*Official UL30VT-X1 Owners Lounge*

Ya it works for me, dunno about the VirtualBox thing. Last couple weeks I was programming in C on MS Visual Studio and coding Tetris in Java (Eclipse). It's a decent machine, it'll probably last me a few years throughout my CS education.

 

How do you install Synaptic drivers? Will it be recognized or there are some tweaks i have to do?

 

Scrolling does seem smoother, but did you retain the 2-finger and 3-finger tap functions?

 

Thanks again. I've been reading this thread for a while now and I figured this place would be my best shot to get help.

Another minor issue is that I've had 3 blue screens since I installed Chrome about 10 days ago. Before that I've had no blue screens or crashes at all. Have any of you other guys experienced the same? I'm staying away from Chrome for a while to see if it will stop.

 

Good idea!

I'm using Safari which is not quite as fast as Chrome, but more compatible, and a lot faster than IE; tons of folks like Firefox best...

 

Hello, i've tried to download the ATK drivers but cannot seems to fix the problem (from ul30vt and G51), can anybody so kind to show me which file to fix the problem ?

Thanks

 

BTW i tried to run old medal of honor allied assault and it cannot run under windows 7 64, anybody knows the solution?
(yes already tried on both nvidia and intel)

 

What's this about Chrome being incompatible with the UL30VT-X1/A1? That is just parsimonious dribble, you nice people! I use Chrome 100% of the time, with my Asus UL30, with xlnt results, ie there's nothing wrong with it whatsoever! :wink:

Where in the world did you get the idea that it's a problem, because it isn't! There must be something else going on with the other guy's notebook to cause a BSOD in Blue, I'll be willing to bet my best socks on that fact!

Chrome is a great browser, prefer it immensely over FireFox and IE, which I would never use if it were the last thing on the planet you could browse with! The IE POS browser is full of security holes, an antique if there ever was one in the browser dept., and surely people are still not using it yah?

Please when you say rash things like that I'd like some qualfication from an expert source, not just a "my computer got a BSOD" without going into the BSOD a little bit more...I hardly think it's from Chrome!

 

Hi guys,

I'm new here and I've just bought a UL30VT a couple of days ago. However, I noticed that brown colors do not seem to be displaying correctly, be it on my browser or Photoshop.

For example, hex codes for brown shades are shown as greyish shades instead. This happens when I'm using Intel graphics and Nvidia.

Any idea what's wrong here?

 

Chrome is barely out of beta, the other browsers are much more mature and user-tested products. Perhaps I should have said "stable" rather than "compatible." Why fight with it when there are so many other good or even better choices?

 

I'm sure that this subject has come up a little bit here, but I haven't found any definitive answers so I'll raise it again.

What, in your opinion, is the best docking solution for someone who wants to plug in the UL30VT as a desktop replacement in the office (I already have a bluetooth keyboard and mouse but want to connect a monitor, hard drive, and a few other peripherals) but then hit the road with it frequently? If all I needed were USB hubs it wouldn't be a problem, but my desire for an external monitor connection seems to complicate things.

I know that Asus doesn't make its own docking stations, and the HP xb4 (which would otherwise be perfect) isn't compatible with Asus computers. Most of the products I've seen have mixed reviews (Cables-to-Go, Targus, Belkin, Toshiba). Any thoughts from some of you who might own one of these products?

Thanks in advance.

 

Hey, just download the general synaptic drivers from synaptic.com. You won't miss any feature. You will have one tap - left lick, two finger scrolling, two finger tap - middle button, three finger tap - right click. You don't need to do any tweaks. Just install it and then remove the old elantech driver, which may be somewhat tricky. If you decide that it's not working for you. Just install the elantech drivers back. No brainer


By the way.. I am using Chrome, since its pre-release version. Now on this little lappy. It works like charm. Trust me.. I is LOOOONG time out of beta. (About 20 months).. And it is perfectly stable and blazingly fast on my unit.

 

Docking stations are not made anymore almost nobody buys them anymore - and there all incompatible with anything other than the model to which it mates. The life cycle of notebooks is currently less than a year - so economically it does not make sense to design one. It takes only a few seconds to plug in your monitor via the HDMI and the hard-drive via USB so it doesn't really save anybody any time, and as you already using bluetooth keyboard and mouse, it doesn't really get any easier.

 

The OP reported multiple crashes after loading Chrome on his machine, so not so stable there. Personally I'm browser agnostic and literally could not care less which one anybody chooses.

 

Hmm.
I removed the elan drivers via device manager then reboot.
After reboot went to install the synaptics one and reboot but after reboot...
theres still the elan at the notification bar at the bottom right corner.

 

You don't need a docking station. My A1 sits around more at home than I lug it around. All I do is connect the HMDI cable for A/V output and a USB cable for all peripherals (DVD, HD, wireless KBM). Works like a charm.

 

You could try deleting the Elan folder and all its contents by hand then reboot. I suspect a part of the driver code resides in memory so the regular uninstall misses it as it is active then. (Don't forget to actually Empty the Trash, as well).

 

I could be other things as well though, but Chrome fits the time window the best. I'll stay away from it for two weeks and then I'll start using it again. With some luck, the system restore might have fixed whatever caused the blue screens.

I've used FF for a very long time, and I'm generally happy about it (and ABP), but I really like Chromes speed and how every tab is it's own process. They fairly recently included support for add-ons with adblocking capabilities and I was stoked to try it. It worked really well - except for the blue screens, if it really is chrome causing them.

 

Delete all the files in elan folder.. Then reboot.. and it should be gone.

 

Thanks for the responses on the docking station, guys.

 

Battery question. If I set my computer on entertainment mode and screen at half brighness while playing zune music with one web browser open. How long should my battery last? Also with one page open and zune playing from my collection the cpu usage is between 40and50%... And all of a sudden while I am typing this, the page flashes everytime I type a letter. any thoughts of any of my concers would be great. Before I forget I am at 58% battery with 2hours and 47 min left... My signature shows my history with the a-1

Update, I closed the web page and the flashing screen went away but two minutes later I only 2 hours and 21 min left

 

Speaking about battery, when I got my ul30vt, I use HWinfo to see what my battery status and the wear level at 3.9%, what you guys get ?

 

The synaptics driver worked vey good, cannot customize much since it said not compatible and cannot scroll horizontally. But much better compared to elantech driver

BTW I found the screen wash out when reading pdf using max battery on power4gear (sometimes) maybe its the power saving for the screen?

 

Hi,

I just recently bought a UL30VT. But when in idle the hard drive makes a noise every 1 sec. Im not sure what this is, but after talking to a ASUS rep on the phone he told me to DOA the computer. Today I did that, and even this one makes that irritating noise once every second. Anyone else have this problem??

Its not a problem in a noisy environment, but when im trying to do some studying in a silent room, the noise drives me insane....

Im actually thinking of taking it back to the store and get my money back.

If it wasnt for the fact that I love everything else about this laptop..

Now to my second question: Does this computer support SATA2?

I might buy the new Intel 80GB ssd gen-2 disk for the laptop, but if its overkill and the mainboard doesn't support it, its a waste of money...

So, anyone able to answer me?

thank u.

 

It supports it. That's the hard drive I have in my 30VT right now and it works just fine.

You'll have to use an external optical drive or USB key to install the OS though, which isn't really a big deal.

 

Hey guys, I just bought this laptop on amazon and I was wondering what cooler or cooling pad I should get. Thanks!

 

Great. Then this might be the solution...

I have not been able to verify that the mainboard actually supports Sata2 disks..

Did u have the same problem with the harddrive making a repeated noise every second? Or is that just my luck to get two laptops with the same problem?

 

I don't know, if yours is at all like mine you'll want a WARMING pad, not a cooler! Kidding aside I've never had a laptop that ran anywhere near as cool as this one, I'd say save your $$$.

 

So yea, i've been reading about this HDD noise since the first batch came out. What exactly is this noise? I mean on mine, it's like how you described it, every second or so, the HDD makes a noise. However, to me, its bearable. The noise is I doubt any louder than a few decibels... But yes, in a quiet study room, I can definitely hear the faint clicks clicks, not exactly "clicks" per se, but thats the best word to describe it.

Anyone else who has a problem with the noise care to share? Im mostly curious.

On this subject, I find my laptop typing surface pretty cool. But underneath, especially on the left side directly under the windows serial numbers, I can the laptop can get pretty warm. Really its subjective, unless I have a thermometer, I can't say what is "pretty warm"; but its fairly tolerable if you place it on your lap. Not sure where Im going with this one, but I assume everyone else's heats up similarly?


And on the subject of chrome, Ive personally used chrome since the very first public beta release, Ive ran into browser issues along the way early on, but system wise, I can't recall a time it has interfered with windows.

And for the record, I immediately disabled IE on the ul30vt. Never touched it; installed chrome first thing as my browser. Not a single issue. I think the poster who had an issue might have another underlying cause since there's many of us in here that use it regularly without any hints of problems.

 

The HDD drove me absolutely crazy as well. I thought it performed fairly well, but I have a really hard time with ANY sound. I run the integrated gfx most of time (again, tnx ) just because I don't like the sound of the fan on the nvidia card, even if it's all that loud.

I installed an Intel X25-M 'G2' 34nm 160GB SSD and put the original drive in a $7 external USB-HDD case. Works like a charm. The SSD gets a score of 7.7 in Windows performance section. It boots in about 25 secs and a lot of things goes a lot faster. However, in my mind, the best thing about it is that it's silent. If I run the laptop on the integrated graphics it's totally silent most of the time, even if I put my ear to it. I absolutely love it!

My laptop only gets warm if I run it on all high settings. If I keep it on integrated graphics and a "normal" workload it stays quite cool.

Yes, I suspect that my problem with Chrome is that it's another program not playing nicely with Chrome. Not Chrome itself.

A different, and very minor, issue is that whenever I watch a movie i MPHC, pause it, put the laptop to sleep and let it finally hibernate a few hours later and then restart it - MPHC crashes. It doesn't if I put it in hibernate right away. Strange, but really not an issue. Just putting it out there if anyone knows why.

 

alas, i could stand the ul30jt wait no longer. I just pulled the proverbial trigger on a ul30vt-x1. I'm a roadie by trade. everything must be black. period.

 

Regarding the hard drive clicking, it's probably the head positioner. In desktop HDs that sound got to be enough of an issue that a couple of OEMs actually released "silencer" firmware which reduced the sound by parking the heads but also that obviously affected performance slightly; the heads and armatures of laptop drives being so much smaller (and presumably quieter) I guess nobody has thought to offer such a firmware fix. If the clicking is regular when the drive is at rest but becomes more random and frequent when the drive is in use I'm pretty sure that's what you're hearing, the drive repositioning the read/write heads. Some brands are louder than others; t'was ever thus.

 

My harddrive is completely silent.. Only whenever I move the laptop or pick it up I can hear the weird cracking static noise. I put my ear right on the harddrive and listen very carefully and I can tell for sure that the sound is coming out of HDD.

Its kinda weird but since I will switch for SSD and this one works flawlessly I am not worried.

 

Ok i deleted elan and installed synaptics instead.
Thanks guys.
Dint really notice much difference though. I felt that the scrolling was skip more frames.

I also noticed the synaptics pointing device thingy at the bottom right corner was not showing the blue finger thing like how the elan works. It is normal i guess right?

 

2zheo.. That's strange.. The difference for me was extreme... WIth elan drivers I couldn't really scroll at all bc the fingers had to be in exact spot. With synaptics you can put them wherever you want and move them however you want and it works

 

UGH, splitting over between getting a ul30vt-a1 for $720 or waiting for JC/JT

 

Bird in the hand???

 

Lurker here.. currently attempting to read through this entire thread, on page 47 but couldn't resist posting this:

I'm debating between buying the UL30VT now or waiting for the UL30JT. The only gaming I want to do is L4D2, Diablo III and Starcraft II.. but I'm pretty sure the UL30VT will be able to handle all those.

What I'm worried about is how it will perform under heavy multitasking.. e.g. Chrome Browser with 25 tabs, iTunes, Bittorrent, Citrix session, and streaming video all at once. Thoughts? Experience?

 

Seems the question of whether or not to wait for the newer models is on quite a few minds. One thought I have is that the current hardware is both available and tested. No model is perfect, but the UL30VT-A1s and X1s have been out for some time now and have proven to be stable performers with excellent build quality and reliability in almost every case. I don't begrudge anyone the improved horsepower of the newer models but they are, as of right now, a "pig in a poke." Your mileage probably WILL vary.

 

Here is a video of the multi-tasking.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpDzJel0JJ4

Also I wanted to mention that after playing Bad Company 2 for 2 hours my temps were still below 60C. This impressed me because all I had done was raise it a few mm off the table some supports. I was playing on all low settings which still looks great and getting a steady 27-32 FPS. I'm going to experiment with overclocking the gpu and raising the settings.

 

Score some RAM for your new UL30VT, whichever one you end up with, and then things you can do on it are in fact endless...25 tabs open in Chrome (or your favorite browser, whatever it is) is nothing for 8GB of RAM to handle!

I find it a bit absurd to be packing all of that into a 13.3" LCD display however, but if the mood suits you then 8GB of RAM will take care of all your needs. As for the 4GB of RAM that comes OEM with the UL30Vt, it will just about do what 8GB will, just not quite as responsive after the 18th open window, or is it the 19th? Hmmmm, ask somebody with 4GB RAM I guess because it escapes me right now... :wink:

This might not be *the perfect* small notebook, but I can't find a better one, and I've tried for 5 months straight. This one does it all; games, movies, HD content of all shapes and sizes, multi-media bear in the woods, it's all there with a fantastic keyboard and action, what can I say... this da kind!

Good luck, and hope you like either silver or black because we don't offer any other color choices at this time. :yes:

 

Good for you roadie by trade! :yes:

We like black on black over here also...why even my M5 BMW has the black touch too, and I can't find a better road car than that, just like I can't find a better small computer than this one either.

Hope you enjoy the new black beauty!

 

Yea i love my ul30vt man.
Its sad that i got atheros instead of Intel although my atheros got no problems at all.

The found the fastboot application to be actually quite useful. Some might say its the same as msconfig but i felt that by actually delaying the program rather than not even starting it is simply great.

Currently still considering if i should get myself an Intel X25M G2 80GB SSD.:X

 

Just got a UL30VT-A1, couldn't wait for the UL30JT anymore. What is the best method to do a clean install?? Preferably legal.

 

As it's new you don't have data to backup so just pop in the Recovery disk and boot from it (hold ESC on boot). Windows will offer to recover to 1st partition, the entire HD, or 2 partitions; make your choice and away it will go. The trick is when the Windows install stops and asks for the ASUS Devices and Drivers disk, do NOT comply; hold the power button and shut down. Reboot, the Windows install will complete, and at that point you can feed in the ASUS disk which will offer you a check-box menu of things to install; make your selections and away it goes with only those drivers and apps you specified being added to the system.

One point, if you are going to make a copy of the Recovery Partition via the Image Recovery program (5 or so DVDs) do so BEFORE the clean install as it will destroy your recovery partition.

And that's about it.

 

Muchos gracias, very very helpful. I just pulled the trigger on a A1.

 

Will probably upgrade to a SSD and 8GB in a year and have a screaming fast little machine that I can use for at least a few more.

 

From the Amazon page:

Product Features
1.3GHz Intel SU7300 Core 2 Duo Processor
4GB of DDR3 RAM, 2 slots, 4GB Max
500GB SATA Hard Drive (5400 RPM); Wi-Fi 802.11 bgn; Bluetooth; 0.3M Webcam
13.3-Inch Widescreen HD LED LCD Display; NVidia G210M Graphics with 512MB DDR3 + Intel GMA 4500MHD (Switchable VGA)
Windows 7 Home Premium (64 bit) Operating System; 8 Cell 5600mAh Battery

Does that indicate 4GB total or 4GB per slot? Also, what speed is compatible, 1066, 1333, 1600?

 

The A1 comes with two 2GB sticks of ram, so if you want to go to 8gb of ram, you'll have to pull the two 2GB sticks. It's DDR3 - 1066 ram. I have the X1 which is basically the same unit, except for a shorter warranty.

 

Hello,
I just bought a UL30VT-A1 and so far, I'm loving it.

I have a little question and I hope you guys can help. Is there a way to make the media function keys (play, stop, next, previous) work with iTunes?

Thank you!