Acer TimelineX 3820TG Owners Lounge. Info, benchmarks, tweaks, mods and upgrades

Hey guys, so it appears that Acer did the bare minimum in attempting to fix my laptop. But I'm still experiencing the crashes, and now I've confirmed they are BSODs.

BlueScreenView says that the crashes are caused by dxgkrnl.sys+5cef8 which I've read is pretty much a hardware error.

I hope I can convince Acer to just replace the motherboard or something to get it working.

Thes random crashes make doing any important work on the computer pretty much like playing russian roulette. The system and go at anytime. =(

 

BUMP .......................

 

Im having trouble installing new ATI drivers over the acer 8.713 drivers.

Can anyone make a complete list of the steps to take? Including reboots etc.

I tried this:

But it says in the ATI install that 8.713 is installed and is the latest drivers when i try to install 10.8 version. Im running W7 Pro 64bit.

Please help, and if something is unclear just ask me

//Atb

 

Anyone else has problem with annoying high frequency squeek or smth after plugging usb device (mouse, pendrive w/e)?

 

Ï use a usb mouse and keyboard, i have not noticed any noise when plugging in or after.

 

I know acer service will fix it when I'll send them my laptop. I just need temporary solution for 2-3 weeks untill I finish my master thesis.

 

I think I need a masters degree to figure out what "smth" means.

 

smth is the short form of something. It's a part of the internet language style.

 

I think ist is a not fixed coil on the motherboard. There is no way to fix it without losing the Acer warranty.

 

That is quite normal. Think I'm at just over 4hrs for charging the 9 cell battery. Still nowhere near the 7hrs I had on my old compal laptop..... which only lasted 4 hrs on bettery.

 

Asking again...

 

Answers a question I self have had problems with. I had a black frame around the screen when I choosed 1920x1080 resultion on an exterior monitor by HDMI.

The solution is to while you are Catalyst Control Center, choose advanced, desktop and screens. At the left bottom you will see an image of an monitor. Right click it and choose configure. Now you see a tab that's called scaling. I had to adjust the lever to 0 to get it to work properly for me.
That's it!

 

Just start a research or try it.

 

Try it?

Most likely not since it's 13.1" and acer is made for 13.3"

 

ignoring again.

Bronsky

 

Hi, guys! I want to buy a Seagate Momentus XT 500GB Drive to my 3820. The thing is, that I read a lot of places, that its causing random lagging when the drive is spinning up. I also find out that there is a solution to disable the quiet mode to fix this. Now what I don't know, how hot and loud it gets with the power saving disabled, and how it affects battery time? Also is there any other performance issues I should know about? Did anyone encounter a faulty unit? Someone who has been using it for a long time now: how does the SSD hold up after a long time, does it wear down? I want to use my 3820tg for VJ-ing in Resolume, my old Dell 6400 (c2d t7200, 2gb, ati x1400) could handle 3 layers with large files no problem, and only had a regular 5400rpm 160 GB Samsung. My 3820tg on the other hand with way improved hardware would freeze after only 2 layers of bigger files (like 1-200MB each, about 70-80 sec long). It has the original WD drive. Since my entire library would not fit the Momentus XT's SSD, would it improve the performance at all? THX for your answers!

 

Hey,

can you please check your wlan rate when the CPU is overclocked.

I lose my wlan connection, with FSB/Bclk @160MHZ to my router and @155MHz it goes back to ~160MBit/s.

I have the Broadcom wlan card.

 

There is a fix for that lag that has been discussed a few times in this thread. You should be able to find it on a search. I never paid close attention because of my SSD.

Bronsky

 

@Just a nick, no connection loss with both the intel and broadcom card when overclocking here. This is with a netgear N router (DG834N)

However the I've noticed that my intel has better signal but cannot do 300Mpbs like my atheros or broadcom can...It manages 64mbps or 1xx max. Odd, it all other aspects the Intel 6200 is much better. Apart from Wireless N.

 

Ouch lol!

...............

 

84C is rather hot, but should be OK. My old TX2 (may it burn in hell) would hit 95 before throttling down to half speed... HP designed that laptop to run at half speed pretty much all the time. The HS/Fan design couldn't handle the thermals at all. I think most people with 'non-overheating units' just didn't realize their unit was throttling all the time.

Anyways, while I don't have a reading on it, the hottest I've ever seen the 3820TG was when I found out my wireless mouse could pull it out of sleep. In my laptop bag (almost no air flow). The wonderful unit has such a long battery life that, 5 hours or so later, when I opened the bag I was amazed it hadn't warped the chasis or damaged the LCD screen. Still, here I type and all is well. Likely got a fair bit hotter than 84C (I should know, I have felt 95C on my tx2...).

 

Thanks!

.............

 

Things are getting scary. Amazon has 16 left (they ship from Tigerdirect) and BH Photovideo is sold out saying the 3820T is discontinued.

Is there a revision or replacement model coming out? I'm not ready to buy one of these now (less coinage ), was hoping to have it in about a month or so but I'm starting to think I may have a longer wait for my 13" than I was expecting.

Anybody know anything?

 

do u have 3820tg now ?
ok i found an old post, exacly the same temps

http://forum.notebookreview.com/6315097-post110.html


I was thinking about cleaning fans when they will fill with dust : there are none way unless i totally disassembly ! right ?

 

Hi guys,

I'm new to the forum, I just received my 3820TG a few days ago :-D Everything is awesome, except that I have realized that when I record sound from the built-in mic there's a high background noise. Changing the boost did not alter the noise to signal ratio. Did you guys have this problem? Is it just my unit or is the mic rubbish? Any help is much appreciated, I'm panicking with the thought of having to return it!!!!
Best

 

Did you try disconnecting the charger? Alternatively you can try disabling the grounding with duct-tape (not recommended thou).

 

Motherboard is off to Shenzhen, China. Should be there in 3 days. Hopefully, Shark does a good job rebuilding my board.

Having this 1410T has saved me a lot of grief. It is already set up with the identical software I use on the 3820TG and all of my files are on the SD card, which I just transferred over. It felt wierd going back to a smaller keyboard but I am getting used to it again.

Bronsky

 

I finally ordered an i5-450 from PCHome! Woop!

Hopefully it gets an automatic 460 upgrade.

Can't wait for this rockin laptop.

 

Found the motherboard... but it's half of the price of the unit itself

• Acer MAIN BD DIS MADISON W/RTC LF (MB.PV101.001) for Acer Aspire 3820TG - Samsung Notebook Ersatzteil Shop
• Acer MAIN BD DIS PARK W/RTC LF (MB.PTB01.001) for Acer Aspire 3820TG - Samsung Notebook Ersatzteil Shop

 

My board is the Madison ... $475. MK in Germany had it for around $450. At that price, it pays to just order a new I3-330M'HD 5650 unit from PCHome (~$835). Just look at the prices of the CPUs. An OEM I5-540M is $518, 40% more than I paid for mine.

If my mainboard can't be fixed, I'll just use my old unit for parts and get a new I3-330M to convert. Hopefully, that won't be necessary. Shark seems to think that they will have no problem fixing my board.

Bronsky

 

Hoping they wont re-build it to look like the one they've sent the first place.

Automatic? Did I miss something?

 

It's a PCHome thing. If you order an I5-450M model, PCHome has been automitically supplying I5-460M models without charging the higher price.

Funny, I keep thinking about that first board and wonder if there is any way these guys get this right. I would say my chances are about 50% that they have any idea what they're doing.

Bronsky

 

Invoice states 460!

 

You gotta love when a plan comes together.

Bronsky

 

Haha, I think the same thing happened to everyone who ordered the i3-330. We all got i3-350s =D

 

For some reason I'm really bothered that the best battery life I can seem to tweak out of this 3820TG is 5hr 54min at 40% screen brightness and WIFI on. My 1810TZ was rolling 7-8 1/2 hours depending on usage at 40%/WIFI ON.

I keep feeling like there is one more setting I can tweak to get me up in the 6.5+ hour range on this beast!

 

Yes, try a 9 cell battery

 

I have tried it and the same for me too. The background noise is soo loud that its about 1/3 of the total usable range. I use Voipcheap.com regularly and their client is not filtering noise, it's just impossible to use this laptop with that software. I tried Skype and it's the same, all I hear in the echo123 service is a loud background noise and something over it. I have started using X-Lite 4.0 which does an amazing job of filtering noise, I heard no noise at all in this software, but it doesn't fix that mic, it's just a software solution.

I've just ordered a retractable mic and earphone combo from eBay for 1 GBP inc. shipping, I am curious how well would such a cheap combo will function. It's just annoying that Acer is sparing money on the cheapest things, like these mics or speakers.

 

Ah, I just got back my laptop from Acer's Czech Service center less than a day before my flight started. They finished repairing it on Friday, and the UPS delivered it on Wednesday afternoon. The same route took DHL about 12 hours.

Good news is that they did not made anything worse than it was and they made something with my keyboard not to have flex. Now, the 3,4,5,E,R,T part is definately fixed. I would call my keyboard almost flex-free now. It still has a slight flex, but it's only noticable when I look at it from the side, not while I am typing, and it's not really flexing, but the whole keyboard being pushed down.

Bad news is that they have stated it on their official letter that they found no problems from what I mentioned, so they did not make anything to my laptop. _Next time I should send them a video recording about the problem_. But why could no one contact me before they sent it back, stating that they don't see the problem I described. I even have my very own recording posted on Youtube (and it's on the first page when searching for Acer TimelineX), I could have just emailed them the link easily, if they asked. So no change in display, but luckily, no change in overclockability either so that's a big relief. I think I will just live with it as it is, as I will have no other machine for the next 10 months (studying CS & Math at Edinburgh now, bringing my computer with me for about 30 km on bicycle every day). BTW, they asked for the original warranty paper, but they did not send it back. I know they might have registered its number, but without the original paper, I cannot sell the laptop when I would like to. I hope I can get it back from them.

Bronsky, I would definately order the cheapest 5650 machine from PC Home, that way you will have one for spares (which you will need for sure . I start to think about Acers like "it's half the price of Thinkpad, but you need to have two to be sure that one is working" kind of philosophy. I am quite sure that if I bought a second one, it would have some problem, and if I could make a transplant like OC-Freak, I could get my first one fixed too.

 

The moment I type this, I'm on display level 3 (1 being lowest), WIFI on, Intel GFX power settings disabled and getting a discharge rate of 8200 mW, what means about 7:40 for a 6 cell. (and no, I am not typing this into notepad...)

 

hey zsero

do you get the brightness shifting when ur plugged into the laptop with the ac adpter?

or running on battery?


and when u get the shifting are u on the intel or ati ?

 

@Bronsky

Long time no see bud. How's your machine? Do any game tests?

 

Hello,

I got a big problem, I just received my 3820TG, and after doing a clean install, I did update the ATI driver to 10.8 and my screen went black, I restarted it and the screen is still black, what should I do ?

 

go back to bios (f2 on startup), and only enable the intel GPU just to get back into windows. uninstall ati drivers and catalyst control control. Then reinstall the acer ati drivers. restart + f2, reenable ati gpu, then reinstall catalyst control center while the 5650 is on.

 

Worst case scenario, reinstall windows. thats what I had to do, but I hope you don't.

 

Only on ATI, on both battery and AC. It happens about every 30 seconds.

 

Here no one heard about safe mode? Just uninstall it, driver sweeper, install the Acer ones.

 

Do you get it steady at around 8200 mW? I can get it down to 6000 mW with BT and WiFi disabled, but it jumps up and down at around 10000 mW in real life light use. Is it possible to disable SpeedStep and lock the multiplier at 7?

 

Hey zsero,
I was about to send my laptop back to acer to get it repaired, but you don't think that's going to solve the issue... did anybody else experience the same background noise with the microphone?
btw: I got my laptop with the 9-cell battery, do you know where I can buy the 6-cell one in the UK?
THANKS!

 

The good news for those that hate the MIC is that the MIC plug is a great source for power to a backlit keyboard, and if done correctly using the MIC plug, you can do the mod with no soldering onto the mainboard, retaining your warranty. See keyboard backlit thread.