Acer Aspire 1410 and 1810 Timeline 11.6" Thread

Yes It is plastic with a brushed metal look. It is 100 times better than the normal finish, high gloss and very durable.

 

I don't know if somebody has already posted this, but there's a new bios out: v3310, it seem to fix Screen flickering for the LG panels.

 

is the bios update only for the 1810tz or all 1810?

 

For 1410,1810tz and 1810t.

 

Has anyone tried a screen film (privacy or protector)? I am thinking about how I can protect this screen... i think that by constantly wiping to remove fingerprints etc I'm going to end up scratching it.

 

Many thanks Ghetto_Child. I can't remember on top of my head the exact version of the Flash player we have and the other properties you mentioned, I will check at home. I will give your other suggestions a try too.

Cheers

 

I just got my 1810t with u4100 processor and 3gb ram. Tried playing a 1080p mkv clip (BBC Life - blu ray rip) from hard drive and the video did not play smooth at all... Any suggestions?

 

Actually he watches it to find out which outfits will make him look fat... No I'm wrong again he watches it to find out whicih girls will make him look fat lol.

it came out a little over a week ago albeit the "Release Candidate" version.

I recommend checking www.ncix.com and also check their weekly sales every wednesday night. This past wednesday's sale
http://www.ncix.com/promo/promosale.php?webid=spring2010
http://www.ncix.com/promo/promosale.php?webid=spring2010&page=2

I want to get a stick on screen film but without the security blocked angles just screen protection and glare diffusion.

You might also want to consider if there's other flash ads etc running. In Firefox and Google Chrome I have FlashBlock running so only the flash items I want runs and all other flash objects are not loaded. In IE8 you don't get that much control. IE8 only lets you chose which sites are allowed to run flash or not on a site by site precision but every object on a site you approve will still run which can slow down your main video. Flash 10.1 should help alleviate this but it's still extra undesired processing.

If you just got it you probably still need to do a ton of updates and add a codec pack of some sort? Media Player Classic Home Cinema I've read is recommend on this forum. You should get the latest Service Pack if any and then the latest drivers for everything. Update the BIOS too should improve the Graphics Processing Unit.

 

Use either SplashPlayer/Splayer/Media Player Classic Home Cinema to playback H.264

 

You must get DXVA working to stand a chance. Our 7300 1810T can play the Planet Earth bird scene no problem now. Installing the latest Acer driver also made a big difference

 

One option you have is to download K-lite codec pack(which contains media player classic) and you would be OK.I have the same notebook and it shows 1080p flawlessly.

 

is vlc no good?

 

Is the newest bios stable?

 

VLC does not support hardware acceleration.

You can also try shark codecs +wmp12. MPC-HC is the best option imo

 

Is there really any point to downloading / watching 1080p on a small screen?

 

I'm trying to watch it on my TV via HDMI...

 

If you don't want to experiment flash bios V1.3303.Tried and very stable.

 

Ok, installed k-lite codec pack and used MPC Home Cinema to play the file. Played the video again. Results? Way better than the first time with VLC but there is still some stuttering (not stopping and starting) here and there... Anything else I should do?

 

Just got my 1810TZ (from sears.com of all places) and it appears the 320gb drive is partitioned into 3 pieces...PQService, System, and ACER. any idea what is where, or why, or if it makes sense to re-partition into a single drive?

 

always split your drive into multiple partitions that way when you need to format your C: or any other drive you don't have to lose all your data from the whole drive. 2nd breaking a drive down into smaller partitions improves performance and allows for smaller file system tables. Win7 by default makes a 100MB system/boot partition and then a 2nd partition for the OS files/data. PQService is acer's recovery partition.

Does anyone know if there's any benefit for non LG panels to use the newer BIOS. The intel driver says my panel is an AOU205C and I was always thinking that's an AOC brand?

 

How do you tell what brand / model your panel is? Just by looking in the Intel graphics utility?

 

1.Try also WMP12 and Windows Media Center.
2.Select high performance power plan(from the little battery in your task bar).
3.Right click on an empty space in your screen and select graphics properties.In Intel graphics media and control panel go to power and select in the power plans"maximum performance".I am assuming you have Intel"s 1986 driver at least.
4.Try also shark codecs.

Keep in mind not all of the above are necessary.Just one of them might be enough.Other people can also suggest something that works for them.

 

Go to device manager(just type it in search),then monitors-> click,then generic pnp monitors-> click,then details,then hardware ids.That's it.

 

Don't touch PQservice at least until you make recovery discs.Having 3 partitions is normal.Recovery,booting,OS and files.If you eventually repartition into a single drive you will gain some space(from the PQservice)but you will lose Acer's recovery system.I did that because I upgraded my hhd and I gained something like 12GB if i remember corectly.

 

Mine says LGD021C, I don't notice much (if at all) flickering but I guess I should flash it.

 

Though I do own Acronis, on one PC I use the freeware Macrium for backup, and am thinking of also using Macrium on my 1810TZ. I can back up (all 3 or just 1 or 2?) partitions onto my server, but I dont have an external drive for the Acer. Do I need a recovery disk, and am I forced to by an external drive, or can I just use my NAS server or other PCs on my network to properly backup?

 

If you mean making a clone and then recover from that I don't see why it wouldn't work.As long as you set your BIOS to usb HHD.You can also clone PQservice into another HDD in a computer that has aDVD drive and make recovery discs from there.

 

Stay tuned on that one

To test your video setup trying playing the famous Planet Earth bird scene from here.



If it doesn't play smoothly then follow the guide that I posted and it will. Once I did that and went to the 1986 video driver it worked fantastic.

 

I've tried many media players and configurations with my Gateway EC1454u (SU2300) and the one that works the best (smooth playback and picture quality) for the most HD videos is Splash Lite.

I highly suggest trying it out. I cannot figure out why it does not seem more popular but it works nearly perfectly for me and has a slick looking interface to boot.

 

Playing 1080p it is not simply a matter of media player.There are many other things that play part in the process.Someone else may use Splash lite and not get the same result because he has some element diferent than yours(e.g video drivers,media splitter,codecs,power settings e.t.c).

 

So if I back up all three together onto my NAS (or as 3 independent backup files, if that is better), and hypothetically my ACER HDD crashes, or I get a virus, etc, I am not clear what I do to restore ? do I need to restore all 3 partitions? use PQService in some way (how?) to restore

 

Anyone tried the new BIOS 3310? If the only fix is "screen flickering" I won't bother flashing

 

You can back up(clone) partition 2and 3(not pqservice) and if your HDD crashes you can tranfer them(through an enclosure case let's say) back to your formated HDD(cloning),or to a new HDD.I think if you can find a way to make recovery discs will give you an extra peace of mind.

 

Thanks....Then when or why would I use PQServe?

 

PQ service contains the data needed to make the recovery discs.If you are planning to just back up the OS and files ,and not make recovery discs, you don't need to back it up.BUT I will have to tell you once more that the best method is to make recovery discs.

You have to understand that what you are aking is not conventional at all.That's why i am trying to guide you through cloning.The conventional method is to make recovery dvd's.Not to worry though,even if you don't do anything and at some point you need to reinstal win7 you just get a copy through inernet use your key and activate through the MS win7 automated phone line.If you want activation through your PC use the following simple method.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=433602

 

yes I opened the intel graphics driver options and several of the sections list what model panel you have. Just browse around inside the GMA driver applet.

Thanks for confirming not everyone has the exact same panel. Now I just need to find out if there's any benefit for non-LG panels to use this BIOS? Unless these AOU panels are actually LG panels too? I still thing they're AOC brand panels.

PQService is the Acer Factory Default recovery image. It lets you format your C: to return everything exactly back to what your system was when you first turned it on. It also has the 2nd option to reset your drivers and system files back to factory defaults without formatting so that you can undo bad installations and start over without erasing your personal data.

There's an Acer eRecovery tool inside Vista/Win7 that lets you make a Recovery DVD of this PQService partition so that you can use the DVDs to do the same recoveries that's on the PQService partition. Usually you get into that partition by pressing Alt+F10 at system startup before vista/win7 starts to load.

If you clone the partitions onto a NAS you shouldn't be able to run the PQService off the NAS because it expects to find the C: first primary partition locally. I'm still trying to find a way to get the Acer Recovery DVDs to boot correctly from a usb flash drive when I copy the dvds to the usb flash. It boots but there's some drivers/scripts missing and it keeps looking for an optical drive instead of trying to read from the usb flash that it booted from (talk about stupid).

At the same time if you clone all 3 partitions correctly (I assume you'll make a single image file of all 3 partitions) then you should in theory be able to restore that single image file back to the hard drive and it will run just the same. If this works you won't need to run the PQService recovery because you'd already be doing a backup/restore recovery yourself.

Making backups is fine but you should test them on a 2nd system to be sure it works before you damage your orignal and lose it all.

 

If you're talking about AUO panels, they are AU Optronics panels.

 

True, but Splash Lite is nice because it includes all of the codecs within the program itself (like VLC media player) and I've tested it on the battery-savings mode (both in Windows and in the Intel graphics settings) and it still plays back just the same.

I also would hope that most people here would already have the latest graphics drivers. All I'm trying to do is give an alternative suggestion to those who feel like they've tried everything and still can't get their laptops to playback HD videos the way they want. Most of the time people will suggest guides to using MPC-HC and whatnot, but rarely do I ever see people recommending Splash Lite, which is very simple to install and try out (not as many settings but nothing really needs to be done except to check the hardware acceleration option).

It can't hurt to try it out for yourself, right? If it doesn't work for someone, then oh well, at least they tried it out. But if it works as well for someone else as it did myself, then I feel it was worth recommending in the first place.

Actually, something to note that I should mention is that I have not tested this program with HDMI output to a larger resolution, so YMMV.

 

I use shark codecs and shark 64bit codecs, but I never watch 1080p on my laptop, because the LCD can't show the pixels. Our LCDs are 720 capable, that is what you should be watching, so stop ing and wasting pages in these forums. Buy a laptop with a 1080 monitor next time.

 

yeah, and don't even think about using HDMI, cause you know, you'd be wasting pages on ulieq's precious forum : he knows what you should be watching.

 

You probably misunderstood me the first time.We are saying exactly the same thing .I agree1000% with you.What works for one person doesn't always work for another.So people should try many things.And I am very glad that you recommended another alternative.

 

I think people are trying to watch 1080p through HDMI in their TV's which is a resonable demand from this notebook.I see nothing wrong with that.

 

Ummmm. There is no number greater than 100%.

 

LOL .There is.If last week you used your notebook 1 hour and this week 3 hours then your notebook time increased by 300%.

 

Iwas thinking one of the USB ports (on my 1810TZ) would remain "powered" so I can charge a device with the notebook off. Is there any trick to get this function to work?

 

Put the notebook in standby. My logitech wireless mouse actually wakes up my laptop from standby so I had to hibernate it.

 

3 choices to "power down" - OFF, Hibernate, Standby...So Standby leaves one (all?) of the USB ports powered, but not OFF or Hibernate? What about some of the previous posts re: battery drain when unused.... Does that happen with all 3 shut down methods? (assuming, of course, you are not charging a device, in which case you would expect battery draining...

 

OFF and Hibernate do not use power at all. Only Standby does, but minimally.
So, if not plugged in, only Standy will cause minimal battery drain - notwithstanding that there will be miniscule battery drain even in Off and Hibernate states due to natural laws of physics. Or whatever law is in charge here - pun intended.

 

Ok, while that may be true in general, but sounds like some (all?) 1410 owners are reporting battery drain of a few % a day regardless of the shutdown method?

 

WRONG, who want's to waste space & time downloading a 720p vid file for this notebook and a 2nd 1080p vid file of the same vid for their desktop/HTPC? If you can get the laptop to play the 1080p then go for it because it's way more efficient to have/get 1 vid file shared around than having multiple qualities of the same vid. PCs do something called scaling so you won't have any visual detail loss by down scaling a vid if it can play smoothly. Take advantage of it, also did you guys know that it takes more than 1080p to match the detail of human vision out in real life? You can research the standards, certain distances from a display is recommended for good eye comfort by the THX standards but at their recommended standards of distance we require more than 1080p to match visual accuracy. With that what makes you think 720p is sufficient?

+1

some laptops have a few different power mode settings for the usb ports in the BIOS. I've seen a Mode1 and Mode2 in a Toshiba Satellite and I assume one is for allowing power passthrough even while the notebook is off.

Notebooks should be able to power devices while in low power/off when using vista/win7 because in the advanced power settings there's an option called "USB selective suspend" that determines if the OS will turn off usb ports/power when the system goes into low power. This is also effected by devices being plugged to the port or not. I guess turn it off if you want your usb devices always remain powered while in low power modes like Sleep.

Also try going into device manager and find your device. Open its properties. There's a power management tab so uncheck the box that allows the device to wake up the computer. If you want the device to never turn off in low power uncheck the box that says "allow the computer to turn off this device to save power".

try following my 2nd suggestion in my comment just above. Apply it to your logitech wireless mouse in device manager; there's a power management tab for most devices.

battery does get used like a trickle drain when unplugged and turned off. More so if you have any devices set to "Wake On..." activity. Devices all have Standby 5V (5VSB) in use at all times. If you really want to save your battery life unplug the battery when you unplug your AC. When you leave the AC cord in with the battery you are slowly wearing out your battery being it is constantly being trickle recharged.

I somewhat agree see my comments just above.

see my warnings 2 comments above...