*Official UL30VT-X1 Owners Lounge*

Just wanted to add that I tried HDMI out to two samsung TV's. One set worked easily, but the second set had the issues repeated here earlier that sound wasn't coming over HDMI. After a reboot and disconnecting/reconnecting the HDMI cable, it seems to work fine now. The last poster said that this problem fixes itself, so it's kind of strange.

 

That is indeed strange about your HDMI situation, it sort of "cures itself" doesn't it? Well fear not because I have also tested my brand spanking new UL30Vt-X1 and I'll be danged if I don't have the same, exact deal and situation going down.

I hook up the HDMI to my Samsung LCD HDTV in my studio, and BAM! One minute the audio isn't working, then a reboot "fixes" the problem instantly, just like with your notebook.

I think these things have an evil HDMI situation going on, it's almost like it has taken up a personality or something...seriously though, this is most likely a driver issue, but God knows when Asus would 'fix' this, seeing how the video driver will most likely never, ever be updated since the nVidia GeForce 210M video board is out of production, and not supported by nVidia for the longest time...so drivers for certain parts of this nice, beautiful little laptop apparently will never happen.

On a separate note, I did go ahead and *swap* the Seagate 5400RPM HD out for a little faster (28% faster by HD Tune Pro's measurements) WD Scorpio Black 16MB Cache 7200RPM HD, and that situation is equally screwy...to wit, my standard tester for HD's is HD Tune Pro 3.50, something I paid dearly for a couple years ago and I use it all the time to check on the health of my HDs...anyway, to make it short and to the point, check out the attachments I enclosed with this post... crazy stuff!

The first three tests were like the first attachment, where there were HUGE spikes in the HD Read Test, some down as low as below 10MB/sec, with that test showing no less than 10 major anomalies, or spikes, which you just do not want to see in a HD...it means trouble!

I figure what the Hey!, it's still under the 30-day window of exchange where I bought it, so I'll RMA it and get a new Hitachi 7200RPM 500GB HD instead. I order the Hitachi a few minutes later, then just for the Heck of it I retest the WD Scorpio Black...and BAM! Check out the last 3 tests...one after another...right, they are all perfect tests for a 2.5" Could not ask for a better couple of tests!

So I'll monitor the situation tomorrow, and test it ad finitum over and over again in fact, throughout the day tomorrow as I use the UL30Vt-X1 for this or that, and see how it goes, and I'll make my decision about the new Hitachi HD by Monday, when amazon.com gets their stock in and will ship on Tuesday, they tell me. If the WD Scorpio Black continues to test 100% I'll cancel the Hitachi order.

That is weird, huh? It's like the HD doesn't want to go...wants to stay in the UL30Vt-X1 forever I guess...

Another strange deal is this...When I Cloned the Seagate to the WD Scorpio Black with Partition Manager Personal 10.x, my usual tool for doing such things (dozens of Cloning operations in the past 2 years that I've used it), all went well, although it took all night copying the FAT32 section of the HD, some 6 hours to copy 12.9GB.

Somehow in the Cloning operating I *LOST* my nVidia drivers, and control panel for the video card, and I mean they were just MIA, (missing in action) gone gone gone. "Weird" to me...never saw that happen before in a Cloning operation, losing a key driver like that. I got out the OEM Factory drivers DVD-ROM, found the Display Driver (it's under 'Software, NOT drivers' if and when you never need to find it), and reinstalled it-- there was nothing in there to install over, the HD wsa devoid of the nVidia CP or drivers, so it installed perfect...and works perfect now.

Everest Ultimate gave me the clue about that, as Everest couldn't find the display card at all, no card, no driver...so then I checked the Device Manager, and sure enough nothing there either. Thus the reinstall of the OEM 186.66.11 drivers, the only drivers that we'll ever have for this video board I guess.

Restarted the computer, did a Registry tweak to make sure that all was well there, Glary Registry Cleaner and Registry Mechanic fixed some 385 errors in the Registry, a BUNCH...and BAM! All is back to normal, all well on the Western Front with this new HD, and the UL30Vt-X1.

That's my big contribution to the night posts, late as it is, but I didn't want to go to bed and forget any of the lurid details for readers, for what it's worth...just in case somebody else runs into the same thing...well, there you go,..just reinstall the OEM Factory video board drivers and all will be well again.

I still am loving this new computer, although there's a couple things that just aren't right about it, so that will be posted about later today, and hopefully somebody will have some choice words of wisdom about the issues...but overall it's greatl! I am so glad that I sprung for this one, it's the cat's meow!

rexrzer727

 

Has anyone ordered a vt-a1 from excalibar pc? Their web page shows 7 instock.

 

I got a new UL30VT yesterday and I am really happy with this except one thing, the very noisy sound coming from the harddisk.

The harddisk is Seagate ST9500325AS, and it is very noisy. "clik clik chi chi" sound keep on coming out from the harddisk, and it becomes very significant when i am in a quiet place. I heard from others that similar situation happened on their machines as well.
I know one solution is to change my WD Scorpio Blue 320G into it. But I wonder how can I copy the hidden partition for one click backup stuff.

Another thing I wanna know is what is the difference between UL30VT-A1 and UL30VT-X1 (I am not quite sure I am remembering it right. In another words, the difference between black and silver one.)

Thanks guy!

 

X1 = Black, 1 year warranty, lower capacity battery, intel wireless card
A1 = Silver, 2 year warranty, higher capacity battery, atheros wireless card

 

which wireless card is better, intel or atheros

 

From what i've read on this forum (every single post/thread about the UL30/50/80 ), the intel card performs better. You can find the intel cards in the black UL laptops.

I hope the UL30JT (silver) comes with an intel card! *crosses fingers*

 

my wifes ul50vt has the intel wifi 1000 card and I get 5 bars everywhere in the house, when my ul30vt-a1 gets to me I will post my findings.

 

Got a upgrade CPU for another laptop from ExcaliberPC a few months ago, they were prompt and courteous; I'd buy there again happily.

 

I'm not sure we really know. The Intel card seems to have a slight edge in sensitivity, but if you read about the Atheros it sounds as if it might be slightly more future proof.

Six of one, half dozen of the other?

 

I wanna have my youtube HD decode on both gpu's. I have installed the Flash Player 10.1 Beta 2, but the HD decode seems not working as CPU usage is still very high.

Is the driver too old? Where can I get the update one?

 

I think the issue with HDMI may be connection/cabling. If the physical connection is less than perfect I've had "failure to launch" sound before. Sometimes just futzing (that's the technical term) with the cable is enough to get sound working, sometimes a reboot does the trick. I think without a firm & definite handshake with the audio on the TV the computer doesn't know to output sound there... it's my working theory, anyway.

As for your HD tests, could there have been any background processes still running? Like Windows Indexing or Update or anything else that might have required some of the disk's (or CPU's) resources the first time? Sorta what it sounds like to me...

 

HDMI is a pretty robust connection. There's no phyiscal connector reason for there to be video but no audio. Also, once I got it working the first time, I have since disconnected/reconnected HDMI many times and have had no problems. I definitely chalk this one up to weird drivers or software on the Asus side.
On a similar note, is there any way to turn off HDMI out without disconnecting the cable?

 

Somebody mentioned that Atheros wireless card is more "future proof"?

What does that mean? I am about to order this lappie and I am deciding between these two wireless cards. I read about a lot of problems with the Atheros one so I wanted to get Intel Wireless.. So which one?

 

"The harddisk is Seagate ST9500325AS, and it is very noisy. "clik clik chi chi" sound keep on coming out from the harddisk, and it becomes very significant when i am in a quiet place. I heard from others that similar situation happened on their machines as well.
I know one solution is to change my WD Scorpio Blue 320G into it. But I wonder how can I copy the hidden partition for one click backup stuff."--earlier in this thread someone wrote.

This is not a good thing, but monitor the situation and see if the HD straightens itself out (they rarely do), and the sound improves or vanishes. The problem with having a bad HD in a new notebook is twofold: 1) the HD is *not* covered under warranty by Seagate since it's an OEM HD 2) in order to *fix* the situation the notebook either has to be returned to Asus for replacement or the original vendor/seller for exchange (the preferred way to go).

This sort of problem is often not addressed under warranty unless the HD fails, and making funny noises like that HD is doing is a prelude to failing, but not failing per se...Catch-22! I'd recommend returning the notebook immediately under some other premise to the seller, at this point, to facilitate ending the problem. If you tell them "The HD is noisy", they may not consider that a problem if it's not failed, so I'd tell the seller that the notebook "Freezes during video encoding and BlueScreens", or "Won't load programs through USB port", something like those situations, where the seller is more likely to just quickly exchange the notebook to make you happy, rather than perform some exhaustive checkout of what the problem really is.

Either way it's best to end the issue if it bothers you a lot, like right now rather than wait around until your window of exchange with your seller expires. I wish I had better news, but I don't. If anyone else has ideas about this sort of deal by all means speak up, because it is difficult and maybe there's another way to fix this without returning the notebook.

As for the second question, about Cloning the HD and all its partitions (which is what you really are asking about) so that you don't lose F9 functionality, I highly recommend Paragon software's Partition Manager Personal 10.x, or similar utility, but I only have had experience with Paragon's software so YMMV with others. Using the "Copy Disk" feature therein the utility goes into Boot Time and literally copies the entire hard disk, line by line, sector by sector proportionately and converts everything on the OEM HD to the new HD. Of course you use a USB 2.0 enclosure with the new HD inside of it to do this trick or treat. It is very effective, has never failed to work in dozens of Cloning operations for my uses, including working RAID HD systems(SATA and eSATA) and remote HD systems, so it's a very robust product and will do what it says it will do.

If other readers have had experience with utilities that do the same thing I'd love to hear about it, but that is my recommendation specific to the Paragon software. They are an old company, with a proven track record of this sort of thing, with xlnt software and hardware resources and Tech Support should you need any with their products, and they get my unqualified seal of approval for notebook and desktop use. Each laptop that I own has gone through a similar procedure as they all have upgraded HD's, and the Paragon software was used every time to Clone the OEM HD to the new HD.

I hope this information helps the poster and anybody else with this sort of issue, as I am a believer in Paragon software. As for the Seagate HD issue itself I'd try and make a decision asap and get the problem handled, the sooner the better.

 

"As for your HD tests, could there have been any background processes still running? Like Windows Indexing or Update or anything else that might have required some of the disk's (or CPU's) resources the first time? Sorta what it sounds like to me..."--tallan wrote.

I would like to explain the issue away that easily, but I cannot. I had nothing going on with the notebook during each and every test, ie all windows were closed, programs off but for HD Tune Pro 3.50, so it's an unexplained set of bad tests at this point...there were 3 just like the first test, with huge spikes in the performance curve, not just that one, I just didn't feel it necessary to post all 3 of the tests last night.

So far today I have given the HD a run twice and it's come through 100% aok fine, in similar testing, so at this point I am keeping the WD Scorpio Black in the notebook, as it does speed up things a bit like you said it would, and as I hoped it would. These are fantastic HD's and also have Enterprise status, with a 5-year warranty. I hope things continue to be fine with this HD as it's not noisy or prone to vibration, it's silent and fast and does what I have asked it to so far.

I have another question but will address it after I reboot this silly thing!

 

Tallan, and anyone else with knowledge or interest in this sort of thing, please see if you can answer this complex bit of questions...

1) My software CP's are screwing up, and I cannot figure out what is causing it

2) The nVidia CP vanished again, and had to be reinstalled today once, and I'm hoping this 'cures' the issue but don't have much hope

With respect to No.1, I cannot do these things except manually by going into the Start Menu, selecting the appropriate Asus Utility, then restarting the computer to get the desired result. The keyboard prompts are not working at all for these things:

A) Power4Gear Hybrid Modes--+the Graphics Boost button doesn't function
B) Fn then F8 does not turn off the trackpad
C) Fn then Space Bar rarely works to select one of the 4 Energy Settings
D) Turbo Mode specifically in the selections for Power4Gear Hybrid requires a restart to function, ie it has to be selected manually in the CP then restart

I am reluctant to just reinstall everything because of a couple considerations...one is I don't want Trend Micro or Acrobat Reader to reinstall, and there are other things also I don't want reinstalled- too many to mention.
The Driver DVD ROM does not function discriminately but for the nVidia Display driver, THAT I can reinstall but the other functions do not, at least I have not figured out *how* to do such a thing.

Should I try to discriminately resinstall things in Safe Boot Mode? I have been working on my PowerMac G5 making AppleTV movies most of the day, so I spaced out on the combination to initiate Safe Boot, so could use that tip also if it is appropriate to fix this in Safe Mode...

This is not a happy post, because all of those keystrokes were what makes this notebook fun to use! Now they just don't function...

Any ideas, thanking you in advance?

 

Im not sure what Atheros card the A1 has, but i bought 2 ul30 on decemeber for gifts and the intel seems to get better reception than the antheros,



Not sure if the VT-A1 has the same card as the X5, but i would probably go for the intel if i were buying again a ul30. I might even upgrade the x5 to intel1000 its only like $15 , but im not sure yet, as i haven't seen any disconnects or connectivity issues with atheros, just worst reception.

 

Rexrzer, I have found the ASUS software to be very fussy regarding version and even load order, which is one reason I don't recommend "nuking" the HD and reinstalling everything from scratch. For example on my G51J I mistakenly deleted the ASUS Splendid Utility, and after reloading while it works it is no longer persistent; my color selection now has to be made every time I reboot. I spent most of an evening trying to track this down but gave up after six or more hours of trying different versions of the software: I'm assuming I messed up the load order and I have some B loading before an A which is not the way it came from the factory.

As for the hard disk I've found it virtually impossible to find, much less shut down, all the automated processes from various MS indexing schemes to applications "phoning home" at intervals. If you haven't seen those spikes again I'd still think it had something to do with a background process that grabbed the CPU's or HD's attention briefly that first run. Your mileage may certainly vary.

Back to the ASUS programs, the only way I know to reliably get everything running "factory fresh" is to use the Recovery Partition to set everything back to the way it shipped from ASUS. Others may have better options, but this is the only one I've found that works for certain.

 

You know that I clean installed Win HPremium 64-bit on my 1201N and had a great machine, devoid of all the Asus crapola much to my surprise, so that was an experience that I should draw from re this computer's behavior. I think there's just *too much* Asus software on this one, just like the other one, and I will seriously think about doing a fresh install of Win 7 HPremium 64-bit once I get the Hitachi 7200RPM HD.

I see no reason to have to put up with this stuff, and also see no reason why the CP's and the Key Commands shouldn't work right 100% of the time, because I got them to work 100% of the time on the 1201N with a fresh install, and all new 64-bit drivers but for Bluetooth...everything else I got fresh, if not with research by the good graces of Driver Magician.

Well, about this one, I got my Graphics Boost Key back in order, and I don't quite know *how I did it*, but it's working, albeit with the 500GB Seagate in place now...I am sending the WD Scorpio Black back to Amazon.com tomorrow, simply decided not to take a chance with it. I'll install a fresh, retail boxed Hitachi 7200RPM HD and go with it. I just have a bad feeling about that WD Scorpio Black, don't ask me why but I do.

I think this computer deserves a nice, fresh retail Hitachi HD because it's very, very good! Me gusta mucho! Especially when everything is working right...so I'll use the Seagate until the Hitachi gets here, then do the fresh install on it, saving the factory HD for a last resort, in case I can't get the new install 100% aok fine. However here's no reason to think I can't do just that...I've been successful there before, and these are after all only machines...they aren't alive and kicking. We make them what we want, and don't necessarily have to go Asus-Line all the way. I'm going to give it my best shot, and do that straight away when the Hitachi gets here.

Worst thing I can see happening with that effort is that I have to nuke the fresh install in favor of the factory install on the Seagate, which will be there ready and waiting for a Clone job to the Hitachi by Paragon's utility, Partition Manager Personal 10.x. If I can't get all these buttons, bells and whistles working 100% on a fresh install that will work as a last resort, and *only* as a last resort. I have faith that I can pull it off aok fine.

One thing that does bug me about this one though is the trackpad Off/ON situation. I turn it off, and nothing happens, even though it's indicated that it's off in the GUI! Trackpad with a line drawn through it comes up ok, but the trackpad still responds to motion, and can be used...so go figure! That seems to be a non-functional utility right there.

That's a wrap for me tonight, I am done with this one, and will take it up again tomorrow after work. The Hitachi will be here between Wednesday and Friday, who knows? It looks like Amazon.com already has the HD's in stock (they were out yesterday...today they say my order can't be changed because "we are preparing your shipment"). That's a great HD to have and I am looking forward to it...

 

Yeah noticed the clocks didnt change in cpuz, lame And I cant seem to find a download for the newest P4G either? Supposed to be deep inside @ Asus website but just cant seem to find any, because its supposed to able to switch between turbo and non turbo without rebooting right? Would be enough for me I guess..

Thanks for the clarification though!

 

The driver available at the Asus download page or on the Asus driver DVD is too old, and with Asus officially supporting Nvidia Optimus technology in their latest models, it looks like there won't be any updates to the hybrid graphics driver for the ULxxVT models. On the other hand, the CPU has more than enough muscle to handle Flash HD decode as long as you don't do any other CPU-intensive work at the same time.

The latest P4G Hybrid can switch between turbo and non-turbo by doing a suspend instead of a reboot which is faster. However, it also has a bug which resets the graphics settings of all the power modes to all integrated or all discrete after a reboot, so changing power modes will no longer switch graphics automatically. If you want to give the latest version a try, it's available at http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?model=P4GHybrid&os=30&SLanguage=en-us

 

Good luck, and let us know how you make out & what you learn.

 

Woha, thats definately still not optimal then Hopefully it'll get fixed in the comming versions?
Ill give it a shot though, thanks!

 

I'm looking for a DC car power adapter for my UL30VT-A1. Anyone know of a good one for the UL30VT-A1 and where to buy it? I've tried Google, but I'm not sure what would work.

I had both a Targus AC and DC power adapter for my F8Sv, but they were expensive and didn't last long.

I purchased a DC to AC power Inverter, but I'd like a simple car DC power adapter, so I don't heed to drag the inverter around. Do the power Inverters work well? I haven't tried it.

Thanks

 

Guys im sick of waiting for this laptop to come in stock. Where is everyone buying theres from? UL30VT-A1 that is...Gentec says ETA for stock is in a week and cant gurantee... arghhhh

 

I have an A1 in transit via excaliburpc and understand that it has an atheros wireless NIC. I have always been underwhelmed by atheros as opposed to broadcomm based hardware. I am thinking about splurging the $18 and getting myself the intel wifi link 1000. Which form factor fits the ul30vt-a1, full size or the half size mini pci express. Thanks in advance...

Also, is the SSD worth the ~$450 for a 128 intel unit... are the noise and performance ratios substantial or just luxury.

Thanks again

 

I haven't taken apart my UL30 to check out the WiFi adapter, but I'd bet it's full-sized mini PCI-Express, with two antennas. Reception is stellar with the Intel 1000 WiFi it goes without saying. I get 5 bars everywhere in my home and studio, even 150-feet away from the N router. If you change cards, you'll also have to install a 2nd antenna from what I have read about doing that...the A1 comes with a single antenna not two (2).

As SSD's go, there are those that wouldn't have anything else, but the cost is prohibitive to me. I have a friend in Australia with a new 17" MacBook Pro and he's had nothing but trouble with SSD's--3 new 256GB SSD's and they've all failed within a couple days, or DOA even worse. So YMMV...for an $800 notebook I feel that a fast 7200 RPM HD is plenty good enough.

There's no noise to speak of from the OEM Seagate for that matter, it seems to be a good HD also. I just prefer something a little faster with 16MB Cache instead of 8GB, but there's nothing wrong with the 500GB Seagate. Try your new notebook stock for a week or two and see how you like it is my recommendation, conservative as it is!

 

From what I have been able to glean from a bunch of research... is that not all vt-a1 shipped with a single antenna (which is mind-boggling). Also, there is a possibility with the delayed shipment of re-stock, they may have swapped out the atheros for the intels... I only surmise this because, on the asus site... the only wireless drivers available for the vt are the intel 1000 and 5100 drivers. The atheros drivers are for the ethernet port.

I have been tussling with the SSD thoughts for a while.... I can get a intel 80gb for a smidge over 200.... which is a solid deal. Will wait and see... I would like to see what kind of wireless performance I get out of the box before I make any mods.... (which 7200 rpm mobile platform do you use... I am prefer WD... just not a seagate fan)

 

The UL30VT uses the half-height minipci-e card. There isn't enough room for a full sized card. The X1 uses Intel 1000, but the A1 uses Atheros card.

 

I think there may have been a refresh on the a1... given the delays and short-stocking, but that is purely speculation.

 

There you go...I stand corrected! A full sized card could not possibly fit where the network WiFi card is placed. I opened up the bottom on my notebook where the RAM access port is, and sure enough there's the WiFi card, 1/2-height as it is right there, with 2 antennas.

As for the A1 coming with the Intel WiFi...it's very doubtful, although you can hope a bunch! Chances are slim to none that Asus would chance the configuration of the A1 at the end of the model run.

You asked what HD's I favor, and there are two: Hitachi or Western Digital are my favored choices. I have one Samsung 500GB notebook HD because at the time nobody made one but Samsung, since then a lot has changed though...everybody makes a 500GB 2.5" SATA-II HD now. I actually just removed a WD Scorpio Black 320GB HD from this machine because it was giving me strange vibes, and some performance tests I did on it were quite bad, showing huge spikes in the performance curve (see previous post on that, with graphics)...that's a 1st bad or potentially bad WD drive in a long, long time.

So I ordered the newest Hitachi 500GB 7200RPM 16MB Cache SATA-II 2.5" HD from Amazon.com, a retail box, which shipped today, so I am looking forward to installing that on Wednesday/Thursday. I *may* clean install a fresh 64-bit OS on that HD, to try and eliminate *some* of the Asus bloatware and streamline the OS a bit, haven't decided one way or the other yet. If I don't I'll Clone the OEM HD to the new HD with Paragon's Partition Manager 10.x "Copy Disk" feature and live with the crapolaware.

I am having a persistent issue at this time with my Graphics Boost button failing to work, off and on, and cannot figure out why it's doing that. So later tonight I am going to reinstall all the ATK hotkey utilties and see if that can improve the situation. I have no idea what is going on, but sure want to get it handled! Annoying!

There are a ton of drivers/utilities and they all interact with each other to control Energy Saver settings, and the CPU/GPU settings--it seems that they don't play nice with each other at times...or so I am finding out. Nobody has jumped in and offered advice or a fix, other than "Recovery" of the OS with F9, and that's just not acceptable to me right now. There has to be a fix for the issue and one way or another I'm going to figure it out!

Other than the annoying driver/hotkey issues I really *like* my notebook a lot, it's very modern, light, it has a great keyboard and action, important to me because I'm a writer and type at 80-10WPM constantly. Oh, another anomaly, the hotkey to turn off the trackpad doesn't function correctly either! The graphic displays all right, to signal the trackpad being turned off, but the trackpad still continues to work! That is annoyance No.2, since I use a BT mouse most of the time when I'm not on the road working.

So between the graphic boost button failing, and the hotkey for the trackpad not working, there are two little annoyances that I need to get fixed, and quickly, too! Asus *does* provide us with ALL of the utility drivers and software at the support web site, and it's just a matter of figuring out which culprit needs reinstalling, at this point, or so I think...

There's always a price to pay for complex machinery it seems, and if this system can't be made foolproof, then I'll just dispense with it altogether, clean install the OS and all new utilities and drivers, and see if that fixes the situation. If that doesn't make it all work 100%, then I'll have to think about returning this notebook also, and continue my search for the perfect small notebook with something else altogether.

 

SUCCESS! Say Yaaaayyyy!

Without even resorting to the Big Fix of uninstalling then reinstalling all of the ATK and HotKey drivers, I had a wild hare moment and thought to myself, "Hmmm, you haven't updated the BIOS from 0204 to 0208 yet, so why don't you try *that* first thing after reinstalling the nVidia VGA drivers/Power4Gear Hybrid Drivers/CP and see what happens...maybe it will fix things right up."

First I uninstalled the nVidia drivers for the N210-M video card, and also the P4G drivers and Control Panel, restarted, installed the new drivers for both those important items, then I downloaded the newest #0208 BIOS off the Support web site. Asus has a convenient WinFlash utility in the Asus Utility Folder in the Start Menu, so BAM!

I flashed the BIOS, and the machine naturally shut down via WinFlash command. When I restarted the notebook I hit F2 to go into BIOS, selected the "Load Manufacturer Defaults" in BIOS Screen #4, the last one before "Exit", Saved and Exited, and the BIOS fiddled around for about 1-2 minutes loading all the appropriate new stuff and manufacturer Defaults, and BAM! All done, fresh, ready to go.

First thing I noticed was the new P4G CPanel has a HUGE desktop Icon, displaying whether you have Turbo on or Off, which is nice! No more doubts about that, it displays it with the latest version of the utility. Then I pushed the GraphiX Boost Button, and for the 1st time tonight it worked! Yaaaay!

In addition to working now, a dialog box comes up to announce that there will be a flash or two of the LCD display when going *out* or *IN* to Discrete Graphics Mode, another *nice thing*! I agreed and said "Yes" to make the utility switch modes, and the screen dimmed once, then again, and BAM! Into Discrete Graphics Mode...I waited about a minute or two, pushed the button again... and right away the dialog box returned, asking me if I really wanted to be changing modes, I said "Yes", and BAM! It changed to Integrated Graphics Mode, plain as day!

I am stoked! I don't know if each one of the things I did tonight, cumulatively speaking, added up to the fix, or if just the BIOS flash did the job, but so far so good...I am a happy camper now with the new notebook!

Now if I can just figure out a way to TURN OFF the trackpad, I'll be 100% aok fine with it. But not tonight, I am going to enjoy the machine and do some writing, then watch a new episode of the Dresden Files on Hulu TV/Video after that, and enjoy the beautiful graphics abilities of the UL30Vt-X1, which are after all, the whole reason I bought this thing in the 1st place! :rolleyes2:

That's the story, and I'm done fooling around with the new notebook as of right now. Thanks to God for small favors, and ask, and ye shall be rewarded! :yes:

 

I know Tallan would not agree... and to each their own for sure... but the moment I get a new notebook, I check the features and then flatten the hardrive (secure partition & all) and go with a clean install. I am not overly concerned with "bloatware" per se, as ASUS really does have some fine utilites... I just prefer to run PRO (for domain reasons) & have a fresh install, where I can monitor registry integrations more closely.

I will have to consider purchasing the wifi 1000, then. $18 seems more than reasonable... Running the attennae to the bezel will be the only problem.

 

Hey guys! I posted this on another forum full of UL30VT uses as well, just thought I should ask it here as well to get as wide a range of feedback as possible...

I am seriously considering buying a UL30VT-A1 (silver), but I have a few questions about the build quality of this laptop. I have an older asus laptop (W5F) and I really dislike the quality of plastic used in this laptop's body... it is very flimsy and cracks with the most minor bumps.

Will any of you guys be able to give me your hands-on impressions of the build quality of the UL30? Which parts of the body are plastic and which parts are metal? Also, is there a lot of flex in the body or does it feel solid? Once again, I am particularly interested in the silver model, but feedback on the black UL30 laptops is fine as well.

I guess I am concerned about this since it seems that Asus traded screen quality, touchpad and webcam for better performance and battery life, so I have some doubts about whether they made compromises on the build quality as well.

Thanks for the help!
-fugeb

 

No, actually I don't disagree. I only object when people who don't know what they are doing, and are unfamiliar with ASUS and its software, "nuke" their drives for no particular reason. You don't seem to qualify in any of those respects!

The reason I object is quite often those same folk end up here wasting everybody's time with questions like "Why did my hotkeys stop working?" which have been asked and answered ad nauseam for years. Ignorance is not bliss. I'm from Maine so "if it ain't broke don't fix it" may resonate especially strongly with me. But if you DO know what you're doing, have at it!

 

Are you saying you reinstalled the Power4Gear Hybrid Utility? If I look on the ASUS support site, the version is from 9/30/09, so it's not a new one. Is there another version that you just installed? If so, what category is it under on the ASUS site?

I know exactly what you mean about small favors. They really feel good.

Thanks.

 

There are two main ways of finding software on the ASUS site: go to your system's model list, which you have done, OR navigate to the Download site, and under Product select Notebook, and under Series select Apps, and then in the final panel select the software application or driver you want. This method will give you access to the very latest releases, but they may or may not have been tested with your particular model machine. In other words by specifying your model you will get the latest ASUS recommended items, by going through the "Apps" screen you'll get the very latest available.

 

Thanks for pointing out the new BIOS! I ran things in reverse order than you just to see if it mattered (BIOS first, re-install Power4GearHybrid second), and that method did manage to step on my Bluetooth stacks setup. And I didn't see the big TURBO Gadget show up, either. After re-installing the BT driver, however, all is well and the TURBO icon, flames and all, popped up too - go figure.

I have been checking the trackpad switch all along the way and mine is functioning perfectly, as it always has (touch wood), so I have nothing to suggest there. It obviously can and should work on your machine as well; good luck with it.

 

Is the P4 Control Panel the same as "ControlDeck"? I installed Power4Gear Hybrid, didn't see any big icon or gadget, then installed a newer ControlDeck, and I do see a new gadget (after rebooting). But it's just sort of an orange/yellow meter, no flames, so I'm not sure I'm seeing the same thing.

Another thing I'm confused about. If I click on the Power4gear icon, I get a prompt asking me if I want an "unknown publisher" to make changes to this computer. I think this happens any time I get an executable from the ASUS site and reinstall. I thought it would give me an option to not ask this every time the program runs, but I don't see that option. Is everyone installing these apps in some way that allows them to avoid these prompts from User Account Control?

Thanks for your help.

 

Guys... lets quit quoting EVERYTHING.. just quote a little part of it... You are making it even longer and it is unnecessary.

 

I don't understand all the issues everyone is having with this computer. When I bought my A1, I also bought an external CD/DVD writer/drive in anticipation that I will wipe it clean.
a) Wiped it clean
b) Install Win7-64 Ultimate
c) Run the driver CD - consulted the Asus thread here on bloatware (for heaven's sake, do a search!)
d) Install everything necessary but not Asus' fancy non-essential software.
e) FULLY functional A1 with NO ISSUES whatsoever. No bios update needed even!

You know, they included the driver CD for a reason! You are making it harder than it should be. Less is MORE!

 

Umm... you mean your HDD access port. The A1 has only 1 antenna installed. Asus claimed that the Atheros card is optimized for 1 antenna. The X1 has two antenna installed with the Intel 1000 card.

 

Okay!
10ch

 

Sorry, I wasn't being literal; I should have said "all flamey colored." Yeah, if it says Turbo33 it's the same thing.

As for the install procedure, yes that's normal. It's the User Account Control, and is your "conscience" so you don't just automatically allow the installation of new applications on your machine (some which could include a virus, worms, or trojans, etc.). You can disable it, but it's much less intrusive than it used to be in Vista and provides a useful security function, so... it's up to you.

 

"Ummm... you mean your HDD access port. The A1 has only 1 antenna installed. Asus claimed that the Atheros card is optimized for 1 antenna. The X1 has two antenna installed with the Intel 1000 card."--sooby wrote

Yes, it was the HD port, sorry about that...I have been too busy concentrating on work to have any business posting here of late...but now that the WinnterNationals Drags are out of my way, over and done with, I can do a couple things with the new notebook, like CLEAN INSTALL the whole shoooting match!! WITH the new Hitachi 7200RPM 16MB Cache 500GB HD installed now, and without any hitches at all...just clean installed everything!

I am about 90% done with the job, and I can tell everybody here that, as usual, it is the difference between NIGHT AND DAY to do this job. The computer is free of about 50% of the Asus crapola, just picked and chose the nice, key applications that I wanted to keep, and BAM! This thing is transformed 100% now...soooo much better, just like my 1201N when I did the same thing.

I'll report back here later after I do some benchmarks and comparisons with the *old version* of this computer, but it is radically better like this with the new, clean installation of Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit, so I can sync with my big PC's media files and other things...it is just NIIIIICCCEE!

Until later...I'll give a couple comparisons which are apt for this deal...

 

I tried Nvidia 195.62 driver on win7 32-bit for testing purpose. Need to modify nvam.inf to have G210M match subsys id of UL30Vt, then manually was able to update to new driver and 3dmark06 was able to run and got a score of low 3600s. Win7 x64 with Asus driver gave low 3400s. Need to run the asus driver to see how much was driver improvement vs performance gained from 32-bit os. I was able to switch between intel and nvidia fine. But then I gave a S3 test, it woke up and later gave me stop 0x7f error. Power cycle got intel graphics driver not able to load, and even though nvidia driver loaded fine, display was probably going through intel with the standard vga driver (only could display 800x600 or 1024x768). But the fact if booted up with asus driver, then able to update to 195.62 (8.17.11.9562), that means manually building a package with updated nvidia components may work. Not sure worth the time to do that...

 

Umm rexrzer727, you do realize there is a quote button right? There is no need to copy and paste and whatever to quote someone. Just a heads up.

 

Thanks for the heads up SoulSaber my man, it's appreciated but sometimes I just prefer to take a little bit of somebody's quote, not the whole thing, and that is why I often do that editing deal...that is normal for me, don't worry it's not an aberration or anomaly!

As for my Clean Install tonight, it's a resounding success, bar none. I eliminated ALL of my problems with the machine, everything now works 100% perfectly fine, no software screwing up, no bad interaction between the various engines from Asus, etc et al. And look at the performance of the new Hitachi 500GB 7200RPM 16MB Cache HD! Holy Smokes!

I have never seen a 2.5" notebook HD of any type perform like the graphics I just put up here. My Lord, 80+MB/sec Read (and corollary to write, it will do the same on an empty or near empty volume) Speed, 57 IOPs in the 'Bless Test', and no more than 30ms in the seek speed @ 1MB, that is just stellar stuff!

I defragmented the new HD after I installed everything on it for the Read test, and it showed...before it had been hovering @ about 72MB+MB./sec, but look at the numbers now! Crazy stuff, to me anyway! Never seen a 2.5" HD perform like that one unless it was an Enterprise Raptor HD...and then again not much better than this as a single HD even with a Raptor.

Well, to put it mildly, I have squashed ALL of the bugs in the machine now...when I turn off the Trackpad with the keystroke Fn F9, it stays OFF, and goes OFF now! I can grind on the trackpad all I want with it defeated and the cursor does NOT move now, where before it never stopped movement, it never worked at all...so one BIG Bug down the tubes.

All of the gremlins with the nVidia CP and drivers disappearing are gone also, no more of that. The Graphix Boost button now works 100% of the time, as does Fn Space Bar, to change the Energy Saver on PG4 Control Panel, which also works 100% of the time now! :smile:

In short, there is nothing the machine is supposed to do that it doesn't do correct and 100% of the time now...no more Bugs! :laugh:

Boot time is down to 30 seconds cold boot to welcome screen, or less, when warm. Restart boot is now 15-20 seconds...and best of all, wake from Sleep is now less than 5 seconds! This thing now ROCKS the world, my world anyway...

Did you see the new WEI scores also? How about those? The lowest is now 4.9 points, where before it was 3.4 points, and that was for CPU performance. NO more! Check out the graphics, also, especially Game Graphics @ 5.8 points, and memory is now 5.4 points, with Desktop Aero and CPU @ 4.9 points. Those are all stellar numbers for a notebook with the Turbo Boost 1.3CULV C2Duo 1.3Ghz CPU, don't you all think that is so? I sure do! The new Hitachi HD is 5.9 points, which equals my desktop's performance number for HD's, and that is a 2-HD WD Black RAID in my PC desktop which writes at more than 240MB/sec, so go figure! :wink:

Anyway, I am truly happy with this machine now, and it's a keeper, plain Jane Simpleton! If anybody had told me the results would have been this good, I'd have done it on the old HD, and not waited...I had no idea it would be so dramatically different than with the OEM HD and the software from Asus, installed 'their way' not my way. :yes:

I am done crowing now, just thank your lucky stars that it's late and I'm tired so there's no rambling tonight, which I will try and limit in the future. I realize that a writer tends to express himself much more freely, and exemplary methods are normal, so my apologies for posts past, when I didn't heed the bounds of normal posts...although I never am a normal post, so don't really ever expect it!

Time to end this and revel in the new machine a little more with a Hulu movie before bedtime tonight, just a short hour-long movie I found tonight, but this machine is so good with its iTunes/Quicktime and Flash video that it's easy to enjoy things like that even when you are tired. This is a fantastic notebook computer, that much I am certain of now...it's just one of a kind at this time. There may be better notebooks out there but not by much, and certainly not in this price range.

 

I am interested in purchasing one of these notebooks, but it hinges on one factor.
I am an engineering student and run programs such as autodesk inventor 2009, autocad2007, space gass and microstran.
Is anybody able to tell me if this notebook will be able to handle such applications.
Thanks in advance
Dave