Acer Aspire TimelineX 4830 Owner's Lounge

Here is the merge-fest thread for the 3830/4830/5830 models:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/acer/553306-acer-timelinex-3830-4830-5830-t-g.html

Good thread, but it has 342 pages of topics that range from one model to the next. It seemed to me that there was a need for a model specific thread for this particular laptop, and since there wasn't one, now there is.

Announcements
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Slashgear's xx30 series announcement / Acer press release:
Acer Timeline X updated: 3830T, 4830T and 5830T on Sandy Bridge - SlashGear

Engadget xx30 series announcement / see discussion in comments below:
Acer announces redesigned Aspire TimelineX Series laptops, prices start at $599 -- Engadget


Reviews
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Notebookcheck.net 4830TG review:
Review Acer Aspire 4830TG Notebook - Notebookcheck.net Reviews

PC Magazine 4830T-6841 review:
Acer Aspire TimelineX AS4830T-6841 Review & Rating | PCMag.com


Resources
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Acer notebook support page, driver downloads, etc
http://support.acer.com/us/en/default.aspx


I'll come back and keep adding to this links to other threads and resources as I dig them up.

 

Tested out Battlefield Bad Company 2 last night at full res with High detail, played for an hour, no lag, no stuttering. Very hot air piping out of the side of my laptop but only when I checked for it, otherwise it wasn't overly noisy and it was fun playing. Immediately after exiting the game I checked my temps and they were fine on both cores nowhere near approaching any limit.

I think most of these throttling issues might be relegated to the smaller machine?

 

I have continued hammering on the laptop and really trying to get the core temps up but it doesn't seem to want to ever get past 87deg. Overall it has been quite a great machine, but it gets nowhere near the 8+ hours of advertised battery life, falling somewhere in the neighborhood of 4.5hrs, give or take, with normal use. WiFi on for internet, document writing, etc.

 

U got the 4830, or the 4830TG, that makes a big difference on overheating and game play.

 

Good call, I have the 4830TG

 

I am quite pleased with my 4830t-6841 so far (2 months). It boots up quickly, and I have a lot of programs on it. They keyboard is very responsive. However, I too am not seeing anywhere near 8-10 hours battery time. Maybe 6. I was wondering if I was doing something wrong. Wifi is disabled much of the time, but I do use wireless printers at home and in the office.

 

How easy is it to replace the hard drive (say with an SSD)?

Also, how do you like the screen?

 

I have not opened it up, but just looked at pictures of takedowns and it looks pretty simple to replace the drive.

The screen I was honestly a bit concerned about prior to purchase due to the glossy nature of it, but in actual use it is not an issue for me at all and the viewing angles are really not bad. I am quite fond of the machine and the form factor is pretty spot on, smaller than a 15, but not too small like the 13 imo.

I have hammered on this thing, heavy gaming, graphics, file xfers, I cannot manage to break 90deg c so whatever heating issues are out there, they definitely do not affect the 4830.

The battery life times are totally not right, 4.5 to 5hrs tops with wifi on moderate use, browsing web, document editing, etc. Not bad, but definitely nowhere near the advertised 8+

 

So, I've owned my 4830TG-6808 for a week now. For those who prefer a matte screen, you can have one for $55, so long as you follow this tutorial to the T: Acer Aspire Timeline 4830t Laptop Screen Replacement Procedure - YouTube
(how to purchase is in the description. yes I replied to the video on youtube)

I'm not so worried about battery life so much as battery wear: after 1 discharge, my battery is showing 4.13% wear (using BatteryCare You can find your battery wear by right-clicking tray icon, click "show", then click the "detailed info" tab). Can other owners also confirm their battery wear? (and # times discharged) This would be of great help.

 

I should have asked this here instead of on UTube. How do you like the replacement display? How does it compare to the OEM model?

 

I can't get that kind of performance out of my 4830tg while playing Counter Strike Source. Did you tweak anything? What are your preferences in windows? After 30 minutes of playing the CPU starts throttling...

 

I replied on Youtube. Basically, you get 30 degrees more viewing angle and the light diffusion is really good (so you don't see an obvious brightness sweet-spot/band). I highly recommend it, especially since it's hard to find on a gaming laptop these days. One con is that you gotta be careful when putting it on, keep the protector over your keyboard so you don't put any premature prints/scratches on the screen. The biggest pro is that I don't have to have my brightness at 4 anymore, I can comfortably use my laptop at 1 or 2 bars brightness, oughta tack on a few minutes to battery life.

 

So, i don't know if anybody else knows what causes this, but when I have VLC playing music, the moment I start running a game, the volume cuts in half. It's not debilitating, but it'd be nice to know if this is from Acer bloatware , defective hardware , or...a new feature of Windows7 Thoughts?

 

Where did you find the matte screen for $55? The link provided in the video seems to have only a glossy 14" for $78.

 

Wups, forgot that wasn't in the youtube. Here it is: Acer ASPIRE 4830TG replacement Laptop LCD Screen from $55.99 Brand-new screens (never used).

 

I have noticed volume changes when the Dolby software kicks off or on. Watch your system tray when this happens and see if the blue dolby icon goes grey.

 

Thanks!!! Wish I could just leave it stuck to "On". On another note, for people changing out the screen to matte, I'd recommend getting the Razer Kabuto mouse pad because you may see what looks like scratches (but really aren't) appear from the keys pressing on the screen while it's closed. I find the Kabuto solves this problem quite well (or you could just ignore it or wipe your screen every time).

 

I just got my Acer timelineX 4830-tg. It has the i5 2450m and the nvidia 540m. 24 hours after i received it the screen dies. sent it to acer RMA and got it back 10 days later. As soon as i got it back i installed a Crucial M4 256gb. THIS LAPTOP IS FAST!!! with my normal tweaks to windows seven (control panel-> Performance information and tools-> Adjust Visual Effects-> the uncheck all the animations. I was getting around 10 hours of batter life with the old mechanical hard drive(western digital Caviar BLUE). with the ssd i now get 8 hours of battery life. it is because the i5 could only work so hard with the hdd bc it bottlenecked at the hard drive. now that i have an ssd the i5 is the bottleneck. so it works as hard as it can. so the battery life went down a tad. but 8 hours is still GREAT for a $600 laptop.

This laptop has everything i need now that i installed the ssd and 8gb of corsair 1600 vengeance ram. Only thing that is missing is a backlit keyboard. oh well. for $790 all together im not complaining!

cheers mates

 

Hello all,

I just bought an Acer 4830T-6678. I also bought 8GB of RAM to upgrade with. The problem is that I am not sure how to properly open/disassemble the notebook in order to instal the RAM. There is no detachable battery (that I can see, which allowed me to upgrade my previous notebook's RAM. I've included an image of the bottom of the notebook

Does anyone know how to do open this thing up?

 

See here for instructions.

 

Thank you downloads. I just wasn't pressing the back cover away from the body of the notebook with enough force.

Now, my question is how to install the two new DIMMs I bought (you can see the bottom edge of them and their package at the top of the picture) to replace the single one inside the notebook. There is also a clear, plastic screen that you can see me lifting up with my fingertips. I'm sorry if these questions are noob, but I don't want to risk breaking anything!

Let me know if you need further information or pictures.

 

Never mind, I googled it. Remove the old DIMM by pressing the metal clips to the side. Install the new DIMM(s) at a 45 degree angle then press down on corners. Presto!

Anyways, would installing a SSD, say a Sandisk Extreme 120GB, noticeable improve the speed and performance?

 

There are two metal retaining clips at both sides of the DIMM module. Pull them apart and the module will lift at an angle.
Remove it and place a new module in the bottom slot at the same angle the other one popped up- them press it down untill the retaining clips click and hold it down. Then do the same thing with the top module.

 

Hi,
recently i formatted by 4830TG, and installed Windows 7 Pro and all the drivers from Acer's website. However,now i notice that the system no longer prompts me that the ODD has been disconnected to save power. Can anyone tell me why the optical drive is no longer going to sleep mode? I Installed all drivers including ePower Management and Powersmart.

 

I had no problem removing the cover and installing the chip.

Now I get the blue screen of death, I removed the new RAM (DDR PC3-10666)
chip and the computer works fine.

 

I have a 4830T and am having slight audio problems (crackling when I'm running on battery power and streaming a movie or music). I read somewhere on the internet that if you rollback the audio drivers to the Windows driver it will work, and it does, except I get this error and the driver fails when I plug speakers/headphones in to the jack. Is there a way I can use the Windows driver but also use the audio-out jack?

 

I read that the 4830t-6678 lists 1066 as the ram speed spec but the actual ram speed is 1333. I want to add 4gb but am not sure to pick up a stick of 1066 or 1333. Can anyone confirm?