First Impressions -- ASUS V6V

download fanspeed I believe...... powergear doesn't directly deal with the fan, it directly deals with limiting the top speed of the cpu... like a governor on a car engine...

 

Honestly: I gave the answer to the question and a solution. What did you provide other than wrong information indicating that you lost performace by turning on SpeedStep when on AC? It's not that I'm out to get you or something, but shouldn't you, as any other, be called on it when what yo're saying is wrong or misleading? My only intention was to answer thw original question. I did.

That must be why AMD spent all that time and resources implementing Cool and Quiet on their desktop systems. Because the pros of always running full speed are so abvious. That must be why intel are working hard to implement the same for their desktops. Retarded? No. Silly? Yes. When you implement a default with all downsides and no upside: That's silly.

It doesn't lower power cosumption at all compared to what you could do by changing between Windows' own power profiles and adjusting brightness yourself. The quick access button switching is neat, though, and that's why it's sad that thy're limiting it for no good reason.

No, but it does cause it to be unneccesarily high when on AC.

Who was arguing this?

I agree. It shouldn't do 'a darn thing'. It is however disabeling SppedStep, which causes the notbook to be hot and noisy for no gain in performance and possibly longer charging times.

Me neither, but in this case they do deserve it. Not for beeing hot and noisy in reality, but for having a small program that in it's default configuration gives that impession with no upside to it. That's silly. No ifs and buts about it. Had they actually been hot and noisy without an easy way to fix it that would have been really bad. This, however is just silly.

I hope so. Unlock full configurability of all profiles, recompile with an updated UI library, change the ugly icons, change the default behavious on AC, and Bob's your uncle. Shouldn't take more than a couple of hours. If they really want to spend time on it some kind of first-run-wizzard to explain settings and choose defaults would be cool.

Honestly: You don't see that this is not a complaint as such, but a solution to a larger percieved problem? What do you think is the most likely answer to please a user or prospective buyer concerned about heat and noise when on AC

1. It's working exactly the way it's designed to, and that's the way it is. It's not a hard concept to grasp.

2. This behaviour is caused by the default setting in Power4Gear beeing a bit silly. I suggest you change your setting to [...] There will be no loss in performance and it'll run much more cool and quiet.

Pick one.

I understand it perfectly fine.

 

So just let me get one thing straight. If i'm unhappy with the way the v6v is performing with power4gear I can either:
bugmenot:

Is this an option in power4gear, or a windows setting?

or

Uninstall/disable power4gear, and let the notebook use speedstep. (sadly i will loose the "shortcut" buttons).

All I really want is the option for dynamic swithing.

By the way, i looked into programs for controlling and tweaking the fan and so on, but i don't really feel i'm qualified to do that. The risk is to high to be fidling around, i'd just end up with a blown up notebook.

 

Yes. That is an option in Power4Gear. There are three profiles available on AC: Super Performance, High Performance, and Game. Checking Auto Performace in the Power4Gear systray context menu will allow the Game profile to utilize dynamic switching. This will be similar do disabeling Power4Gear and choosing the Portable/Laptop power profile from Windows' power applet in the control panel. Both Super Performance and High Performance act as the Windows' Always On profile, no matter what.

 

Thanks for the quick reply, just needed to be clear on that.
Great to have a forum, where I can get a bit of help...

 

Powergear is designed to increase battery life... period.. that's the whole concept...... it's a program that controls most things that yes, you could control yourself.... The reason the software is there is to help more people realize all these functions and not waste their time with it. Call Asus and compain about it if you want, because I didn't design the software and I think for normal users it works as advertised and that's all you can ask for. If it's not doing everything you want, it's not a problem with powergear, it's a problem with you not being able to find the right software for what you want to do.

By the way, anyone who really wants to compain about what powergear doesn't do... it's a very simple program and if you have any programing skills at all, you would have already found a solution to to make work exactly how you want........

Just so you know, powergear didn't always work this way......... a couple versions ago, all profiles were available while plugged in....... it was changed for a reason, call Asus up and ask them why.

 

Glad to be of scervice!

Justin: Read the last paragraph of my last post once again. In life, people will sometimes diagree with you, and some of these times you will be wrong. Everything else is just you blowing smoke. Thought you were better than that.

 

Wow, I get away from this forum for a couple of days and Justin is getting a new enemy again ahahahahha......

Now on to the topic......

By default w/o using Asus Power4gear, the system will boot up in full power mode. Thus if you have an 1.86 Ghz processor it will run at 1.86 Ghz on boot up. There is speedstep application to control it and make it change dynamically. Asus provided one called Power4Gear. It is not the best application out there but it does the job it is supposed to do. Assist in power management of system.

Now, if you or anyone feel power4gear is crap and cause problem there are other alternative out there such as SpeedStepXP, Centrino Hardware Control, or RM Mark....

Each of them will allow you to take control of your processor and make it dynamic or static speed.


Outside of these applications, by default again...Plug in the AC Plug w/o any application to control the speed it will boot up at full speed. Some could be control via the BIOS while some can not.

Put this topic to rest and don't ruin this thread with bickering.....

 

Actually: Install Windows XP SP2 fresh on a notebook it should, by default, use the Laptop/Portable profile, so that it will clock down to 600/800MHz on a Dothan at some poind during Windows load. The default startup multiplier on a P-M is 6X. With SpeedStep enabeled the proper drivers installed Windows will respect this. In fact, when Dothan first replaced the Banias many manufacturers had issues with the processor beeing stuck at 600MHz until they implemented a BIOS workaround or preinstalled a MS hotfix on their systems.

And, no. I have no desire to be Justins enemy. I just don't see the point in running hotter than you have to, and much less vigourously defending it by talking down on others.

 

I have it on “Game” setting all the time, how does this affect the CPU performance ? This seems to be the only setting which keeps the fan at 1400 rpm in the idle mode. Setting it to “Super Performance” or “High Performance” doesn’t seem very usable at all on V6, because of the fan speed and the amount of heat it generates. I would hope the new BIOS update would address this issue...

 

Playing a game, video editing, watching a DVD, ripping CDs, any 'real world' benchmark or use, for all practical purposes: Not at all.

To qualify the answer: It does introduce some latencies when switching up that may influence some purely synthetic benchmarks, but we're talking microseconds here.

If you want to forego the shortcut button there are software available that will give you as much control over this as you like as well as opening up the inermediate multipliers to automatic switching. Useful, for example, if you are, say, using a colour boosting filter for DVD playback that is just a bit to heavy on the CPU to run at 600MHz (or whatever), but may run fine at 700Mhz. Could give you an additional half hour (or more) of watching for example. Just enough time to finish ROTK:EE

Wouldn't mess with these unless you're comfortable spending a little time reading up and understanding them, but if you do they can be very useful.

A BIOS update will not change it. The 'culprit', so to speak, is, as I stated previously, Power4Gear. You (we) would need an update to that for this behaviour to change. There should be no downside, however, to simply leaving it on the Game profile. (Unless you want to use different screensaver and standby timeouts for DVD, for example: Then you'll have to set this manually each time or just live with the heat in one of the profiles.)

 

Thanks bugmenot,

I'll stick with the "Game" setting as it seems to be the best one, and makes V6 run at 45~49C range, which is just about comfortable on my right hand..

 

DVD is a good one to stick with........ even email is good while you're just doing general things....... but for most email mode's standard lcd brightness is too low, so you could change the setting......then when you need more power you could always change it.

 

Well, just to let y'all know, I just gort my v6v the other day. I was afraid that it might be to loud for me, but the 1400 rpm, doesn't bother me at alle. I know everyb
ody's talking about the W3..., but for people who want to have a standard 4 screen in 15", the v6v is a very nice machine. But be carefull, you can't leave the house to get a drink without missing it. The v6v is very persuasive... i love it..

 

I'm glad someone is speaking up for the V6.... the W3 took all of the steam away from the V6 once it was released and both are basically the same machine and one is right for someone while the other is right for another person...

 

The screen aspect ratio thing raises a question I've been pondering...


While I understand the appeal of widescreen for television - (I'm a filmmaker so I truly get it), I'm not sure I understand the reasoning for a notebook computer.
The world of computers seems to be much more vertically based than horizontal. It's all about scrolling up and down... internet, documents, etc.

Besides being able to watch movies using more of the screen, am I missing something?

Since a 15 inch widescreen has less height than a 15 inch full screen, isn't a disservice being done in the name of "different"?

If I want to look at two pages side by side, wouldn't it be just as possible on a full screen 15 inch as a wide screen 15 inch? Wouldn't the widescreen 15 inch in fact be a smaller screen?


I'm leaning toward the v6 myelf but - am I missing something???

Seriously - let me know, this isn't a "dare" or something, it's an honest question.
:asus:

 

SMA -

Well when you consider a 14" widescreen has the same width as a 15.1" ...... you'll ge tthe same widescreen dvd picture size on both..... but you'll have 1.5" less height on the 14......... if you're a big vertical scrolling .... email, internet, etc........ widescreen isn't right for you or anyone unless you've got a huge widescreen... Regular ratio is still the best thing for office applications.....

Technically you have a wider desktop so it's easier to set up side by side's on a widescreen........ but that's only true if the widescreen is the same res..... like WSXGA+ on a 15.4" and SXGA+ on a 15.1 ...... then it's better.

If you know the benefits of widescreen and don't want it on your laptop, more power to you, seriously....

 

I was actually in the same situation as you. I was almost set on buying a 14" widescreen like on the W3, but then i thought about it a few days, and i went for the V6. The primary reason being, as you and PROPortable mention, all the vertical activity. But also i find, that the 4:3 ratio screens, are more suitable for the type of work I do on my lappy besides office. Graphic design, picture editing, mathematical programs.
I guess if i wanted to watch dvd's and play games i would have gone with a widescreen.
Figure out what fits you the best, instead of just getting a widescreen because they're on the market.