3820TG Owner's Lounge - Part Two

Did you install the standalone Intel driver (the one which is version 8.15.10.2189)? If you did that then remove the Intel AND the ATi drivers, then install ONLY the ATi driver version 8.752. That already includes the Intel driver and you do not have to update the Intel driver or install the standalone Intel driver. I think that's why you're having problems with the Mobility disabling itself.

 

The 5650/6550 is not 15% weaker then the 540 in the 3830. You're not far off but I think it's more like 5%. I don't think there would be a noticable difference between the two during gaming or aaplications that require a GPU.

Now the new LG with the 550 might net you 10 more FPS while gaming but I'm afraid the price of the LG doesn't make the screen/extra FPS worth it. If they can net it in under $850 and prevent heating issues then it MAYBE competition for the 3820 but you know what? I think it'l be over priced and financially out of reach for the masses that fell in love with the 3820tg.

It IS a sign of a bright future for people who want portable power without having to carry a 15" or bigger (I also never got to see the 4820tg's which I would of loved if it had a second fan instead of the DVD)

 

If you compare the notebookcheck.net benchmarks for both, the GT540 scores 8180 on average on 3DMark06, which the HD5650 scores 6724 average. While the results may be slightly skewed in favour of the GT540 as the 5650 is used on weaker computers, and that the core speeds can be anywhere from 450-650, the 3DMark Vantage scores are less skewed, with the GT540 scoring 3478 in the GPU test while the HD5650 scores 2710. As the test only takes into account GPU power, it is better than the 3DMark06 test but still inconclusive because of the varied clock speeds. However, I think it's fair to say that the 5650 is about 10% weaker than the GT540. Just my two cents' worth on the topic

 

I am keeping my 3820TG. The throttling problem looks serious to me and I think the dual fan cooling solution on the 3820TG is genius. The cooling on the new model can't really be tested because of the throttling problem.

I use mine for work mostly and find that, with CPU/GPU fully overclocked, my little Acer is actually a bit more powerful than mobile workstations that cost 2x as much. USB 3.0 is a nice feature and some would prefer the new keyboard. I prefer the old look and color as well. I would probaby have gone with the 3820TG. It's a close call though (assuming that Acer fixes the throttling soon) as I do like some of the improvements in the new unit.

Stock I think the 3830TG will significantly outperform the 3820TG. Fully clocked, I would still guess the 3820TG is more powerful and benches better. Once Acer fixes its throttling problem, hopefully we'll get some objective benchmarks on a side-by-side.

Are you using factory drivers from the Acer site. If so, you should only have to install one driver which controls both. Is that what you did? Or are you using some other driver combination (is so, I would assume your problem lies there).

Bronsky

 

The sweetspot for portable business power is 12-13". The LG P330 is actually the successor to the P310. The P310 was the inspiration for Acer's design of the 13" 3820TG, which it touted as the natural successor to the P310. The old LG was legendary. I tried to import one for almost a year before I saw the 3820TG.

My guess is that we'll never see them in the US. The P310 was never imported here. Those who get them in the US will have to buy them overseas and swap the KB. Some will do that, just to get the better display (if the new LG IPS display is 13.3" and 720p resolution, will we be able to swap them in our Acers?).

All in all, it looks nice, is a bit thick to accomodate the GT 550, but, if they really make it by Q4 it will probably still be the most powerful 13" on the market. The other problem is that LG is considering introducing it late in the product cycle so there might be some better options by Q1, 2012. Time will tell.

 

Both the Intel (8.15.10.2189) and ATI (8.713.3000) GPUs are updated with the latest drivers from the Acer site, but I'm afraid that if I were to uninstall my Intel one, the ATI one would disable itself again and I would end up with a blank screen. I can only download the ATI VGA one from the Acer site as the AMD didn't work last time. Do I disable the Intel or uninstall it? Thanks.

Sunny

 

How do I remove the drivers without ending up with a blank screen ? . I'm not sure whether I can download the 8.752 one which is under AMD, as mine's under ATI. Thank you, sorry to bother.

 

Reinstall the ATI driver only. Try it first withtout uninstalling anything. When you're done, see if you have the same driver # when you run intel only and when you have the ATI running. If they're the same, you have successfully overwritten the Intel driver.

Bronsky

 

ATi is under AMD (ie both are the same company). It is perfectly okay to install the AMD driver, version 8.752. You can remove the drivers one by one, uninstalling then waiting perhaps 15 minutes or until you're completely sure the driver is gone, then restart and remove the other one, wait some more and restart. Then, install the AMD driver and everything should work fine.

 

I totally agree with you the 20tg design is elegant the keyboard is nice no big change the only thing i suffer from is the screen but i get used to it dont notice the difference any more ( i own it from 4 months right now and i think this going to last for another year before i look for replacement

 

I'd rather see an 3820TG with just an sandy bridge CPU/USB3 and new keyboard, keeping GPU and cooling solution/chassis the same as now.

And throttling is an common problem for many sandy bridge laptops, at least the quad cores. I have yet to see an i7 2630QM that doesn't throttle during stresstesting. MSI, asus, HP, Acer.... all models with 2630QM has been throttling under stress testing, mostly because exceeding power usage limits rather than temp limits since throttling usually happens at 85-90 C area.
Throttlestop can't adjust power usage limits for the new sandy bridge CPU's

I've got myself an HP DV6-6071 with 2630QM and AMD HD6770 GDDR5. Cheapest "gaming" laptop around here, the HD6770 is really powerful. But yes it do get a bit hot and sound like an jetplane at max load, unlike the 3820TG which can be described as "silent" even at max load.

 

But where do you connect it? Do you connect it with a HDMI -> DVI + Toslink splitter?

But do they throttle under _normal_ usage? I mean, gaming, long programming compilations, 3D content creation?

Personally I share the opinion that Linpack, Furmark, etc. are power viruses and they put unnecessary strain on the components without any real world benefit. I have been using my desktop Q6600 which is overclocked from 2.4 Ghz to 3.6 Ghz, and its super stable even under 24 hour long 3D rendering sessions. But I know for sure that it wouldn't pass a Linpack or Furmark burn test, and I would just ruin the components on my motherboard / video card by duing it.

 

3dmark vantage:

Acer 5742G (GT540M i5-450M): 3785 points.
Acer 3820TG (HD6550M i5-480M): 3762 points.
Acer 3830TG (GT540M i5-2410M): 4516 points

3dmark 11:

Acer 5742G (GT540M i5-450M): 958 points.
Acer 3820TG (HD6550M i5-480M): 1100 points.
Acer 3830TG (GT540M i5-2410M): 991 points.

Results from notebookcheck.

According to 3dmark11.... GT540M is the looser, and in 3dmark vantage there is almost no difference on computers with the previous generation CPU, only the sandy bridge CPU makes a gap in performance.

IMO GT540M is not an upgrade, it's rather an sidegrade. If I had to choose I'd choose the AMD card since I prefer AMD drivers over nvidia optimus.

 

You're comparing the wrong thing We're talking about the HD5650 here, but you're using the HD6650 as a comparison to the GT540, which is wrong because the 6650 is way more powerful than the 5650.

 

Way more is an overstatement. It's basically the same card but with a nudge higher voltage and clocks.

 

HD6550 is an 50MHz higher clocked HD5650 and is what one would be likely to get today in an 3820TG - where they are still in stock.

 

Here are the specs for all 3 video cards. The HD 6650M has 80 more shaders than both the HD 6550M and HD 5650. The 2nd Generation TimelineX series does not have the HD 6650M I believe; so I don't see the point of this argument. Unless, there is a foreign model with the HD 6650M that I do not know about.

HD 6650M
Pipelines 480 - unified
Core Speed * 600 MHz
Shader Speed * 600 MHz
Memory Speed * 900 MHz

HD 6550M
Pipelines 400 - unified
Core Speed * 600 MHz
Shader Speed * 600 MHz
Memory Speed * 900 MHz

HD 5650
Pipelines 400 - unified
Core Speed * 450-650 MHz
Shader Speed * 450-650 MHz
Memory Speed * 800 MHz

 

Yeah small typo, should be 6550, and that's what my numbers are from too. The 6550 in the timelinex has only 800MHz memory as well, not 900MHz as "per spec". So basically it's an HD5650 with 50MHz more core speed an bit higher core voltage.

 

My HP DV6 throttles from just playing wow at least, and that is not due to temps since it's hardly hitting 80C. The odd throttling makes it jump up and down from x15 multiplier to x26 multiplier, ingame it's noticeable as "stuttering". It doesn't happen all the time though.

 

The score for the 5650 on Vantage is about 1000 points lower than the 6550 (using OC-Freak's data). Considering that when 3DMark Vantage was created, the best GPU combination will only score 5000, so a score difference of 1000 is actually a 20% performance gap, which is not too much of an overstatement

 

I have a question to ask: For those among us who have reapplied thermal paste before, did you follow the steps in the service manual to disassemble the laptop (ie remove all the components and separate the chassis etc), or is there a shorter and faster way to do it, like for example ignoring the removal of all the separate components and only separating the chassis? If so can you guide me to see how to open it like you did? I really don't want to follow the service guide as the huge number of components to remove increases the chances for mistakes, and I don't want that. Thanks

 

From doing it so many times, I streamline the dissassembly a bit. I take out the bottom screws, ram door and disconnect the wireless antennae. The SSD is pulled and battery removed. Keyboard, screws from keyboard tray, connectors on speakers, mike, etc, needed to separate halves. Then disconnect USB board, open fan/fin plastic covers and move the antenna wires outside the plastic. I don't remove the antenna wires, just loosen them outside the motherboard footprint. Then, you should be able to loosen and flip the motherboard over. Disconnect the CPU fan and then the GPU. Clean, paste and reverse.

Bronsky

 

For some reason I'm envisioning Gomer Pyle USMC field stripping his 3820TG...

 

Wow this is going to take a while... i suppose that's the tradeoff for having a small laptop like this.
Which components are ok to skip? For example, from your guide you did not remove the touchpad, lan or bluetooth connectors, so am I right in assuming that those are safe to leave as they are?

 

Correct. Touchpad stays with the top half of the shell, BT is under the USB card and I don't touch that. The wireless card depends on how easily you can flip the mobo over. The antennae leads are already disconnected. It might be easier to take the ram and wifi out but I think I leave them in.

If you do this, take your time and take pictures as you go along so you can see where everything went. G'luck.

I could probably do this blindfolded.

Bronsky

 

I've had my 3820TG for nearly a year now, and since I've been getting temperatures which I feel are a little on the high side, I decided to re-apply some thermal paste, which I did last week. My laptop is always sitting on a Coolermaster Notepal U2, with its 2 fans running. The temperatures did not change significantly after re-applying thermal paste, which is a bit disappointing. My CPU usually runs at low to mid 50's under normal load (Firefox with 3-4 tabs, MSN, dropbox etc running), and the GPU about the same.

After a quick 15 minute play on Crysis 2 (1366x768 resolution, System Spec set to High in Graphics options, which I assume is the lowest, the other options are Very High and Extreme), I had CPU temperatures in the mid 90's, the max being 100, and GPU reached 82 degrees. Should I be worried about these temperatures? The CPU is reaching the max temperature for the 450m, if I'm not mistaken. Anyone have any suggestions as to how to lower the temperatures? Thanks.

 

Will I need to remove the USB board, the LAN board, the speakers or the power board?

 

No. You unplug those items.

Bronsky

 

Yeah I'd like to know how you did this too? Is the headphone jack also an optical out?

One other audio-related issue, I get a constant high-pitched whine coming from the laptop. When I plug in headphones it crackles and changes pitch a little but then settles back to a constant whine again. Has anyone else come across this?

 

I wonder if our laptops will eventually be able to take advantage of PowerXPress 4.0 AKA BACON through drivers, or maybe it's intended only for Sandy Bridge and on. Apparently the newest model of the dv6t from HP already utilizes it.

 

I think ATi's manual approach is way better, because the automatic switching in Optimus is not, well, optimised yet. I've had a lot of instances where 3D games ran on Intel HD Graphics instead of the dedicated GPU. I would rather that I get full, non-application based control than have unpredictable automatic control.

 

Oh the optimal solution (no pun intended) is to have automatic switching but with quick and easy manual overide.

 

I've got an odd situation with my battery I think. It's currently saying 97% available (plugged in, not charging). Has anyone else come across this?

 

Confy, mine is like that too. I don't think it's anything to be worried about.

 

That is as expected. It will not charge your battery if it is just 3% (may be even 5%) used. This will actually help in longer lasting battery (in term of durability).

If you use more than say 10%, and plug in, it will charge all the way till 100%.

 

I am quite happy with the current Switchable. If there is any development I like to see, it should be on ability to CrossFire between Intel and ATI when in graphic intensive mode.

There are some development to CrossFire Fusion APU (6620m) with Discrete GPU (6630m), and the result (in very rare case) can surpass GTX460!

AnandTech - The AMD Llano Notebook Review: Competing in the Mobile Market

 

Good day lads, got this weird problem with the laptop completely freezing up when playing flash videos, the sound keeps on playing like nothing wrong, but the numlock and ctrl+alt+del don't do anything at all, the only way out is to restart. Is it perhaps the flash version that's bugged or the catalyst drivers, reinstalled flash, even installed shockwave (just in case), reinstalled the catalyst drivers as well, 11.5 now. Still no luck. I happens quite randomly, sometimes it happens once a day, sometimes after every 5 minutes.

 

Hardware upgrades.

So I was looking at upgrading a 3820tg for a friend and ordered a US keyboard from china (e-bay). The thing arrived with a broken "3" key. The seller was pretty cool about it and only asked for $5.00 to ship me a replacement. The thing is though, the keyboard plastic was shiny and felt really cheap. I'm going to keep it as a spare I think and not install it because it felt that "cheap".

On the other hand I'd be willing to try the backlit keyboard if I knew the plastic was of higher quality. Anyone physically have both keyboards and can comment on the build quality?

Lastly, my friend is having a wireless issue. Maybe once every week or 2 the connection will drop. Nothing serious. It actually says it's still "connected" but it's not and you have to disconnect/reconnect to the connection before it's working again. Doesn't happen often enough to be a problem but - I'm thinking of swapping out the wireless card for a new one. Any suggestions? There was one posted a wile back that had wi-fi and Bluetooth on one card. An intel one? (As far as I know there is no bluetooth on their machine)


thanks
-dam25

 

[offtopic]
How do you get the custom status below your username? I always wondered how to do that
[/offtopic]

 

This asymetric cross-fire is an interesting concept. By linking the Lliano IGPU and the 6630 DGPU, the combined effort can produce some incredible results. It clearly is not ready for prime time, but might be a significant leap forward in small ultralight computers. There is no reason that the new Lliano can't power a 13" ultralight with a dedicated HD 6630. This is worth keeping an eye on and, if AMD can get the drivers to work right, it could put a hurting on Intel and Nvidia both.

@too456 - If you edit your profile, there should be an option for custom user profile. If you don't have it yet, I think you need to complete a specific number of posts before you get that option.

@Damarious25 - I have found that the quality on the replacement keyboards varies widley. I have one that is the same quality as my backlit keyboard. This is the one that I bought. It is expired now. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=110676740440 The backlit is a bit firmer because of the extra thickness.

Bronsky

 

Missed this. Pretty interesting concept indeed. Crossfire with integrated and dedicated in a laptop. Although I assure you if AMD hits on something Nvidia and Intel wont be far behind. I also think this is just a passing idea coming from manufacturers as dedicated technology will quickly surpass any crossfire combinations laptop manufacturers can muster up.

Worried about that... The keyboard I bought actually felt like the keys had been "shaved" or "sanded" and new letters stuck on. Glad I didn't pay too much for it.

 

For those you who bought a Canadian 3820TG or US 4820TG without Bluetooth and have no desire to adapt a BT module to your unit, HP is now shipping a Wifi mouse. HP ships $50 WiFi Mobile Mouse, gives your Bluetooth radio a break -- Engadget It will free up one of your USB ports but it's not cheap. I guess if you add in the price of a BT module, it isn't bad.

Bronsky

 

Are you guys having any problems with keyboard lag?

 

Good day lads, curious about one question, I have oc'ed the 6550 a bit, and while playing dirt 3 the pc just shut down, not warnings nothing, how normal is that ??? )))

 

My guess is that you're OC'd more than a bit. A shut down like that from instability is fairly common from an OC'd Video Card.

For the year I have owned a 3820TG, I have never experienced any keyboard lag.

Bronsky

 

Also curious about one more thing, perhaps some of you have experienced this problem.
When I am using the Media Keys (FN+Play for example) in Winamp, winamp is being really buggy about it, it sometimes doesn't pause or play when needed, and when you forward to the next song it actually skips 10 or so songs in the list. Don't seem to have this problem on my PC, or the other laptop. Even if I connect the keyboard which I am using for my PC (Logitech G11) and use it's Media Keys I have the same problem.

 

Curious about one more thing, I installed Witcher 2 today and found the game to be totally unplayable, in the menu for some reason instead of seeing all the possible selection options I only see the ones that my mouse is over, in the game itself I don't see any text in the hint boxes and during the movies and even gameplay I have some weird foliage or texture issues where the screen is covered with weird textures.

 

Hi everyone, minor updates released - Realtek HD Audio Manager updated to R2.62, and the beta hybrid VGA updated to Catalyst 11.6. Works fine on my computer, no hitches whatsoever. Find the updates on my driver update post linked on the first page

 

The release of the 3830 for 750 on amazon + free xbox 360 is kind of tempting. I'm very attracted to the battery life, sandy bridge and usb 3. However the throttling issue is alarming.

 

Throttling issue is the only reason why I'm not buying it right now. I've added to my cart like five times...