*** OFFICIAL GIGABYTE AERO 15 OWNERS LOUNGE ***

Is there a changelog Gigabyte publishes with driver and firmware updates?

 

Hey Guys,

My Smart Manager wasn't launching for quite a while and couldn't use a lot of the F-Key hardware buttons such as brightness controls and fan controls and I finally figured it out (stubbornly i did NOT want to do a clean install). I had "app access to diagnostics information disabled" and a lot of the app access for components (camera, etc...) disabled in O&OShutup 10 (as per @Phoenix 's tweaks) and it was keeping me from launching the utility. I believe it needs access to all those things before even launching.

Hope this helps someone.

Cheers

Edit: also make sure you don't disable the Gigabyte Fusion autorun.

 

Same problem, I'm documenting my efforts to fix it in this Reddit thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/gigabyte/comments/8psasu/aero15x_latest_bios_fb06_kills_nvidia_card/

So far:

FIXED: Error Code 31 was to do with connected display devices. I use the Thunderbolt 3 port connected to a hub for my primary monitor, the mini display port for my secondary and the HDMI for a mixed/virtual reality device. Disconnecting all of them and restarting allowed the Smart Update software to detect the nvidia card. All is working as it was before now.

Upon detection:

 

Yeah, as a rule of thumb, I disconnect any connected devices while try to update either firmware or drivers for any of those devices.

 

Did anyone successfully installed Linux and setup their Nviadia card? I cannot seem to get it to work, neither proprietary driver work (neither nvidia or bumblebee) and I can seem to get it booted while with the proprietary drivers. With the free nouveau drivers I can boot, but the card is not functioning and some programs are glitching (chrome, spotify, vivaldi).I've tried all the kernel variables (`acpi_osi=! qcpi_osi="Windows 2009", `acpi_osi="!Windows 2012"` `acoi_osi="!Windows 2016` and etc) but they dont help. I've tried both Manjaro 17.1.10 and Ubuntu 18.04 and both have similar problems, though with manjaro I can get it to boot more easily with the free drivers, but no nvidia.

 

Yes. TL/DR, you need to install 16.04 and upgrade to 18.04 LTS to get NVIDIA working. 18.04 has a bug (May 2018) where the live USB cannot correctly format the HDD and install grub.

Here are the steps I took from memory:

1: Back up the system to USB. I used the Windows 10 backup, the Gigabyte one didn't work for me.

2: create a Ubuntu 16.04 live USB and install by completely wiping the hdd. I kept the BIOS in UEFI mode otherwise the touch pad did not work. NVIDIA did not work at this point and I had the login loop as well as much other crazy stuff.

3: Reboot the system. Do NOT attempt to login via gui, instead hit Ctl+Alt+F1 (or maybe F3 worked) to get to a terminal. Now you will do a dist-upgrade to Ubuntu 18.04. After this, Nvidia worked just fine with the apt version of the Nvidia driver (no bumblebee stuff). When I did it, upgrade from 16 to 18 was not enabled by default, I had to force the dist upgrade

 

I'm having a slightly different problem, hoping you can help. My gigabyte fusion never autoruns and I need to launch it manually to access any of the keybinds I've set up on the numpad. Where do I enable the autorun? I can't seem to find it in the fusion app.

Thanks,
Alex

 

Does anyone has their num lock randomly auto turn off and on?

 

No but I do have my brightness randomly set to 50 and then back to whatever setting I had, but only when I'm on lower power.

 

Asked the Gigabyte support about the changes in bios version B06 & EC 006. This is their reply:

 

This is what they updated in the bios or will fix in the next version?

 

Updated in the bios.

This is for the Gigabyte Aero 15X v8 i7-8750H

 

That worked, thank you so much!

 

Hi everybody. My aero 15 (2017) seems to be dead after almost a year of smooth and correct usage

Now when I turn it on, there is a white light coming out from the power button, and two of the four indicators from the side are on, but that's all I get. No bios, no flashes on the screen, no response when pressing any key, no fan, no heat, no noise. It happened without previous problems. I just turned it on today, and suddenly it didn't work at all.

I can turn it offf and on, and same thing happens over and over. So I guess I will RMA it. Did anybody had the same problem?

Also, I opened this laptop right after buying it to add another hard drive. I will remove it before sending it to the company. Do you think I could have some trouble cause of this?

Sad day for me, I loved this laptop!

 

I'm reaching temps of around low to mid 90's on my CPU playing Jurassic World Evolution..wondering what effects of this will be. Didn't even know it was possible have the laptop elevated at around 10-15cm yet still gets hot even with all the thermals.

Graphics card is around mid to high 80s... I didn't realize this until I decide to monitor temps because the game was freezing quite a bit because the CPU would throttle.


AND this is with my undervolting the CPU...

 

What fan settings are you using?

 

On my manual deep control settings.

Strange thing is it's just that game.. it's never gone so hot with Warthunder which is the other main game I play.

 

Hi guys, some weeks ago my Aero 15 automatically was updated to windows 10 1803, I rolled back to 1709. How can I update to 1803 again? Windows update say I'm up to date and there are no updates, only some small fixes for 1709.

 

Try downloading the Windows 10 Upgrade assistant.

 

Hey guys, I've been trying to read this unending thread looking for information but i'm hoping someone that has been here for awhile can shed some light for me.

I'm looking at purchasing a used Gigabyte 15 (7700HQ/GTX1060) locally. Reading this forum makes it seem like it's a wonder any of these things still work. But most forums are full of unhappy owners. Not happy ones.

Anyway, Can anyone confrim/shed some light on how common the following issues are

1) Color banding, I've heard some people saying the display is only 16 bit/ 65536 colors. This is obviously a far cry from modern 32-bit color displays.

2) Keyboard issues. Does it still have the weird key rollover issues?

3) Keyboard issues. I've seen people talking about issues where some keys flat out don't work. Is this a problem that happens out of the box or randomly over the laptops life?

4) I've seen people talking about lag problems when optimus has the Intel GPU running. Is this A common problem?

5) Ram upgrades. The laptop has a 16X1GB stick in it. I've seen ram compatibility lists for the 15x. But none for the 15.

6) Performance on battery life. is the CPU/GPU being downclocked significantly while on battery? Can you allow the CPU to run at normal speeds? what is the impact on battery life if you do so?

7) Would you purchase again right now at $~1200?

8) Does the warranty transfer to new owners? or is it limited to the original purchaser?

 

My display settings show that it's 32 bit.

My unit does not have many keybaord issues, but I do know some that do find some certain combinations not working. The ones that do not work on mine are never used by me, so I never notice.

Seems to be random.

By "lag" I think you are referring to the stuttering/freezing issued on windows 10 with optimus graphics. This is a common problem across all optimus laptops using gtx 10-series, kind of unfortunate to be honest.

Don't have much info on this, I've stuck with the stock 16GB that came with mine.

It's not significant enough for normal work loads (on the balanced profile at least), but it is present. Gigabyte has done some stuff under the hood that I do not know how to disable. Battery life is alright, but worse when comparing the aero 15 with the old windows 10 that came with the unit vs the new spring creators update (same could be said for stuttering issues). This is ~9 hours vs ~6-7 hours when comparing windows pre any creators updates vs now.

I would consider buying it at this price point.

I don't think so?

 

Just got my Aero 15X yesterday and have what I believe to be an odd issue. The touchpad has this issue where I cannot click with one finger and drag with the other. On every laptop with a touchpad that I have ever used this is a common function. Has anyone seen this issue? The touchpad seems to be registering both fingers just not that specific function. Oddly I can click and drag with one finger. I have tried reinstalling the drivers, updating them, downgrading them. Only thing left would be a fresh install but I'm really hoping to avoid that, well I'm really hoping it isn't defective and have to return it.

Is this just a function that is not supported or did I get a broke one?

BTW...read the past 50 pages of this thread and couldn't find this issue so if there is a known fix I did my best to find it but no luck.

 

The screws have some kind of dark painting that would disappear once you opened the laptop. I'm about to RMA my unit, and I did open it to put an additional hard drive. Would you try to repaint it in order to avoid problems during RMA process?

 

Spent some time reading about this. All signs seem to point to it being a software issue that will be addressed 'eventually' and can be dealt with in the meantime by disabling the GTX1060 in the device manager and manually forcing it on when needed. I had a MBP years ago where you could download a program to manually control the GPU. Is there no simple program to manually enable/disable?

Shame to hear about the battery life decreasing with updates. Hopefully things improve in the future.

According to the internet the warranty is tied to the machine so as long as you have proof of purchase and a serial number you're good to go.

 

I tried that but that caused some issues, the only other way was to disable the nvidia gpu through the BIOS which is fine but needs a reboot everytime you want your gpu back.

I hope so too. I honestly wanted to use the gigabyte recovery tool, go back to stock and never update again. I plan to install windows 7 seperately and see how performance is on there.

That's good then, because I haven't been able to register my device on gigabyte because someone else already had (I think? - open box unit). I guess if I ever need to use the warranty, it should be fine.

 

Yeah I had the same problem originally. What I did was install Windows Precision drivers for the trackpad:

Another thing you could try (as there are a few disclaimers with installing the drivers) is clicking in the very bottom left corner of the trackpad. The trackpad on this runs ELAN drivers which aren't great, but it's hard to match Apple's trackpads.

Hope this helps.

 

I'm seeing the color banding as well. I'm not happy with the display at all. It's sufficient in a lit room, but it's a huge disappointment when I compare it to the displays on my Razer and Asus laptops.

No issues here. No rollover, no repeat keys, no stuck or non-functional keys, and I have never had to configure anything. The keyboard on mine works great.

I experienced the "micro-stutter" people have been talking about. emptyproject11.exe fixed my issue, but of course the tradeoff is higher power consumption.

I also couldn't find solid info on this. My Aero has a 1x16 stick of Kingston RAM, and I haven't been able to find the same model. The two I've been eyeballing (which are compatible, at least on paper) are Kingston HX424S14IB/16 and GSkill F4-2400C16S-16GRS

5-7 hours on my custom power profile which has the speed capped at 2800 MHz, instead of the "stock" profile which limits it to 1400 MHz on battery. If you're playing a video game, expect much less. There is some GPU throttling on battery. It's important to note that I under-volted the CPU by 125 mV.

Maybe at $1200, assuming I can use what I learned through trial and error on my current Aero, and skip the frustrating "what the hell is causing these issues" period.

I'm not sure, but from what I've read the warranty is tied to the serial number, so it might be transferable.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is standard behavior for touchpads on windows machines (unless it has dedicated mouse buttons in addition to the pad). The method to do things like drag icons and highlight text is to double tap and drag.

If that sounds confusing, it's because it is. Here's how it works (steps 1 and 2 are in rapid succession):

1. Tap and release
2. Tap and hold
3. Drag

 

Has anyone had odd Bluetooth cutout behavior on the 15x? I've had this intermittent problem not with devices being disconnected from the service, but the entire service freezing and then doing one of two things: either reconnecting after a few moments (often I've had the Bluetooth settings up ready to cycle BT off and then on and magically it regains access to my M&K) or disabling entirely required a full reset of the system. And when I say disabled, I mean that the drivers no longer show up in Device Manager unless you ask DM to show-hidden devices.

Resetting or shutting down fully seems to take care of the problem nearly all of the time and I'm musing about what the cause could be. One possibility I thought of was either an intermittent antenna connection (loose wire at the connector) or heat related as it most commonly happens when I have the system under heavy processing load. One thing of note is that I never lose WiFi service. Do Intel WiFi units have BT piggyback on both of the dual antennas or just one? If it's just one, possibly that antenna is loose. If it's both, I think that's probably a dead-end.

This isn't a show-stopper as I'm not strictly relying on BT and it works about 98% of the time, especially under light use. But it has cut out at in-opportune times (games). I can switch the devices to WiFi antenna for the mouse and wired USB for the keyboard, but it would be nice to have BT operating more reliably.

 

This is exactly the problem, I didn't know/think to try the bottom left corner only for this function. Between my history of using Macs and Windows Precision Driver laptops I became spoiled in expecting entire surface area to be configurable as a single click base.

Which Aero 15X are you using that the drivers work on? I tried on mine and it gave me half of the setting options and didn't function well as a whole. I may have done something wrong and will try again when I want to tinker. Thanks for the reply!

 

please i need help to disable the hideous intel GPU and use the NVIDIA only on Aero 15. i've been using this horrible laptop always connected to an external screen because it was the only solution i found to use the NVIDIA GPU, but now i have some work away from home and i need to use the laptop screen. i already setup the preferred graphic processor to high-performance only and also setup manually ALL installed applications to use only the NVIDIA GPU, but still, this stupid laptop only uses the pathetic intel GPU. i don't mind to totally destroy the intel gpu if possible, i don't even understand why this thing has that thing on board. basically i need the NVIDIA GPU only, i really need to use this laptop for work and it is insanely slow even processing JPGs due to that horrible intel GPU. please, let me know if there is any solution to completely kill the intel GPU and use only the NVIDIA on the laptop screen like when i'm using an external one. i really hate a lot the Aero 15, it's the worst laptop i ever used, but i wasted all my money on this piece of junk and now i need to find a solution to work with it.

 

I've found that for the last three Windows laptops I've owned or used I could use the function of click and hold anywhere, swipe with secondary. (Surface book, XPS 15 and even my kids Dell 7577) If I click and hold with bottom left corner and then swipe with secondary finger the function now works for me. My guess is I just was always clicking too close to the center.

 

@NeKryXe Well the laptop display is connected to the intel gpu soo disabling it to only use dedicated graphics would be catastrophic. Optimus is there to preserve battery life, and it has its drawbacks.

 

Sell the Aero 15 and buy a laptop without Optimus, ie without iGPU

 

Hey, the smart update application Gigabyte provides doesn't follow the latest driver versions. Are there any other ways to keep up with the latest drivers?

Recently I found about Intel® Driver & Support Assistant application but it's only for intel hardware.

 

I recommend to rename "Smart Update" to "Stupid Update" and forget this software or delete it

 

You can use device manager to manually check for driver updates for specific updates. I use geforce experience for nvidia driver updates.
Audio drivers can also be manually checked for.
That should be about it, anything gigabyte you can check through your laptops support page (e.g. new BIOS that hasn't shown up in smart update yet).

 

Okay I just tried it on my Aero15, and not only does the "double tap and drag" method work, but the method you described also worked.

Clicking with one finger and then dragging that same finger: works.
Clicking with one finger, leaving it stationary, and then dragging with a second finger: works.

 

in fact when i bought Aero 15 i wasn't even aware that it had an intel gpu, i can't even understand what's that thing for.

anyway, the Aero 15 works perfectly connected to an external monitor by hdmi. the intel trash disappear and the laptop works only with the nvidia. so, i'm pretty sure that if i find a way to disable that hideous intel gpu that the laptop will also run great on the native screen.

Aero 15 is really really weird, i never saw before a laptop with one graphic card for an external screen and another for the native screen. it forces me to have access to an external screen everywhere, making it useless for most of the need of a portable device.

well... anyway. what about the bios? is there anyway to disable to intel gpu? or on the board maybe.

i already tried to delete and also block the intel gpu on the device manager but it doesn't solve the problem.

i also thought on finding a way to connect the native screen by the external hdmi, but i'm not comfortable doing it, it's probably not easy. but there must be a way. it doesn't make any sense to have a laptop with a graphic card that doesn't work with the native screen.

 

Good point. This explains why I get a black screen in Fortnite on native monitor full screen but not external.

Sent from my Pixel XL using Tapatalk

 

I'm having a problem with my Aero 15x where when I unplug the laptop from the A/C adaptor, the battery jumps from 100% to 98%. But when I plug it back in, the battery shows 100% again. Is there any fix for this?

 

Not sure that I fully understand your issue, so I'm sorry if I over-explain things.

An external monitor IS the only way to use only the Nvidia GPU. However, the Nvidia GPU is still used on your internal monitor. Any computer that has switchable graphics, in this case Nvidia Optimus, can switch between the intel iGPU and Nvidia dGPU. This is great for a lot of users because it greatly increases battery life by using only the iGPU when doing boring tasks like Word/Excel and most web browsing. The trade-off is that even when the Nvidia GPU is running, the image data must still pass through the intel iGPU to draw on the screen. However, from what I have seen, this only negatively impacts gamers in that it may add some screen tearing from the additional buffering of the iGPU.

So maybe that is actually what you don't like about this machine, but you mentioned "processing jpgs." Nothing should stop you from using the Nvidia GPU from doing any calculations or hardware accelerated anything, you will just have that frame buffer stuff from the iGPU. If you DO need a purely nvidia setup, and can't even handle the buffer to the screen, then you should buy a laptop with GSYNC, as it completely bypasses the intel GPU all the time. Basically if you buy a laptop nowadays and it has an Nvidia GPU but not GSYNC, it will be optimus switching graphics. However, it sounds like your real problem is that you can't get the Nvidia card to wake up when you're using the internal monitor, and since you mentioned messing with the nvidia control panel profile already, it might just be a driver problem.

 

It's for doing light duty on a laptop running off the battery so that you can get more than 15 minutes and not have to burn excess power through the nVidia GPU. Intel for light loads, nVidia for heavy loads. laptops without the discrete chip are usually fine with just the integrated chip as they only do light duty as it is.

Again, you're misapprehending what the purpose of the intel gpu is. You do not want to, nor can you, disable "that hideous intel gpu". It is integrated into the CPU itself. It is not going away. You want it so that you can email, watch YouTube, and write Word documents and not draw the battery down too quickly.

If you want access to the GPU, it will either do so automatically on its own heuristics or you can tell it directly what GPU to use:

Click nVidia settings in the notification area->Manage 3D settings->Program Settings tab-> Select a program to customize (or add an exe). Check what the auto-select settings are using (if it's a game or a high-end software package it will likely already be the nVidia chip). Change it if necessary.

No. It is normal. You're using the laptop wrong and not understanding how it works.

Please don't do that.

You tried to do it.

Look, in the future don't do that. You don't understand how your system works and you're trashing its normal functionality before asking how it's supposed to work. In the future please understand this:

The Intel GPU runs the laptop's display normally and the nVidia GPU takes over when there is a program that needs to run under load. It performs well when there is a program that requires the GPU's horsepower. Otherwise the Intel chip does fine at saving battery life. Do not treat your laptop like a desktop. It is not and is not designed to run that way.

That's.... not possible. Your native screen is hard-wired internally to your laptop's interface.

 

Has anybody else experienced an issue with green screens while watching videos? For example, whenever I try to watch a movie using the netflix app all I can see is a green screen. There is still clear audio and even visible subtitles, but the movie is replaced with a solid green screen. The same thing happens when watching videos on microsoft edge and google chrome. I was able to prevent this issue on chrome by going into settings and disabling the "use accelerated hardware" option. Everything else on my aero 15x seems to work fine.

 

I had this happen once, I figured it probably happens right after a stutter. Try updating your Intel GPU drivers. I don't know what solved the issue for me, but that might have been it.
That said I rarely use hardware acceleration due to the colour shifts in videos.

 

Hi,

I purchased my new Aero 15x 8th gen a month ago and I'm slightly disappointed with speed and overall stability. I'm sure it's the Gigabyte bloatware that's causing it as I've never had any issues with past laptops. I'm also wondering if it's possible to get more out of the processor as 2.2GHz is lower than I'm used to although apparently it can be increased to 4.1GHz? Does anyone know how I would go about increasing the speed here? I'm a software developer but when it comes to hardware I'm limited in my knowledge.

Sometimes even simple things like opening File Explore has a 2 second delay. This is a £2k plus laptop surely these simple operations should be instant?

I'm also getting random blue screens of death since updating the NVIDIA Drivers which is very annoying and I haven't managed to resolve this yet.

Thanks in advance for any help from a frustrated user.

 

Just wondering if anyone can confirm if the Aero 15 or 15X works with Oculus rift and HTC VIVE. ?

thanks

 

Using the Smart Manager, set the profile to high performance and fan to not quiet.
The opening file explore delay is a optimus bug which havent have a solution since it was first introduced.

Yes it does

 

Thanks for the reply.

I was also wondering if there is adequate support for Gigabyte laptops in the UK and how best to extend the warranty if I bought one

 

Thanks for your reply. Could you please advise on the CPU situation? 2.2 GHz is pretty slow for a laptop like this? It states on the official specs that it can go up to 4.1 GHz. Do you know how I'd go about increasing the speed to around 3GHz without doing any damage?