ASUS N71JQ Owners Lounge

Thank you for fast response

And which is the method to upgrade bios that has the lowest chance of bricking the unit ? I would want to upgrade the bios to 208 then and if it does not brick than continue with installation.

I never knew before that bios upgrade can brick a laptop, I just upgraded bios on my Asus g71gx like a month ago through a thumb drive and built in asus bios upgrade, makes me happy that eveerything went through fine

 

You are welcome.

I usually flash using easyflash tool that is in the system bios.
The file to be flashed should be on a USB thumb drive which is formated with FAT 32.
The Easyflash tool does not seem to like NTFS partition.
There are higher risks of bricking the system if the file is located on the hard disk. Two owners of N71JQ bricked their notebooks because they had the bios file on the hard disk while they were flashing with Easyflash.

 

I'll look into this, I had my USB thumb drive formated with NTFS and it worked, but I'll use the FAT 32 like you said.
Should order it this week, so maybe next week I can pick it up.
I just got to 50th page of this forum, not sure what other 100pages have on this notebook, but I'll run few games to see how it performs.
I'll defeniatelly try bf:bc2, sc2, tf2, global agenda and fifa 11 demo.
Off to take a look at the remaining 100 pages

 

Good luck. It's a lot of reading you will be doing. :wub:

It seems I am the only active member with N71JQ. You will see lot of posts from me.
Sadly many of the other owners disappeared and don't check in here to help others who has problems.

 

Well I'm grabbin this for my brother in law who's in Poland, so once he gets this puppy in a month when I visit he should be a happy owner.
I'll direct him to this forum if he has any questions or inputs but his english is not the greatest might have to help him out once in a while

 

If he has questions he can visit us here.
I will try to help if I can.
In the next 3 to 4 weeks I will be more busy and it could be that I will visit this forum less often.

 

Well, duh, I belatedly found out why I've never been able to burn a recovery disk: my dvd burner doesn't work. CD burner works, dvd burner doesn't. I hadn't even checked that because Asus tech support kept telling me that burning recovery disk was a known problem that they are working on fixing. They've been telling me that for a month now.

Called Asus tech support - on hold about 1/2 hour - surly fellow got on and just said return the computer. I asked if I could just stop by a facility and get a new dvd burner. He hung up on me.

Asus seems to answer the phones much quicker with somewhat higher class, tho still not very impressive, answerers in the AM.

How hard is it to remove the CD/DVD player? Are there instructions someplace?

 

There ya go, Ken posted disassembly guide some time ago, it shows a step where you have to push it out with a screwdriver, could not find a step if any screw is holding it in place.
http://www.gentechpc.com/Asus/N71VN Series Chapter 02-v1.0.pdf

 

Thanks - but that's for the N71VN model - and I don't see where it tells you how to remove the cd/dvd. That should be a simple job, shouldn't it? But they'll probably want me to send them the entire computer.

 

I think it's under ODD (optical disc drive ?) not much info included there, just push from back and pull from front

 

Yes usually ASUS will ask you to send in the complete notebook, but here in Germany last time I had a hard disk damaged and they accepted that I just send then the HDD alone.

The disassembly guide is the same for N71VN and N71JQ.

Removing the DVD drive is very easy.
There is only one screw that is holding it in place.

If you look underneath the machine near to the place where there is the Windows license sticker and the serial number sticker, you will see a screw hole near to which there is a drawing of a circle. This screw holds the dvd drive in place.
Remove this screw and then you can slide the DVD drive out.

 

Mr T to the rescue again!

By the way, don't call Asus tech support in the evening or at night (US time). They seem to have only a skeleton B team on duty at night, not that their A team is all that impressive - except compared with the night crew, plus there's about a 20 minute wait at night.

 

Lol meant to put this in the search.
If it was possible for me to put a second Hdd in the laptop.

 

If it is an X1 model then most probably not.
Except if you can find a shop which sells the missing sata HDD connector board.

 

This is why I spent the extra $ and got the A1. From what I read it is very difficult to upgrade the X1 to accept another HDD. You have to fine somewhere to buy the connector and then disassemble the laptop. Way too complicated for most people. It is really a shame that they didn't include the connector as it is really easy to swap out the HDD's when you have the connector.

 

Just spent the last 2 weeks with the N71JQ-A1 as my only computer and it served it function well. I primarily bought the N7 as a desktop replacement when I have to go to another location that does not have a computer. My only real dislike about the laptop is the location of the power connector, I would have preferred it to be in the rear. Other then that small complaint the N7 worked flawlessly, on for about 14 hours a day and never had a problem.

 

Yes I also dislike the power connector placement. On my desk the power cable goes down the table at the backside so it has to pass in front of the laptop exhaust fan. The cable gets very hot which is not very good for the cable on the long run.
I usually connect the plug in a way that the cable is lift up so that it passes above the exhaust, but it looks little bit funny.

 

Anyone found some legs they can atttach to this thing in the back to raise it ?

 

Well the hdd thing is no real biggie , I have plenty of externals.

Still plenty of space on the laptop itself too.

What I really want is a laptop skin that will fit this laptop.
I like the back color its just prone to finger prints and scratches , which it has a few small ones that I have no clue how they got there. Probably from lugging it around in in my laptop bag thats a bit to small for it

So yea a good bag and a skin for this beast is a must.

This laptop is pretty much awesome. Mobile gaming everything.

 

Did you check this out?
Xotic PC Article & Info Section - Articles - Exterior Finish - XOTIC PC CUSTOM EXTERIOR FINISHES

 

I have strong reason to believe that my HDMI device is defective. It does not seem like anyone in this forum has had this problem. Per Asus Online Support, I updated the BIOS to 2.08 and the VGA drivers but it does not resolve the issue. My BIOS was previously at 2.04 but now that it is at 2.08, my cpu fan seems loud at times. Anyone notice this?

But back to the original problem, the HDMI port on my laptop does not work and I continued to seek help from the 1-800 Asus Line (U.S.) The representative seemed poorly trained; I was on the phone for over 1 hr with no resolution. She finally gave me a RMA no. to send the laptop in. Bottom line, I just wanted to point out a possible HDMI defect in these laptops and will provide an update when I receive my system back.

 

On my N71JQ the HDMI connection works perfectly fine. I use it every day to connect my notebook to a 24" monitor at my work.
In fact the HDMI connection is used every day for around 10 hours.
The HDMI connector could have a problem on your particular machine, but I don't think this is a general problem with this model.

On my machine with bios v208 the fan is only load when there is a load on the machine. It is supposed to go higher on rpms when under load.

 

For anyone in Toronto area, there's a sale tomorrow, ncix is opening new store and they have n71jq-x2 as a doorcrasher item at $999.
NCIX.com - Canada's Premier Computer Store - Great Technology, Service and Selection.
Worth a shot to post this, maybe some Torontonian is looking into this laptop

Edit. Looks like this is for all ncix locations, not only toronto, gl if anyone neeeds one

 

Ok, so I got the n71jq I'm burning recovery disks right now and I'll try to do bios update later.
Could you experienced owners here tell me which drivers I should upgrade ? and point me in the right direction ? Mainly gpu drivers as I have never had ati gpu before.

 

Congrats!

Basically you can update almost all the drivers.
You can download all of them from the N61JQ driver thread.
Here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus-reviews-owners-lounges/494250-asus-n61jq-driver-thread.html

 

oh my, this laptop is making some crazy high pitch sound, if I remember correctly it was mentioned in this thread before, it's the cpu, right ?
does this ever go away ?

 

Just wanted to say that I have successfully flashed to BIOS v208. Works good when you know how to do it. And I'm happy to report a much quieter cooling fan, which really wasn't much of a problem before bit is nice and quiet now. Still pretty cold down here in Antarctica but it's supposed to be Spring in the southern hemisphere. Right now we're looking at -30 with a wind chill of -52. Yup, pretty bitter. But I'm digging it. Cheers.

 

Check this post to make it go away:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/5971571-post308.html

 

I just purchased my N71Q. I have a desktop running XP with a hardline DSL connection. I do not want my desktop to go wireless. But I want wireless access to the internet for my laptop and access to files on my desktop. I also plan on streaming movies on my laptop. Which is the best router to buy?
The Linksys N series seem to have a lot of compliants. I don't want DLink as I had problems with them in the past.

Any recommendations?

 

Damn, I had this lappy for few days to test it out and so far I'm quite suprised.
Everything seems great about this one, yeah I had small whine issue but thx to this thread I messed with the mic settings and no more
Quality of it seems great, screen looks great, cooling is phenomenal, and it even looks slick
I tried bf:bc2 for an hour and I kept cheking temps every few min or when fans woud be the loudest and I never saw gpu higher than 84c, and as soon as it hit that high fans would kick in higher and they had no problemknocking it to 78c, great cooling.
Fps was also phenomenal, I play on my gtx260 on medium settings so I was hoping for playable medium settings here and it was no problem, with no major action fps was at 40 and higher action around 30, very playble, I honestly did not look at fps that much cuz game was intense and smooth
Also tried sc2 on high and no problems there, game was smooth.
So far great buy

 

When clicking Ctrl + spacebar on any text editor I get some Japanese (i think) character picker or something. Anyone know what it is and how to disable it? I use a program which has a very useful shortcut with Ctrl + spacebar which I would like to be able to use.

p.s. Thanks Turbogear and Ken Lee for your help in getting the bios update. My fan is also working good now
One thing my laptop has though is that something seems to not be attached properly or some component is too close to something else and sometimes there's is a noise of something vibrating, maybe against something else. If I move the laptop a bit it stops as if whatever was making the noise was repositioned so it doesn't touch anything anymore. It seems to be on the lower right corner area.

 

I tried the Ctrl+spacebar on mine, but I don't get any strange characters.

The vibration is most probably from the HDD compartment.
I had the same problem before. I used to hear vibration sounds from the right side of the touchpad. I found out that the hard disk on this side was not held in place very tightly.
Look at the disassembly guide on page 2-6 here:
http://www.gentechpc.com/Asus/N71VN Series Chapter 02-v1.0.pdf

You will see that the two hard disks are slided into place and screwed on one side only.
Basically the problem is that the side which is not screwed (front side) is not tight in place on some notebooks (probably manufacturing fault ). So when the HDD is running it sometimes start to vibrate and produces a resonance sound. In my notebook one HDD compartment is tight and the HDD can not move up and down. In the other compartment the front plastic grips are not holding the HDD very tightly. The HDD can be moved up and down by around one millimeter.

My fix for this issue was to insert a small piece of paper between the compartment door and the hard disk. This pushes onto to the HDD and it cannot produce vibrate sounds anymore.

 

I have heard that on mine too where I just hit the spot and it quits. I wondered if it was due to the tilt I have it on my adjustable lap desk.

Seemed like it was under the keys. (left side) I tapped it between the touch pad and keys to stop.

 

As I said in the above post, the only machanical thing I know of and that can vibrate in the area around the touchpad are the hard disks.

If the noise is coming from near to the left uper corner of the keyboard where the hotkeys are then it would be the CPU fan.

It was the same for me before on the right side of the touchpad. Some times I used to hear this vibration sound. Tapping at the spot or moving the notebook upwards used to stop it.
Inserting a piece of paper between the hard disk and the HDD plastic cover door stopped it for me.

 

I haven't even tried out the hdmi on mine yet. What doesn't work on mine is the dvd writer and I just found out that Asus doesn't have any replacement dvd writers available. The local tech was supposed to replace it for me yesterday, and then Asus told him they don't have the part. And yes, many of the Asus tech support phone answerers are very poorly trained. Every single thing you ask them they tell you to hold on while they ask someone else, and that takes a long time, and then they come back on with an irrelevant answer. When I tried to ask them when they are going to get in the part they jerked me around, making me wait numerous times while the lady relayed my questions to someone else who I was told I cannot speak with directly, finally furnishing me with another phone number to call, which turned out to be bogus. This all has been going on for over a month now, and I can't even get an answer from them about when the part will be available.

Aside from all that the machine works real good, thanks to Turbogear's bios update help. That's thanks to Turbogear not Asus tech support!

 

Yes Turbogear,
I assumed it was the fan. Seemed like it was above the pad under the keys area to the left a bit. It didn't and doesn't do it all the time.
Actually just that one day when I was using it. I was guessing because I may have had it tilted more than other days. I have a laptop desk that straddles my legs with an adjustable top that raises where the laptop rests on.
Really neat for how I use it sitting in my recliner chair.

 

Thanks Turbogear. I'll have to try that. It does sound like it's the same thing.

Now hopefully someone will know what the ctrl+spacebar thing is
You don't actually see anything by just pressing ctrl+spacebar but only when you start typing again. So the keyboard shortcut turns it on and off.

 

Well, that's what they told me yesterday. Today the local authorized dealer called to tell me it came in after all, and I brought my laptop in, and he replaced the DVD/CD writer as I waited. I THINK the new one actually works.

Too bad Asus has so few authorized dealers. My travels just happened to bring me relatively near one of them just now. Otherwise they wanted me to mail the whole computer back.

 

Hi Guys,

I have not been in here for a while, (busy working on my house). First I want to thank Trubo for giving me a heads up on BIOS 1.08. I loaded it with EsayFlash and it worked out fine for me; no more fan ramping up and down.

With regard to the current conversation, my DVD burner works just fine. I bought my N71JQ back in May and it came with a LG BD/DVD. I tested the HDMI port when I first got the laptop and it works fine with TVs and Computer displays. This was true right out of the box and with updated drivers and BIOS 1.07 or 1.08.

I fix computers for everyone I know, so I have seen a lot of different laptops. This one is the best by far. I really enjoy using it.

Dave

 

Turbo's the real Asus tech support. I'm still waiting for those Asus tech support telephone phonies to email me back re the cycling fan and busted DVD writer issues like they said they would about a month ago.

 

Thanks guys for the positive comments.

I try to help people around here whenever it is possible.

Actually I also first came to this board some years ago looking for answers to questions that ASUS telephone tech support could not give.

The ASUS telephone support here in Germany is also miserable. In the past they promised to call me back for some problems, but they never did it.
Besides we in Germany have to pay more money than usual land line calls for calling the tech support. They charge us 14 cents per minute whereas normal land line calls cost around 3.5 cents.
Sometimes you have to wait more than 20 minutes before you can speak to somebody wasting your money while machine tells you to hold the line.

 

"Besides we in Germany have to pay more money than usual land line calls for calling the tech support. They charge us 14 cents per minute whereas normal land line calls cost around 3.5 cents.
Sometimes you have to wait more than 20 minutes before you can speak to somebody wasting your money while machine tells you to hold the line."


Yipes - at least calling them from here via their 888 number is free.

 

I had this laptop for a month now, I love it and it runs everything great but 80% of the time on startup it will BSOD 0x00000116 atikmpag.sys and ONLY once then it boots fine. Its been doing it since I got it but did NOT do it on the preinstalled bloated OS..

I tried:

-Multiple reformats
-Running Furmark (no artifacts)
-Running games for days straight (no artifacts or crashes)
-Reinstalling the drivers multiple times
-Use Driversweeper after uninstall
-Use Asus 10.8 drivers
-Turn off ATI Powerplay

Nothing is fixing it, once in a while it will randomly boot without the BSOD. It never crashes in games or stress testing or artifacts, temps are all good on GPU/CPU, RAM is slightly warm. If I uninstall the drivers and run with the default windows driver it won't BSOD.

Running 7 x64 Ultimate.

 

I was having problems with things crashing. A friend recommended CCleaner, a free app for cleaning out registry. First time I ran it, found almost 400 problems. Ran it until clean and no more problems since. Might work for you.

 

^^ best. I found this little gem of a program ages ago. A def must for everyone

 

I've not had this issue and I'm also running 7 x64 Ultimate - the drivers I am using/have used though is the official ATI Notebook drivers 10.8 available here: ATI Catalyst? Mobility Display Driver

Worth a try

Have to say I do love this laptop, fantastic piece of kit.

 

Now that I've got the defective DVD writer replaced, and the cycling fan fixed, thanks to Turbogear - mine is - knock on wood - working perfectly. Some things I haven't tried out yet, like the hdmi, since I've been on the road, but at least for what I know about it's 100% right now.

 

I ran it, so far it cold booted twice in a row without the BSOD. I think it did something ill know for sure after today!

@Nipedley I am using the 10.8 drivers from AMD as well, the Asus ones have an issue with one game when AA is on causing text to be invisible.

 

And it BSOD again on boot..

 

Those without the problem what bios are you running? Im using the latest 208..