K53TA.. The best deal ever... could be!

Something terrible happened My secondary video card was heating up very quickly and the pc was back from the service because of a bios upgrade problem. I thought they maybe applied no paste to the second card. I opened up the machine and really what I thought was through there was no paste on secondary graphics chip. I applied some re assambled the pc and then w7 gave me no display driver found errori fine I reinstalled drivers and now my pc wont see secondary graphics chip.. What might have I done ? Was there a cable for it to function _ How can it just dissappear ___ ?

 

due to your interest I dug up the post about it.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-pavilion-notebooks/588705-hp-dv6z-amd-llano-6xxx-series-owners-lounge-105.html#post7739161

seems I was not quite correct in my statement. According to the above posts, dual graphics (aka crossfire mode) will not work with single channel memory configuration. If you are in single channel then it should default to using the Radeon 6650m. This is according to the fine print on the chart from AMD which we have all seen but never read the legalese

chart from AMD

as for the reason, its because the 6520 cant keep up with the 6650 in crossfire mode if it only has single channel memory access.

 

also, my memory is different branded also but same speeds/specs and I think its in dual channel mode. Cpu-z and Hwinfo64 both fail to report single or dual. I know in other systems cpu-z has told me "single" or "dual" for the "mode" field.
I think you are fine and do not need to worry about this.

 

what is your memory configuration? The previous several posts of mine could be related as the owner of the HP dv6 stated that his 6750m would not show up at all in catalyst when he was in single channel memory. I cannot say whether not showing up in catalyst and not showing up in device manager are the same problem.

 

I am using dual channel... Card is non existant now ... Wındows wont even recognize there is a card .. How can it be disabled _

 

sorry, I have never opened mine up that far and have no experience with laptop physical modifications. Hopefully someone else can help you out.

 

the gpu is soldered directly on the mobo. no plug on it. I've read on some forum that some people do not put thermal grease on their chipset (not recommanded but..) and their computer still work. First thing you should do is a full uninstall of Catalyst, reboot, reinstall the new catalyst (Mobility), reboot and after that, check if it's detectable. You should see Radeon 6600 and 6700 series on GPU-Z. I got some problems installing catalyst on my computers, but the biggest mistake is trying to install catalyst w/o the windows 7 service pack after a clean install of win7. It was giving me a BSOD each time and catalyst was f***ed.

 

asusk53 is right. thermal grease, though highly recommended, is not exactly required. I'm not a betting man, but I wouldn't freak out just yet. Definitely do a clean reinstall of your display drivers.

Just curious, do you know what the temps were like before you repasted it?

 

Hello from Russia, folks.

If you run Windows 7 or newer OS read this post.

I stumbled upon a bunch of hidden (in registry) advanced processor power management settings which might be usefull in multicore processor perfomance/efficiency fine tuning. Once unhidden these settings become availiable in Control panel -> Power options -> "Change plan settings" link -> "Change advanced power settings" link -> "Power options"/"Advanced settings" dialog -> "Processor power management" node.

Let me introduce most obvious ones:

- Processor performance core parking min cores
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\0cc5b647-c1df-4637-891a-dec35c318583)
Specify the minimum number of unparked cores/packages allowed (in percentage).
Default value for all windows power plans = 10% (i.e. for our quad-core APU - less then 1 core). I set it to 100% to avoid core parking.

- Processor performance core parking max cores
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\ea062031-0e34-4ff1-9b6d-eb1059334028)
Specify the maximum number of unparked cores/packages allowed (in percentage).
Default value for all windows power plans = 100%

- Processor performance core parking core override
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\a55612aa-f624-42c6-a443-7397d064c04f)
Ensure at least one processor remain unparked per core.

- Processor performance core parking parked performance state
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\447235c7-6a8d-4cc0-8e24-9eaf70b96e2b)
Specify what performance state a processor enters when parked.
Values are "No preference", "Deepest Performance State", "Lightest Performance State".

- Processor performance core parking decrease threshold
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\68dd2f27-a4ce-4e11-8487-3794e4135dfa)
Specify the lower busy threshold that must be met before decreasing the number of cores/packages that are unparked (in percentage).

- Processor performance core parking increase threshold
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\df142941-20f3-4edf-9a4a-9c83d3d717d1)
Specify the upper busy threshold that must be met before increasing the number of cores/packages that are unparked (in percentage).

- Processor performance core parking decrease policy
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\71021b41-c749-4d21-be74-a00f335d582b)
Specify the number of cores/packages to park when fewer cores are required.
Values are "Ideal number of cores", "Single core", "All possible cores".

- Processor performance core parking increase policy
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\c7be0679-2817-4d69-9d02-519a537ed0c6)
Specify the number of cores/packages to unpark when more cores are required.
Values are "Ideal number of cores", "Single core", "All possible cores".

- Processor performance boost policy
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\45bcc044-d885-43e2-8605-ee0ec6e96b59)
Specify how much processors may opportunistically increase frequency above maximum when allowed by current operating contitions (in percentage).

- Processor performance decrease policy
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\40fbefc7-2e9d-4d25-a185-0cfd8574bac6)
Specify the algorithm used to select a new performance state when the ideal performance state is lower than the current performace state.
Values are "Ideal", "Single", "Rocket". Read their descriptions in dialog.

- Processor performance increase policy
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\465e1f50-b610-473a-ab58-00d1077dc418)
Specify the algorithm used to select a new performance state when the ideal performance state is higher than the current performace state.
Values are "Ideal", "Single", "Rocket". Read their descriptions in dialog.

- Processor performance increase threshold (aka "up%" in k10stat; and I believe it must be uqual to k10stat`s value)
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\06cadf0e-64ed-448a-8927-ce7bf90eb35d)
Specify the upper busy threshold that must be met before increasing the processor's performance state (in percentage).

- Processor performance decrease threshold (aka "down%" in k10stat; and I believe it must be uqual to k10stat`s value)
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentCo(trolSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\12a0ab44-fe28-4fa9-b3bd-4b64f44960a6)
Specify the lower busy threshold that must be met before decreasing the processor's performance state (in percentage).

- Allow Throttle States
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\3b04d4fd-1cc7-4f23-ab1c-d1337819c4bb)
Allow processors to use throttle states in addition to performance states.

- Processor idle disable
(HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power\PowerSettings\54533251-82be-4824-96c1-47b60b740d00\5d76a2ca-e8c0-402f-a133-2158492d58ad)
Specify if idle states should be disabled.

TO UNHIDE THESE SETTINGS CHANGE REG_DWORD VALUE "Attributes" FROM "1" TO "0" UNDER (IN?) CORRESPONDING REGISTRY KEY.

In attachment - reg-file for unhiding all mentioned settings (just remove ".txt")


About core parking ( http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/pnppwr/powermgmt/ProcPowerMgmtWin7.mspx):
"Core Parking is a new Windows kernel power manager and kernel scheduler technology that helps improve the energy efficiency of a system by dynamically scaling the number of logical processors that are in use based on workload. Similar to how processor performance states help scale the performance of a single processor, Core Parking is designed to help scale the performance and energy efficiency across the set of logical processors in the system. When the Core Parking algorithm reduces the number of logical processors that are in use, it parks some of the logical processors in the system. The kernel scheduler correspondingly gives preference to unparked logical processors rather than parked logical processors when it schedules any non-affinitized threads. This lets the parked logical processors become idle, which in turn lets the corresponding processor cores transition into a lower power idle state.
Core Parking is most effective on systems that have processor idle states with extremely low power consumption. When combined with ITTD, Core Parking helps reduce the amount of interrupt activity on systems that run Hyper-V. On systems with processors that include Intel Hyper-Threading Technology, Core Parking is also leveraged to help intelligently schedule work between threads that are running on multiple logical processors in the same processor core.
We have engaged with leading processor vendors to tune the Core Parking policy defaults. System manufacturers are encouraged to change the Core Parking policy parameters only with detailed consultation from the system processor vendor.
Core Parking is supported only on Windows Server 2008 R2. However, the Core Parking algorithm and infrastructure is also used to balance processor performance between logical processors on Windows 7 client systems with processors that include Intel Hyper-Threading Technology."

PS I don`t know whether it is actual for "Windows 7 client systems" but registy keys are all there and it is worth to test...

PPS See also http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/pnppwr/powermgmt/ProcPowerMgmtWin7.mspx

 

Catalyst 12.1 whql released 25/1 : Seems Switchable graphics support has been dropped. If not a bold typo

The following notebooks are not compatible with this release:

Any notebook launched after this driver release
Switchable Graphics enabled notebooks.
Toshiba® notebooks (please contact the notebook OEM for driver support for these notebooks)
Sony® VAIO® notebooks (please contact the notebook OEM for driver support for these notebooks)
Panasonic® notebooks (please contact the notebook OEM for driver support for these notebooks)

http://support.amd.com/us/kbarticles/Pages/AMDCatalystSoftwareSuiteVersion121.aspx

 

^sounds like switchable graphics refers to the intel/amd switching. not our llano

 

Seems false positive, as same message appears on 11.11 and forth. On different note any one tried that custom profile feature of 12.x release which does not work for me on preview build or may be was doing that wrong. Now can't wait to know dmn RMA

 

@mbk - So do you see any performance increases with any of that?

 

Figured out how to run Ubuntu 11.10 on the k53ta.

Ubuntu Forums - View Single Post - [ubuntu] asus k53tA

 

Well, I didn`t perform multiple tests but I feel some increased smoothness in games and definitely CPU temps are little lower. I`ve only tweaked "Processor performance core parking min cores" and "Processor performance decrease/increase policy". Also WEI raises from "6.9" to "7.1".

 

more importantly, the Radeon HD 6600/6700m series cards are specifically NOT included in the list of supported cards. All of the cards surrounding them above and below are listed! The 6520g is listed by itself.
Edit: It seems that the 6600/6700m are not listed on the 11.12 drivers either, but this line is included:
"AMD Vision Engine Control Center enhancements for Dual Graphics
· Improvements have been implemented to better facilitate the enabling and control of the Dual Graphics within the Vision Engine Control Center "
http://support.amd.com/us/kbarticles/Pages/AMDCatalystSoftwareSuiteVersion1112.aspx

 

Remember that AMD changed the name from CrossfireX to Dual Graphics in the 11.something update. So Switchable Graphics probably does mean the intel/amd combos but no way for us to be sure.

 

I have installed 12.1 mobile catalyst and switchable and dual are here. Both 6520 and 6650 are driven by new drivers. Only difference I noticed is when you switch off dual grafics "linked adapter" info on "CCC -> Information -> Hardware" becomes hidden.

PS I do not trust AMD web drivers installation, so I took drivers directly here
http://www2.ati.com/drivers/mobile/12-1_mobility_vista_win7_32_dd_ccc_ocl.exe

 

All I can say is that they need some more updates to get this thing working flawlessly. I would make tests for fixes but Asus has HORRID RMA support so I gotta wait longer -.-

 

Anyone try Skyrim on this setup yet? I have it for XBox but looks so much better for PC... any thoughts

 

Read some pages back. Gist: runs pretty good at high settings on native screen res.

 

Yuss. Turned off antialiasing and I can run it on max settings just fine on the native resolution.

 

My experience went smoothly with no issues. Sorry to hear that!

 

Any one tried that custom profile feature of 12.x Catalyst release

 

@gumba123

Any new cooling mods on your k53?

 

Any thoughts at all? I'd appreciate the input from knowledgeable people such as yourselves.

 

I purchased from Bestbuy also 5 months ago, but was one of the many lucky ones with a good laptop. Unfortunately with battery life, I rarely use my battery so not enough testing feedback, but usually I get what you get ~about 3.5 to 4 hours without overclock and on Battery mode with LCD brightness at the lowest setting of 1 just doing simple things like reading pdf files and very little internet usage. Maybe if the wifi is shut off it will last a little longer, but I never tried that. I try to use an electrical adaptor most of the time even when I'm on the road.

Sorry to hear about your bad experience. I've heard this laptop has given some people fits with LCD screen blacking out, motherboard failure, power bricks dieing, and overheating. These all sound like potential problems from all laptop brands and make.
Even all of us here are never free from the risk of potential motherboard failure or something else burning out due to overheating-so it could happen to any of us in the coming year or more. It's something I fear a little since I never took an extended warranty (It sucks that despite ASUS being known as a good company that their tech support and repair can still be a dang sham.) . So I'm just hoping nothing ever goes wrong. If it does there will be no choice but to use their 1 year warranty service. I don't trust repairs from anyone so you just hope these things never fail on us. If you were good at fixing laptops yourself then you could check if ASUS made a shoddy repair.

So it's probably smart to take an extended warranty on all laptops these days.(I'll probably regret it if mine blows out in the next year or 2). It will probably cost $200+ to repair a $400 laptop--by then it may be smarter to buy another newer laptop. The only other thing we can do is minimize our laptop usage when at home by using our desktop (reducing the chance of failure from overusage) - but that's hard for me to do when my laptop performs faster & plays games better than my 4 year old dual core desktop .

 

Hmmm, well that's actually very good to hear. I try to keep it on the charger as well, but it's nice to be able to leave it behind at home sometimes. Perhaps I've become a bit paranoid with all the problems. At this point it honestly wouldn't surprise me if they messed something up in the repair; the two times I've sent it in they haven't even put my case back together correctly. I've been a little reluctant to take it apart thus far in fear of them blaming me for breaking the case or being the cause of any other problems. I have fully intended on repasting this monster since the day I bought it.

Yes, these days extended warranties are probably worth it because many manufactures have a no questions asked type policy in replacing your machine. My first reaction is to always say no to extended warranties, but I'm slowly changing my opinion. I'd rather avoid ever having to speak to a member of the Geek Squad for the remainder of my life; they seem to know so little about computers it infuriates me. Because of this I figured an extended warranty with Best Buy would have done me little good down the road. And like you say, a few years from now this computer may not even be worth the money spent on a warranty anyways, so who knows.

Thanks for the input, I appreciate the help. Time to undervolt and overclock!

 

hello, i recently bought this laptop becuase there were people saying it could run bf3 well and it had a great price. Now as i play bf3 im only getting on average 25 30 fps. everything is set to low, high performance mode is on xfire is off, and gamebooster is enabled. I have not OC'd it or anything like that. I was hoping I could run it between 35 and 55 fps, If anyone knows how to get that kind of performance without OCing please let me know. Thanks

 

OC is a must for A6.
Not necessary for GPU.

Default settings for CPU are totally fuked up.

 

With overclocking CPU and GPU versus non-overclocking, I think there is on average +10 to +15 FPS improvement.
The greatest improvements are seen with oc CPU with k10stat to around 2.0.- 2.6 ghz during gaming instead of the stock 1.4 to 2.3 ghz. So if you are going to game, then it's in your best interest to atleast oc CPU. Overclocking GPU will provide up to another +5 FPS over oc CPU alone (on Batman AC I benchmarked a +7 improvement with gpu oc of 650/1001).

And make sure you have the AMD 11.12 drivers since they provided the best results so far. The latest 12.1 drivers have been tested to be worse than 11.12: see>> http://benchmark3d.com/amd-catalyst-12-1-whql-and-12-2-preview-benchmark/6
On BF3 I get between 35-60fps on medium settings depending on the complexity of the scene and the resolution I'm playing at -1360x768 or 1440x900 external LCD resolutions.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/asu...607232-k53ta-owners-lounge-8.html#post7977043 --oc gpu

If you are afraid of overclocking while gaming, then you can get a cooling pad, just do minor overclocking so temps don't get too high, and give your laptop a break every hour so things don't stay hot for longer than 1 hr at a time.

 

This computer can run anything and everything. No worries to anyone the only games to worry about are ones that don't have Dx11 if you can't get the dual graphics cards to work with the dx9 games in my case it wouldn't like some others and I could play Medal of Honor with about 30-40 FPS but could drop to ~20 in some areas but I played games like Battlefield 3 with max settings and AAx4 (anything above 4 shows minimal difference) and I was getting really really high FPS but It did like to drop in in certain areas but I never really did test where a LOT of action was going on since I need repairs on my PC. As far as dx9 games I would just do that trick to make the computer use the 6650m instead of the 6520g (if your forced crossfire wont work) which is what I still have to do.

The few games I wouldn't totally recommend are The Witcher 2 and Metro 2033. Although the Witcher 2 looks almost the same on med-ultra so if it plays on medium then you're set.

So far it's heading in the right direction though

 

Hmm but if i do OC would that void my warranty? Also i was reading some forums and few guys were saying they were getting 35-50 fps without OC on caspian border, whereas im only getting 25-30 do you have any recommendations or software programs that could boost up my fps to an average of 40. I was reading some benchmarks for this laptop aswell and this thing can run bfbc2 on high at 40 fps without any issues. So with bf3 i should be getting a minimum of 30 fps on high and im just getting there on low. I dont have a clue about overclocking so i wouldnt ever try that but im just wondering if there are any simple fixes that could boost up the fps, that dont involve any overclocking.

 

Overclocking with software will not void warranty and it is very safe. Just read this thread on page 1 and learn about k10stat.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus/601808-k53ta-best-deal-ever-could.html

Code:

[url=http://aspiregemstone.blogspot.com/2009/06/k10stat-amd-griffin-processor.html]Aspire Gemstone: K10STAT AMD Griffin Processor UnderVolting Guide[/url] ----about k10stat program info.
[url=http://sites.google.com/site/k10stat/]K10stat[/url] ---k10stat 154 program version I'm running.
 ---Copy any of the settings for k10stat in slickdealpost below--
[url=http://slickdeals.net/forums/showpost.php?p=41660379&postcount=879]Slickdeals.net - View Single Post - RETIRED: ASUS K53TA-BBR6 Laptop: AMD Quad-Core A6-3400M 1.4GHz APU, 15.6" LED, 4GB DDR3, 500GB HDD, 1GB AMD Radeon HD 6650, HDMI, WiFi-N, 6-cell, Win 7 Prem 64-bit[/url]

 

For BF3 use this tip located here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-...overclock-optimization-guide.html#post8247097

Adds 5-6 extra FPS.

Heck I can play BF3 using the 6620G in my A8-3510MX (DV6z) at 720p all low settings 25-35fps, so the 6650m should be able to manage better.

 

I wonder if anybody asked for a k53ta modded bios on Bios Mods -The Best BIOS Update and Modification Source

 

Nice! Thanks! That provided me 5 fps improvement. In a scene I was seeing 35-38fps, I see 40-42 minimum now. But I see around 42-52 most of the time. This is all on medium settings & ultra textures at 1360x768; with oc cpu 2.2-2.6ghz, and gpu oc 640/960.

 

I didn't find any. I've already tried to find a modded biod to be able to play with the fan rpm. Nothing successful for me

 

thank you very much for this info, ill try it soon and see how it works out.

 

thank you very much for this info, ill try it soon and see how it works out.

 

ok so i opened up notepad and got into bf3 but i have no idea where to go from there. could you give some instructions, because im kind of a noob at this stuff.

 

Here I made for you to download below: the BF3 user config with the optimization and FPS set to display--just unzip the file and place the user config in same folder as BF3.
If you don't want FPS to be visible, you will need to edit the file by changing the line: from 1 to 0.
eg. render.drawfps 0
(change from 1 to 0 to remove FPS display; & change back to 1 if you want to display FPS again.)

Code:

http://www.mediafire.com/?1xghcs7zrz1cxee
(BF3 user config with the optimization and FPS)

 

now it says internet explorer cannot display the webpage from the link you gave me. instructions might be better so i can do this myself, thanks for helping me out though i really do appreciate it.

 

(The download link from mediafire in previous post opens fine in firefox.)
Regarding BF3 optimization:
Just make a text document file like HTWINGNUT clearley stated:
rename it to user.cfg; I had to use a program called "rename files" to properly rename file as a .cfg file and not a .txt notepad textfile.
Rename Files - Free software downloads and software reviews - CNET Download.com

and edit the user cfg file with these lines in the file: (the 2nd line is to indicate how many FPS you are getting)

"Without" overclocking oc cpu or gpu, I was seeing between 35-52 FPS, so you should be happy! With overclocking I was getting 40-60 FPS.

 

Does BF3 still work faster with the 6650m alone or is dual gpu better?

If it's faster with 6650m alone then where is that guide to change the default from 6520g to the 6650m?

 

With AMD 11.12 drivers and no profiles, I see similar performance in dual gpu and alone...I usually leave my system on 6650 alone. But BF3 was getting same good performance with dual (if it was better then maybe by +1FPS). It's very smooth at 1360x768. Overclock and nonoverclock is very playable on medium settings/ ultra textures...the optimization trick seems to have helped some!

 

It could still be forcing the game to use both but either way I have tried to use the 6650m on other games without dx11 and never works so I will soon try switching the default gpu to 6650m instead of 6520g like others have done.

If I disable the integrated GPU in bios or device manager it will automatically switch to the 6650m when I restart right?

 

not sure about bios editing--no one ever figured it out. Configure switchable graphics has always worked for me--set specific games to high performance. I've heard opengl games like Alice Mcgee & Rage were the types of games where Configure switchable graphics doesn't work (a problem found in all AMD A6/A8 dual radeon gpu laptops).

 

is there a way to only use the 6650 instead of the apu on dx10- games? 'cause I'm playing saint rows 2 and it's laggin as hell and on bf3 its running very smooth .. thanks