Weird problems with Asus G73JW-A1

I am also beginning to see the freeze up issue. I’ve tried a number of things but so far I have not been able to determine what is causing this. I’m now trying the whole removal of the battery suggestion and we’ll see how that goes.

 

Same bloody issue, bluescreens with the following errors;

"The computer has rebooted from a bugcheck. The bugcheck was: 0x000000fe (0x0000000000000005, 0xfffffa800a1b41a0, 0x0000000080863b34, 0xfffffa8006d18c50). A dump was saved in: C:\Windows\MEMORY.DMP. Report Id: 021411-24554-01."

previous one was

"The computer has rebooted from a bugcheck. The bugcheck was: 0x0000009f (0x0000000000000003, 0xfffffa8007b5c060, 0xfffff80000b9c518, 0xfffffa800717e010). A dump was saved in: C:\Windows\MEMORY.DMP. Report Id: 121910-16192-01."

and random freezes where i need to use the power button to shutdown... I've tried updating drivers and disabling sleep crap but nothing worked so far

Would love to get an answer from Asus about this but they dont seem to think this is a problem effecting more then one person

 

I think I'll say it again...

If you are having lockup issues, and cannot figure it out, then start from scratch, reinstall the OS with a fresh install, and DO NOT ENABLE WIN UPDATE yet. Instead, follow up with installing Win 7 SP1 RTM. After that, then you can enable Win Update. So far, none of my machines that I did this with have had any weird Sleep/Hibernate issues, nor any lockups.

Installing SP1 over a machine with lockup issues will not fix the issue.

 

Haven't tried the clean reinstall+sp1 yet. The solution i now have for the random freezes when idling is: install folding@home. It will use the idle time of your laptop to calculate and do stuff for curing diseases. You can turn the cpu usage in it to very low so it won't raise your power bill . But still it really helps haven't got a freeze since then . Ofcourse, It is an ugly method to fix someting what really should be fixed by Asus themselfs.

 

you could just turn on high performance mode, and peg the processor at 100%...

 

Probally, but folding@home does that only when you aren't using the cpu, so it does not disturb you .

All other solutions in this thread btw didn't worked for me, the battery removal, microsoft patch, drivers reinstall/update, turning off all battery savings stuff. etc. None of them worked, haven't tried the clean sp1 install yet. This is really the only "solution" for me that actually helps lol.

 

You are assuming it's an Asus problem, and not an OS problem. This issue goes across all brands, so it's a WINDOWS issue.

 

Too bad this issue also happens in linux from a live cd... Also, Asus delivers this laptop with Windows. With their drivers and support for Windows. So even if its a Windows only issue, It's still something Asus should fix don't you think?

 

No, I think it's something Microsoft and Intel should fix.

 

I think, I pray, and I hope that I have resolved the issue finally, oddly enough with the third clean install it was still occurring, BUT after reinstalling the video driver back to an older version, and then finally to the latest available from the asus site, it seems to have ceased! I always had a suspicion it was driver related, and I pray I'm not jinxing myself here, but after downloading and installing and rolling back the video driver a few times and finally updating it manually it seems to be gone! I recommend everyone try this a few times, it was probably the fifth time I had reinstalled the video drivers, but it may have even been a sneaky ninja windows update in there too, since I reenabled them.

 

I would remove the " I think" from your sentence.

Kodos to microsoft on the new sp1. I've honestly never had a more stable system before in my life (XP had its issues here and there). Even before SP1, 0 lockups in the past 3 months

For me though, I've never done a clean install since I've got this thing in June.

Its not strange for lockups to happen on one notebook while another doesn't lock up. There are several errors such as karnel which normally happens on higher end.... desktops/notebooks. Thats microsofts/intels fault and they already fixed that issue.

There's the old update realtek drivers as usual if you never did (audio lockups but not sure if this matters for JW). There is the windows hotfix in my sig (karnel/hybernate lockups/issues but I bet the hotfix is useless now since I'm sure microsoft included it in one of their windows updates but give it a shot anyway), Disable drivers that are showing errors in manage (I used tune up utilities, very useful).

Finally, update to SP1. If none of this stops your lockups, then do what chastity said in her earlier post.

 

It's a feature, not a bug!

 

Although I didn't do a clean reinstall of Windows 7 and installed SP1, I just updated my computer again with Windows Update and the problems seem to have completely gone :S No more hangs during shutdown and I haven't experienced a lock up during gaming or surfing for at least 2 weeks. Wonder if anyone else who hasn't yet reformatted has had the same luck?

EDIT: Nope, still getting hangs during shutdown, will do a fresh install of windows and chuck on SP1 before updating..

 

New problem here,
I got the new bios 205, started the flash process, then the message saying "2 seconds to shutdown" appears, the computer shutdown and dont turn on again, tried with and without battery, etc...any suggestions or will I need RMA?

thanks

 

I have the same problem... my G73JW shuts down suddendly or sometimes it's lockups inthe middle of something

most of the times is playing dead space2

I update the last drivers from nvidia website and install the hotfix that comes with the asus utility cd...

anyone has a solution please???

 

This is the exact same problem happening to me after about 3.5 weeks of owning the ASUS G73JW-3DE. It's so frustrating and random that I'm debating just trying to return this laptop for a refund. Please post if you do happen to find a solution to this issue. Thanks!

 

Uninstall Trend Micro. Use something that isn't coded by monkeys.

 

ok I installed SP1 and nothing seems to be fixed... this weekend I´ll try a full install from scratch and add the SP1 without any thing coming from windows update... if this works I´ll post here

 

Now that is an excellent idea. I'm sure you will be happy with the results.

 

I have this laptop and experience these freezes on GNU/Linux too.

So I think it's a hardware problem, not software.

There's really nothing we can do, stop wasting your time and admit to yourself that you bought a piece of junk.

 

Well, you might have a bum unit. Likely not though.

 

@iamsergio at the risk of having repeated this a million times, do you have momentus XT drives? There is a firmware update for them. I'm not sure if that's related to a total lockup type of freeze, but it's worth a shot.

 

Ok this is the update: I fully install Windows7 from scratch... after that SP1 offline... after that last driver available for the graphic card... and finally all drivers for the rest of the devices.

and... after 1 hour of game play of Dead Space 2 this piece of junk shuts down again without warning...

I think this is a heating issue... during game play the GPU fan was running normaly but the CPU fan was expelling a lot of heat... my only idea is that the CPU's thermal compound is not enought for it...

any idea?

 

You can run a hw monitor like HWINFO32 and have it log you temps while you game. This way you can verify if it is a heat issue.

 

I also had this freezes (G73JW).
round 3 times a week (i use the notebook 10h a day)
sometimes in idle-time. sometimes at full working by moving the mouse.
Now i have installed ASUS Power4Gear, set in HighPerformance and turn Turbo-Mode on. Set all Powerthings to "never"...
I did this since 2 weeks and for the moment, there are no more freezes. But i can not belive...

But: I also think this is a hardware bug. This is why ASUS do not "hear" us. They wont make a call-back action like intel...

Maybe Power4Gear in Turbo-Mode helps...

06.04.2011 ---> But it does not!! Again freezes....

So now it's time to buy a new notebook - forget ASUS G73 it is BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD

 

hello again... shuts down still happening on my G73.. and the top temp when I was playing was 87C in one of the cores but at the error moment it was only 67C top
so no thermal issues I think

 

And how are the CPU temps?

 

Hi,

I am also experienced the lock-ups. And I have been recommended this machine to everybody... :-(
It happens even after a new, clean install of Win7 + SP1. Ans when was this thread opened?...

 

________________________

Awhile back I posted the following about how MacBooks seems to always crash my system (BSODs) whenever I am logged onto a network with one connected. Hence, since I've owned this system, I've avoided Macs like the plague (well, I've always done that but more so recently). Well, I think I have fixed this problem. In fact I am typing this right now with a MacBook online as we speak which makes me very happy.

As it turns out, my situation is kinda unique and I hope that this info can also help you guys out. I'm on win7 x64, running zone alarm. What lead me to the solution was that my problem wasn't Asus specific. I installed ZoneAlarm on my girlfriend's new Sony Vaio, and her system BS-ODed. I was floored....and bowed down to the power of the Mac.... j/k. I'm glad it did crash (she wasn't), because right there I knew, this problem wasn't specific to ASUS. After a couple of weeks of sporatic researching, I found this info.

In my case, the issues are not related to the system itself (hardware). It is Windows 7. It suggested I uninstall ZoneAlarm as well, but I like ZoneAlarm. Is there a better firewall out there, I wanna know? So instead, I downloaded the hotfix and installed it.

Windows 7 ntoskrnl.exe blue screens - Microsoft Answers

Let me know if this helps anyone with your other issues.

Good Luck!

Oh and for the record, XoticPC tech support has never responded back to me with any solutions. I guess they don't give a flying crap!

 

I'm a lurker of this particular thread. I have the g73jw-mx version of the asus laptop.

My problem is similar, in that I've had it lock up on my under windows 7 quite often, mostly when I am playing World of Warcraft, but also I've had it lock up while playing Settlers 7 and once while viewing a flash YouTube video.

The only reason I post here is becuase I believe I have made some progress with this frustrating issue. Let me list some points of interest:

1. I have a dual boot system, Fedora Core 14 and Windows 7 Home Premium
2. Usually in 4 hours of playing a video game I am guaranteed about 1 hard lock. Once a hard lock happens in a game they seem to happen more frequenly after that.
3. I've followed the suggestions posted before me, such as unsintalling Power4Gear, this didn't help.
4. When playing games or doing the same activities under linux, I have never experienced a hard lock (this is contrary to some experiences reported by some users which concerns me and suggests we may not be dealing with the same issue)
5. The only diagnostic information Windows reports in event viewer that is of interest are the following errors:
   
   "ACPI: ACPI BIOS is attempting to write to an illegal PCI Operation Region (0x4), Please contact your system vendor for technical assistance."
   
   "LMS Service cannot connect to Intel(R) MEI driver"
   
   The first error returns an official statement by MS:
   
   "ACPI BIOS is attempting to write to an illegal IO port address" error message when you open the event viewer
   
   And the second is probably a result of poor support by Intel, but I doubt that either is the actual cause of the Hard Locks.

WHAT SEEMS TO WORK

Since the only reliable way for me to reproduce the hard locks consistently seems to be to play World of Warcraft for several hours, I decided to use it as a basis for my testing.

WoW has a start up option which disables the use of sound in game so that the sound driver is not used (apparently they include this for troubleshooting issues related to problematic sound drivers.) When running WoW with the sond driver disabled, I have not have a hard lock up in about 8 hours of play. From past experience I'd say there should be about a 95% chance to have a hard lock up within 4 hours of play that means theres about a 2.5% chance that the issue here is not the sound driver. As I play more and more WoW hard lock free the percent keeps going down.

Moreover, to give further support that the sound driver may be the issue here consider that there is precedence for issues with sound as can be found at these links:

ASUSTeK Computer Inc.-Forum- G73JH-A1 Sound Issues (the dreaded static problem)

steam freezes up windows 7 laptop - Steam Users' Forums

http://forum.notebookreview.com/asu...516054-creative-audio-center-lock-up-fix.html (Might be a directly related issue.)

http://forum.notebookreview.com/asu...5985-asus-g73-hard-crashes-video-games-4.html

(read the part here that says "
I played around with my settings, once I ENABLED BOOST BASS via the Creative Audio Centre , my laptop just FROZE anytime it wants to, I had to hold my power button to switch off!

So if you have Creative drivers installed, DO NOT enable the boost bass option!")

Anyhow, try this out and tell me your experiences!

 

You could just uninstall the Creative Audigy MB application, and just use the straight Realtek driver. Use the Graphic EQ to adjust Bass Levels.

You can also enable CMSS-3D and set it to minimum.

 

Hi, I sent this email to the company I bought My Asus G73JW

Problem: Computer Freeze
Occurence: Paternless problem, lately between 5 to 20 freeze a day.

It's a common and well known problem - Reference: http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus-gaming-notebook-forum/536734-weird-problems-asus-g73jw-a1.html
A thread with 19 pages, no solution yet.

Resume: from the forum discussion: The freezes happens without pattern. Does not seems to be software related, neither a driver problem (all have been tested by users, all version, all possible setup, fresh install, SP1... It happens with Window (all flavor) or Linux (Ubuntu)
With Bios 202 (original), 203 or 205 (the latest)

Seems to be power related but unrelated to Power4Gears or Turbo Boost.

People who contacted Asus were blatantly told they never heard about this issue before, thus trying to isolate the individual hoping time goes by and business as usual.

My situation: (shared with many) I am in Peru, some are in Afghanistan or Japan or else so sending back the unit is out of question. We bought this powerful unit for production and extensive work in critical environment.
I don't play games but wanted the power (Usb 3.0, two hardrive, ect.), I use this machine to get into my dedicated server. I manage over 200 websites. I use this computer to show my business to clients.
Those freeze are not only annoying but dangerous (corruption of my work) and a show stopper for my client.

Either this freeze problem get fix very soon or else the laptop Asus G73jw goes to the garbage. (2000$, second battery, and brought in Peru, it hurts)
I can't even surf the web with this Oh powerful amazing, awesome beast machine!!!

My finding: when it freeze, the only thing responding is a hard reboot (Press the power button 5 seconds) but also if I unplug the AC the unit shuts down. That is what most point me to power related.
In Peru we have 220 volts. What is it in Afghanistan and Japan? There might be a faulty filter in the AC adapted that affect only some type of current. Others came to point the battery, it was a close call.

That could explain why is affect some machine and not others. It is not inside the machine (hardware like motherboard or memory, or software like OS) So it should not be the battery either, at least not directly.

The only thing left is the AC adapter. The fault is triggered by the type of current. For example, a spike in the 220v range is not filtered correctly by the AC adapter. Only those with this occurrence are affected.
This is why everybody trying to troubleshoot the machine have not identify the problem. It reside outside. This also explain why it happens without pattern as what is being done with the PC.

If it is the problem, It is Asus responsibility as the PC come with the AC adapter and it should work in all electrical setup in the world as any standard laptop.
I am not an electrician.

I hope someone will identify the freezing problem soon. I did my part and shared my experience. Fix it fast or I will be one more to Dirty up ASUS.

Sylvain Larose

 

@Larose: Have you tried confirming this by using another power brick?

 

subscribing , My laptop jh is doing this every few days ONLY when unattended. Just sleep mode is enabled.

 

Here also still the same problems. I live in NL and we also have 220v. I only have 1 freeze every week. But if i plug in more usb devices which requires much power (like charging my phone) or plug in a VGA cable. It crashes more often. Currently I only have attached the mouse, the power cable and a network cable to this notebook and turning all the powersavings options off. Also turning on a program like folding@home (with cpu usage low) works. But still 1 crash every week.

 

I would then suggest you invest in a stronger power brick.

 

Just to see if you are having the same issue as me and can solve it in the same way please follow these simple steps:

1. Open Device Manager
2. Expand "Sound, video and game controllers" option
3. You should have one that is listed as "Realtek High Definition Audio", on every *other* option other than Realtek right click and select "disable"

What this does is it stops the other sound drivers from being used and if your problems go away it is probably related to a crappy driver. If you want to troubleshoot even further try disabling Realtek driver but then your system will be without sound.

The other thing you need to do is to uninstall and products by Creative on your system. I had THX installed on my system but you could have some variant.

 

Well, there's your main problem. You're using consumer hardware for an enterprise (or commercial) task.

Yes, all your problems should not be happening. But most people who expect an extremely high uptime on their equipment pay to achieve that. I'm not saying that corporate hardware is better - it's generally the exact same inside - but the QA and support levels are different. You won't get enterprise level support from a consumer product, because that's not what you paid for.

Additionally, you're in a climate that is not particularly suitable for PC components. Having a reliable computer is subjective - let me give you a car example. In canada, we have all-season tires on our cars. Most people also get winter tires in the winter. Why, you ask, would you buy winter tires when you have all season tires? Aren't the all-season tires good for all seasons? Well, actually no. They're designed with a specific usage in mind. Canadian winters are more extreme than, say, californian winters. Or Korean winters. Or Japanese ones. By selling an "all season" tire, the company is selling a tire that is not particularly suited to all seasons, in all conditions. I'm not going to get upset at goodyear, or bridgestone, or toyo for selling me inappropriate tires - I'm going to get upset at the sales representative who sold me a product that is not suited for my specific needs. Yes, goodyear, bridgestone and toyo market their tires as all season tires. Yes, it's a little frustrating. But as an informed consumer, I'm aware that the situation will dictate my needs. If I get terrible handling on my car because I've got bad tires on it, I can blame the company that made the tires. But if I put bad tires on the car ... or, try to use the wrong type of tires in the wrong situation, it's not really their fault.

I'm not saying that you made a bad choice with your computer. I'm saying that your computer choice is not appropriate to the application. You bought a gaming machine that generates a lot of heat in a hot climate. You bought an inexpensive budget machine with consumer level support for a business application. You bought a compact car when you needed a pickup truck. Yes, it is having problems, and no it is NOT your fault. But your major problem here is the level of support that you are receiving.

Any brand of computer will have problems, so choosing an appropriate option which has adequate after sale support is essential. If you're having problems, you need those problems fixed, regardless of brand. I'm sorry that it happens to be Asus, and that others have similar problems. But you don't just need a fix, you need a FAST fix, and that level of service costs extra - and is not available with asus consumer products.

 

Philosophical arguments albiet correct are probably less than useful in his situation.

 

Yes, but now he knows. The way he signed his name and everything leads me to believe he expects a certain level of service and professionalism.

 

Follow-up. The company I bought my laptop have sent this case to the Asus engineer with a link to this tread. So it is reaching the good level.

@DCx - You are obviously poor in geography. The temperature in Peru now is about 20degres, I am on the coast, not in the jungle so it has nothing to do with heat. By the way I did not buy a car, it's a computer. Your analogy is failed, sorry. And about Consumer vs. Enterprise product, I think that you are right about the difference but any class of computer should work out-of-the-box and be fixed rapidly when a common problem surge. I looked at the specs on paper and for what I needed it was the #1 choice and apart this freeze problem it's getting the job done.

@gmatt - I have no Creative drivers on my machine. I double checked and the only sound drivers are the Realtek ones. I have a fresh install with minimal standard drivers. Win7 Enterprise with SP1. Updated and with Bios 205. The freeze happened on all Bios versions.

@Chastity - I don't have another power brick. I don't want to invest in more material to troubleshoot my machine. That is Asus job. One thing I am doing is running solely on battery. Lucky me I bought a second battery... So far so good. Had not a single freeze while running on the battery only.

The tech support suggested I use a UPS until Asus can identify the issue. Ok, fine for my office but I did not buy a table pc. This is a portable computer. Traveling with a UPS is of course not an option.

Help to Asus: To those having freeze issue, can you confirm your geographical location and the type of current (110 or 220 volts) and if you have freeze while on the battery only (AC adapter unplugged).

Thank you all.

 

I just registered for the sole purpose of complaining about this.

I would like to note that I have freeze-ups no longer than 3 seconds that happen frequently (at least once per minute) unregardless of whether I'm just using the computer or even playing games. This is so god damn frustrating and it's starting to feel like I have tried everything (but I have not). I have a G73JW btw.

A clue I have found is that the GPU is apparently well-known for causing stutter, and in my case this sounds very likely apart from that the HDD can be playing a huge role in this as well.

Has anyone tried using windows/games on SSD and noticed a difference?
This could well isolate the possibility of it being a harddrive issue. I am considering buying a fast SSD myself, but my wallet is simply not good enough. If you are considering this, remember to buy an SSD that has at least 200mb/s read and write!

Has anyone tried using the stock GPU drivers?
I will do this when I get home.

In the mean time I can only say that this is something that has appeared after 2 months of extremely frequent use. It could be something I installed, but I have tried:

Done
* Reformatting my computer
* Updating the HDD firmware to SP24 (or something)
* Updating all network adapters
* Disabling various sound drivers that I'm not using
* Disabling pagefile
* Unparking the cpu
* Uninstalling power4gear
* Removing unnecessary software and services
* Restoring nVidia graphical settings to default
* Deleting tons of processes like explorer.exe and so forth while playing a game

To-Do
* Downgrade GPU drivers to the stock drivers provided by Asus
* Update windows with hotfixes provided in this thread.

This is making me go crazy anyway. There is no way in hell that I am RMA'ing this instead of finding the solution myself and damnit I won't give in either.

Edit: I should be having 230v Larose (I live in Sweden), sorry to burst your bubble.

 

You have a latency issue involving a driver. Start disabling items in Device Manager until the issue goes away, and then update the drivers for that device to a set that works.

 

Hello, I was confirmed by the laptop vendor that the freezes does not seem to apply to people in U.S. and Canada that runs on 120v. A member here said he had freeze and was in Montana, U.S. on 220v. Check this link with the current type by country: Electricity Around the World
Afghanistan: 220, Sweden:230 (qvazzler, you're in) Peru: 220, Japan 100v.
The current in many country is not filtered and/or cleaned in a consistent way so some days are fine some days are worst. The AC adapter is letting trough something the the laptop can't handle so it just freeze. Checking the error log is fruitless. The laptop might ask the AC adaptor for current differently when idle or at full workload.
Those with freeze can confirm here their country and type of current.
Thank You

Edit: reply from the biggest vendor in U.S:
Let me know what the discussion thread geographical location request turns up. That data would be very helpful to the engineer at Asus. Maybe we can get down to the bottom of this afterall. I will keep doing some research in the meantime and let you know if I find anything.

 

Good to know that you both a) acknowledge that you bought a computer, and b) that it's a consumer class product.

Since your product was working just fine, you're complaining about the REPAIR time. Which is what I was commenting on.

As for geography, I think you need to check a map. Peru is a big country, and most of it is hot.

 

Actually I found some more exlusive information. I have already disabled all possible things in the device manager anyway.

Seagate’s Momentus XT Under Fire for Lagging, Freezing - Mobile Magazine

Just take a look here, it's madness! Momentus XT, Momentus and Momentus Thin notebook drives - Seagate Community Forums

 

That info is old, especially since the firmware is up to SD25.

 

Perhaps old but outdated is unlikely.

Many many people are still posting here with problems.

Just look at this spreadsheet one of the staff members made that anyone can edit: https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AmGtkXs5maUvdHlYQ1hNNEpMMXp1Y3pLNmJMeDJBc1E&hl=en#gid=7

 

People are still posting about their problems because they don't want to read the long threads and the solutions, but just post about the same issue over & over and wait for someone to answer them.

 

Yup, exactly the same thing for me. I haven't updated drivers, but I have disabled all the sleep stuff. Generally, as long as I am using the laptop, no problems, although it will occasionally freeze up when I am using it, but very rarely.

Generally happens when not in use. Often, it just reboots.