Acer Aspire TimelineX 4820TG Owners Lounge

The Arrandale ICore CPU was an engineering masterpiece. They are still nearly as powerful as any of the dual core CPUs on the market today. The TimelineX was the best of Acer's timeline models by a mile.

That T440s looks like it's going to be a great design.

 

Hi, Im thinking of refreshing my good old 4820tg. Mine came with i3-350m and HD5650. I have replaced the hdd to a 7200 rpm hdd. In addition to everyday normal use, I use my laptop for gaming and some CAD work.
I am now thinking or maybe replacing my CPU with something like the i5-480m (i5-580m is too expensive for me). Is it worth it?
I have also been thinking of upgrading to 8GB of RAM, would I notice any performance improvements in gaming and/or CAD software?
In addition to that, I would like to replace my thermal paste but I am a bit confused. Some in this thread speak about just replacing the shim? Some replace the paste and there was something else too... And could I replace the paste myself or should I leave it to professionals. Never done it before..

All suggestions are welcome

 

if you can find 480m cheap, I don't see a problem. the difference won't be mind-blowing though.
not in games, in CAD probably yes.
I've replaced the thermal pad on the GPU with copper shim to bring the temps down and just repasted CPU with AS5. if you're careful enough, you can surely do it yourself.

 

Thanks kefan777 for ur help! But I have some more questions
Which copper shim should I get for our 4820tg?
Do I have to add paste to the shim also? both sides?
So I should get 3.5g of AS5 for the CPU? Whats the best method of applying it, I mean in what shapes or spread it evenly with something or? With what should I remove the old paste, does any kind of solvent work or should just rub it off with a paper tower or sth.?

 

I think the shim size I saw mentioned before was around 1.2mm but don't quote me on that.
Yes thermal past on both sides of the shim
3.5g should be enough for you to do your 4820tg, mine, my sons, and a few friends before you run out.

Here's a great video on how not to do it: Thermal Paste: Kentucky Style
And from the same guys a video on how to really do it: Thermal Paste Appliation

 

this is mine:

Specification

Material: Copper
Dimensions: 20mm x 20mm x 0.8mm
Thermal Conductivity: 403W
Specific Heat Capacity: 0.38KJ

but I'm sure that both 1mm and 1.2mm would be fine too.

 

I ordered 2 pcs of each of the following:

20mm x 20mm x 1.0mm
20mm x 20mm x 0.8mm
15mm x 15mm x 1.0mm
15mm x 15mm x 0.8mm

I remember reading in this thread that 1.2mm was a bit too thick, causing some minor gap/contact issues. I hope one of the above works! I have to wait a week or so for the shipment to arrive from China.

 

Again, many thanks!!
now just have to find the shim online and place an order. Ebay links would be appreciated
But what do u think about the 8gb RAM upgrade, worth it or not?

 

whereabouts are you located?

as for RAM, it's your choice, you should know how demanding the tasks you're performing are.

 

I´m from Estonia

 

1x Acer CPU / GPU Copper Shims 1 x CPU / GPU Shim UK SELLER | eBay

ask him about postage to Estonia. if you don't mind waiting, order from China.

 

Has anyone applied a new (better, ips like, matte) screen succesfuly? I read from somewhere e1-471's keyboard is it suitable with our 4820tg'!s, if anyones care.

 

Received my shims today. Already have some AS5 I got a couple weeks ago so I guess I'm ready for surgery.

I'm rather nervous to try! I think I'll do the 20mm x 20mm x 1.0mm shim first, going by previous reports of which size/thickness work best.

 

It would be thick i think and is needed to resize mb.

 

what are you talking about? Did you actually try it?

Because I did, I have one of those on GPU in my 4820TG.

 

Tell us then if 1mm fits or should we use 0.8mm

 

I did one also I'm not sure the exact thicknees but it is definitely thinner than 1mm. If am not wrong it was 0.6mm.

 

I´ve read that 1,2mm is too much and 0,8 is fine.... nothing about 1mm yet. But I think im gonna go with 0.8 then, but if anyone else thinks that even 0.8 is too thick, let me know

 

Hello again !

Sorry to put this back on the table, I still have no answer to my problem and I think it concerns a few people here wishing to upgrade to 8GB of RAM. Fully explained post here

I ordered some RAM a few weeks ago ; the computer doesn't boot with them and I really don't understand why !

RAM I bought:
KINGSTON Laptop Memory DDR3 PC3-10666 - 4Go 1333 MHz - CAS 9 - SR X8

Do you have an idea why these RAM don't work ?

If you managed to upgrade to 8GB of RAM, which RAM did you buy ?

Thanks a lot

 

Who here has suggestions for places to buy replacement batteries for this? Does anyone here have a 9 cell battery and think it's worth the extra weight over the 6 cell ?

 

it should work, try each module in each of the slots. you can also run memtest86+. maybe try running all default settings in BIOS too.

I bought G.Skill 8GB kit first, got 1 faulty so sold it when I got it back from RMA, now using Crucial I got ridiculously cheap and it wasn't even a matched pair and worked flawlessly for the past year.

 

So about the copper shim, which one is the best fit: 0,8mm or 1mm ?

 

I use 0.8mm.

 

What is the latest AMD GPU drivers that work? I have the 6550m GPU.

disregard post. I did research on this about a year ago, and completely forgot about it.

The latest official AMD drivers that work on this laptop are 12.4
Anything beyond that requires the unofficial leschat drivers. The reason being that all drivers beyond 12.4 (12.6) have some different bundled Intel integrated GPU that is not compatible with this laptop. As a result, either the discrete GPU works very bad, or the laptop loses its ability to switch. In most cases, both occur.

 

i ordered the 1mm shim, gonna take a month with shipping
omni, try these drivers: UnifL ← leshcatlabs.net should work well


So 1333mhz ram would work fine with i5-480m?

 

Hate to necropost but is there a(n easy) way to do this now?

 

Anybody have experience using the Cooler Master Notepal X-Slim with the 4820TG?

If so, how well does it perform in reducing idle/productivity/gaming temps? Thanks.

 

Just replaced the thermal paste on all chips. Thaught the thermal pad was on the video chip but it wasnt. Anyway, about the copper pads, 20x20mm is too large, yes u can fit it there, but i think it would leave a tiny air gap. 15x15mm would be the correct size shim. I also replaced the i3-350m with i5-480m, first minutes, everything seems okay. But I have no idea how well did the thermal paste spread first time doing this on a laptop.
Oh and what i belive was the chipset with the thermal pad, there was no or a tiny bit of paste between the pad and the chip so i repasted it also. btw, I used arctic silver MX-4

I also checked out the PLL to OC the cpu a bit, it was ICS VS3197BL and I cant find something like that from SetFSB

 

There is no need for thermal paste between the thermal pad and the chip and heat sink.

The thermal pad will fit closely to each component.

 

Tarts5, how are your temps compared to before pasting?

 

well, to be honest, the temps were a bit hot, like +10 degrees celsius more than before. Something was wrong, so I opened it up again to repaste, I think I had put too much thermal paste, so this time, will be putting less. Also while trying to clean the thermal pad from the paste I added, I pretty much messed it up and ended up buying a new one, the new one looks a bit thicker though. So yea, first time repasting didnt go as well, hoping to be wiser now. I think I will will have my laptop running againt in about an hour so will report back soon.

 

No worries, hope it works out.

 

Well, idle temps with only firefox running:
GPU: 53 degrees
CPU: 53.5 degrees

Could it be that the i5-480m is running a bit hotter than my i3-350m was? That could explain the increased temp....?
Anyway, current temps are still hotter than before pasting and I can hear the fan spinning more than before. I bought 4g of paste, so I can have another go at repasting, but really thinking of letting a professional do it. I used the small dot method.
Would be great if someone could post their i5 idle temps

 

I'm not sure why temps aren't lower - did you spread the small dot of paste on the CPU/GPU before putting down the heatsink?

Hopefully others with more experience on this like kefan777 or Lorda can help you out.

 

No I didnt spread it, I understood that that putting the heatsink to the cpu/gpu will spread it quite well.
Just ran prime95, the torture "In-place large FFTs (maximum heat, power consumption)" test for an hour, CPU temps reached max 84 degrees and 64 for the GPU.

Edit: after stopping the stress test, idle temps have dropped a little, both the CPU and GPU are reporting around 46 degrees.

 

I think you want to spread the paste into as thin a layer as possible covering the GPU/CPU before putting the heatsink down. Plus, with the shim on the GPU you'll need to paste the top side of the shim so that it has good contact with the heatsink.

 

3rd attempt at pasting, this time I spread the paste into a thin layer: CPU temps stayed the same, GPU got a lot worse, 97 degrees maximum :S. Feeling a bit dumb now, is the arctic silver mx-4 paste s*it or am i doing something completely wrong

 

53 in idle si baaad.

I gave my 4820TG to another family member, but from what I recall, after repasting CPU with AS5 and adding same paste and copper shim on GPU, my temps were in the 37-42 region when in idle and around 75-78 under 100% load.

beforehand, the load temps were about 7-8 higher, idle pretty much the same.

 

well, 4th time pasting, got atleast somekind of good news: GPU max temp (tested with furmark and gta IV) that I reached was about 70 degrees, then OC-d my GPU to 750/1100 and everything was stable and GPU was running at 82 degrees max. Im thinking this is acceptable?
But the CPU is still running way too hot Applied the dot method btw, looked at many comparisons etc and the dot method seems to be clearly the best way to paste

 

Have the room temperature also in mind.

 

Thanks. Going to order another copper shim, since 20x20 was too big, 15x15 seems to be the correct size. But what about the thickness, should I go with the 0.8 or 1.0mm?

 

What version the latest graphic drivers are?

 

Hey! First of all, whoa, I got help here about 2 years ago now when I bought my 4820TG, with selection of which and answers to multiple questions.
I'm not very experienced in hardware/specs, so, after buying it I started checking this site less and less.

Anyhow, I googled a little about the video card(s) in the 4820TG, and ended up here. And here you are still keeping this thread so alive! This forum seems really great and helpful!

Well, okay, returning to my question.
As mentioned, I don't know much about hardware. I haven't looked how the insides of a laptop looks. (I assume it's at least partly different from a full-size desktop).
But I was wondering - bluntly - is it possible to upgrade the video card in this laptop?
I have the 4820TG with i5-460M, and HD5650-video card. Is there a compatible card out there that will make a difference (if so, will it work with Acer's drivers)? Or maybe I'm just embarrasing myself now, and it's not really possible to change a video card in a laptop?
-shrug-
Oh well, they say that asking doesn't hurt anyone.

Thanks in advance for any reply!
Matt

EDIT: Oh, I haven't checked through this entire thread, not really sure how to get an overlook of this many pages, so, uh, sorry if this already have been discussed.

 

Hi Matt

Unfortunately it's impossible to upgrade a video card in notebooks that do not utilize an MXM connector- 4820TG doe not have this possibility and neither do any of the contemporary Acer notebooks.

So the short answer is - it's impossible.

 

Oh well. Then that's clarified at least, thanks a lot for the quick answer!

 

Mattedatten, you may look into overclocking your HD5650, it OC-s quite well, will give you a small performance increase in games

 

This thread has helped me out like 100x in the past
Couldn't find any successful mods on this though, so I wanted to ask if anyone has had any luck getting bluetooth to work using one of the combined newer gen intel wifi cards like the 6235+bt ? I've got the 4820TG version which shipped without bt and I want to avoid sacrificing a usb port to use my headset. If not anybody got a tip which combined wifi+bt modules might be worth a look?
Ta!

 

Removed.

It is the 4820TG thread and not the 3820TG.

 

any updates on the problem with the RAM upgrade? I have exactely the same problem.. can't do anything.. it just restarts shortli after the start... no matter what I try...
I installed a 4gb corsair element and it just won't boot...

 

90% of the time a machine won't boot with new RAM it's just not seated properly. Turn it off, take out battery and re-install your RAM. If that still doesn't work then you might have incompatible RAM.