Tuning the Aero 15-w/x/v7/v8 - Common problems & solutions

I also got ACPI issue, but not on extreme side. Seems the EC controller is quite erratic and its firmware is unstable, maybe Gigabyte could try to improve the firmware?

 

So my Samsung 960 Pro NVMe boot drive just died in my 15X. I assume from overheating. Need to RMA it now. I think I've installed Windows about 5 times on this machine and will need to install it again soon. Oh the fun.

 

So I got terrible temperatures as well, playing Forza Horizon the CPU hits 93°C on some cores. Same when benchmarking with TimeSpy.
After undervolting by 0.185V it looks better, but temperatures are still above 80°C - no more throtteling though when running TimeSpy.
https://imgur.com/gallery/yZXsEr9

Thanks for the very informative thread!

 

I have major issues with backlight bleed to the point where I can see a slight blue tint on the right third and top and bottom left corners on my screen. Also, I've been having severe internet connectivity issues. When I use discord I have a constant 300-10k ping, as well as not being able to connect to some game servers. My cpu seems to be running slightly slower than average as well. When I disconnect my headphones and reconnect them while my aero is powered on, it seems that I cannot switch back to just using my headphones, either having to settle for sound out of both my headphones and speakers or just my speakers. Really feeling like I should just return my device based on just the backlight bleed alone.

 

yep i got this ACPI EVENT 13 issue as well :

• ACPI error 13: The embedded controller (EC) did not respond within the specified timeout period. This may indicate that there is an error in the EC hardware or firmware or that the BIOS is accessing the EC incorrectly. You should check with your computer manufacturer for an upgraded BIOS. In some situations, this error may cause the computer to function incorrectly.
• DistributedCOM error 10016

On bios FB05

 

Right now I am adding another SSD(970 EVO) to my aero 15x, but also consider a repaste (I used it for almost 5 month), just one problem, I can't unplug the battery....this thing is too hard to unplug, anyone has a good idea about this?

 

Just take your time. Is really hard to unplug the first couple of times. Then it will get loose

 

Hi! First post here!

So I just received my 15x v8 today. I really read up on all the issues, and I amazingly don't seem to have any of them I've noticed so far.

I do have a coil whine when it is plugged in... not sure if that's a big deal or not?

Also, I noticed the anti tamper stickers on the back... Am I going to void my warranty popping off the back panel? I'd love to stick a Samsung 970 in/add more ram/upgrade the wireless card/repaste. I'm a little leery of voiding warranty on a $2,000 laptop so many people have had issues with.

 

I have checked with my local distributor and they gave me the go ahead. Ultimately, there is also a thermal pad inside the box for you to insert your 2nd nvme ssd.

Wow that sounds awesome, will you also verify the event viewer log by error ? If there is no acpi error will you share your bios version and driver versions ?

TIA

 

I've got a question. I skipped through the thread, I just wanna know if anyone here has claimed to fix the cooling on this unit and can provide a video with it under simultaneous stress?

 

Hi everyone,

Wondering, do Aero 15x V8 has a ' USB PowerShare' - like my old Dell laptop, charging anything while laptop turned off.
Tried all 3 ports while laptop turned off - no result, no charge.

Checked the BIOS - no option to enable powershare (dell do have one).

Any ideas?

 

and one more stuff,

anything I can do with the shaking display? Seems like it is not screwed tight enough, some small vibrations on my table and laptop screen goes shaking badly moving there and back.

 

Hey guys, I just had a question. Recently my aero 15 v7, started running a lot hotter and turned out the CPU was throttling just playing dota2. So it turns out the fan on the CPU side (ride side) just doesn't ramp up and stays at its standard speed. I am wondering if this is the normal set up, as I never had to worry about it. Or is that fan done for?

I am not in the US for the foreseeable future, so can't really do an RMA. Anyone know what to do here? Thanks for any help.

 

FB05, same issue. Not sure that it actually affects anything so I will not add it to this thread but it is not nice for sure. Would like to see gigabyte fix it

Often people like to exaggerate backlight bleed because camera photos look worse in person but that looks pretty severe, if you can notice it normally I would consider a switch. The internet problems are almost always related to your isp/network equipment/drivers. I am not sure what you mean with the CPU slowness, if you have quiet fan mode on then yes they do throttle to ~15W.

No, you don't void the warranty by breaking the stickers and opening the laptop.

One guy made a thread with the last gen 7700HQ model and sanded the heatsink and then used LM. He claimed some ridiculous temp drops which I kind of find hard to believe.
I have seen the vast majority of people who use LM and other pastes on this laptop claim very small improvements or even worse temps by a degree or two.

In fact I tried to repaste with LM several months ago. Did several benchmarks controlling for fan speeds, ambient temps, software running in the background. Repeated the LM application 4 times before I gave up. In the end LM either matched the stock paste on CPU/GPU/both or lost by 1-2C. I just cleaned everything off and switched to kryonaut. I never bothered to write up my results because they were so uninspiring for hours of work. Short of modding the heatsink this laptop will throttle just like razor blade/gs15/etc. It is not surprising with 45W+90W and very light heatsink.

Both fans should be running at the same speed always. If the CPU one is totally stopped then you have a problem (well, there is a problem regardless). Try reseating the connector?

 

Thank you for the Quick response!
Have a torx toolkit on the way, hopefully, will be here soon will update when I am able to open the back plate and re-seat the fan. But thank you for confirming that the fans should be running at the same speed.

 

Try to run Gigabyte SmartDashboard and see what is the reported RPM (it is not the SmartManager), they do have individual fan reporting iirc, I will check when I get home later.

edit: They don't have individual fan rpm -_-

 

I've seen the 7700HQ/1060N unit be fixed with LM and reworking, though still warm. But the 8750H is impossible, as it is on the GS65.

I asked because people were trying to say that random users online claimed no overheat/throttle with LM, and I said no. So here's the nice proof I'd wanted. Thank you.

 

Hello,

First time posting, but a long time lurker. Thanks to everyone who has contributed to this great thread. I have had my Aero 15x for about 4 months now and it has fulfilled all of the wants/needs that it was purchased for. I have recently been researching and entertaining the idea of purchasing a set of USB-C earbuds for the digital quality. I know these are more immensely popular with the Android phone community on the newest phones (I am not an Android phone user). From what I have read I understand that there are some issues with the Android phones whereby the manufacturer of the USB-C headset use a DAC (Digital to Analog Converter). This misses the point of the purely digital USB-C port (vs the 3.5mm jack). While I understand that our great laptops have the 3.5mm jack, I would like to move into the USB-C earbuds world, but I am curious about if they work as designed on the Aero model laptops. Some of the ideals being the pure digital signal, Noise Cancelation (can draw direct power to run the NC processing on the earbuds) and keeping USB-A ports free. My primary end goal application would be 5.1/7.1 surround sound emulation for gaming and movie/music enjoyment via a purely digital signal.

So if anyone has an Android device with USB-C earbuds (mic and speakers) or purchased 3rd part USB-C earbuds, have you connected it to your Aero laptop? If so, did it work? Do you know if your earbuds have a DAC? Have you tried gaming, watching movies or listening to music with them, how was the experience? Did you have to install drivers or software to get them to work? Appreciate any insight.

Peace,

DeadMeat

 

Hi all, i’m kinda in a pretty pickle at the moment. I closed the lid of the Aero 15x before I went to bed the previous night. When I woke it up the next morning by lifting the lid, I was greeted with BSOD “DPC_WATCHDOG_VIOLATION”. Googled it and have been trying to boot into safe mode via smashing the F8 button, inserting a Win 10 installation flash drive. Checked BIOS, both M.2 NVMe could be detected. Nothing seems to work. It keeps going into BIOS. Anyone could kindly advise please?

 

So after opening the back plate and looking down inside, the fans both work. The fan on the right side (where the charging port is), does ramp up but it is definitely running slower than the other fan. Regardless, the temps are way too high. Have ordered some thermal compound so will try that, otherwise, SOL and will have to wait until in the US again to try and RMA over Christmas break...

It's just frustrating to see that the CPU temps jump up so far high to cause thermal throttling on a simpler game like DOTA2. GPU temps stay around 75 F max, so hoping changing thermal paste will help.

Yeah, I have tried to pull up the rpms separately and it just isn't there. Thank you for trying.

 

Try to reset default your bios, if anything try to play around Intel Rapid Storage Setting, I will try to check the bios see if any setting might need to be tweaked.

edit: Go to advance section, and check the sata setting, play around with the mode (AHCI/Intel rapid something).

 

Updated thread.

Thanks to notebookcheck we know that anyone who received the AUO82ED display lucked out.
It is possibly brighter than the LGD05C0, and definitely has much better response time (~9ms/~7.5ms black to white/grey to grey vs ~11.5ms/~17ms BtW/GtG on the LG.)

The AUO overclocks to 160Hz, the settings for this are on the first post. Now we just need anyone who got the LG panel to come forward and maybe test how well it overclocks. Otherwise it is pretty much settled that the AUO panel is better. This is maybe a case of gigabyte giving reviewers a worse panel and putting a better one on majority of the retail units.

 

Thanks steakikan for your kind assistance.

Before i saw your reply, I was trying to bring up the repair menu, by interrupting the boot process. Now it doesn't even boot into BIOS. am not sure is it my keyboard problem now or am I totally screwed?

 

What is the DP version supported by our Thunderbolt port? Is our thunderbotl Alpine Ridge or Titan Ridge?

 

To answer your question, yes, USB-C headphones work on the Aero without problems. I have tried my USB-C dongle from my essential phone and it works fine.

Your explanation though doesn't make much sense. "purely digital" isn't possible with headphones, since audio is an analog phenomenon. At some point there HAS to be a DAC in the system or you would not hear anything from the headphones. Circling back to what you want to accomplish, using USB-C to deliver power and audio over a single cable is good use-case, but one that can be accomplished with USB-A as well. Bypassing the DAC built-in is almost always a good idea. With the exception of Apple, basically every laptop has a garbage DAC built-in. Personally I use the Fiio E17k as a solid DAC/AMP replacement for when I'm on the go. When I'm at home I plug into a Schiit Modi DAC and Magni Amp.

Your 5.1/7.1 dream via usb-c can be accomplished with the help of Audeze, as they make a great new headset for this purpose.

 

Hi gnlu26,

Thanks for taking time to reply with clarifications, answers and suggestions. To further clarify my sought after solution (but I presume that nothing exists at this time), I am looking to see who has tested what USB-C earphones and how they work on their Aero 15x. So I again appreciate your feed back and suggestions. I am actually looking more for earbuds as I already have wired over the hear headset that works great. I have found that my ears and head are overheating with the over the ear solution when used for lengthy gaming sessions. I would expect that earbuds make for cooler usage by trapping less body heat. I would also enjoy the advantage of less bulk for traveling that earbuds would provide. I suppose I am looking for something along the lines of the Xiaomi Mi ANC Earphones. These almost fulfil the niche usage that I have in mind, but they fall short by not having the 5.1 or more preferable 7.1 emulation. I suspect that there is 3rd party software out there that could accomplish the same thing. I just don't know what the compatibility would be with which earbuds and the Aero 15x USB-C port. I was hoping that this might be a good forum to examine and review what works and what has not worked for those who have tried what products with which Aero version. Perhaps this topic would be better served in a more specific forum topic or in it's own category?

Regards,

DeadMeat

 

Well then your best bet is a USB-C cable from Shure. You can buy basically any of their in-ear monitors and attach the cable to them. This also has the added bonus that you can switch between 3.5mm(included with all their headphones) and USB-C. The SE215 is their entry level model at $99, and you can go up to the SE535 at $449.

For 5.1 and 7.1 emulation, you're going to get that from Dolby Atmos. Some games, like Overwatch, have it as an option from the audio settings. Otherwise, you can enable Atmos globally on your machine if you buy it from the Windows Store. Should go without saying, but don't waste your time running Atmos when listening to music through spotify or the like, it will just ruin your music.

At the end of the day, USB-C headphones on the Aero aren't necessary unless you want to boost garbage sound quality coming from the 3.5mm jack. 5.1/7.1 emulation can still be done through the 3.5mm jack and Atmos.

You can always start another topic if you have more questions, or you can just PM me directly.

 

This ist realy good thread here!

I have an issue and maybe someone could help:

If I Set to "high Performance" I get a noisy Sound (coil whine?) from the middle of the mainboard. It's not loud but if I am in a quite room I will hear that.

If I Set the Laptop to balanced, the noise has gone... It seems only to appear if the cpu is running on 3.9 Ghz and is on idle without load.

Using Balanced Mode is not a Option, because max clock speed is 2.1ghz.

And I rly dont understand why my cpu isnt clocking down from 3.9ghz if it is on idle even it s running on high Performance.

My Desktop 8700k is also running in high perf mode but is clocking down to 900mhz if its on idle.

Any suggestions here from you?

I am sry for my bad english

 

on your coil whine, I think you should just bring to the seller/for warranty if it is quite annoying
on performance and idle speed, do not use the Gigabyte SmartManager power plan, it is like that (will always keep to 3.9ghz on performance, and 1.2ghz on battery mode cmiiw)

 

You are right... I ve mailed with the seller, they send me a return code via DHL and will Exchange the device directly after incoming.

 

First off I'd like to say thanks for putting together such a brilliant thread.

I've just got an Aero 15X FHD and have gone through the list of recommended changes and they explain a lot and make things easier and better.

Regarding memory I note the Kingston Hyper X seems well recommended and people have had good success with it. Does anyone know if just one stick of it can be added to go with the original V-Color stick of ram? I appreciate it'll only run at the slower clock speeds.

On the note of speeds, in the real world is there much difference between ram speeds when using a pair of standard or the Kingston Hyper X sticks?

 

If you want to use your v-Color with an other Brand, Buy crucial 2666 CL19. Otherwise your sticks run at 2400mhz.

And yes, in real World, while gaming you loose some fps... There are YouTube vids which compare 2400 vs 2666 and Also compare CL19 vs CL14. You May loose about 15% Performance.

 

yesterday i did an win10 update (don´t really know which exactly). And today i installed the new nvidia driver 417.01. And now the mouse freezes seems to be history..

 

Thanks for the info, most helpful. I had a look around and as you say it can make quite a difference to the fps of some games.

My use is mostly to hold large amounts of data and stop them having to go to swap memory so probably not such as issue performance wise but unless I find a cheap matching compatible sodimm like the Crucial you mention then I'll probably get a pair of the Hyper X.

 

I would go for memory pair, Intel new processor seems quite picky with memory.

Is it from Gigabyte update or Nvidia official website? I wish it solved the BSOD too.

 

Hello

Today finally I got my aero 15x from HID evolution with LM on it. Install all drivers via smart updater run undervolt with throttle stoop as well. I done stability test on Aida 64 and noticed my cpu can't get any higher then 3.49 GHz any idea?

Also when I run balance mode via smart manager or Windows battery option my close is capped at 1.89 GHz and don't want to move any higher.

My temps are 62 GPU and no more then 72 on cpu.

 

New to the forums and I recently purchased the Gigabyte Aero 15w-v8. For the most part the laptop has been fine, however I started having a minor issue yesterday:

Most of the time when I boot the laptop it loads into the BIOS automatically and even pressing different F keys at the BIOS splash screen did nothing. And in the BIOS the m.2 drive that came with the laptop is visible and is selected as the only boot drive.

However, when I get into BIOS, if I hit the "esc" key and chose to not save changes, the laptop boots into windows normally. But I have to do this every time it boots into the BIOS.

Any ideas or tips to try to resolve this? It happened with the stock drivers/BIOS, and even after updating BIOS to FB08 I still get the same issue.

 

I have a whine / buzzing only when plugged in as well.

Why? What about you guys? It is it just us two?

Normal?

Just got my laptop.

Sent from my SM-G950U using Tapatalk

 

Is it normal that the screen brightness can't be altered by using FN F3 or F4 ?

I can adjust sound but not the brightness.

Already tried adjusting in smatmanager 18.0.2.8 from auto to manual but no change.

 

Sometimes it does happen, just restart smartmanager or GigabyteFusion

 

U mean remove and reinstall smart manager?

 

Try just restarting the machine but if not then I'd try uninstall all versions of Smart Manager and then reinstall the latets one.

 

Hello

Currently I am stuck with no sound in my aero 15x. Tried everything with fresh windows install with no success any suggestions ? I have sound when I received my laptop

Windows suggestion from trouble tool is No speaker or headphones are plugged in

 

try to install the audio driver from smartupdate?

 

Done it all version from smart updater, gigabyte website, even old windows driver from updater. Still same.

 

Can you check your sound devices setting? Right click on Sound icon on taskbar, choose Sounds and then on the tabs choose Playback and screenshot that.

 

Got only 1 device and it is showing as a unplug

 

Update :

Spend some time with Zoltan from Hid evolution and it looks like foulty sound card on motherboard.

I received fantastic customer service and will be returning my laptop HID evolution already organised shipment for free for me even they don't have to.

After all issues with aero 15x starting on software ( smart manager, smart updater etc) finishing on hardware sound not working I decided to move to different laptop.

Thanks for people on forum that tried to help.

 

wrong thread, please delete

 

Hi guys,
I just ordered an Aero 15x V8 with FHD screen, first model had keyboard problems (D key needed to be smashed) and creaks with the F5 one. I've received a replacement one which has totally different components inside, LG screen now before AU OPTRONICS, Kingston memory (before I don't know, could I find this through Windows information system? I've saved it...), Toshiba SSD and before a slow Transcend), also different keyboard running much better but having the right shift key with dimmer LED.
Could you please tell me if the LG screen is better than the AU OPTRONICS? I'm having backlight bleed too with this one... I'm shocked with the black level of this screen which is poor compared the the Sharp screen of my Dell Precision 5510 at work.
I don't know if I must give up on that Aero and wait for something else, new one supposed to be announced at CES beginning of January.
My unit looks better than my previous one but it's older regarding manufacturing period...
Many thanks for your insights!