Very important: configurations and battery life / heat.. please read and comment...

Hey Everyone.... I just wanted to make a new thread that dealt with expectations of systems with different configurations and how they affect the battery life and heat of a system.

(This thread for better or worse is being brought to you because a member of this forum read about the new Z33's being quieter than the older M5's and therefore ordered a unit to Denmark.)

I don't want to say he told me I was lying, because he was very nice in his email to us. However, he ordered a 2.13ghz cpu and a 100gb/5400rpm hard drive... in a Z33a. He ordered an optional 9 cell battery because he knew the battery life would not be good with this configuration. What he did not take into account and was purely assumption on his part, was how heat and therefore fan speed... and therefore fan noise........ is affected by configuration.

This doesn't just go for the Z33a, but it's certainly the worst case. The higher the configuration, the worse the battery life and the more heat that will be created. That heat needs to get removed from the system and that leads to faster fans which stay on longer. The new Z33a has taken all of the considerations into account that anyone has even mentioned about the fan..... different fan and new bios directions for when to kick on the fan and at what rpm and so forth. This is something I want to make sure everyone understands when they look at a certain configuration. This fellow is well outside our return period and at the same time this is completely normal for THAT configuration.

What's most important is that when you're looking at a maxed out system, you have to understand you're not going to get the battery life estimated under "average" and to get that performance all the time, you're going to have to put up with extra heat and more movement on the fan. In actuality, there probably isn't more heat in the terms of the system getting "hotter"..... but there is more heat that the system has to expell, leading to a fan that designed to react accordingly. IF you are going to get a system with a very high configuration, make sure that you can make use of it. If you only use all the power sometimes, make sure that you know how to use some power saving features..... like use powergear or fan speed or something of that nature.

I feel bad in one instance, but at the same time, this high performance was something that this customer needed. He brought up that we were talking about the new Z33a and how the fan operated differently on this system (which is does) and under normal configurations, everyone seems to agree that it's quieter than the M5n.......... although I never thought the M5n was loud, but it certainly reacts differently than the new unit. My only gripe is that the first thing he mentioned is that I said it was quiet... In my defense, I was never asked in here or in another other manner about fan behavior with this particular configuration, although I wouldn't think it would be needed as it's acting in a common sense manner.


I'd like this thread to be a learning experience for everyone and if anyone has anything to add or has any questions.... this is the perfect thread to do it in. At the same time, do you think I should put a disclaimer after all of my threads?

 

A nice thing would be to tell everyone that the descriptions here is all relative based on the author's perspective. Because of this when I say it is "quiet", people might infer based on their definition of what "quiet" is. Too bad, I guess using quotes would be the best approach without getting scientific.

Regarding the heat and performance thing most "people" should know this already, the faster it is the more heat it generates; therefore, more fan noise. And it just gets worst with a smaller form factor.

 

Good point.... I'm thinking about getting more scientific because it's customers *like* these that are the ones who seem to feel the most jaded about their systems.... I guess they just don't understand the physics of the whole thing..

 

It’s a good point…

I also assume Asus would soon be updating the CPU in some of the new models and I wonder how this would affect heat, CPU, fan situation? I have V6 (1.86GHz) and I’m quite happy with it now and it’s just about comfortable, but what will happen if you put even faster CPU ? (personally I feel this system is just about maxed out)

Mind you, this is not the problem that only Asus might be facing. Apple is having similar problem with their Powerbook’s G5. Anyway, I guess we will soon find out….

 

Yeah... that's always my qualm about something like this...... Like when there is a price drop (which by the way was confirmed for the last week of July) ....... a month after that.... about too late to effect school shoppers... but that'll be the time that Asus' system start coming in with say a the next speed cpu... say a 2.0...... and keep the same current price....

Now, my problem is that ok.. you get more performance.. it's slight, but everyone wants the best value for the dollar cpu.. which right now is the 1.86 and will be the 2.0 in a month or more...... but that does effect the cooling of the system...... at it's top speed, it will create more heat than a 1.86 and therefore require faster fan speeds to keep cool....... Now, if you use powergear correctly and don't have it on high performance all the time........ you will lessen the problem to only when you're running at full tilt......

So there is a way to correct it under normal use, on a more normal sized system... a 2.13ghz on a 12" system is really pushing performnace to the limit and you're going to pay for that...... there's a reason most all 12" systems you can find in the world either run a ULV 1.2ghz cpu (at most) ... or certainly nothing up past say a 1.6ghz......

 

This is why Intel should of never leaked this info so damn early. It really effects barebone assemblers because it is mostly enthusiast who buys these systems, which also happens the majority who knows the price cut. Lets hope Asus can do the "right thing" whatever that means. Note: I'm not a reseller even though I sound like one. Just can't stand Corporations screwing people around whether it is small business or commoners. A logical choice is to leak it a week or two early, and not a couple of months.

The scientific approach would be in the right direction in helping users understand the heat/battery issue. But I think there is just way too many variables involved to get the clear cut answers that people want.

 

Well....... price cuts aren't a science, but they're ALWAYS the first month of every quarter..... usually around the second week give or take... this one will be very late, but it's not a surprise to anyone....... Honestly, I'm not sure how people don't know... anyone buying a say... 2.1ghz cpu in the last week before a price drop is going to either, a: be really pissed off and feel "taken" or b: feel really sick... either way it's their own fault....... I'm hard pressed to even allow anyone to buy a 2.1ghz cpu in the last month before a drop unless they KNOW it's coming... because I don't want people coming back to us and expecting money back or something.... But most of them "need it now" and understand that's how things go.

About the "science".... I'm thinking of getting out my trusty laser thermometer and buying a sound level meter........ and maybe doing a break down of all of our laptops and giving levels under certain configurations........ This would be tricky because even if the tests were just done under "standard" modes..... and under say.....no load.. just sitting idle..... or under heavy use like a benchmarking program.... that's still a TON of information..... if you compound that with all these different settings, the table would grow exponentially and I'm not going to do ALL that to try to explain to someone how their particular system should behave...... especially if they couldn't understand "faster means hotter and using more energy" ......... to begin with......

Even the big companies only care about giving the benchmark numbers under average configurations......

 

Okay, wow this is quite interesting..

I didn’t see this thread until after I bought my Z33A today. It is okay though, I think it’s only to be expected. We already know that across most platforms the Sonoma chipset and new Intel cpu generates more heat and uses more battery life. I was seriously considering the Sony Vaio S4xx series and I know those have worse battery life and a heat issue because of the Sonoma platform and new intel chips.

With the Z33A as small as it is, I hope Asus took attention to testing the machine to make sure it is able to properly dissipate the heat. As far as battery life, Asus and other manufactures are limited on what they can do, because ultimately it is up to Intel to create a good mobile platform that helps lower power consumption. From the looks of it so far the 915GM is worse than the 855 in that respect.

The Z33A is still very new and there are few reviews of the unit and none that address this specific issue of fan noise/heat in comparison to the older M5n.

Anyways, I have had the luxury of using the Z33A a couple of times before I decided to buy it and today I used it for about 15 minutes on high performance mode and the bottom of the unit was slightly warm, but not hot or anything.


I'll have my Z33A in my hands on Friday and I would be happy to do a review or maybe just address the heat/fan concern and do some battery tests for everyone to see.

Here's the Z33A I ordered.

Pentium M 1.7ghz (533fsb)
768Mb DDR2-400
Seagate 80gb 5400rpm
9 cell battery

Oh yeah and Justin, you mentioned that the prices change at the beginning of the month, do you have any indication that the price for these micro-dimms are going to come down?

 

Perhaps we should have a dedicated thread to fan noise. ?? I would say the 12" laptops and dtr's are the only laptops i ve seen with loud fan issues. I would say z33a is very much bearable. I ve seen it with pm 2.0 i cant say its worse then a 1.6 full throttle. Hard to call this one.

 

Memory isn't ruled the same way cpus are...... intel's in it's own world...... but again, for cpu's we're looking at say our prices changing on say... Monday July 25th... that's the best bet right now....

For memory... here's the thing.. infineon is the only ones currently even making a ddr2 400 microdimm. That alone keeps the price sky high...... They are planning on bringing out 1gb modules sometime before fall....... that should affect 256 and 512mb sticks...... but the biggest thing is really production levels..... there are only maybe 4 laptops (and I think I'm being liberal on this one) in the world right now that even use them..... the S5a and M5a (z33a) would be two of them and you could imagine they're a niche product and don't sell enough on their own to drive the market down on memory....... Since Asus makes a lot of the vaios, I haven't checked but I'm sure it's in at least one of the new systems.... if there even is anything out...... but other than that, there's nothing.

The DDR333 microdimms took about 7-8 months to come down in price..... that all had to do with production levels going up and those go up when more systems need them.... So to recap.

1. more companies need to start making them

2. 1gb modules will drive down cost of smaller sticks

3. more systems need to be designed with these sticks.

It's no doubt that microdimms are going to be the future of ultraportable ram, and Asus has made a push for it in the last year and a half....... becasue it allows for just that much less space and that much less weight..... but memory is like the stock market..... and microdimms when they are only used on a handful of computers is worst of all. At one period microdimms (ddr333) ... last year... basically doubled in price becasue kingston cut production because there wasn't a real push in the market for them........ That is something only someone who bought a ton of that ram the day before could really love....... so timing is everything and stuff happens as they say.

 

I plan to buy my ASUS laptop... still deciding between W5 and W3... around the second week of August... would this be a good time or should i wait till the end of August?

 

If you do plan on doing it then I will support you cause you would be like the few individuals who will be go into that much depth about a notebook. It is certainly do-able but just long and tedious process. The hardest part is designing a standard testing procedure that reflects the realistic modes of computing.

 

As an update...... This particular instance has really come to a head and I think I may have some some what of a language barrier with the customer. But basically without revealing too much..... the customer seems to say that powergear does work, but whatever kind of computing he's doing...... he NEEDS the highest performance. So he's in a catch 22 basically....... If you absolutely need all of that performance and can't put up with how ANY system would act in the same way......... their only choice would to use a desktop and that's not an option either.

Now, This person is a week past the return period as it is and lives half way around the world. Even if I could over rule our set rules, we're looking at another week at least to get this unit back and that's a week or so before price drops. a 2.3ghz cpu is going to drop like $250 which is something that is not figured into our restocking fee..... but our return period is a set number of days because prices like this change and it can't be longer than 15 days..... Usually the last 4 weeks before a price drop, no one buys the top end cpu, obviously..... so things like a shorter return period are set up to protect us in an ever changing market...... after all it doesn't take more than a week to know if you like a computer or not.

Does anyone have a suggestion for this guy? I'm sure he'll be stopping by or maybe he used the forum for research and hit the road......... but he NEEDS the full cpu performance and he wants basically no fan........ I'd tell him about some good watercooling systems I've been developing but I think he needs this to be portable... the whole reason he got a 12" to begin with.

 

he could always get a slightly larger system like the 13" or a 14". They are still pretty portable and could be better in cooling. If he sticks on the 12" then he is really out of luck. I think he needs to fiqure out a compromise. He is not going to get best of both worlds because their are no solutions yet.

 

I've been using my z33a since monday and have been very impressed with it. i am typing this reponse on it right now. I am working on a review that will hopefully be finished this weekend. And I will be including temperature measurements at various parts on the exterior made with a multimeter because I know temperature is a popular interest.

I was worried about fan noise so I ordered it with a 1.73 GHz P-M. The fan is running right now but isn't very loud. It's about as loud as a quiet exhale (exhale as quietly as you can without being silent ). Sometimes the fan is silent.

-Dave

 

Right, but when you go all out on a 12" system... it's hard.. even a 14" would be hard pressed to run a 2.1ghz any different... it's creating the same heat... the only difference is that the fans can get slightly larger... Z33 and Z63 have basically identical fans though.. so that theory is out the window...... stepping up to Z70 might help, but that's it.. and that's out of his size range, but also something he should have thought about before hand. There is no way to have that kind of AWESOME performance and put it in a 12" system to meet your performance and weight/size requirements, without some sort of issue... nothing in this world is completely perfect and there's basically no way to make it perfect.

 

So when there is a price drop on chips do manufacturers, ie. ASUS, replace the chips in models, ie the W3. In other words, when prices drop will ASUS start putting a 2.0 chip in the W3 model or will the price of the W3 come down or niether. Sorry if this is a basic question, but as you can see by my name I am a newbie.

 

That's ok, but you're pulling this thread off topic. Basically for custom systems, dealers like us will be able to start using the new pricing the day it comes out.... 3rd week of July.... But Asus, their systems that are built after the drop will most likely just keep the same price and bump up to a 2.0ghz to keep it current... Then those have to ship to the US and then to the dealers and then get out to customers..... Ensemble models are usually 3-4 weeks behind and that is only if there is a call for these systems at the time of a price drop.... it could be longer before anything is done... so certainly before September you'll see most likely a bump up on the the cpu but keeping the same price.