Acer Travelmate P645

Hello,
I'm about to buy this laptop and install an SSD, but before that I've got some questions.
The model I'm about to buy is a FHD IPS one with 500GB HDD and 20GB cache.

My questions :
1)Can I just leave the cache and install the new 2,5" SSD ?
2)Should I unbind the cache , uninstall it and then install the new SSD ?
3)This notebook has got a recovery partition with all drivers right ?

Thanks !!

 

Hi there- just a few questions about your question. Which specific model number corresponds to the model that you're talking about? What do you mean by cache?

 

It's the "ACER TravelMate P645-M-54204G52TKK".
The cache seems to some sort of smart cache to help out the HDD.

 

I am unsure of whether your model comes with a hybrid drive (ssd+hdd combined) or if the cache drive is currently taking up the 2.5'' slot in the laptop. Either way, you should be able to uninstall it and put in a really ssd in its place.

 

In other news, I have successfully installed a 250 GB Samsung 840 EVO SSD into my Travelmate P645 MG 9419 and am using it as my Ubuntu host drive. When I ordered this laptop I wasn't expecting it to be able to hold an additional 2.5'' drive so this came as quite a bonus. Being able to have a hard drive for each OS is a huge plus instead of having to dual boot off 1 drive. The added benefit of extra storage space is also nice. I am very happy with this purchase as it took me quite a bit of research to find (not very popular in the US).

 

Could you clarify? Are you saying it has 2 2.5 bays or 1 2.5 bay and 1 mSATA bay? Thanks.

 

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I meant that there is an additional 2.5'' bay to the mSATA bay. So all in all, there is 1 2.5 bay and 1 mSATA bay.

 

Nice !
The notebook arrived yesterday and so far it's what i wanted.
Is there a way to install the normal synaptics driver?
Eventhough I've installed all drivers from acers home page, some still seem to be missing.
I can't get those function keys to work ....

 

Hi Ipbug,

That's really interesting, as I am considering the same machine, but I'm having quite a few problems to find the cable to connect the 2.5" hard drive to the Motherboard.

Did you find both the cable and the hard disk tray (please have a look at this page pictures to see what I mean:
Acer TravelMate P645-MG-74508G75tkk Notebook Review - NotebookCheck.net Reviews

Did you keep the parts (connector + HDD tray ) codes ?

Thanks!

EDIT: I found the connector code (...just one page before this one, sorry).... but I couldn't find the HDD tray code....
Perhaps you didn't need it as installing an SSD you were not worried about vibrations....

 

Yeah I re-installed OS from scratch. I also ran into this problem but when I installed Launch Manager from my the driver backup that I made using Acer eRecovery before I wiped the hard drive and the feature was restored.

 

@Starflex- Yeah, I wasn't too concerned about vibration and the 2.5'' drives fit pretty well (not much room for movement anyway). I wouldn't worry too much over it and if you do encounter problems, you could probably just fill up the gap with thin sheets of paper cutouts or something.

Good luck.

 

Thanks Ipbug. I am looking for the i7 - 4600u model and for a convenient way to get it here (Australia). Apparently it is only available in Canada and they charge heaps of money for shipping and custom fees...

Inviato dal mio GT-N7100 utilizzando Tapatalk

 

Thank you, this is precisely what I did when I installed an SSD in the empty bay in my Travelmate P645. When I put the bay cover back I noticed that the SSD rattled around slightly. I took a layer of Post-It notes and used them as a shim to take up the extra space and it worked just fine. Thanks to everyone here for their suggestions and for the legwork in finding the part number of the proprietary SATA cable. :thumbsup:

 

Hi, I was contacted service center for entire europe (in Czech) and they wroted: U must use this parts for add additional 2,5" disk:

Ordered booth and waiting for arrival. I have prepared 1TB 7mm HDD drive from WD.

 

I'm glad to hear that. The negative reviews of the keyboard on notebookcheckdotcom is the only thing holding me back on the P645. Like others, I'm am looking for a replacement for my trusty 3820TG.

 

Keyboard is not bad - i was worked wit Lenovo E and T with superior keyboard before this Acer for many years and this one in Acer have only one disadvantage for me - low key travel.

 

I had a 4830TG and had been looking for a replacement for about a year and was almost ready on settling for a macbook pro and then I found this gem. At first, the review about the keyboard was also troubling for me, but I was willing to take a chance since everything else was so highly rated. I was not disappointed. In fact, I like the TravelMate PG645's keyboard much better than my 4830TG's now. I tried out a few other laptops' keyboards in the past few weeks and I still prefer the P645's.

While it is true that the key travel is not as deep as average keyboards, it is definitely very "crisp". The response is also good when you press down on the key, letting you know instantly that the key is pressed. It makes typing fast almost easier as I don't have to move as much per key stroke. The screenshot here is a picture of a typing speed test I did.



I actually average a better speed on the P645 than my 2 year old Timelinex.

 

Placed an order for a Travelmate TMP645-MG-7653 from here:

PROVANTAGE: Acer NX.V93AA.006 Genius Buy TravelMate TMP645-MG-7653 I7-4500U 1.8GHz 8GB 256GB SSD 14: W8.1P


How much stuff from the TMP645-MG-9419's review pertain to the 7653 model? http://www.notebookcheck.net/Review-Acer-TravelMate-P645-MG-9419-Ultrabook.108645.0.html


What's the difference between the TMP645-MG-7653, TMP645-MG-74508G25tkk, and TMP645-MG-9419? All three of them have the same specifications and similar prices.

Newegg has the TMP645-MG-74508G25tkk laptop.


EDIT: The only TMP645-MG-9419 laptops available are the ones for $1600 from Newegg, $1270 from Amazon with 1-2 months of delivery time (aka they don't have it in stock), and other small retailers are charging around $1300.


EDIT2: I have confirmed that you can buy a replacement battery for the TMP645 if you contact Capital Data, which services business laptops and sells components, including for Acer laptops.

It's still slightly annoying that no other retailers carry the battery, including Acer's own laptop parts store.

 

In official EU warehause for entire EU is battery availaible withou problems...

 

I live in North America. Acer US and every other online retailers didn't have any batteries available, just that one laptop service and parts company.

On a side note, I think the TMP645-MG-74508G25tkk is the TMP645-MG-9419.

Though I still can't find the difference between the TMP645-MG-9419 and the TMP645-MG-7653. And Acer's website isn't helping because both laptops look almost exactly the same spec-wise other than one of them having a backlit keyboard (I don't care), and the 9419 was priced a lot higher.

EDIT: The 9419 has dimensions in millimeters and weight in kilograms, while the 7653 has dimensions in inches and weight in pounds. Hm...

 

I have notebook for two weeks now, and I'm slightly disappointed... Acer software is very buggy. I was installed clean install of Windows 8.1 with update. Installed latest chipset, and Intel with AMD (with fix) for graphics. And of course all missing drivers. Now, when notebook sometimes go sleep - after wakeup fingerprint not work and ProShield app saying "Program is locked, contact administrator". Only solution is reinstalling ProShield. It is very annoying if u must do this every day. And sometimes notebook do not wake up from sleep .

HW is good, keyboard is good, cage is good... but SW is very bad

 

Is the weight of the laptop 4lb or 3lb?

All of the websites say it's around 3lb, but Acer's sales support says it's 4lb because the 3lb is without the battery.

 

Any of you guys dealt with Acer's warranty service? I kinda want to know what it's like dealing with them.

 

For Depot service it is not bad. The techs at the Temple Texas Depot have always treated me well. I've had a number of Acers going back 7 or 8 years. My old 1410T is still working and in use by my son. I have had my 3820TG and my daughter's V5-122p to the Depot for repairs and each time, the Acer techs not only addressed the problem I pointed out to them but they replaced a number of other items that I was not even aware needed to be addressed. They replaced the Alps touchpad on my 3820TG with a Synaptics version which worked 100% better, even though I never complained about the touchpad performance at all. I had sent it in for a shorted web camera.

As far as consumer brands are concerned, I would pick Acer depot service over Asus or Samsung (I've dealt with both).

That is very typical for Acer in the US. The US is a bit of a backwater market for them. MK in Germany has everything you could want for an Acer but they're expensive and shipping is prohibitive.

 

I wonder if it's possible to replace the 7260 b/g/n WiFi card with a 7260 ac card?

 

Just a heads up folks: AHCI : Enable in Windows 7 / Vista - Windows 7 Help Forums

Did Acer set the Travelmate to AHCI in the BIOS by default before installing Windows 7, or did they leave it in legacy mode?

 

Anyone tried using Intel XTU?

 

3lbs with battery but without the wall wart external power adapter.

 

Just weighed my p645 on my digital Soehnle scale. It is precisely 3.4 pounds. I suppose with a good spreadsheet workout, it could lose a few extra ounces.

 

I forgot to tell you guys that when I measured my Acer Travelmate's weight, it was 3.45lb (not including AC adapter) according to a scale that my dad borrowed from his laboratory.

Perhaps if I tossed out the removable RAM stick, WiFi card, and the mSATA drive it would be 3.31lb.


On a side note, did any of you have success with updating the Intel and AMD graphic drivers without breaking the graphic switching?

Intel's driver keep saying that my OS is not compatible when I'm very sure I downloaded the Windows 7 64-bit driver, and I'm not sure if installing the AMD beta 14.7RC driver would break the switching.

I also updated the WiFi driver, only to notice that the download/upload bandwith decreased significantly according to Speedtest. The bandwith performance returned with using system restore to rollback the driver update.

 

I have a P645 since a couple of days. Version with a 500GB HD and 20 GB cache, core i5 and just intel graphics. Went for win 8.1
Very nice machine, but there is a problem. The wireless connection slows down and is lost very often, sometimes even after a couple of minutes. Apparently this is a known problem with the intel N7260 wireless card, many threads about it on the Intel forum. Anyone having the same problem?

 

@mend

make sure you are using the most recent driver from Intel (not from Acer)

 

thanks for the tip. First upgraded to latest drivers from Acer (16.6), after that from Intel (17.0). Makes no difference unfortunately.

 

Isn't 17.1 officially available already? I'm using it although on 7260ac and I don't think I got it from Intel website.
Unfortunately these cards don't work very well on 2.4GHz band when there are neighboring networks around.

 

For people looking for replacement battery: ap12a3i | eBay

 

can someone with clasic/hybrid disk make o photo of the disk cage please?

 

Problem sort of solved by inactivating UAPSD (using 17.0 intel driver). No more lost connections at least. Found this solution in several fora dealing with the 7260 problems. Apparently both N and AC versions of the chip are affected. Wondering now how much battery life will be affected, but assume it will not be anything major.

 

I noticed that updating the WiFi driver reduced the download/upload speed on the same router.

 

My throughput is slightly better with the most recent driver. These drivers are a mess...

 

I just noticed that the corners of the laptop display are chipped after a week of usage, most likely from repeatedly removing/inserting the laptop into my college backpack with other books in it.

 

I've also had wireless disconnect and performance issues. I fixed them by uninstalling all intel drivers that i downloaded and rolling back to the ones included with windows. My driver version is 16.5.3.6. Old but its rock solid.

 

Anyone noticed problems with the paint job?

My laptop's matte paint is chipping away at the corners. The laptop is only 2-3 weeks old.

 

In the meanwhile I have updated to the 17.1 drivers. They work well with default settings, no need anymore to inactivate UAPSD. Problem really solved for me!
I read in other fora that this also seems to solve the problem for others, but apparently not everybody.

 

Just noticed another corner that appears to be discolored with an odd blend of gray, white, and black.

 

Hi guys,

i recently purchased this laptop and it came with windows 7 professional through downgrade rights from windows 8 pro.

my concern is how do i re-install windows 8? Seller never sent any OS media. Where can i find the windows 8 Pro Key?

Unfortunately seller never responds to the query.

thanks.

 

If the laptop came with Win 8 from the factory, than that is the system that is on a hidden recovery partition.
You don't need a product key for that - just launch recovery (most likely ALT + F10 at boot) and proceed from there.

 

Thanks, will try that method.

But also to check, if i can't find windows 8 recovery whats is the other alternatives? Like, extracting the windows 7 key and use it for downloaded windows 8 pro ISO file ?

 

The method you advised works, i am restoring the windows 8.1 from the recovery.

Thank you very much.

 

Hi,

Can we use the fingerprint for system log on?

Just to add that i have uninstalled the Proshield software as i am not going to use it.

 

Here is detailed photo with connector I have now mSATA SSD 256GB from factory and 1TB 7mm HDD in my system perfect!

Price of this connector is around 5 USD from Acer Service Center in Czech.

https://picasaweb.google.com/104350714084902509461/AcerP645HDDConnector?authuser=0&feat=directlink