Z96 Owners Lounge!

Thanks for the quick reply. I'll check again that I am seating the stick correctly, but am I happy with the 2 gig.

Bought the unit last year and it is a great one!

Jeff

 

Well since I got such a quick and good answer for my last small issue, here is another one I have seen. Wondering if it is aXP issue or a USB hardware issue;

If I have a USB printer, USB mouse, USB external hard drive all connected to my laptop and then plug in my USB 2 gig flash drive the ability to access or write to the flash drive is flaky. I can open it in explorer but trying to read or write to it doesn't work or locks up. If I remove one of the other USB devices then it works ok. Doesn't matter which one though.

The Z96Js only has 4 external USB ports.

Ideas?

Jeff

 

Probably a USB issue, given your symptoms and effect after removal.

USB ports each supply specific amounts of power and since the flash drive works after you pull one of the other 3 devices, it's possible that the symptoms you're experiencing are because 4 connected devices draws more power than the notebook can reliably deliver through all 4 USB ports concurrently to permit normal function in each.

Does the problem exist when you're on battery or AC power?

 

Yeah. I would recommend picking yourself up a powered USB hub. This will allow USB devices to draw power directly from the wall rather than potentially straining the USB power capabilities of the notebook.

 

Hey Guys. Just wanted to let you know that I was able to get over five hours on battery with my year and a half old Z96J today, using the 9 cell I bought as part of the initial purchase. This translates to over three and a half hours on the standard 6 cell.

I was able to reduce power consumption to between 14W and 15W under windows xp by turning the backlight nearly off, wireless and bluetooth off, no external devices connected.

I was using my Z96J to take notes, so the load on the computer was very light.

I accomplished this by disabling everything possible in the device manager. Major power consuming devices appear to be the USB hubs, bluetooth COM ports, the audio processor, and the UAA bus.

I have a feeling that part of the reason is that bluetooth does not properly turn off. The internal bluetooth is connected via USB, so by disabling the USB hubs, it should be unable to draw power.

I am currently messing around with linux(gentoo) to see if I can lower power consumption even more.

I'll post a nice guide once I've completed my findings.

 

Hello everyone,

I would like to upgrade my 3945 to the 4965AGN; however, I would like to know if this is even possible on the Z96Js, and if any one has done this exact upgrade?

If there are any issues you all might know of I would appreciate it.

I emailed Asus but I am figuring I will be waiting a long time for an answer.

Thanks

 

Hello again,

I answered my questions:

As the card name states 4965 ( 965) I need Intel 965 chipset to use this card for its full potential. One can just get a/b/g or bg when installed as there is a missing lead if you don't know.

What a jip when one needs a new mombo chip set for a network card.

Sorry for taking up anyone's time on this.

 

I started a new thread about maximizing battery life on the z96J. It is located here:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=2860118#post2860118

 

Has anyone ever tried to connect an external antenna via the aux connection on their wifi card?

I have, and I discovered that the aux port on the card didn't work. So I called up intel and got a replacement.

Still doesnt work. So I can only assume that it is a problem with my Z96J.

If anyone is willing to try disconnecting the main antenna from their wireless card and see if they still get signal, that would be great.

I am trying not to jump to conclusions, but this could be a bug in everyone's system as it is not something that would normally be discovered.

 

That is very interesting. I have never tried to do anything like that with a laptop before.

I'd disconnect my main antenna and try using just the aux, but I don't have time at the moment(or anytime in the next week or two).

What operating system and what drivers are you running? Did you try bringing the laptop with aux connected up close to your access point?

 

I am running ubuntu with the standard restricted drivers. And In windohs I am running the most up to date drivers for the card, provided by intel.

I have tried being right next to my access point.

Thanks for the reply. If you do ever get around to it, be sure to post your findings.

 

You tried it under both windows and linux? That's really strange... Like I said, if I get a chance, I'll try it. But don't count on it, and if I do try it, it won't be for a long time.

 

Does anyone know if the Z96 works with this?

Western Digital Scorpio WD3200BEVT 320GB SATA 2.5

As I have a 80gb drive and time for an upgrade.. but thought of waiting for a 500gb one.. day... but drive is getting too small..

 

Yes, the z96 uses SATA HDdrives so you should be fine.

 

I have a T2400 I think in this.. what is the top max CPU I can swap off to replace this.... not that I intend to do this soon... since it is working fine.

 

I believe the chipset will only support 65nm processors so you are limited to the T7XX series. Not to say these are shabby processors. I have a T7200 (2.0 GHz) in my Z96J and it does an outstanding job. (Games, DVD ripping/burning, and other desktop pc stuff).

Here is Newegg's page for the T7XX processors.

If cost is no issue get the T7600 (2.33GHz), otherwise I recommend the T7200 (2.0GHz) as it has a good price point, you get nice speed along with the larger L2 cache (4MB).

Also had a question:
What version of SATA support does the Z96J have? SATA I (1.5) or SATA II (3.0)? I am thinking it is SATA II (3.0) but wanted to check here, since I a cannot seem to locate another reference.

Zack

 

The Z96J will support the Core Duo's with codename "Yonah", as well as the Core 2 Duo's with codename "Merom" (t7200, t7400, t7600) with a BIOS update. I also have a T2400 in my Z96J, and while I have considered an upgrade since I heard merom was going to be released, I just can't justify the cost of the merom. I have a desktop for when I need serious power, and the merom's price just isn't dropping. It's sad to see a newer t7500 cost less than half what a t7600 costs.

I have no idea about the SATA.

 

@JPZ: Good catch on the BIOS update. I forgot to mention it.

 

If he bought wasn't one of the first to get a Z96J, and didn't get one until after merom was released, he probably has a compatible BIOS. Although, I wonder when they started shipping with the updated BIOS...

Anyone who is looking to upgrade to Merom, be sure to check if your BIOS needs to be updated.

 

Hey guys ...

has anyone seen a secondary drive tray available for the optical bay on these puppies? ...I know they had one for the Z/M71 series, but haven't yet located one for the 96.

Any input would be appreciated ... Thanks!

SE

 

^ Nope, I don't think its possible.

Damn this is still running? Anyways I am still using my S96J and it's been great.

 

evanz, if this notebook does not have a removable ODD bay, you won't find the HDD caddy because it doesn't exist.

(I don't know whether the Z96 has a hotswappable ODD. You can check on asus.com for instance)

 

hey JPZ, its been a while.
so far the systems been running great. i upgraded my z96 memory to 2gb couple months ago and disabled the swapfile which really improved performance
too bad though... my battery is about to die...its like a year old. it discharges from 100 down to 70 at normal rate then jumps from 70 down to 4%. i could only think that some cells are busted. but anyway, i dont really use the system on battery a lot so its no big deal. its on ac and runs 24/7.

 

Hi there.

That's too bad about your battery. Have you tried calibrating in BIOS? I've discharged my 6-cell battery 5 days a week since I got it two years ago, and it's still holding up well. It holds 85% designed capacity, which I think is pretty good for how old it is and how much it has been used. My 9-cell battery, which I've used significantly less, is as good as new.

 

oh yeah, i should try to calibrate it in bios.

 

by the way, is it possible to install XP 64bit on this system? or would i need the Core2Duo for that?

 

Your CPU (T2500) does not support 64 bit.

 

Emporiumboutique beat me to it. You need a 64 bit processor to run a 64 bit OS, so if you want to run a 64 bit OS you will need to upgrade to merom. I do not believe the Z96J supports any 64 bit processors besides merom.

 

hello guys just wanna chyme in on the 64bit.....

on my s96s, i tried the 64bit vista ultimate but i did not see any performance increase. 32bit was still the fastest.

 

There are other reasons besides pure performance to use a 64-bit OS. But under certain circumstances, certain types of memory intensive programs should see a slight increase in performance.

Some of the big reasons to use a 64-bit OS:
1. Ability to address large amounts of system memory
2. Support for 64-bit programs. There are some(not many, but some) programs which only exist for 64-bit OS's.

 

That's correct. The only benefit you get for using a 64bit OS is the utilization of 4gb of ram. There are still many programs and games that don't use 64bit, not to mention the amount of ram a program uses (usually only several MB to 100MB). Even if you see a higher score in benchmarks, the performance increase is minuscule.

EDIT: this time JPZ beat me to it

 

I need to replace the dvd-rw drive in a z96j. Will any standard EIDE slim drive work such as this one?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827151162

-edit and am I right in assuming that the optical drive uses the IDE inteface (not SATA)?

 

Chris27, yes its IDE.

BTW, the HDD in mine is a Travelstar. it has acoustic mode enabled and the only way to disable it is to boot from the Hitachi disk into its program and change the settings.

questions is, does disabling acoustic mode increase performance?
any idea?

 

Just to chime in.

The interface for the HD for the Z96 is SATA I. I think I remember that from the specs.

Love mine, do live video capture and editing on mine with Avid. Thinking about moving to bigger HD. Have 2gig ram, but don't think the upgrade on the processor is worth the while.

Anyone know if there is a difference MXM video card available for it? Mine has the ATI x1600 mobiliy and I would like to move to NVidia.

Jeff

 

One other thing.

I noted that some of you are not running a swap file with 2 gig ram. Does this really work ok? How much performance increase do you have?

Might give it a try myself.

Lastly, how to you over clock the video card?

Jeff

 

well, without swap file, windows will not access the HDD when performing anything (exept for reading the program). games load faster. alt+tab between games is instant. everything just runs faster and smoother.
downside is, when there is a memory hogging software running, and youl reach the limit of your memory, windows will notify you that your running low on memory. if you dont close programs to free memory, some of them might crash. no big deal for me, cause that only happened when i run my video converter, converting mkv-avi. the program has a bug.
otherwise, i can run lots of background software plus 2 games (guildwars and NFS most wanted) without crashing

you can use "ATT" for over clocking. use it at your own risk. i can safely clock it to 500core/400mem.

as for the video card, its integrated. you cant replace/upgrade that.

 

hey guys,

i just spent like 30 minutes reading through the last 10 or so most recent pages of posts, and could not find the answer to my question.

i have a z96 from abs rebranded as their Mayhem Z2 laptop. It came with a 160 gb hard drive, which is now down to 1.5 gb of free space.

I was trying to find out what the clearance size of a hard drive is for the Z96 laptops. I was hoping to take apart a Simpletech 500 GB external and place the drive in my system, and then use the enclosure for teh 160 thats already inside. However, the 500 gb simpletech drive is 11 mm thick, whereas standard 2.5" hard drives are only 9.5 mm thick. Will the Z96 be able to accomodate the additional 1.5 mm?

Thanks,
marc

 

I don't know about 12.5 you could try and measure the HDD bay? But that won't make you certain either, the only way to make certain is to try it out without buying the HDD (or if somebody who tried it lets you know).

You can find 320GB HDDs in 9.5 format, though, if you're willing to go down from 500GB.

 

i know that the 320 would fit, but i was hoping to go as big as possible so i dont have to worry about just saving everything anymore lol.

do you know if the users manual makes any reference as to what size drives will fit? unfortunately, ABS did not send any of the documentation from asus regarding the laptop, just their books, which dont include those kinds of specs.

 

Check the advanced model page on ASUS.com, it might say the height of supported harddrives. (modelmenu=2 at the end, see the ASUS_FAQ if you don't understand what I mean.)

 

As an alternative, you could just get an external drive. Or you could get a 320GB internal drive, then buy an external drive if you run out of space in the future. Sorry, I have no idea whether the Z96J supports a thicker hard drive. I don't remember how much room there was then I put my hard drive in 2 years ago, but since the front of the Z96J is so thin, my guess is that there isn't much extra room to hold anything beyond a standard thickness drive.

Edit: You could also buy a 320GB drive and an enclosure, then put your old 160GB drive in the enclosure to give you a total of 480GB storage.

 

I looked for it on asus.com, it's not listed, probably because it's a barebones.

 

i cant seem to find anything about it on the website..

im probably gonna end up keeping the drive either way, as bestbuy made a mistake on the price they were advertising in-store, and it came up at 119.99 rather than the original 199.99. I'll let you guys know if the drive ends up fitting or not.

thanks for the help

 

Hi guys,
Is it just me or is the Z96j reached the end of it's notebook lifetime? I mean I am a gamer and when I first got the Z96j it was running circles around my desktop (at that time). Now however it's a different story, while I run WOW (World of Warcraft) with no problems, I am having trouble with games like AOC (Age of Conan) the game is running a 10-12 FPS. That was the last straw for me, it was a nice two years with Z96j but I have ordered the Sager NP8660. I am just curious if other Z96J owners feel the same?

 

The gpu in the Z/S96 series is obsolete for contemporary, newly released games. It's 2-3 generations old now, and AOC is making even current high-end cards struggle, where they were able somewhat to handle Crysis. WOW is based on an engine that is several years old, that's why your notebook still runs that effectively.

GPU life cycles are less than 2 years for cutting edge games mid-high settings, as the developers take advantage of the increased capabilities of the chips. I remember when FEAR was the hottest thing going that brought graphics cards to their knees, and today even mainstream cards can handle it with relative ease .

 

Isn't that a bummer. I just got my Z96Js 15 months ago. I know tech go fast but wow.

That and my mother board just crapped out on me......no POST, tried processor and ram and removed everything else from the mobo. Bother...

Well, I am sending off for ASUS to take a look at and we'll see if I end up with a new one or not.......

Still love the unit. I do video work and it is quite quick for me!

Jeff

 

Just to add to what ClearSkies said,

Imagine people who bought a laptop with an x1400 or a 7400m two years ago, or the people who are buying 8400m or ATI 2400 now. Those laptops struggle just as much if not more than the Z96J to play modern games. Yes, the 8600m and the ATI 2600 and the mainstream HD 3xxx cards are a bit better than our X1600's, but the X1600 is still a strong card for the mainstream notebook market. I've got a 3870 in my desktop and I'm considering another 3870 for crossfire, yet I still enjoy gaming on this laptop. I play newer games on my desktop with all the nice eye candy, yet I find that I keep coming back to all the old games. All the games that were great for their gameplay and the userbase. My Z96J is more than capable of running these games. So when I'm away from my desktop, I can play all the great games even if I can't play the latest.

I love my Z96J. I mainly use it for taking notes in class and for coding work. It is my travel machine. For everything besides gaming, it is still a solid laptop. My origanl 6-cell holds 85% of what it did when it was made over 2 years ago, and it has been discharged almost every day for the last two years. It still lasts two and a half hours. My 9 cell that I purchased with the computer has barely worn at all(maybe 1% or 2%) and it still lasts 4 hours.

I've considered upgrading the processor, but the prices for Merom are ridiculous. They cost more than twice as much as Santa Rosa. That's ok though; the T2400 is still a strong processor.

Finally, I just wanted to add that the Z96J is the first laptop that I've owned for more than a year without purchasing a new laptop. It has made it past two years, and will likely make it another year or more.

 

I also play older games more... maybe I'm getting old?

 

No, no, no..... NOSTALGIC.

Applies for those us living in the post-30s set, anyway

 

It's all about perspective, I guess.

I couldn't imagine playing games on this tiny screen with it's crappy speakers. Get an xbox 360 or a decent gaming desktop for that. Oh and BTW, either of those will cost you a LOT less than a equally speedy notebook. If there even was such a thing.

Unless you're a rich kid, why are you gaming on a notebook? I use mine for surfing the web, software development, business productivity apps, and transcoding videos and I don't forsee it getting 'too slow' for quite some time. Heck, my Z96 can even handle full 1080p high-def images, so I can't knock it.

But I'm cheap. I've always bought the best notebook there was, 1 or 2 years after it came out. That strategy puts me in a good price-point. My Z96 is about 18 months old now, and was less than a grand to build when I got it early in 2007. At the time I knew components would be coming down in price so I got a core duo and an 80 gig hard drive and that more than got me through. I know that somewhere along the line I also sprung for an Intel N-speed wireless card, but that was maybe $30 bucks, I don't recall, but it was no biggie and Intel's reference wireless drivers + utility package is the most stable thing, I just love it.

This platform is so flexible. I just spent about $350 bucks last month on upgrades to a new Mermon 2.16Ghz T7400 ($179 @ eBay), 200GB HDD and 2Gig RAM. Some of the latest web development apps (plus a really fat anti-everything+firewall suite) had me pushing my total working set to over a gig of ram and I thought, what the heck, let's spend a bit on the old girl...

So my advice, use the proper tool for the job and long live the Z96.