck.

BTW, enjoy and welcome

 

That did not work.

However, I managed to get my hands on a can of WD-40 from a nearby office (I am deployed to the middle east right now) and that worked like a charm.

Do you guys generally recommend keeping the SRS audio software?

 

A matter of choice as it is mainly for effects. If you like it keep it.

When you get a chance, let us know how well you are able to play the U-tube Flash files. I can play a few with no problems..the nvidia one, at 1080P, I will never play again

 

I received new Seagate replacement drive form Asus today. The acoustics sound pretty much the same as the original Seagate drive. There was no hint of clicking, just the sound of a spinning drive

One reason I believe there is no clicking of any kind is there is no operating system included. Asus sends out blank drives, you will have to use your own OS or restore disks. If you have none of the above, the Asus E-store will soon be carrying system restore disk, but not at this time for the UL30vt. I’m told the ones for the UL50’s are in stock, any difference? The Asus girls did not know, or the cost.

So, I formatted drive and ran a SMART test on it. Hmmm, two Reallocated Sector Counts right off the bat. I’m sending this one back and keeping the original with an OS and only one allocation error(?). Not a big deal if the counts stay below a few but my other Seagates and Western digital dives have 0, so I’m being picky.



[ ST9500325AS (5VE7FKP3) ]

01 Raw Read Error Rate 6 118 99 172069169 OK: Value is normal
03 Spinup Time 0 99 98 0 OK: Always passes
04 Start/Stop Count 20 100 100 190 OK: Value is normal
05 Reallocated Sector Count 36 100 100 2 OK: Value is normal
07 Seek Error Rate 30 64 60 2717887 OK: Value is normal
09 Power-On Time Count 0 100 100 120 OK: Always passes
0A Spinup Retry Count 97 100 100 0 OK: Value is normal
0C Power Cycle Count 20 100 37 190 OK: Value is normal
B8 <vendor-specific> 99 100 100 0 OK: Value is normal
BB <vendor-specific> 0 99 99 1 OK: Always passes
BC <vendor-specific> 0 100 99 65540 OK: Always passes
BD <vendor-specific> 0 100 100 0 OK: Always passes
BE Airflow Temperature 45 72 55 471531548 OK: Value is normal
BF Mechanical Shock 0 100 100 8 OK: Always passes
C0 Power-Off Retract Count 0 100 100 8 OK: Always passes
C1 Load/Unload Cycle Count 0 100 100 1362 OK: Always passes
C2 Temperature 0 28 45 28 OK: Always passes
C3 Hardware ECC Recovered 0 50 49 172069169 OK: Always passes
C5 Current Pending Sector Count 0 100 100 0 OK: Always passes
C6 Offline Uncorrectable Sector Count 0 100 100 0 OK: Always passes
C7 Ultra ATA CRC Error Rate 0 200 200 0 OK: Always passes
FE <vendor-specific> 0 100 100 0 OK: Always passes

 

Hi everybody, I got a problem on my UL30VT and maybe you can help me:

I mistakenly uninstall SRS Premium Sound (the sound enhancement program which is originally sold with the laptop) and it's impossible to get it back!!!

I tried to reinstall the audio drivers many times (Audio_Realtek_Win7_32_64_6015958) but it's still do no appear anywhere (I have also looked in the sound device properties and the SRS Premium sound tab is not there anymore like it used to be).

I made a lot of researches and this problem looks to be common to Asus laptops with SRS embed...

So does anyone have any ideas, patch or solutions? (There is a patch for this problem but only for 32bits system and I got a 64...)


Thanks for your help and ASUS please correct that problem quickly!!!!!

 

Hello! I am both new to this forum and this computer, as I just got it yesterday and I have one issue remaining

sorry to seem if I am cutting off the person who posted above me: please, address his issue first

my issue lies in something i've seen mentioned in this forum before, but never heard much about or a solution

After waking from sleep mode, which i use quite a lot, i cannot use the graphix boost button. i.e. i cannot click the button and switch graphics cards

why is this and/or how do i fix it?

thanks in advance

 

I installed the drivers off the V2 driver DVD during a recent clean install.

So the tab is not here?

 

What version of Power4Gear are you running? If it's not 1.24 or 1.25, that's probably your problem.

 

Here's a quick question, how do I prevent the P4G Battery Saving plan from changing my wallpaper?

 

Turn it off in P4G. Just take a good look at the program to notice all of the settings.

May I ask what are you referring here at? I can play any 1080p from Youtube with about 50% cpu usage using integrated GPU and at about 25% using nVidia. With flash 10.1 of course.

 

That is just me not happy with the less than so so Flash playback and fishing for info. My apologies if i sound like I'm haranguing there.

Questions were being asked if the SU7300 had the mojo to play these files..
and other questions were asking why [they] could not pay 1080P youtube flash files.

I have found a few that play back fine but many have dropped frames thru-out playback. I compared flash to other mp4 codecs that play static 1080p files, perfectly, at 9-12% utilization. And this is with the Intel. If the flash files are fully streamed then we are just playing a static file, no.

Many posts back questions were being asked why they were not able to play flash file, via streaming, correctly. I have a hard time playing some flash files on my T9300. After searching the web it seems many people are having problems, with various settings, playing flash with 10.1 and HW support on.

So, this leaves me feeling that Flash is just a very inefficient codec. If I'm way off base here, then let me have it

 

Thx for explanation. I just wasn't sure if you're unable to play flash or what, because it looked ok for me.

I agree with everything you noticed bout flash video. The thing is, that I'm just not bothered with it, as long as it plays half decent. I'm used to poor SD clips, so HD feels superb. We don't have Hulu or anything similar here, thus the longest clips I ever watch in Flash containers, are around 10min or so, which makes it easier to bare with.

I hope less and less users will have problems with Flash playback since release of 10.1. Everyone's CPU should handle it with some overhead now.

 

Hello everybody,

I am a new registered user here even if I read this forum since months ago. In fact I started watching around the 30JT but, as it is still far to come here in Italy, last week I bought the UL30VT.
So, again, I have read all this thread (… and I started formatting my new notebook also watching what to install.
But here is my doubt:
normally, the first thing to install is the CHIPSET driver. In this case it should be the driver for the Intel GS 45 but nobody speaks about it. Why? Is it included in another package?
Is it recognized by windows?

Thanks in advance


EDIT: I am unable also to find the P4G 1.1.25. Where can I download it? Unfortunately I can find just the 1.1.31 or the 1.1.24 .... Thanks again

 

Welcome!

ASUSTeK Computer Inc.-Support- for the P4G 1.1.25. This is under the UL80vt utilities so not sure if it's what you want to run.

Which shipped version did you have? My Driver DVD-V2.0 comes with, drum roll, P4G V1.1.29 for 32 and 64 bit. My only problems are random loss of GPU switching after sleep. This must be fixed with a restart.

 

last time i checked it was the latest... .36 i think...


i tried .25 before i used the latest, and there was no change, but i'll try .24 and that again, thanks
UPDATE: uninstalled last version. tried .24 and still didn't work. installed .25, put to sleep once, opened back up, and it did work! BUT the next time i did it, and every time since, it hasn't

still can't use graphix boost button after sleep mode..

 

hey Hydra, thanks for responding.

mine is 8.15.11.8688. i tried using the manager to update but windows says it is up to date. when going to intel's site and downloading the latest driver, it does not allow the installation and says something about being incompatible. Maybe cause of the nvidia hybrid graphics?

i have yet to solve this issue though, i will try and play with p4g then. maybe it will solve the problem from there. I doubt it though because the problem persists even when changing through the different modes (battery, office, media and high). i will test them again though. I can't believe i am the only one having this issue.

i will let you guys know what i come up with.

thanks again!

 

Is there any way to add pinch-zoom as a multi-touch gesture to the touchpad? I must say, I like the Elan touchpad software on the UL30VT a lot more than the Synaptics touchpad software on my G73JH, which is good...because I don't ever use the touchpad on my G73JH. I like the two-finger scrolling and three-finger tap right-click a lot. I just wish I had pinch to zoom (and some other multi-touch gestures too, like maybe a back/forth swipe gesture) as well.