W3j Owners Lounge

It's one of the F1, etc. buttons. I just flow my finger through all of em to get into BIOS

 

When I run speedfan it says HD0 47 degrees and Temp1 51 degrees does anyone know what temps these correlate to? F2 gets you into bios.

 

I believe that HD0 is the hard drive temp and Temp1 is the CPU. Temp# can vary though on different notebooks.

 

Just a quick update on my OC'ing - finally got it running with some great help from Mastha212 - THANK YOU! Now at 490/490, 3dmark05 standard settings (running all game tests @ 1024x768), with a score of 4574.


Let me also mention here for anyone who's a novice to OC (such as myself): Be wary of what surface you're running your OC tests or games on. I should have thought of it earlier, but I placed the W3J on my desk calendar, which has a thick plastic overlay on top. Needless to say, this soaks up heat like a sponge and gets hot fast - hotter than the W3J got. So this heat compounded the OC heat, and the system rebooted on me with clock speeds that were not near the 490 I tested with. So keep in mind that what's under your laptop counts I took the calendar off my desk and placed it directly on the wood surface and it ran without a hitch, and no artifacts.

[EDIT: When I run it @ 499/499, I get a driver stop error, blue screen of death, and automatic reboot when running 3dMark05. I don't get any artifacts when testing through ATI Tool, however.]

 

Hey guys, I have a question concerning my W3J. Right now I have my computer go into standby when I have the lid close. I've been having trouble reactivating my laptop out of standby mode. The screen is just black. I'm not sure whether I need to play with the settings, or it's just some dumb mistake. I'd appreciate any help. Thanks!

 

Right click on desktop>screen saver>power options>advance>choose what you want to do when lid closes

You can also check if hibernate is enabled

 

Well I purposely set it on standby. But i'm just having trouble getting it out of standby mode when I open the lid.

 

I've heard some others have problems overclock their x1600 as well but Mastha cited no difficulties whatsoever so I think we need him to enlighten us . I'm having one hell of a time trying to overclock my card. I finally was able to a couple nights ago after I checked the "immediately initiate changes" box in ATI Tool. I went up to 486/486 and didn't push it any farther. I was just glad I was able to get it farther than 1 mhz without my screen going black (which is what usually happens).

Now I try to load that 486/486 overclock setting and my screen goes black. I have no idea whats going on. This setting seemed perfectly stable. It's well below Mastha's and I detected no artifacts or anything like that.

 

Yeah, I've gotten mine just slightly above that, at 490/490, still below Mastha's 510/510. He was kind enough to put out a separate thread detailing what he did here http://forums.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=56531, and I posted my experience there as well. Hopefully we can continue to get discussion in that dedicated OC thread, can solve each other's problems Ah, the W3j - bringing people together

 

i kept forgetting to ask, whats the difference between the super multi dvd ram drive and a regular dvd rw dual layer burner

 

Wikipedia is your friend

Advantages of DVD-RAM

* Long life — without physical damage, data is retained for 30 years minimum. However it is suspected that it is just a theoretical claim without firm proofs.
* Can be rewritten over 100,000 times (DVD±RW can be rewritten approx. 1,000 times). Faster DVD-RAMs support fewer rewrites (3x speed: 100,000, 5x speed: 10,000) , but still more than DVD±RW. (Remember, these are theoretical numbers. In practice they could be smaller.)
* No DVD burning software required – discs can be used and accessed like a removable hard disk. Windows XP and Mac OS (8.6 or later) supports DVD-RAM directly; earlier versions of Windows need device drivers or InCD.
* Very fast access of smaller files on the disc.
* Automatic hardware verification of written data, no need to verify manually via software.
* Robust plastic cartridge protects the disk, similar to a CD Caddy (where applicable).
* In video recorders, DVD-RAM can be written to and watched (even separate programs) at the same time, much like TiVO.
* Supports time slip recording and recording without border in/out writing
* Finalization not necessary


Disadvantages of DVD-RAM

* Most DVD devices do not support DVD-RAM.
* DVD-RAM is more expensive than other DVD types.
* DVD+RW and DVD-RW can be written faster than DVD-RAM when writing large amounts of data. Especially when considering that most DVD-RAM devices have write verification enabled by default, which essentially cuts the writing speed in half.
Note that with the release of 12x speed DVD-RAM in Japan and the pending release of 16x DVD-RAM, this statement may no longer be correct.

 

Got my w3j today!!!! Feels awesome so far but I havent had time to really get into it yet. Honestly this is prolly the best computer I have ever seen. Amazing design, rock solid, perfect screen. No complaints at all.
thanks Danny at MilestonePC.

Oh yah, I got a sleeve, case, and usb key because I preordered- The sleeve and case are a little big but I think it will work well because I can put other stuff in there now and still fit the w3j in comfortably.

I'm gonna have a ton of questions soon once I start playing around with it so I hope you guys are ready

Dan

 

hmmmm- can't get my bluetooth mouse to be recognized.
any suggestions?
thanks
Dan

 

yeah my desktop had problems with this too...i just set it to hibernate when closed...i think its an xp problem

 

maybe a long ****, but if Norton's is installed, it may be blocking the com port used with bluetooth

go offline, disable nortons, and see if you can connect

if you can connect, then you'd have to configure norton's...

i got my pocket pc to sync via bluetooth eith the w3j after like an hour of playing with it

 

Norton is poopy. I took it off of my w3 two days after I got it.

 

well it works (it can find my old laptops BT address) but it just wont find the mouse. I havent installed the software for the moouse b/c with my old laptop I just searched for the mouse with BT and it connected

 

Another problem~

The fan on my w3j is constantly on and it seems quite hot. It's not that loud but I can definitely hear it always when idling. Could there be something wrong with the heatsink? (don't really know what this is but i think it was mentioned before in another post)
I would think that the computer would be able to run, at least idling, and not have the fan on in any way.
thanks a lot
Dan

 

what mouse do you have? For my BT logitech, I needed to hit the "dectection" button on the mouse first, and then open the BlueTooth manager on the W3J and select the mouse to connect. From then on it was always automatically detected.

 

okay. so im back.

 

my dvd rom drive is in the "safely remove hardware" list. anyone know how to remove it from the list? i intend to leave the drive in forever.

 

I'm using the Hcontrol registry tweak - and the play/pause button (named Media Player) is currently set to winamp.exe. Without Hcontrol, the play/pause button opens windows media player, but then acts as a play/pause button.

Is there a registry command or way I can make the button ONLY a play & pause button

Edit: I successfully made it only a play/pause button by just deleting what was under:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\ASUS\HControl\MediaPlayer]

 

Ditto. Not only does it cost money, but it doesn't even work that well, esp. the firewall. I went with AVG for antivirus and Kerio for my firewall. Both free, both work just as well or better than Norton but don't need a subscription.

 

I think the reason it says safely removal for the dvd drive is that its hot swapable and you its just letting you know its swappable at any time. I dont know how to remove the taskbar icon though.

 

I have a logitech v270. There is only an off/on switch and a reset button. Someone mentioned to me that there are programs that can manage BT - does anybody know of any good ones that work?
thanks
Dan

 

Just wanted to say thanks to everyone who is contributing to this thread, there's some extremely useful info being condensed in here and it's making the whole W3J experience absolutely fantastic!

You all rock.

Now keep it up!!!

 

how much does the w3j weigh? I checked on asus website and it said 2kg with a 4cell battery. I'm just confused as to why people say it's heavy if this is the case

 

Approx. 5.4lbs with the DVD drive in there...5.0 - 5.1lbs with the traveler's drawer (included in box).

 

^ i'd like to know also.

 

someone can make photos of angle view (vertical and horizontal) of the W3J please to compare with the A8J.

thanks.

 

Eddie already made videos of the W3J's viewing angles here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=56099

 

The reason the optical drive is displayed under removeable devices, is because it's a removeable device... sorry for the sarcasm but it is as simple as that.

One advantage of this feature i've already found is, if your playing BF2 for example, the dvd is needed in the drive as you start the game. but after this you can eject the disc to save it spinning constantly to save noise / battery. well as an alternative you can simply "remove" the optical drive, the disc spins down but you dont have the hassle with find a cd case.

 

Dan,

I have the same mouse - works beautifully. What you need to do is:
Make sure your BlueTooth is on before you do this...

1) Install the software from the logitech CD. I installed the Logitech manager (or whatever it's called) for the SW updates, but didn't install the other stuff that lets you change settings.

2) Put the batteries in the mouse, turn it on, and then hit the little "connect" button on the underside of the mouse. The green light should start blinking.

3) While the light is blinking, go to the W3J BlueTooth manager - it's in the taskbar tray, basically just a bluetooth icon - right click on it and it should work exactly like the wireless internet - you select what you want to connect to, in this case your mouse, and it will tune in to the signal. Once you do this you shouldn't have to do it again. From this point on it should be detected as soon as you turn the mouse on.

If this isn't working, feel free to PM me and I'll try to help you through it.

Adam

 

I agree that it's to your advantage to leave it this way. You never know when having the hot-swappable feature will be useful, and IMO it's a minor inconvenience to have that on the taskbar tray. But, that's just my two cents

 

Should I uninstall Power4gear before installing NHC?
thanks
Dan

 

hi,

(re-posted as quite a number of members now have their notebook and have used it for a considerable amount of time)

just had a few questions before i buy this notebook in europe!

1. how loud is this notebook? i am after a notebook that is whisper quiet. i want to be able to work at night without it sounding like a jet engine! how often do the fans kick in? how silent is it for normal everyday tasks? how loud is it for intensive tasks like encoding or gaming?

2. how hot does it get? can it be comfortably used on ones lap? how hot does it get underneath? are there any blocked vents underneath if used on ones lap?

3. how good is the screen? the apple macbook pro claims to be brighter than past models. is it comparable to that screen? are the whites really good and other colours bright and rich or is it dull and murky? is it as good as normal desktop tft's made by samsung, dell etc?

4. how bad or good is the glossy screen? are there a lot of reflections? do you keep seeing your face on the screen when typing etc?

5. how good is the battery life when writing notes and browsing the net? how can the macbook pro get claims of +4 hours etc? just becuase of the underclocked gpu?

6. will be pairing it up with an iMac instead of a macbook or macbook pro; good decision? they seem to be blighted with problems!

7. anyone hooked it to an external tft/crt? whats the quality like on the external monitor via vga? will i miss not having a dvi port like the mb and mbp? when doing serious work like image editing and video work (80% of the time) i will hook it up to an external tft for more screen space. should i worry about image quality? the rest of the time i will use it as a normal laptop for notes and presentations. who else will use it mainly when hooked to a tft?

8. any annoying faults found so far?

9. how much of a bottleneck will the 4,200 rpm hdd be for us in europe? i will probably update it in the future when i have the funds!

10. any screen bleedings at the bottom or in the corners?

the answers will hopefully go a long way and help me purchase this laptop!

my main concerns are questions 1, 2 & 3 becuase they are irritating issues with my current laptop. all i want is a laptop that is super silent/quiet when running and runs reasonably cool whilst having a crisp bright screen! not too much to ask is it?

thanks,

 

1. In general - it's quiet, for sure it's not like a jet engine (I know what I'm talking about - had Sager before - now, this was LOUD). During gaming fans are on the highest gear but even on that you shouldn't hear them that much, they are not annoying

2. there is no problem with working on laps, write now I'm writing exaclty in this position and every evening I lay in bed with it so don't worry

3. IMO screen is good considering its size. It's bright. Someone can tell you that the angles are not so well but the truth is you should see it on you own.

4. The glossy is a masterpiece. Really. This is my forth glossy display and from this point of view it's brilliant. No reflects, no mirror, even in direct sun.

5. Battery life is about 3:00h. Maybe 3:15. Remember that the MBP doesn't have fans so the battery life is better but it gets A LOT warmer.

6. No idea, don't have iMac

7. Haven't tested it yet.

8. Hot air from right went, can be annoying.

9. 4200 SUCKS!! And I mean it!! Change to 5400 or 7200 asap!!

10. Haven't seen.

All I can tell you is that W3 is fantastic. It can be a little louder but remember what it has under the hood and what size it is. It is cool, maybe after whole day hardcore working it can be a little warmer but not to unacceptable level. After changing HDD to faster one, the only thing I miss is DVI (and maybe that went on the right side), but really, with DVI this would be my Holy Grail.

 

I must say I love the W3J, it's an amazing laptop, light and portable but packs a punch.

my main caveat with it is the right side vent that most people complain about, when gaming the air coming out can be extremely extremely hot. At other times it's just warm air. The touch pad clickers are kinda hard but I got use to it and the glassy screen does reflect, but not very badly.

 

I'm interesting to buy a w3j-H002P but i can't buy, because there is not that model in France (i'm french ). then i think buy it in UK.

then some people can give me link where they buy there W3j-H002P ?

but before a question the keyboard in UK is a QWERTY model or AZERTY model ? (in france is AZERTY)

thanks for answers

 

Dan,

You can keep Power4Gear installed and install NHC as an additional program - thanks to Mastha for answering this question for me previously

 

I just installed NHC beta 1.10. It works with Power4gear but I took power4gear off anyways cuz it seems like they might conflict. Only problem is that NHC says the cpu is only running at 1.0 GHz as opposed to 1.83. It is also saying that my FSB is only 533 as opposed to 667. Im pretty sure this is wrong cuz in the system properties it tells me 1.83 GHZ. - not sure about the actual FSB tho. I've tried fiddling with NHC but can't seem to get it above 1.0 GHz (at least thats what it says). I would have imagined upon first loading the NHC that it would be full CPU power especially at max settings.
any suggestions?
I apologize if this is in the wrong forum but it might pertain to other w3j owners.
thanks
Dan

EDIT: Actually I think it just is reporting it wrong in NHC. I searched and found someone else with this problem.

 

Today i tried to move a 4.something gig file from one of my other computers to the w3j but it wasnt possible becouse the w3j said it was lacking space on the harddrive. Have over 50 gigs free so what can the problem be? Have moved smaller files the same way before without a problem but what happend with the large one has never happend to me before and i was taken by suprise.

 

I just got my W3J yesterday, I was wondering if anyone already upped their ram yet. And what brand/company did you get?

 

whatever you do, don't buy A-DATA

 

Have you tried converting your HD to NTSF? there's something with Fat32 I believe where it can't transfer files over 4gigs or so.

 

Yeap, FAT drives can't have any single files over 4gb, you need to convert to NTSF.

 

Considering how easy it is to do (especially with the Desktop icon), I'm surprised that they don't do that at the manuf. before shipping.

 

I've mentioned this a dozen times and I'm only commenting in this thread now because obviously it's been overlooked........ yes it's easy and no Asus isn't stupid for not doing this from the factory. Plenty of gamers still prefer fat32 as ntsf is slower....... A hard drive can go from fat32 to nstf once... but you can't go from ntsf to fat32 ever...... so to send it from the factory as fat32 and put a hotlink to the run command to change it, it's honestly perfect for everyone. Now, those who don't think doing this is as good as formatting it in ntsf originally don't really know what they're talking about..... because the same amount of space is getting eaten up for this formatting either way.

... so if you understand what I said, and I know you would (it's others I'm considered with), then you'd see this is honestly the best choice, even if 50% of users are going to change it to an ntsf file system....

 

X -- yes, upgraded to 2 sticks of Corsair 1024MB, available for around $89 per stick from NewEgg. Definitely helps smooth out the gameplay for me in BF2 and Oblivion.

 

Abaler, is that 2 sticks of 1 gig for a total of 2 gigs? Does that really "improve" gameplay noticeably as compared to 1.5 gigs? I just got a 1 gig stick *i believe patriot forget* on Newegg (love their discount) and don't know if i should just go ahead and get another.

About NHC. Yea it does that and it only really reports 1.83ghz when the cpu load is around 90%. Even if you set it to Max Perf. it still reports 1.00ghz. Don't fret though, the cpu is actually going at 1.83 even if NHC continues to report 1.00 You WILL feel the hot air burning. I ran ATI Tool and 3DMark for an hour and NHC kept reporting the 1.00 # so it's buggy. The only thing I would like is for it to report the cpu speeds at each multiplier that's in use. Since it's not reporting correctly, I keep wondering if the chip is only switching between min & max multipliers.