U30JC discussion thread

Has anyone had success running Skyrim? According to System Requirements Lab my A1 should be able to run it (it is above the minimum settings) but I was curious if any fellow owners had experience running Skyrim.

 

I would not ever take 'minimum' requirements as worth anything other than marketing fluff.

The following 'recommended' requirements for Skyrim lists a quad core cpu - leaving our U30Jc's out in the cold with their lowly i3 350's.

See:
System Requirements of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim | PC Game Requirements

 

My u30jc is acting up! I got a BSOD out of nowhere and upon rebooting, it fails to recognize my the nvidia graphics and defaults to low-res. Cannot access the Intel or Nvidia graphics control panels, and I tried reinstalling the nvidia driver, but it tells me it can't find any nvidia graphics card!!

Has this happened to anyone? This sounds like a hardware failure.

 

Lavabug,

sorry to hear about your issues - did you get it resolved?

I would try the following:

Unplug AC adaptor. Remove Battery. Press any and all buttons including the power button to remove any static electricity and/or residual power in the circuits.

If the above doesn't work, I would repeat the above but before I did, I would download the latest available Video Driver from our support pages and then I would go to Programs and Features and Remove the nVidia driver. Then, I would go to device manager and Remove the Video Card (also check any box that says to remove the drivers too). Do a full shutdown (not a reboot).

Upon installing the latest Asus supplied drivers, I hope that your system will be running normally.

See:
http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/Drivers/VGA/nVidia/VGA_nVidia_Win7_64_Z817126830.zip


From here:

See:
ASUSTeK Computer Inc. -Support- Drivers and Download U30Jc

Good luck.

 

Thanks for the reply, I ended up solving the problem. Called up ASUS and they suggested I go into the bios and choose "safe defaults", which resulted in windows not starting up, so I bit the bullet and formatted. All works well now, and better than ever! The the long-standing Intel driver-crash problem upon waking from hibernate that me and others used to have posted about seems to have been completely eradicated, probably since I did a fresh install with the newest (asus) version of the integrated gfx driver.

 

Good to hear it is working now.

Seems rather drastic to format and re-install (for some people) but that is truly the only way to get 100% results.

This is why System Restore is always disabled first thing after a clean Win7 install.

 

I'm thinking about selling my Asus U30JC-B1 soon and purchasing a Asus Transformer Infinity.

Specs (Just in case you forgot)
Newegg.com - ASUS U30 Series U30JC-B1 Notebook w/ NVIDIA Optimus Intel Core i3 370M(2.40GHz) 13.3" 4GB Memory DDR3 1066 320GB HDD 5400rpm DVD Super Multi NVIDIA GeForce 310M+Intel GMA HD

What do you guys think I could get for it?

Have any of you sold yours recently? What did you get for it?

Thanks for any help

 

Hey guys,

I recently formatted my u30jc with a clean windows cd and all is going well, installing all the drivers. but i when i'm trying to update my BIOS, for some reason, it won't allow me to download any of the BIOs utility. when i try to install them, it tells me that the Windows Flash Bios utility is only for Asus products. I know it has been mentioned that you can also update BIOS through startup but i haven't gotten that to work either. Has anyone else experienced this? Thanks!

 

Does the ASUS U30Jc notebooks can be installed inside the laptop 3g modem?

 

Having had this laptop for nearly two years now, I would like to clean its fan, as it's fan seems to be working harder now (and the exhaust air is quite warm). Is there any easy way to do this, without taking it apart completely?

 

Has anyone had any luck with the UL30 backlit keyboard mod on our U30JC? I was wanting to attempt it but I know nothing about wiring. And where to find +5v and grounds

 

get some canned air, and pry open the keyboard (those 4 clips you see at the top of the keyboard, use something like a flathead screwdriver

use the can, blow it into the fan, facing out. Make sure you do it in a ventilated area

 

I need to clean out the fan assembly on an Asus U30JC model.

Does anyone know where I can get the service manual with disassemble instructions.

It's a French Canadian model that came with an i5 sandy bridge.

I'm also interested in sourcing the english keyboard for it.

 

Do someone Know the differences among this model and U30SD ?

Ii'm considering if buy it, new, (i3) or a second hand Lenovo X220 (i5).

I'm particularly interested into have insights about keyboard and build quality but also the display aspect is a point to consider.

thks

 

I hope that there are still people coming across this thread nowadays .

I have a U30JC that is now 2 years old, and left mousebutton on the touchpad stopped working: it is in the normal "up" mode, and can be pushed down, but won't give any click (it just gives in, after which it slowly moves up again). The right mouse is still working perfectly (giving a nice clicky sound). Does anyone have any experience repairing this? If I were to open/disassemble the laptop, would I have access to the back of the buttons without having to "break" things (e.g. cutting tapes /cables etc)? I can't seem to find this problem anywhere on the internet.

 

Hopefully there are some still reading this thread!

I spilled a bit of coffee on the keyboard of my U30JC, and then some of the keys stopped working or, more commonly, key other characters - i.e. press the "i" key and a "5" shows up, and so forth. The affected keys are in the middle-right section of the board. I figured that the keyboard itself was probably compromised and that replacing it should do the trick. I bought a replacement and just connected it, and lo and behold, that did not fix the problem. So the problem must lie deeper within, but I have no clue what to do now. I assume that the liquid must have gotten into the connector.

Is this even worth fixing or figuring out now? What would I have to do?

Thank you!

 

I've used RealTemp 3.0 to see my CPU's temperature, it is over 90° C under load!!! The fan seems to be operating not at 100%, I don't hear too much noise from notebook. How do I know the percentage of fan's speed?
I'm going to clean it from dust. But why does fan not operate at 100% to cool down CPU? Is there some application to configure fan speed? I tried SpeedFan 4.49, but it doesn't allow to configure fan, seems like it doesn't support this notebook.

 

Your u30JC is 2-4 yrs old and is Overheating with noisy fan as soon as your cpu is under load for a minute?
Mine too, here is what i did to silence my baby and and prolong its life.Yes Heat is very bad for cpu/motherbaord,it reduces performance and seriously decrease its lifespan.

First download this nifty free app to read temperature of the motherboard and cpu. If cpu temp is over 65c under zero load,and above 75c under cpu load then cleaning is required.

HWMonitor CPUID - System & hardware benchmark, monitoring, reporting


The Main culprit:

Dust clotted inside the exit duct of the fan.I noticed there is some grease to oil the fan motor and with time it gets agglomerated with dust and blocks the exit duct.






After Cleaning:



The Lazy way:

You're not a techie/geek and you don't want to disassemble your u30jc as there is a LOT of screws like 40-50 screws, its a 2-3 hours job and its a pain really.

Use a Vacuum cleaner.

With the vacuum powerful airflow, aspire as much dust as possible from the air vent of the laptop. The inside of the laptop is solidly attached/ screwed and can endure gusty conditions.

Remove the brush from your vacuum and use the hose or a crevice tool attachment if available.
If you have high/ medium/low setting on your vacuum. Start vacuum on Low mode.
Aspire for 1 minute move the the hose slowly around the air vent, right to left, up and down. Do not block the entire vent with the hose always leave some space for air to get in.
Then 1 minute on High settings, don't move the hose much.
And lastly another minute on medium/low settings.
So 3 minutes in all is my recommendation, you can try longer, up to you.

Do not use a blower or hair dryer.Only vacuum cleaner.

Results not guaranteed as i didn't perform the lazy task. But hopefully it will remove some dust clot and reduce heating a little.so please share your results with the Cpuid app and compare the temp before and after that operation for us to know how effective this trick is.



The Good Way:


We need access to the fan and exit duct and for that, complete dis-assembly is required.

There might be another culprit,it is the thermal paste that links the cpu/gpu to heatsink that needs to be replaced with a more effective one. I used artic silver and grated the paste which seemed dry and put new paste.


Tools needed:
A pry tool ( or flat screwdriver )
small Philips screwdriver
Small brush
Thermal paste ( Amazon.com: Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound 3.5 Grams: Computers & Accessories or with cleaner to remove dust/old paste: Amazon.com: Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound 3.5 Grams with ArctiClean 60 ML Kit: Computers & Accessories )
optional: Silicone oil ( Amazon.com: GHK Silicone Oil (30ml): Sports & Outdoors )

There are 3 sets of screws to remove. On the Back, Under keyboard and motherboard. And most screws needs to be removed..

First before shutting down your laptop open the disc tray then shut down.
Remove battery,disconnect power cord, remove sd card, and all usb peripherals.

Remove all screws located on the back of the laptop.
After that take off the dvd drive, pulling the tray out, it will come off.
You will see 3 additional screws to unscrew!, on the edge where the disc tray was located.

Remove the Hard disk. After removing the disk , there are 4 additional screws inside 3 on top, and 1 on right bottom in a deep hole.


With a pry tool/flat crewdriver remove the keyboard. Disconnect the keyboard cable by lifting up the white connector.
Take off all screws.

Now we can remove the cover with the help of the pry tool.

Now we have access to motherboard, Remove all screws you can find, even the small ones on the fan.

when lifting the motherboard disconnect the white connector below.

Now take off screws off the fan.and disconnect fan connector and you'll be able to open the fan and clean it with a small brush. I also put a drop of synthetic/silicon oil on the pin of the fan propeller.Makes the fan runs more silently.


Grate the old thermal paste from the heatsink and with the artic cleaner 2 wipe off the paste from the cpu and gpu.

Put new thermal paste both on the heatsink, and on the gpu/cpu with a bank/plastic card

See video how to apply paste ( How to Apply Thermal Compound to a CPU - YouTube)


Don't forget to connect back:
the fan connector to the motherboard, that powers the fan.
the white connector to the m/board
the wifi module and black/white cable!
else you'l be royally screwed and have to unscrew again if you miss any of these!!

You can find some pictures here:

u30 - Imgur

Now you can screw everything back.

Happy screwing!

My temp cpu/motherboard turns around 50-60c and rarely exceed 65c.

 

Maybe just a software issue and NumLock is engaged
Press keys: Fn + Insert/NumLk


Then try to see if affected keys are working.

 

@Gizmoh, thanks a lot for the long explanation! After 2 peers complained about my fans making too much noise (they both own a macbook air), I thought I should clean the fan and grilles inside my u30. After unscrewing all screws at the back I didn't feel any flex in the bottom part yet..... So after reading your post about the amount of work it'd actually take to get to the fan, I decided to stop this little adventure and go for the "easy way".

Anyway, for those interested, the "easy way" of cleaning your laptop by just putting a vacuum cleaner right next to the air outlet seems to work very well! Here's my results:
To get my CPU to it's maximum temperature, I used Cinebench, which did a great job pushing the CPUs to 100% all the time. I played it twice to make sure there was no more thermal drift. For some extra heat, I had a 1080p youtube movie play (such that the NVIDIA would also do some heat generation). Not very scientific but the results are pretty significant!

Before vacuuming
Idle temperature: roughly 65/62 (core1 / core2 according to HWMonitor)
Full load temperure: 86/84

After vacuuming
Idle temperature: 50/40
Full load temperature: 70/67


Some notes:
1] I used a very powerfull vacuum cleaner that went all the way up to 1700 rpm (lowest setting: 300). I first vacuumed for about a minute on the lowest mode, then for about two minutes on the highest setting, whilst giving little flicks to the laptop in case dust got stuck somewhere. I think the power of your vacuum really matters!
2] I wouldn't know why there's a constant difference between CPU temperatures, maybe one of the two is better fitted with thermal paste?


Anyway, I didn't check my fan speeds before the cleaning, but I can check them now: 3150 rpm idle and 3820 on full load. (not sure what the min/max would be?). Over 3000 rpm feels a bit like an overkill for me whilst idling, I might experiment with the fan speeds some other time.

 

kosonik. happy to help.

15 degrees difference on idle mode is a great achievement. So I suggest every owner to go with the easy way first !

And you are right, the more powerful the air suction of the vacuum, the better.

It is normal that the core 1 on cpu produces more heat as more apps use only the 1st core of the cpu. as many apps aren't optimized to spread processing load on both cores.

Fan speed is automatically regulated depending on the cpu/motherboard heat, so it should run more silently at lower rpm.

 

can anyone comment on the longevity of the asus u30jc - i sold mine a couple months back, but if this thing is durable i want to pick one up. thanks.

 

hello everyone , can someone help me with the full bios image froman asus u30jc , cause after i flashed the last bios image 217 , my laptop is dead and i need the full (4 MB) image from another u30jc for reprogramming the bios .
Any help will be apreciated ...

 

Hey guys, I'm in the market to replace the battery for my U30JC. Mine came with the 8 cell 5600mah 84whr A42-UL50. When looking for a replacement, I keep seeing third party and OEM A32-UL50 batteries with similar specifications as my old battery from sites that claim compatibility with the U30JC. Is this battery compatible with my computer? Thanks!

 

Probably yes as to the quality of the replacement and how long it lasts would be pot luck.

 

Thanks! I'll have to roll the dice then. It's hard to wrap my head around all these different model numbers with the same exact specs and little info about the differences between the batteries.

 

I would go for an official replacement, it's safer.

 

Greetings,
I have tried to upgrade the stock AR9285 WiFi card on the U30Jc with Intel centrino Wireless 6200n - no luck
The device manager gives an error code 10 the device can not start.
ve tried with latest and with some older drivers incl. the one downloade with intel's driver update utility.
The 6200n card i being correctly detected, with successfull driver installation, but can not start.
The system is Win 7 x64 Entrprise SP1 with all the updates.
All the latest drivers from the U30Jc support url are also present.

Can anyone help me?