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

It should under be this folder
ATI\Support\10-xx_mobility_vista_win7_32-64_ccc\Packages\Drivers\Display\W76A_INF or any folder inside the Display

 

There is no \Drivers\ folder under Packages... Weird. Only \Apps\

I'll try to re-extract them.

edit: same thing, no Drivers folder was extracted.

 

Hmm I missed this are 10.11 cat drivers out now?

I've been testing the new 1.19 bios on a few games now. Apart from random (annoying) GPU fan bursts when the GPU is idle it seems solid.

I can push the ATI clocks a bit higher on this release too. At least they haven't crashed at over 700 core and 1100 Mhz memory. Used to crash after 30 mins now it seems good!

Edit: Could be the 10.10e driver I'm using givening me these stable gaming clocks..

 

I tried to extract the installer with Universal Extractor and still no drivers...

Maybe I downloaded the wrong package and got only the Catalyst.

 

I'm using a Samsung PX2370 external monitor and when the laptop goes into sleep mode with the HDMI connected, the laptop freezes upon "awakening" and requires a hard reboot in order to respond.

Is there a fix for this issue?

 

Ok, I just tried extract them, seems like
10-11_mobility_vista_win7_32-64_ccc.exe don't have the Display folder
but 10-11_mobility_vista_win7_64_dd_ccc_ocl.exe have....

ATI Catalyst? Mobility Display Driver
AMD Catalyst™ Accelerated Parallel Processing (APP) Technology Edition, this one got the Display folder

 

Are you using the offical Acer drivers or have you upgraded to newer versions?

 

Yeah I realized. I'll re-download them when I get home.

Stupid me.

Thanks

 

I'm using the Catalyst 10.10 GPU drivers and all others are Acer drivers.

 

Could be the 10.10 drivers. Try the Acer recommended ones to see if you still have the issues.

 

Hello Guys,

Thanks for a very informative thread. I have installed an Intel X25-M 80 GB on my Timeline (windows 7). As of now it freezes a couple of times per day and I have no idea what to do. No heavy usage, mainly some office and web-browsing. It is set to AHCI in bios and i have followed the instructions in the FAQ. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

It's not a problem on your part. My drivers don't have .inf files too, so I can't install them manually even if I want. Seems the only way is to use the installer, which doesn't always work. I've had to reinstall Windows before because ATI drivers couldn't install properly no matter what I did. ATI has never solved their driver issues. NVIDIA beats them hands down in the drivers department.

 

So I bit the bullet and joined the club. I am definately not a fan of the half size shift key on the left hand side, but I think a full size keyboard will fix that problem. Good thing this machine has three usb ports

I got the i5-430m, with ATI5470 graphics, 4GB ram. Anybody have experience overclocking this processor? I also plan on putting in an OCZ Vertex SSD, as well as 8GB RAM. Let me know what you have done, I'm curious.

 

Hi, well, I have this notebook for about 2 months now, so I desiced to write small after-time review, with some interesting info about warranty repair.

So, whre to start? First, overall impression is still the same good. I mean, almost every friend thinks this notebook is cool. One even bought it too. I actually havent used its 5650HD GPU, but its great to have this power available.

Now to actual things. Overall system performance is somehow stuttering. I mean, my CPU, i5 460M performs well, but the system is sometimes sluggish. For example, when I do the cool Aero version of ALT-TAB, sometimes its perfetly fluid (on HD5650) but sometimes its very sluggish. Also, when I start or close windows, for example IE, or some folder, the startup animation and close animation are stuttering. Sometimes. But I plan to clean install Windows, so maybe it is gonna help.

Keyboard - I actually type pretty fast, I think this keyboard is very nice. Only thing that bothers me is spacebar sound. It sometimes sounds like if you have wet boot... You know....

Battery life - one word - great. I get about 6 hours with my work, with wi-fi on. Thats all I need. And I laugh when my friends at school constantly look after wall socket....

HDD - Yes, it does often do clicky sound, but I dont think its some dealbraker, I get used to it pretty fast.

One strange (maybe normal) thing I noticed is when I connet my notebook to my LCD. In normal default gamma setting, it seems to have slightly washed out colors compared to my 8800GT desktop card. And I have IPS LCD, so its not LCD problem. But thats maybe just difference betwen ATi and Nvidia cards. I don´t know....

And last - the warranty I promised to talk about. I noticed my notebook had slightly cracked its case on the base right LCD holder part. So, I called to Acer service. I told them my problem, next work day, PPL courier arrived and took my notebook. That was friday. In monday, I got e-mail that my notebook arrived to service. Than, in wednesday, I got email that they sent my notebook back. In tuesday, only 6 days after I send them notebook, it was back. They changed the cracked part, but they even changed LCD backcover, and flashed new BIOS version. So, i am very pleased with speed and quality of Acer service.

Only bad things I noticed is that new case has no more the three stickers - Core i5, ATi and Windows. Well, at least I removed the Acer Timeline sticker and now I got clean case. And the LCD surrounding was scratched, but 'I believe they just tried to clean it, becouse it scratches so damn easily. Its really bad.

So, I hope I maybe helped someone. Please, if you know how to get rid of some bad things I described here (spacebar sound, sometimes sluggish Windows, etc....) please let me know. Thanks.

 

pop a ssd into your laptop and the lag will go away.

 

No stuttering or lag here using the stock 5400rpm WD drive.

But will swap some day for the speed improvement. (not to fix any non-existant issues)

 

So my laptop is getting to my GF's tomorrow...

I assume she will use it as part of the deal is she doesn't take hers. What should I tell her she needs to do when she gets it?

-Does the battery need to be charged first, before use.
-Can I register it after she cancels out of it?
-anything she shouldn't update it it auto updates?

Thanks.

 

I successfully updated my drivers. I was just an idiot and downloaded the Catalyst Software instead of the full Catalyst+Drivers package. Seems fine now.

Although, I still get glitches in Black ops, but a lot less than with 10.6

 

How does Black Ops run on this thing? Also, which card do you have? 5650 or 5470?

Also, I just formatted and for some reason my CPU activity doesn't seem to want to go below 25%, which i killing my battery Is there something I forgot to install? I changed to minimum CPU usage to 0% in the power plan so yeah. I don't get what's keeping it up there. When I look at my processes, the only one that has more than 0% usage is Firefox, and that only goes to 1-3% every now and then =/

 

Anyone ever use Squaretrade.com for 3rd party warranty?

 

Anyone have any experience ordering from aceroutlet.ca? I ordered a US keyboard from them - it wasn't cheap, exactly - cost me $29.99 and approx $15 shipping, but I felt like it was more legit than ordering from an ebay merchant in Hong Kong, and I wasn't sure if the keyboards I could find on ebay were strictly backlit or what (I do not want to do the backlit mod).

Long story short, the new HDD I ordered from Newegg, at the same time, with $.99 shipping is due to arrive today while the keyboard from Aceroutlet.ca is still listed as "awaiting fulfillment" - annoying to say they least. Was wondering if anyone had any experience with this merchant.

 

Hi,

Does anyone know how to set it up so the machine switches to 5650 automatically when I plug it into the wall outlet? From the help, I should be able to do it by simply checking an option in the display setting but somehow it seems that I don't have that option available (not disabled, just not there). Is this option model specific even within 3820TG?

Another question regarding the hard drive. I get a mere 5.5 out of the performance score while others are at 6.7. Any hint how to improve this without changing to SSD?

Thanks.

 

To go beyond 5.9, you would need SSD...

 

I have the 370M + 5650 one. It runs pretty well except for the occasional artifacts. I'll benchmark it later.

 

Any idea what kind of a bump one would get going from the stock 5400rpm drive up to 7200rpm??

 

Just little bump, unless you are considering Momentus XT, which still can't be compared to SSD, though...

 

I just played Black ops for a longer period of time and the artifacts are definately still very much presents. Also, after 10-15 minutes, I got a system freeze.

Is the new BIOS version update recommended?

 

I got the new Need For Speed game, Hot Pursuit. I cranked settings to maximum quality except FSAA, and I'm getting 30-35 fps on 1680x1050. This is the best looking racing game ever, and Core i5 460 + ATI 5650 gives quite a smooth framerate.

 

My bad, double post.

 

Well, in any event I ordered the Samsung 7200rpm 640gb drive. I wanted the extra space for a monstrous music collection so at least I'm getting that sans 5400rpm.

 

Black Ops will not run correctly until there is a decent patch. Shades of WAW.

 

Is there such a thing as a wireless HDMI? I am looking for something that will plug into my Acer's HDMI port and transmit wirelessly to another HDMI receiver plugged into a 23" FHD monitor (actually, I'll be using a 3.5' x 6' smartboard on the receiving end).

Is there such a thing?

Bronsky

 

For the consumer market, I doubt it, considering HDMI 1.3 has a bandwitdh of about 10.2 Gbit/s.

Although I've seen some that are USB dongles you can plug into your laptop, and the receiver on the other end has an HDMI out, but it's not actually HDMI that you're sending over the air. The fact that it's a USB dongle says it all.

 

Hello,

I have the Acer 3820TG with new installed Windows 7 Ultimate - 64bit Edition all drivers installed without problems the system runs wonderful, but one Problem have it. Then i plug a HDMI -> DVI Kabel in my laptop also the HDMI in the Laptop and the DVI in my 19" TFT Display i will become no signal, but my system show me found new Hardware it is my TFT display id "T920". I think my dvi is defect. Also i go with Laptop and cable to my brother and tested it on his 22" Widescreen Display now i have a picture but it is very bad full, of vertical stripes and the blue color is to high. The cable is ok from my desktop pc to this LCD Displays it is ok. Can anythere help me to fix this problem?

 

I would need this for a professional presentation and my company would pay for it. I wonder where I would look on the enterprise side to find something like this if it exists?

Bronsky

 

This would probably be sufficient. IMO kind of sits on the edge between commercial and consumer.

Amazon.com: Cables To Go 29670 TruLink 1-Port 60 GHz WirelessHD Video Transmitter and Receiver Kit (Black): Electronics

For a wireless solution you end up getting allot more wires then just plugging it straight in via a single HDMI cable.

Maybe what you need Bronsky is a wireless remote for your PowerPoint presentations, so you can leave your laptop tucked away nicely with the projector

 

Amazon.com: ASUS WiCast EW2000 Wireless HD Video Transmitter and Receiver: Electronics

Review here: Asus WiCast: Wireless 1080p to your TV - AnandTech :: Your Source for Hardware Analysis and News

 

Hi guys,
I wonder if any ATI 5470 owners installed the new driver:
“AMD VGA Driver (Supports AMD Radeon HD 6370M/6550M Graphics) 8.741.1.6”
From Acer’s site. I understand that it’s the new ATI driver to update from 10.6.
is it? And do I have to install 1.19 bios or can I stay with 1.13 ?
I wonder if anyone installed the BL keyboard that was talked about 100 or 200 pages back that got the power from the cable and did not need mods? If so please include a link.
Thanks for the answer

 

I am receiving my 3820tg from Canada. I know some people have issues with certain drivers but what drivers out of the box would you guys recommended I download and install?
The only game I play is starcraft II Thanks!

 

I would load the most recent Acer/AMD VGA driver. If that works okay, I would consider flashing the bios. I think there are new bluetooth drivers as well.

Bronsky

 

Hi, I got a 3820TG last week and for the first week in worked perfectly fine. I used some tutorials from here to install a clean windows (thanks to the authors btw.) and had no problems at all. Even gaming didn't push the fans to make much noise. But now, in windows without any heavy load or anything (Just opened a video) the fan on the left side suddenly started to speed up and is running at I guess 100% since. It never throttled back down and constantly pushes out cold air. Rebooting, keeping it off for a day, using the battery, nothing. As soon as the notebook is turned on, the fan starts running. Anyone know of this issue or how to fix it? I can't seem to find anything specific. Thanks.

 

Which bios are you running?

 

1.13 was pre-installed; after the fan got crazy I updated to 1.19, which didn't help.

 

Is it possible to roll back to bios 1.13 in case i have issues with 1.19? Thanks!

 

Any word on a 3820TG coming to the US with i5-460 and 5650?
I've noticed that most people claim the resolution looks better on a 13" and that the cooling is better on the 3820TG because it has separate fans/pipes for CPU and GPU.

Currently the only thing the 4820TG seems to have over the 3820TG is that the optical drive can be taken out and you can have a HDD/SSD combo for max storage and speed.

My wishy washy journey for a laptop has me waiting on my ordered 4820TG. It's expected to arrive on dec 10th. I'd be willing to pay a similar price for the 3820TG though...
If you buy from Canada and you have a problem (DOA or something's wrong with it) how hard is it to return it? It seems like it would be a pain in the .

 

I flashed the bios to 1.19 and it seems to have helped.

 

I don't think you'll see the 3820TG in the US. The 3810TG was never sold here either. Acer is having a hard time keeping any supply of 4820TG's available. The company has a line of slates coming out next month and CES is right after the holidays. I wonder if there will be any sandybridge notebooks available at that time, even if only in prototype.

Bronsky

 

Ok thanks. I guess I'll just sit on my hands until the 4820tg comes in the mail.

 

Woot just did my US keyboard swap, adios crappy french bilingual keyboard!!! Fits perfectly, no trimming, just dropped right in.

 

Also anyone know how i can get Built in bluetooth installed? I dont want to add one of those micro dongles, as i will be low on usb ports after cd drive and mouse dongle.