C90S Reliability and Success Rate

My main concern is the reliability of the Asus c90s.
Just how much of a gamble is ordering one of these systems?

The c90s would be ideal for me because of the price to power ratio, especially with the choice of a GDDR3 8600m GT. I would choose the G1S, but it's a little too expensive and looks like it will shoot lazers at me and fly out my window.

But the thing is, even with the individual testing that gentech does for each of their c90s units, I still hear complaints about how people have defective units that are overheating and freezing in gaming or overclock mode causing them to have to RMA. It really seems like there are more questions about fixes for the c90s than any other computer in this forum, at least from what I see.

So my question is this: is it worth it to get one of these? I don't care much for having long battery life, and if I get one, I'll probably order it from gentech so hopefully I wont have to worry about RAM compatibility issues. The above average temperature also worries me. Will this cut into the longevity of my system? I live on a hot and humid tropical island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean so this thing about the c90s heat feeling good on a cold winter night doesnt really apply to me. Is there a new BIOS out that fixes these problems?

I know there is never a straight-up guarantee on anything computer related, but I want to hear your opinions before i drop around 1500 dollars on something that could be a pain.

Thanks guys, these forums have been a really great resource to me. If these questions are more suited for the owner's lounge or the common problems and fixes thread, sorry about that. I just figured it would be more usefull to have the responses all in one place.

 

I had trouble with my first c90 because the gpu kept overheating. I believe that was just a defective unit. I talked to ken and had a new c90 back in a short amount of time and am very satisfied with one. The temps are very cool even under the most intense loads my c90 has not gone past 79 degrees yet. The c90 is an amazing machine and yeah like you I got the c90 because of the price which was too tempting and now with the gddr3 gpu it seems even more enticing.

My overclocking and gaming modes work fine and have had no problem with them.

The main thing you hear about is ram problems and thats the majority of people. I think most people that use 2 x 1gb are safe because I didn't have problems with either of my c90s in the ram department. Yes there is a new bios which should fix the ram compatibilities and turbo gear problems people have been having.

Another reason you hear about all the problems is the c90 adopters are coming in the waves recently so like a billion threads were made about problems even though they were usually about the same thing. Most other laptops have had this same wave of problems when they were released too. The g1 has had many problems of its own.

I am more then satisfied with my c90 and was amazed at how well gentech and Ken took care of my problems. I mainly bought the c90 because I believe a high end 8700/8800 will make it into the c90. Good luck with your decision! I think we've converted 2-3 this week into getting the c90 instead of g1 or some other laptop. If there was an option for the gddr3 when I purchased my c90 I would not have taken longer then 1 sec to make a decision. It really is the most powerful 15.4 inch now.

 

@raijba

this is a great notebook, you can be sure of that, i have mine for +/-3 weeks and i still think it was the ideal choice for me.... has for the very excess heating on the left side where the HDD is....rubbish...it does heat a bit like every other notebook...(i have a 5400rpm 160GB)....as for the stability. very good i can say.. you can also buy Transcend ( the 2nd larger RAM distributor worldwide)RAM memory sticks, i dont know about others but these are 101%
( i have Transcend DIMM PC2-5300U CL5 (DDR2-667, 2x1 = 3GB)

with a C90, you get power in your hands

 

"Real men own a c90!"

That's all you need to know.

 

I got my c90 just over a week ago, and I haven't had any real issues so far. If you buy a hard drive running at 7200rpm, it'll be a bit hotter than the 5400. Just hope you don't have any RAM issues... and even if you do, Customer service with GenTech is amazing, Ken's busy, but he'll help you out with your problems as much as he can.

 

Yeah Ken will help you, no doubts. He even awnsered my questions about my problem yesterday, even though I didn't bought from gentech. (if the $ would have gone up a week before, it would have been another thing =/).

 

Hey Raijba...I've got one on order! Price performance ratio is outstanding. It has a certain 'cool' factor LOL about the Lazers.

 

I got mine a short while ago. Besides the few problems I've had, which were user based, this machine is nothing short of perfect. I ordered my ram from GenTech, so I've had no problems in that department. The rest was real easy to put together too, I had alot of fun. It got me interested in modding my old eMachines.

 

hey, thanks guys for all the feedback
i think i'll become a real man now lawl
its nice to know that 3gigs of ram from gentech has worked on yours, eightball. it was pretty discouraging thinking none of them ever worked. except swoley's or something. before i pull any triggers though, i think some PM's are in order.
good luck with all your systems

 

3 gigs of corsair isn't going to work. However I'm in the process of updating to 0804 BIOS which might work says the tech rep?

 

BIOS 801 ? Just flashed on this BIOS and my 2gbx1 corsair still doesn't work.

 

Mine doesn't either.

(Meant to say 0801 not 0804)

 

well this updates are supposed to solve some CPU issues not ram issues