~F3sv Owner's Lounge~

just got the report from asus, the mainboard is broken.

any chance this new mainboard will be a better performing part as the f3sv has kinda a poor performer (heat, gpu)

and (i am really hoping that with the nvidia gpu fiasco) can they offer a replacement laptop unit. with newer parts. since the mainboard failed on me. as they described it mainboard failure can also include gpu failure as the gpu is soldered to mainboard.

thanks

 

Most likely you'd get the same type of component, with perhaps later revisions (which may improve things considerably, but usually doesn't).

They could perhaps put in a later F3 version mainboard (if anything has been released since). But usually they don't do it.

 

Hi everyone. My f3sv (uk version) is coming back from repair on monday (new mobo) and just had a quick question. My dad also ordered a laptop which arrives on monday (inspiron 1525). It comes with the 320gb hdd and i wanted to swap my hdd and his hdd. I just spoke to asus and they said the F3sv supports a max hdd of 200gb. Can anyone confirm this, because i could of sworn i saw F3Sv's with 250gb hdds.

One other quick question. If it does support it and i just place the dell hdd in my f3sv, would i be able to just use the Asus recovery disk to format the hdd and reinstall the OS and drivers over the current OS which is on the Dell HDD?

Thanks.

 

I would guess that the 320HDD will work without a problem. The 200GB is probably the maximum size of the HDD that the F3Sv was tested when it was new, so that's what the support person quoted. Anyway, there's no reason not to try.

The recovery disk and drivers disk will work just fine to install on the new HDD. However, make sure that you have a backup of the Dell installation! (I know some computers do not come with any optical recovery media, just HDD recovery -- so if this is the case for the Dell,make sure you don't throw away its OS)

 

I just checked out the ASUS site for the F3Sv and it appears they are now offering winXP drivers for it! This is great news for those of you who want winXP but couldnt find the drivers. Go check it out if you are running winXP.

>ASUS Support Site<

O, and my F3Sv just died on me last night, looks like a faulty GPU

 

I have a 320Gb Fujitsu in mine. Works fine. Replaced the ASUS supplied 200Gb about 4 mths ago.

 

How do I find the cd-key for my Windows that came with the laptop because it broke? I want to install home premium on a pc.

 

use magic jelly bean key finder (this is assuming you can still boot into windows). Why not send it back to asus if it broke?

 

Windows sticker on bottom of notebook.

Be aware this key is only legal on that particular machine since it's an OEM key.

 

Oh that doesnt make sense. I have a pc that I wanna put windows on it.

 

you can always phone microsoft and explain the situation, i hear they are pretty good about those legal issues and often just give you a key you can use.

 

That's an option.

So, sivillim, what you mean is that the laptop broke and you want to reuse the Windows license? Well personally I'd have nothing against that and consider it fair use, but that doesn't mean much... I still fear it may be against the EULA of the OEM installation --- you need to check.

 

I will give Microsoft a call. But since its OEM would Asus have restricitons?

 

I guess the restrictions are pretty much the above, you can only use it with that particular machine. But check the EULA for more details.


Edit: yep that's what the license says. Only that particular computer.

 

here is my wishful thinking (inspired by the story of the repaired G1s using updated 9series gpus)

my f3sv-a1 under service for mainboard replacement due to gpu failure. i wonder if any of the following can fit or is eligible as a mainboard.

checked the f3 series, there are a couple of gpu variants.
ati mobility 2600/2400 from f3sa, and f3sg nvidia 9300m.

 

haha, nope wont happen. Just got mine back from asus support due to gpu failure and its just another 8600M GS (hopefully without the known defect this time)

 

Ok, as I was preparing to send my laptop to Asus I tried to fix it. To my surprise it turned on but there is another problem. The picture explains it all.

 

Is the gcu on the f3sv built in? Im pretty sure its fried on mine.

For a while the screen was messing up (big *** red lines, blurry screen), then after a week of that the display wont work at all. Tried to hook it up to my friends display, but nothing.

 

yeah, you gotta send it off to asus to get it replaced. Turn around time is pretty quick so dont worry too much about that. I just sent mine in two weeks ago for the same problem and it only took 4 days to get it back (shipped it monday, got it back thursday), excellent service (for north america anyway)

 

Will they replace it under warranty only? Or can I get them to bill me for the parts/labor? Or can I do it myself?

 

im not sure, but it will still be under warranty. As far as i know, the F3Sv isnt even 2 years old yet, and thats how long the warranty is. You cant do it yourself.

 

I am sending my F3SV X1 to asus due to gpu issues. I scraped off the thermal pad from the gpu and cpu and put artic silver on. It worked fine for months till i get 6 mini screens of the same thing. So i read the warranty is void. I accept that. But when they call me up should I deny ever opening the case expect to blow the dust out or be like yea i did do such and such. And if im screwed, could I buy a new gpu or whatever parts i need to get it working agian?

 

The warranty is indeed technically void. However, you could mention that the reason for which you removed the heatsink is to address the GPU problem without replacement -- which may make them more lenient, although it's not at all sure...

In any case, I would try to get it serviced from warranty. It is not unheard of that ASUS service doesn't even look at the "warranty void" stickers and just replaces the bad parts from warranty. At least in North America.

You can probably also buy it, you will need to buy either GPU if it is discrete, or if it's soldered then the entire motherboard. It can be quite an expensive fix. (roughly 300-500 USD)

 

Thanks for the reply. I did not remove any stickers to access the components. It is soldered I think.That sounds like a plan. Oh and I did a sloppy job with the Artic Silver because theres some off the "die"?, but on the chip. I dont think they will give me a break but I will try. Thanks

 

If there were no stickers, then you can simply not mention any of this on your RMA form, unless they ask explicitly... with the risk of getting problems later if they do realize you opened it up, and if they are into the problem-making mood

 

If your familiar with Asus laptops then you know about the brown transulcent material paper thing that covers the GPU chip. I took that off for some reason. Im just hoping they look at it and are like w.e thats probaly how it was shipped out, like a defect or something. Also I typed a note of what the problems were with my laptop as they requested. They also asked me to print out an excel sheet that I need to list my components. I couldnt so I just wrote that everything was stock. Anyway, I will see and post here with the results if anyone cares lol. Thanks for the advice E.B.E

 

We care. It's always very useful to get feedback if your advice was good, irrelevant, or maybe counterproductive. The advice improves in the next round. At least ideally...

 

Well I sent the laptop to them and they are sending it back. On the Asus RMA status page it had a tracking number but no information as to what they did or if they did anything. They would have called me if there was a problem right? Also there was no OS installed because Vista fouled up after it installed and is giving an error. nervous lol...

 

They probably fixed it if they are sending it back with no communication about it. If they needed the OS, they probably did a recovery to factory defaults.

 

I hope your right lol.

 

Good news. they replaced the HDD and Motherboard. took 2 days not including the weekend.

 

Nice. Glad you have your computer back. Free of charge

 

to f3sv owners with replaced motherboards,

with the nvidia gpu defect in mind,

do you think we were given improved parts?

according to cpuz my motherboard is a v1.0, rev. c0.
gpuz; 8600m gs rev.a2. released may 09 2007.

 

So it sounds like they dont care about voided warrantys?

 

not so much as 'dont care,' more like 'dont check'

 

Which sort of implies "don't care"...

 

Well, its time for me to move on. The F3Sv has served its purpose but I decided I don't feel like carrying around this huge thing to classes anymore since it barely gets me through the long ones anymore (battery not long enough). Bought myself a desktop for gaming, and I'm planning on getting one of those small netbooks before I go back to school

$308 GPU: Nvidia GTX 260 core 216

$199 CPU: Intel E8400

$132 (2x$66) Hard Drives: Seagate 500GB 7200.11

$30 Optical Drive: LG 22x DVD writer

$75 RAM: OCZ Reaper Hpc Edition 4GB DDR2-1066 CL5-5-5-15

$158 MOBO: ASUS P5Q Pro

$220 LCD Monitor: Samsung 2253BW

$61 Keyboard: Saited Eclipse 2

$110 Case: Antec 900

$115 PSU: Seasonic 600W M12

 

good to see that this board is still alive
i have a question
i was going to install XP but keeping vista to duel boot
so to partition i went to the disk management (right click on computer and clicked manage)
that's where i am confused
i got
C: (vistaOS, Primary partition)
D: (Logical Drive)
than i have another primary partition that is 100% free
so i decided to erase it and merge it with C: but when i try to erase it it says
"The selected partition was not created by Windows and might contain data recognized by other operating systems, Do you want to delete this partition?"
does this partition exist for all you guys or only me ?
i am wondering if it is suppose to be ASUS recovery partition

Also if any of you guys did duel boot of XP + Vista (Vista first than installing XP for me)
which hardware needed new drivers for the XP?

 

I have a dual boot of XP and Ubuntu, I created a small guide (in my signature), but its pretty much useless now that asus offers drivers for XP for the F3Sv. You might want to use video drivers and sound drivers from laptopvideo2go and realtek respectively though, since when I used the asus provided drivers I felt they offered very low quality when compared with the ones in the guide.

 

when u were partitioning for the XP and Ubuntu
did u also see that 7 G primary partition you never made?

 

I don't remember, but if I did have it, I deleted it. Its most likely just a recovery partition.

 

that's what i thought too so i deleted it
however it is useless since i cannot expand my C: or D: to that unallocated volume (don't know why)
only thing i can do is create a new volume for that area
but with only 7G i can't really install XP there

oh also when i partition for duel boot
do i have to shrink volume from C: (the vistaOS) or is it okay to shrink volume from D: (extended volume)

 

You just need to create enough free space for XP, so if vista is 160GB you need to shrink it to something smaller. I'm not sure what you have for a D: though. Its completely up to you, the only restriction is that there are 4 primary partitions (you can have unlimited logical ones though, and they are the same as primary partitions as far as i can tell, so basically you can have as many partitions as you want)

 

You should be able to move around the partitions to take advantage of the free space, using e.g., Partition Magic in Windows or qtParted in Linux. These partition managers have more options than the default ones in Windows (at least PMagic does).

Be aware that when moving partitions around & shrinking them, there is always a distinct possibility of data loss. So make a backup of your data prior to trying anything!

 

so, ive run into this problem before, but cant find a fix for it.

When trying to recover vista (from XPinstall) i get a big red error and msg: "Cannot load imagex 0 from src WIM file"
this is at the partition stage.

I was under the impression that the solution to this was to remove the partition with a utility(used PM8.0) before the recovery, but this doesnt work.

Now i guess i am going to have to load some sorta partition utility via USB but what is it that i must do to get this recover CD to work????

 

this thread, asus tech fixed it

 

did you got any solution? my laptop has the same problem!

 

I recommend an upgrade/reinstallation of the ATK drivers (because it sounds like a power management issue).

 

Yeah either of those "solutions" work fine. The problem goes away after that. I have not had the problem reoccur since then.

 

2 years over.. and that means warranty too.. And my graphic card died I guess. When the system boots, I see dots here and there like some random design screensaver. In a few minutes, the system restarts. But when I disable the graphic card, it works but very slowly.

Since the warranty is over, I cannot take it to ASUS. is it possible to buy a graphic card (the same 8600gs) and replace it with the dead one? If that is not possible, can I just take off the graphic card and make it work like one of the desktops I had that had no graphic card?

I need this laptop to work at least for 3 more months.