Asus N550JV - user review and owners lounge

Hello,

In-case i want to replace that battery for the laptop, from where to do i get a replacement? Not that I need it now but I was just being curious and I searched google and I don't any place where they sell the battery alone.

Does anyone know or have any experience regarding the matter?

Thank you

 

Hi guys,

I'd like to know what everyone's general consensus on this laptop is? I am coming from a Dell precision m6600 and I am looking to downsize in both weight and size without severely sacrificing performance/specs. After a TON of research, the Asus N550JV seems to give me the best blend of specs, features and portability that I am looking for. There are however a few things that I think may bug me and I was looking for some feedback on them.

1. I have heard some negatives about the silver keyboard, especially as it relates to the back-light causing more harm than good in semi-low light situations due to the lack of contrast. What is you guy's take on that?

2. I am looking to switch out the optical drive for a 2nd hard drive, but I have read of issues with the DVD drive bezel not fitting properly on the hard drive caddy. Is this true, and if so, does anyone know of a brand of hard drive caddy that will fit the DVD drive bezel to look like stock and not protrude at all?

3. Does anyone know if Asus offers onsite repair warranties similar to Dell, HP and Lenovo? I am really not to keen on sending my laptop out for repair if something ever goes wrong with it.

4. I have also read that the right click on the trackpad is very stiff and troublesome (sometimes resulting in unregistered clicks) is this true as well? If so, how often does it happen and does anyone know if Asus plans on fixing this issue?

Thanks in advance for any and all help given!

 

Just purchased the N550JV-DB72T and I love it so far. Had a Dell XPS M1530 for 6 years and it was starting to act up quite a bit so needed to replace it...and I am very happy so far.

I do have one question. On my Dell I was able to check a box to disable the trackpad when I had my USB mouse plugged in. I cannot find a way to do so on the Asus...anyone out there figure out how to do this yet? Can you please send detailed instructions for doing so. It drives me crazy when I am working on the Asus and my thumb grazes the trackpad and moves my curser someplace other than where I want it.

Thanks ahead of time for the responses. Have a great day!

 

Launch "Asus Smart Gesture", go to the last tab, "Mouse Detection". Check the "Disable touchpad when mouse is plugged-in"

 

Asus N550 N550JV HDD Caddy

I have this one

 

Does it sit tighter within the laptop than the stock one? Like is there no gap (mine doesn't stick out)?

Sent from my dlx using Tapatalk

 

Thanks. Do you know if this one is available in the U.S.? This looks like it comes from overseas. If this one plays nice with the DVD bezel then I may just have to pay the extra shipping and wait the extra time for arrival if I decide to get a N550JV.

Any further help from anyone with my other questions would be much appreciated!

Thanks!

 

Can someone help here at all please

Hi Al

i purchased my nv550jv about 2 months ago, overall i am happy with its performance, love the keyboard and what i perceive to be a well built design
However i cam across a couple of issues that i did find solutions for ( i will share ) and one issue that is grinding my balls

1) Slow shut downs, and start up
I found that the laptop when being properly shut down or rebooted would take about 7 minutes to do so, the culprit was the Bluetooth drive, grab the lates one from the asus website and Bingo it fixes it ( well in my case )

Now my problem

When i first bought this laptop i noticed the there were about 9 partitions created , most of which where recovery, i was able to factory reset the laptop ( only able to clear files on the windows partition ) and restore it to what was considered factory default, however i kept on getting the partitions, so long story short i got a replacement

This one that i have now does not have the 9 partitions but has 6, i believe the store placed there own image on the machine which screwed a few things up.

My problem now is that i am trying to what i consider to be a FULL factory reset, this includes wiping both the c: and d: drive and re-installing all applications as factory standard to completely start again

i have done the following:

1) i have rebooted into what looks like the default windows recover console and when i try and do a factory reset i am told i am missing a partition
2) I have created a recovery USB ( 16gb ) and tried kicking from that, all it does it loads up my windows desktop
3) tried various options in the windows 8 recovery space, BUT what i actually want to do wont work

Essentially i cant wipe the bugger, it seems that for some fantastic reason the days of resetting your laptop are becoming a little more ambigious, there is no recovery console and there is not the ability to create recovery DVD's

any ideas lads and ladies, im open to all

Thanks

 

Short answer, I would advise against buying into N550JV as a workstation equivalent, does not seem reliable enough for this role. The unit has tremendous specs for the low price tag and I would recommend it as a multimedia laptop, but it comes with several engineering flaws which should be a concern for someone looking to do real work on it.

Long answer, story time

I'm a graphic designer myself, and I bought the N550JV because my old laptop was way outdated. My previous units were all Dell, a mix of XPS and Latitudes. The Dell Precision never made sense to me, too big & heavy. To compensate for the lack of a decent screen I used an external IPS screen on occasion.

I bought the Asus because I didn't have time to wait for equivalent Haswell models from other manufacturers. My manufacturer short list included Dell, Lenovo, Samsung. None had an appealing unit out at the time of purchase. Asus was a candidate but I had written it off due to various engineering issues they had on their Ivy Bridge lines. Asus makes interesting units but still lacks maturity as a notebook maker (my opinion ofc). They do seem to improve significantly from one generation to another though, and when I saw the way the N550JV was built (dual fans, all components easy to access, metal lid etc) I decided to bite the bullet an buy it. Overall I am satisfied (not happy) with my decision, but with what I know about the now N550JV I wouldn't buy it again as a workstation replacement unless budget was a concern.

Toughts on hardware:

• Screen - excellent viewing angles and max brightness, decent contrast (has backlight bleeding), but rather low color gamut. My unit has a patch of stuck subpixels, don't know yet if it's extending and/or if this should concern a new buyer or not.
• Cooling - decent out of the box, needs fan control software to work as intended. (without software control fans are always on, unit is prone to throttling under heavy mixed load). Fans are silent though. Cooling could be excellent with proper firmware.
• Keyboard - mediocre, but i got used to it (key travel, key positioning). I don't use back light, keys are visible even in low light. Keyboard cable is prone to a contact flaw (battery presses on ribbon and might lead to some keys not working in isolated cases). Engineering dep. screwed this up in my opinion.
• Trackpad - hardware buttons are stiff, I don't use them. Good news is driver supports even right click via two finger tapping. Some user complained their trackpads were not sited properly. Possible QC problem.
• Battery - if you're coming from Dell's professional line, you should note there is no way of turning off battery charging. This will have significant impact on battery life. So far battery seems ok.
• HDD Caddy should not be a concern, most of them seem to fit. (those who do not probably don't have standard length)

My advice is to take a look at Dell Precision M3800 / XPS 15 (2013). A new budget Precision 2800 has also been announced.

What N550JV still has going for it is the price. If you buy it and get a good unit, you just saved yourself ~1000$.

 

Yeah, I am sure you noticed by my username and signature that you and I do the exact same kind of work, so the punch in the gut you just gave me really hurts, lol. It is a good punch in the gut though (if there is such a thing) because you saved me from pulling the trigger on something that may not have worked for what I wanted to do with it. My biggest problem is trying to find something that balances all of my needs without major issues. I had looked at the m3800, but that laptop has heat issues as well as another major issue where it constantly emits a static/high pitched noise whenever the laptop is plugged in/charging, and apparently Dell has no clue how to fix it. Multiple people here on this forum have reported it and many of them have returned the laptop due to that problem. I would love to go the XPS route, but it has a major issue with heat as well, as some reviews have said that the keyboard measured upwards of 120+ degrees Fahrenheit when the laptop started working fairly hard. Heat is the number one thing that kills computer parts, so I do not want to mess with anything that has inadequate cooling.

At this point I am not sure what to do next. I had been looking at the Lenovo IdeaPad Y510p, as they are a good brand with solid laptops, but one of the issues with that laptop is the freakin' red keyboard keys. It makes me mad when manufacturers try to get cute and do stuff like that because there are people like me who find that kind of thing extremely distracting, and it's not something that is user replaceable. Why not just make the keys all black like pretty much every other laptop they make? The other problem with Lenovo is that every other laptop they make has a glossy screen and doesn't have 1920 x 1080 resolution, and that is a deal-breaker for me as well.

Again, I appreciate your help. If you or anyone else has any other suggestions or input on this I am more then open to them. The search continues...

 

Hi guys,

I was just wondering if my battery wear level sounds normal..
Out of the box (1 month and a week ago) I believe it started close to 4%.

At this moment HWinfo puts it at 5.8% wear.

I always have the battery on ac power, I did one near (3%) empty to full charge to calibrate just recently.

5.8% feels relatively much to me, but I not an expert on this, so maybe this is normal for a month old N550?

Thanks

 

its my question too
hwmonitor shows 7% wear level for me just after about a month and i think its not normall

 

My laptop is a week old and it shows 6% wear with a 600 cycle count.

 

My unit is 7 months old and battery wear is at 9%. When I bought it i think it was 3-4%.

I would strongly recommend not to let the battery fully discharge unless you really need to work until the last minute. It may help to calibrate but it also ages the battery.

 

Thanks for all your responses!
It does make clear some of you do somewhat worse and some do relatively better, but because of these differences, I still wonder what's considered 'normal'.
Maybe someone can give some expert insight, so we all know if our wear level is acceptable in relation to it's 'age' (which is handy to know concerning the limited warranty on batteries).

@Coercitiv: I have discharged it once, after a month, and not to 0% indeed, but to 4%. Asus advised me to monthly discharge, in response to my question what's the best way to treat their built-in battery, when I just bought the notebook.
They informed me that having it plugged in all the time is no problem, but a once a month calibration is advised.
As you mention, fully discharging might help to get it accurate, but ages it aswell. After I've read How to Prolong Lithium-based Batteries - Battery University and Battery Calibration – Battery University I'm planning to certainly not do it more then once in three months (probably even less) and to not under 10% discharge.

 

My current battery level is at 15% with just 2 months of usage. Is that high? I use the laptop alot daily (16-18 hrs) and sometime when I plug it in I forget to remove the plug once its 100% charged.

I was wondering if I need to do change my battery in the future where can I get one. I had searched it on google but with no proper result. Does anyone has any info regarding this?

 

AIDA64 ( AIDA64 | PC Benchmark | System Diagnostics | Stability Test .) can inspect the battery to determine its wear level under power management.
For a brand new battery the wear level should not exceed 5%.

 

Yes i used AIDA64 for checking the battery wear level and it shows me 14%. Should I sent the laptop back to the supplier to get it checked or changed? What will you suggest?

 

Keep in mind software is only guessing battery wear: it may be right or it may report higher than actual wear.

You could wait 3-4 more months:

• if your battery is bad it will continue to deteriorate rapidly and you'll easily make a warranty case out of it.
• if it's just a calibration problem it will correct itself in time, and more importantly battery wear will stay within normal patterns.

 

You can do a full cycle charge and discharge, then observe the wear level again.
If it's still at 14% then it's likely a battery issue.

 

Does anyone have a link to a tutorial on how to move windows to a SSD on the N550JV?

Im thinking about adding a caddy/SSD to replace the optical drive (which i havnt used a single time since i got it).

Just want to see how much work it would be and sadly my searches on the forum didnt find me anything.

Thanks.

 

Personally, I'm not too worried about my battery wear percentage. It fluctuates and actually went down today... I get about 5 hours of battery life, so I'm more concerned with that.

 

here is the software I used which is good and free:

EaseUS Partition Master Free Edition - Free download and software reviews - CNET Download.com


and below is a good detailed guide on how to do the whole process using this software.

How to Migrate to a Solid-State Drive Without Reinstalling Windows

I did a full disk clone using EaseUS. Remember to initialize your SSD drive in Windows Disk Management first else it won't show up in EaseUS.

If you are using the laptop to do the process (as I did) you might want to consider one of these for about a £5 (they allow you to plug your SSD into usb, handy to transfer the data across from one hard drive to the other if your laptop doesn’t have space for 2 hard drives)

USB 2.0 to SATA Serial ATA 22P Adapter Cable For 2.5" HDD SSD Laptop Hard Drive | eBay

 

Though i agree with most coercetiv comments, i do find this laptop is good for its pricing and graphics function.

I have had this for almost a year to date. I had actually got a return package from Amazon ready to ship its back and get refund due to keyboard and win 8.1 upgrading issue.

However I'm glad i tried what was suggested here for the fix and kept it for my photography needs:lr5 photoshop and programming.

1. Screen: fortunate few without issue. After calibrate with Microsoft tool I'm happy with its color matching on my camera.
2. Battery life after one year still holding charge well as give me 4 _ 5 hours plus depends on my usages. Disclaimer; i have ssd and 7260ac since day one.
3. Temperature is acceptable even after running over 6 hours and editing 400 pictures in one shot. I found its better if i switching on high performance mode when doing task such as this. Thus increasing in temperature.
4. I only got throttle while tested a game for my kids but if switched to high performance and reduced the setting to medium then it played fine. I'm not a gamer so it's not an issue.

I could have gotten a mac (not in my book without upgrade and crazy cost) or the xps 15 (have a post somewhere here), but this saving allow me to get more lenses for my photography addiction.

At the end each brand will have its own short coming (read xps15 forum to find theirs). I have enough issue with dell , hp (heat, battery life,durability) vs lenovo (reliable at high cost,slow to refresh Gen4 intel).

You may have not find the perfect laptop cause everyone to theirs own 'luck'. You can try yours and may find one that work within your set criterias regardless brand. You may have know its shortcomings, test out right away in first few weeks in case something wrong or just go with a MAC.

Side notes: i learnt that laptop or computer are now built to last no more than 3 years. Hardware degradation expected and software is just bloated.

Gl

Sent from my SPH-L900 using Tapatalk

 

I have got a problem with my asus, when playin BF4: Cpu starts throttling immediately when the game starts, even if the temperature is below 60c.

I've installed the Notebook Fancontrol, and I run the cooler on full power while gaming. Weirdly, the problem doesn't appear, when running Prime95. The temperatures rise overn 80c, and it still doesn't throttle.

What could help, is the problem in Bf4 or in my computer? Here's a screenshot from the Intel XTU, when running BF4:

 

Would really appreciate people's input on this with the touch pad.

I've had this laptop since about early December. Just started running into problems with the touch pad the other day. Done no updates still running windows 8, due to hearing about a lot of people having problems with the HD 4600 graphics card being messed up in regards to HDMI on windows 8.1, anyways back to the touch pad at first I thought it was just related to it going into sleep mode and the touch pad would stop functioning, but it really is no rhyme or reason- It just randomly stops working totally, or just barely responds at others. I followed asus directions to uninstall the smart gesture driver, and download the latest driver for the laptop. Even after reinstalling still run into the same problems.

Only thing that seems to be consistent is when the touch pad acts up I can flip down the lid and it will start working again.

Any one else have this issue, or possible fixes?

 

HI,

I am the proud owner of an Asus N550LF. I am noticing that after a while of non intense activity, the fan is kicking in at high speeds on this laptop, and then staying at these speeds without dropping. Just now, the Laptop hadnt been touched for over an hour, i fired it up from sleep and the fan kicked in straight away at what sounds to me like a high speed. My Motherboard , CPU and HDD are all showing between 33-35 degrees so nothing overheating there.. probably as a result of the fan being on so high I'm guessing!

My basic spec is as follows:

Operating System
Windows 8.1 Pro with Media Center 64-bit
CPU
Intel Core i7 4500U @ 1.80GHz 35 °C
Haswell ULT 22nm Technology
RAM
8.00GB Dual-Channel DDR3 @ 798MHz (11-11-11-28)
Motherboard
ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC. N550LF (SOCKET 0) 35 °C
Graphics
Generic PnP Monitor (1366x768@60Hz)
Intel HD Graphics Family (ASUStek Computer Inc)
2047MB NVIDIA GeForce GT 745M (ASUStek Computer Inc)
Storage
238GB Samsung SSD 840 PRO Series (SSD) 32 °C
Optical Drives
MATA BD-CMB UJ172 S
Audio
Realtek High Definition Audio

Yes I have upgraded the HDD to a SSD but i also noticed the excessive fan behaviour before the upgrade. Is it normal for the fan to kick in at high speeds on this model even on low intensity useage (web surfing) or are there more moderate settings available? Are there any fan control setting available to try, I have heard of Q-Fan and Cool and Quiet but can't access these anywhere.

Cheers for any assistance guys... I'm worried I might have to send this model back and start over again, something I am not looking forward to!

 

@ carnaige


Cheers, I trust you would have mentioned if you had any issues (I dont think your fan issue is caused by the SSD either)? Guess ill attempt this as soon as i find some free time to fiddle with it.

Thanks

 

You're being throttled due to high GPU temp: as soon as GPU reaches a certain temperature, CPU clock will be dropped in an effort to give more thermal headroom for the GPU.

The only fix I know fot this is to disable this throttling using either Throttlestop or a small piece of software made by a forum member on this thread, Morv (check his sig).

You won't see the same problem when stressing the CPU only because in that case the firmware is correctly configured. (CPU is allowed to go up to around 90C i think).

PS: since you're already familiar with Intel XTU, you might also want to undervolt the CPU a bit. Some users managed to get 100mV undervolts, I'm happy with my 80mV rock stable undervolt for months, and I'm quite confident you could set a 50mV dynamic undervolt without even having to test system stability. This should shave a few degrees in load.

 

Most of the users on this thread have the N550JV, which has a different hardware config, so I'm not sure if your system has a dual fan config too... but that is of rather low importance in this case.

What you're experiencing shouldn't happen, not on low or idle loads. I heard a few other users complain about similar behavior long ago, but cases were isolated (1-2).

There is only one software able to control the fans for N550JV - NotebookFanControl. It does so by overriding the firmware commands so it should correct any problems you're having. However, since N550LF and N550JV have somehow different hardware, the configuration file might not be correct, which could lead to problems (in extreme cases even HW failure).

Asus has been using the same registries and algorithms for fan control even on previous Ivy Bridge models, so if I were you I would try NotebookFanControl without much hesitation, but I still feel obligated to notify you of the potential risk.

In case you use it and activate the N550JV profile, don't panic when the fans stop, it's normal behavior and the reason most of us are using it in the first place They should stop and then only ramp up once a certain thermal threshold is reached (55C i think, I got mine configured differently).

 

Thanks a lot, I downloaded the throttletoggle and now I can finally run games on full power!!

My CPU temps are max 80c, that should be fine? And actually I've been running on undervolted cpu, I just took the screenshot when I was testing without. I changed the multipliers to max (36,35,34,34) and undervolted 80mV, it's stable. 100 mV crashed my laptop, but this seems to be working fine!

Another question: I re'installed Win8.1, and now my three-finger touchpad moves aren't working (for example to slide 3-fingers down brings the deskboard on the screen). Is it because I removed some Asus-programs?

And do you recommend to change the theramal pastes to somethin better?

 

You're in the safe zone. If you're not playing with vsync enabled you might want to limit max fps to 59. This will help with thermals. (I believe i used Nvidia Inspector for that, googling should find tutorials)

Asus SmartGesture is what you need for touchpad control. Be sure the gestures you want are activated.

I would but there is a seal on the cooling assembly.

 

Hi, I have 2 questions and need someone give answers

1) Will this laptop run without battery (plug in only)? I saw in notebookcheck.com website and they said the battery can be removed ( not user replaceable though)

2) Is there any software controlling the battery charging level for this laptop?

 

Yes.

You don't have any control over battery charging, if that's what you're asking. Firmware does exhibit some control over battery charging however, it only starts charging after battery drops under 95%, thus limiting battery stress somewhat.

 

Thank coercitiv for your answer. Both issues really are annoying in my head since I ussually use laptop as desktop replacement.

By the way, I just discover that new model in N550 series name N550jk equipped with geforce 850m. The 850m have more power consumption than 750m.(45w compared with 40w) so wiil the new model will get more significant heat?

Thanks in advance

 

I have an ASUS N550JV-CN163D notebook :

1.What modell of battery it's in N550JV notebook ?
2.Where can i find a brand new battery and how much it cost it ?
3.Can i change it ? It's soldering inside of notebook ?
4.Anyone have already change his battery in N550JV?
5.When the battery it's 100% charged, can i let the AC adapter plugged in ? Or i need to disconnect it from notebook ?
How it's better ? It's not recommended to fully discharge the battery ?

6.Right now my laptop it's brand new one .But after a while, how can i check my battery quality ? wear level ?
How to check it how good or bad it's already my battery ?

7.I need sometimes to recalibrate my battery ?

8.What's your advice for a good maintenance of battery ? How to use my laptop to have a long age of battery ?

 

mmp669-All About Gadget: ASUS N550JV Entertainment Laptop Frequently Asked Questions

 

Can't tell. As far as i know there wasn't supposed to be a GTX 850M with DDR3 VRAM, makes me wonder what clock rates they're using or if the presence of DDR3 will limit GPU workload.

Worst case scenario, even with 5W more in power usage I wouldn't worry. It might even run cooler than the 750M for light workloads.

 

1. C41 N550
2. Probably online stores, haven't searched.
3. Can be changed. (rather easy)
4. Probably not.
5. When the battery is at 100%, leave the AC adapter plugged in if you're going to use it. It's worth to keep unit unplugged if daily usage is minimal (1h for example). Never fully discharge the battery unless you need to work until last minute. If you use your laptop only plugged in, once every few weeks do a partial discharge (100% to 40%), once every few months discharge to about 15-20%. If you're going to leave the laptop unused for more than a few days then it would help to shut it off with the battery at 60-80% and unplug the charger.
6. There is a software check but it's not that reliable.
7. Short answer is NO. Longer answer is you're already calibrating by doing what I wrote at point 5 or simply by using the laptop off the charger.
8. Use you laptop as you normally would. Avoid keeping the laptop in extreme heat (over 30C). Read answer 5.

 

So , when it's 100% charged , i must to unplug the AC adapter !

I ask this because when i'm at home, i can use it every time plugged with AC adapter, but i wish to know, how it's better to use :

a) with AC adapter always plugged in ( when it's possible and i'm close to AC source )

b) when it's 100% charged, i need to disconnect the AC adapter for have a long life of battery .


ASUS C41-N550 Built-in Battery
http://www.welcome-to-buy.com/asus-c41-n550-battery.html
Voltage: 15V


ASUS C41-N550 computer batteries
http://www.battery-store.eu/batteries.php/asus-c41-n550/100109/1003152/167635
Battery Voltage: 11.1V


Replacement New 53WhmAh 7.5V Asus C41-N550 Laptop Battery
http://www.batterywood.com/laptop-battery/asus-c41-n550.htm
Voltage : 7.5V



Replacement Laptop Battery For Asus C41-N550 53WhmAh 7.5V 4-Cell Black
http://www.laptopbatteryinc.ca/asus-c41-n550.html
Voltage: 7.5V



ASUS C41-N550 Battery
http://www.replacement-laptop-battery.info/netherlands-battery-asus-3687.html
Battery Voltage: 14.8V


Question : why it's so different Voltage value for all of this C41-N550 Batterys ? Which of them it's good and which of them isn't good ?
Which of them it's original and which after market ?
Why it's so big difference about their price also ?
Because it's too big price difference between this C41-N550 Batterys .


Pwr+® Car Charger for Asus Adp-120zb Bb Laptop 19v 6.32a 120w Adp120zb Adapter
http://www.ebay.com/itm/260880462997

http://www.ebay.com/itm/370629588880

What do you say about this car charger for ASUS N550JV notebook ?

Do you can advice me other car charger which it's better than this 2 models from ebay ?
I know , it's after market car charger , "Made of China" .
But it's safe to use this kind of car chargers ?

 

According to the notebookcheck, 850m is ddr5 only.

This refresh should give this notebook significat boost in graphic performance. Since the clocks are already set to 1150 Mhz on the core as "stock", I think the temperature of stock 860 Mhz speed of gt 850m ( even bumped to 1000 ) will be inline with gt750m despite higher Power consumption.

Looking forward for someone topost benches soon

 

Hello everyone!

I have been using this wonderful Asus N550JV, the touchscreen model, and I simply enjoy every single minute of it. However, I have one little problem that I hope to sort out with your help;

You know that this touchscreen model comes with a glossy screen where the glass surface covers everything including the bezel. In a bright room, it gets hard for me to see what's on the screen through my reflection! So I thought applying a matte screen protector would solve the problem. However, I could not find a certain product online which covers all the glass panel including the bezels. I do not want to apply a screen protector which only covers the 15.6" screen because it would not look nice, Does anyone know a certain brand which can cover all the screen and the bezel? Any eBay.co.uk or Amazon.co.uk links that you can post here is welcome. IF there is none, can you recommend me a normal nice matte screen protector, again I will appreciate any links.

 

Anyone here with W7 installed getting really high cpu temps?
I've noticed that even if im just on chrome and an IRC client running, my CPU goes into the 50-60C range. Not sure if my fans are even going on past quiet. Any clue for why this is happening? From what I searched through this thread, theres no fan speed option, correct?

Just to show, this is what is being shown through 2 different temperature checks.
Fanspeed: http://puu.sh/7DVuM.png
CPUID HWMonitor: http://puu.sh/7DVvp.png

 

anyone know of any reputable retailers (not third party amazon sellers) where the N550JV can be purchased from here in the uk? seems very hard to track down. is a pending refresh causing the lack of stocks?

 

Anyone here having problems with the speakers?
First, I have to turn the volume up to a significant level before the speakers get activated - the external sub start playing right from the lowest levels. Also when speakers has been "activated" it's like they never turn off. Even if I mute in Windows I'm hearing speaker noise. A hissing sound like white noise. I have to restart the laptop to get it away ..

 

I can't belive i brought this piece of junk. This thing constantly has win 8 software issues which took me a few days to solve just the critical ones, the win 8 is still junk, a constant headache and pain to use. Win 8.1 update completely killed restore partition of the manufacturer.

Mine came with a sticking esc key, haven't noticed in the first few days and as a result can't swipe it in the store and have to send it to asus for repair for god only knows how long.

The only version the store had was touch, so i brought that... well i can't see anything the glare is just brutal, and i don't need no useless touch screen on a windows pc. What a waste of money, i wish i can sell it to someone quick.

 

Hi, the only issues I had were that I did a partition clone rather than a disk clone initially, and this did not work. It worked fine with the full disk clone though and no I don't think the fan issue is connected, as I'm pretty sure the fan issue occurred prior to the upgrade..

 

Hi and many thanks for your response, I appreciate it

This is such a strange one, The laptop will go for hours without this happening then all of a sudden the fan will just seem to pick up out of nowhere and then won't drop again! Having said that, I tried NotebookFanControl and it didn't seem to do anything to the fan when it was running loud (last experienced on Friday under low/idle modes). The laptop has been on and off (in sleep mode) for about the last 18 hours and there has been no fan speed pick up with a fewf apps running. It does seem to happen more if its is off the desk (e.g. on our laps in the lounge), which you might expect given the change in surface. What I would then expect is for the fan to slow down again, but this is what hasn't been happening, unless I shut down and start over.

The fact things seem ok at the moment suggest that NotebookFanControl set to 25% could actually be working, but I have no way of knowing for sure. Can you recommend any good fan monitoring software that shows/monitors the fans actually speeds? I have Speccy & CPUID but these only show temperatures, and not fan speeds....

If the problem comes back/persists then I am going to send a message to Asus to see what they suggest. I notice there are BIOS updates on the ASUS site with mentions of stuck fans in the fixes list, but I'm a little weary of going down that route at the moment...

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Looking at my system info, it looks like my BIOS version is 209: American Megatrends Inc N550LF.209 02/09/2013 - however, the same fan fix is listed against 209 on the Asus website:

I guess it wouldn't hurt to update the BIOS, as long as I don't brick the laptop!! How easy is a BIOS upgrade, would i lose all apps etc?

The final thing I am considering is replacing the upgraded Hard Drive (Samsung Pro SSD) with the original HDD to see if the issue persists, but I'm pretty sure the fan issue existed prior to the upgrade. Guess I need to keep monitororing things under certain conditions and go from there....

 

Hi everyone, I have just bought the N550JK. It costs 999 Euro.

The Geforce 850M is DDR3 not GDDR5 based on GPUZ (I was so little sad).
When idle, the laptop is quite cool, but when I play some games (Dota 2, Starcraft 2, Shogun 2) with max setting, temperature can reach more than 54 celsius degree (base on Game Booster 3.4 and room temp is 19). Due to some unknow issues, it cannot run speedfan (crash into blue screen).

Anyway, I have a questions: How can I install a clean Windows 8.1, there is no license key come with the laptop, seller told I can recover laptop using recovery partition, but I prefer a clean install?

 

So we have confirmation for the 850M and DDR3 combo. Could you please tell us what clocks the 850M has under load?

As for the clean Windows 8.1 install, I'm afraid you're out of luck. Unless things have changed, and I doubt they did, your only options are reset to "factory settings" or reinstall using recovery partition/disk. Your OEM serial key cannot be used with generic Windows kits.

The best approach when buying a new laptop nowadays is to buy a "Free DOS" version and purchase an Windows OEM license separately. This allows you all the flexibility you need when installing, and the new OEM licenses can also be moved from one system to another you own.