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

Well, I don't think I can flash anything because I can't get out of that "Acer Empowering people" screen. It doesn't post and I can't get into bios. So far Crisis Disk is not helping. The screen would stay blank and won't reboot at all.

 

Did you leave it without power, no battery and pull the cmos batteries? If you're not comfortable taking anything apart, you might want to call them in temple texas and explain that you imported your unit and it needs warranty work. If you didn't save your original drive, they might let you send your unit without a drive.

Bronsky

 

That is what I originally planned, but i'm currently still at my university, so I don't have the proper tools to open up my laptop. Going to do this later once I get home.

Anyway, just incase ripping out the battery don't work, mind if you give me more information on temple texas. Also, I though that we weren't able to get warranty on the imported units?(haven't kept up with the forum since September because of school) Any chance I can get a free US keyboard swap from them?

Bronsky, what happen to your laptop anyway?

 

Mine was damaged from a jobsite accident. I'm having the motherboard repaired.

I'll dig up the address for temple texas. Dig out your old receipt, they may want you to send it to them. They are surprisingly cooperative. They've been confirming warranties on imported units.

Bronsky

 

Turns out that the problem came from my ssd. I'm not sure if my SSD crapped out on me or something went corrupted.

Anyway, can someone tell me how I can unshadow my bios and is it a good idea to update to bios 1.17?

Also, when using crisis disk, I'm suppose to rename the "BIOS.DAT" file provided by acer to "BIOS.WPH" ?

 

My system cannot hibernate since a while ago. It simply puts me to the login screen. I didn't install any new program, except windows updates. It is really annoying since I usually put my system to sleep mode and automatic hibernation after a couple of hours. But now it happened the second time, that the system turned on in my backpack, and couldn't hibernate, just stay on the login screen and turning crazy-hot till I noticed or the battery run out.

 

When playing COD i get random freezes for 1-4 seconds every five minutes, and more often the longer I've been playing. When running DPC latency i noticed that turning on the wireless card (standard atheros) I get a couple (4-8) of red spikes. Could that be the problem or is it just a matter inadequate power in the computer (havent O/Ced anything)? I am running 1280x1024, no aa, on a 20" screen.
I also read this post stating that i could be the harddrive going idle too fast, but I wasnt able to find any more info.
Any clues?

 

Did any of you replace the thermal pads found on the GPU heatsink with paste or did you re-use them? Debating whether to replace the pads with premium ones or going with paste.

 

I did not have a thermal pad on my GPU.

Bronsky

 

Hi!

I'm going to buy the 3820TG, but I'm not sure whether I should go for the one with 450M CPU or the one with 460M CPU. The 450M costs 753£, while the 460M costs 915£.

Other than the CPU and 180GB larger HDD I can't see any difference.

Which one should I buy?

 

There are thermal pads for the video memory.

I just left the stock ones that came with the system.

 

I seem to be having same problem as you. I performed as DPC as well and get spikes when on/off wifi. My problem is a bit more serious as game dont freeze every 1-5 min but when it does it freezes for good and i have to hard restet my laptop. If you look a page or two back ive been able to run high o/c for long time with disabled wifi and play single player missions with no troubles. I guess im not the only one with this issue, i too have Atheros antena.

 

Hi guys, I've got a question that you might be able to clear out for me!

I've got the 3820TG with the i5-450 processor. I switched to a SSD-drive and installed Win7home premium and the drivers from acers website.

The problem now is that I seem to be running on only one core instead of two!

- In CPU-Z: "Processor #1" is marked gray, and it says that I'm running 1 processor, 2 threads.
- In task manager i get two graphs for CPU usage history, but from what I understand that's 1/thread, i.e. only 1 core is operating.
- In 3DMarks06: "1 Processor Core, HyperThreadingTechnology Available - 2 HTT Processors per Core".

- But in Device manager I can see 4 processors, which I interpret as two cores running two threads each... "ACPI-x64 based PC" also seems to be properly installed.

I haven't clocked anything and I get 6703 i 3DMarks06 with 1588 i CPU-score.

Can anyone help me understand this? Do you get the same info on your systems?

 

Check in msconfig, under Boot tab, Advanced options, is the "Number of processors" checked? It should be unchecked...

 

Haha thanx for the quick reply, it worked perfectly! Now I have 4 in both device manager and CPU-Z.

The irony is that I changed that setting earlier today while reading a tweaking guide to get the computer to boot faster

 

That option isn't for boot faster, its just for debugging purposes...
By default, booting should be using all the processor available..

 

what u mean by thermal pads? U mean no o/c stock clocks? thx

 

He mean this

 

I mean this

 

Did you notice any heat sink connection on sink that gores over the HM55 chip? My HM55 was perfectly shinny and I could not see a corresponding contact surface on the overlapping heatsink/fan assembly (I think it is the GPU side if I recall correctly)for a connection to the heat sink. The 4820TG actually has a copper heat sink on it to remove heat.

Bronsky

 

On both 3820TGs that I have repasted, I noticed that they had thermal pads that went between the HM55 and the heatsink. In both cases the thermal pad stuck to the heatsink when it was removed.

 

Hi, does anyone know whether most USB-sticks are bootable with this notebook?

Has anyone tried? Is it recognized as a drive?

 

I've tried an old 1gb-stick with dos, and installed windows from a new 16gb usb. Both worked perfectly.


EDIT: I have another question. I just installed 1.17 bios hoping that it would solve the issue of me getting a bluescreen every time the computer returns from sleep. It did not work however. Does anyone have any idea of how to resolve this issue? I'm quite fond of using sleep...

One more thing... I've read that you get poorer performance in game if you overclock the processor. Has anyone found a solution for this yet?

 

Finally my 3820TG from computeruniverse arrived yesterday!! D

no complaints so far, screen looks great too

 

Congrats! Have fun!

 

Yea ... wierd, cause my unit had the thermal pads for the GPU video ram, etc, but nothing on top of the HM55 chip. I looked at the heat sink again yesterday after reading your post to see if there was any sign that there had been a pad there and it looks like there was not. I guess I'll have to order some thermal material to put in there when I get my unit back. Acer's QA/QC seems to have missed one there. Funny too, cause Shark Tech is replacing the HM55 as it looks like it was shorted in the accident.

Bronsky

 

Bronsky, I can also confirm that my unit had a heat pad on the HM55 chipset. Also the RAM of the GPU too.

My i5 580m is going great. Notebook seems so much faster! Whats the latest on your motherboard? You must be itching to get your 3802TG back up and running again.

 

It's driving me crazy. I've been able to do most things on my 1410T but it's like driving a Yugo instead of a BWM. Other stuff, I've been able to do on my desktop.

Shark has already taken 3 weeks to do the repairs. I hope it will not be much longer. I keep thinking that I should have bought a replacement and sold it when I put mine back together. Oh well.

The higher powered I5 is perfect for the 3820TG. Glad you like yours.

Bronsky

 

I can't decide between 460M and 450M. The 460M is 300$ more expensive.

 

The difference is not worth 300 USD, though it shouldn't be that much.

Any other differences?

 

320GB HDD vs 500GB HDD.

 

You'll want to change it to either a Momentus XT or an SSD, so it does not really matter

 

I'd choose the 450m and upgrade the hdd on my own. If you rely on cpu performance upgrade to a 580M

For about 300$ you're able get a faster and bigger drive plus the faster 580M...

 

Thanks. Going to order the 450M-version.

 

Is the momentus xt that much louder/more vabrating?
I've been wanting to switch out the HD but dont want to pay SSD prices and have heard alot of feedback saying the Momentus shakes the whole laptop and is loud as mess.. is this true?

 

If the graphics are secondary in importance to you you could buy mine... http://forum.notebookreview.com/not...09-fs-acer-3820tg-3022-modified-upgraded.html

 

Does anyone still had a problem with the Intel Centrino 6200 Advanced?
I bought here: 6h Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6200 802.11N Half Mini bei eBay.de: Netzwerkkarten -Adapter (endet 28.10.10 12:11:12 MESZ)
On Windows 7 I cannot get it to work, the drivers install and stuff but it always says "This device cannot start (Code 10)". This error was in Device Manager.
I tried everything. I have the drivers from Intel and from Acer Support. I tried different configurations and still does not work.
Intel's support page, read about the blockades, so that the card will work with specific hardware.
Do you have any ideas or solutions?

 

Where do you guys find i5 580 that cheap? At the leading internet retailer here in Norway it costs 345 USD.

 

i5 580m items - Get great deals on Computers Networking items on eBay.com!

 

Will you run IntelBurnTest instead of Prime? I assume you'll be in the 90's when you use a true stress test app such as that. IBT + Furmark on max burn are the best combo I've used for stressing cpu and gpu. I want to see what you max out at so I can figure out if I want to upgrade past the 370m or just wait it out until sandy bridge in a few months.

Also how long have you had the laptop? You're already at 3% battery wear. Do you use it on battery very often or run it down low? If it's been on AC power its entire life, this may show a poor battery by Acer. I've got systems that are over 2 years old with 0-5% wear. Fujitsu system batteries seem to have quality next to none (I've yet to have one show any wear and they last as long as day one).

 

what program do you recommend to use for monitoring fan speeds?

 

Do you find gaming hard on only 13"? I guess it's soemthing I have to get used to.

 

Hello, I'm new here. From France. Just Bought a German 3820 tg with 5650 i5460, 750 hdd.

Got two questions (probably already answered but couldn't find the answer in so many posts).

1 I will make a clean install (with abr, no problem) but I need to know wich driver I should install to have the latest drivers and in wich order (I want switchable have graphics). I've read a post dealing with this but I can't find it again...

2 I need to change my german keyboard qwertz with a french keyboard azerty. Where could I find one. I've read the other post dealing with it, but I would prefer have a 3820 keyboard (and not a 3810 wich is thiker and need cutting). Does anybody find some 3820 keyboard?

Thanks

 

I got mine from the laptop money for 229 inc postage. Make him that offer.

Hi, ok I will try intelburn test not sure it will get it hotter than prime95. Had this 3820TG (My second one) for since Sept i think it was I use the battery a bit but its still at 3% which it reported a few days after i got it. I expect it to suddenly report like 6% wear or something soon.

 

Heres the link - backing up drivers is discussed in there http://forum.notebookreview.com/ace...rks-tweaks-mods-upgrades-162.html#post6465732 and the 3810 keyboard does not need adjusting. Only the backlit one does.

Bronsky

 

Where do you read battery wear?

 

To be honest, yes, it's all true. The Momentus XT is louder than average (still not on a disturbing level, just noticable), and on the right palmrest you can feel it spinning too. For maximum performance it is adviced to use quietHDD, so the drive never realy spins down. I have a second profile for batery mode, where spindown is enabled. On the bright side it realy is a snappy drive, and that is what realy matters. If it would be twice as loud as it is now, I'd still go for the performance boost.

 

My battery was on 2.65% when I purchased it, and 4 months later it still holds that level.

 

The big deal in the newest firmware update ( Link)for the Momentus XT is that the drive will not spin down automatically. Though, it seems some can override this with Windows advanced power management.

Are you using quietHDD and the newest firmware (SD23)? I thought quietHDD and HD Tune was only for AAM changes which, for performance, should make the drive louder. I've never used either of them though. My hdd is the base drive in the Momentus XT. It definitely doesn't feel like a 4200rpm drive but is far from intolerable.

 

Nice thread guy/gals (^_^)

I'm looking into getting one of these machines. Now that you've had yours for a few months, how is the notebook holding up?