U30JC discussion thread

Sorry for my english, but I was thinking about intake vents too. It might be in the front of the notebook, where the speakers are. Got to do some testing

 

Do you have the smart login enabled? If so, disable it and see.

Have you tried it in all of the different modes and it still does it no matter which mode you're in?

Have you tried the first rule of computer (non-server) troubleshooting and rebooted?

 

1) I never installed Smart Login. Cute but not really that effective, and it slows down boot-up.
2) All power modes show the same wake up problem. Not sure, but I think that if I manually set what closing the lid does (ie. sleep) then it is applied across all of the various power modes. Any way, I just tried all power modes, -- no change.
3) Rebooting is the first thing I tried.

So then I tried my second rule of computing: try restoring to a "happier" state. Went back to 7 PM last night. No joy.

I think I'll try restoring back to 24 hrs ago. See what happens.

It has got to be something I installed or updated. The only change was that I tried updating an experimental Optimus video driver Nautis on this forum wanted me to try out.

That may have been what did it.

 

LoL, I would say that would have been the first place I started if I was experimenting and it happened after that!

I have hibernate turned off instead of the default 300 minutes and standby ONLY when lid is closed and not the power button. I only set it in high performance and battery mode, but I had to set it for each (it was part of the power4gear profiles). I spent about 15 minutes going through the profiles I'm going to use the most and setting them for battery life with a hint of performance.

 

Yep. I went through every detailed settings in the Power4Hybrid profiles. Tedious.

More on that later.

A different question. I never have been able to figure out what the Fn+C key was for, since pressing it never did anything (even though I have that pretty blue LED w/ S symbol on that key). This is through three installs of the OS.

I just read in Tech Report's report that pressing Fn+C on their unit resulted in flipping through various Color Correction profiles.

Does your unit do that?

 

I pressed it once and noticed the screen looked like it changed a bit but I was extremely tired last night when I was playing with all that. If I remember correctly, it's right next to the camera on function key?? Like I said, I may only get to mess with it again Friday... I'll see if I have any time whenever I finally get home tonight!


Oh, and I guess I meant power4hybrid instead of gear... I couldn't remember, I was close at least! HAHA

 

Just a random question, I was looking at reviews and someone said that this does not have a "right click button"... is this true? Is it a single button, where you have to do the three-tap thing to get a right click? Thanks!

 

It's a single button that see-saw's/pivots right or left. If you press on the right hand side, it will right click.

 

I am curious on the opinions of the long term durability of the u30jc? I don't want problems, I keep my laptops for 4-6 years with good care. Can the
u30Jc handle this? I understand that ASUS might not be the easiest to deal with for repairs, this is a factor for me also - I prefer no repairs but if I need them I want to be able to get them. I am choosing between.

Asus u30Jc
Thinkpad edge 14
Dell Lattitude E6400

I know there are performance differences but performance is really bad if your computer doesn't work or you have shipped it away.

Thanks for your thoughts.

 

The best advice I believe anyone can give you would be to look at their track record, read up in their forums and see what people say about their laptops and how they do and base you decision on that. Warranty from Asus is actually really good compared to most other manufactures, that did play a part in my decision making as I've never owned a laptop from them but have TONS of motherboards and other components! Unless I really like the benchmarks and what I see on the UL30JT, I plan on keeping this laptop as long as I have my toshiba (just over 10 years so far).

Good luck with your decision!

 

Me too. So when those experimental drivers failed (I'd saved to System Restore b4 I began), I restored back to b4 the drivers, uninstalled both video drivers, (rebooting each time), and then reinstalled both official ASUS site video drivers.

I thought that took care of it. Perhaps not.

But on my Fn+C hotkey ... does yours do anything? Mine doesn't. Did I forget to install something?

My Fn+V doesn't do anything with the webcam either, though I have a camera icon on the V key. I just figured it had to do with launching one of ASUS' webcam apps that I didn't install.

Please let me know if those two hotkey combos do anything on your unit and what they do.

Thanks!

 

Okay, so the restore from yesterday evening didn't fix the sleep+wake-up issue.

Uninstalling, rebooting & reinstalling NVIDIA+Intel VGA drivers, ATK HotKey & ATK Media, and Power4Hybrid also hasn't fixed it.

I'll restore from 2 days ago & see if that does it. If not, reinstall the OS for Quatro.

 

This was a post I answered ya on the other page. I've reflected on it and know for a fact that it changed something on the screen(like colors) and I wondered what it was doing. To answer your other question, yes, the camera button works on mine and I think it's really neat. If you use your webcam for something like Justin.tv and want to play around with filters, colors, things like that...it's nifty!

Do you have anything besides power plugged into the laptop now (Ethernet, USB, hdmi, etc.)? Is there a disk in the disk drive? Have you went into the power settings and see if there's anything set to allow to wake from sleep? Have you tried sleep in both AC and Battery mode and both have the same results (does it do anything different at all between the two?)?

 

delete this please, was supposed to be editing the post above instead of double posting

 

Fn + C will toggle between various gamma corrections: soft, theatre, normal, vivid.
Fn + V opened Lifeframe and camera.

 

When I press Fn+any other hotkey like power settings, wifi, sound, brightness, etc, there is an icon that pops up telling me it's doing something (as I'm sure it does on yours.) But when I press Fn+C ... there's nothing. As if the driver is missing. Perhaps in my reinstalls of the OS, I've left something out. Same with the webcam hotkey Fn+V ... nothing. But I can easily use the webcam (just comes on) when I use Skype or Gmail's video. Very odd. Same with the nVIDIA contrast/brightness settings ... nothing happens. At ALL times, incl HULU HD & DVD movies, it's the Intel HD control panel that affects my contrast & brightness. The nVIDIA tab does nothing. (a problem I posted earlier, but with no response.)

Did you remove any of the ASUS apps or are they all still there? Perhaps I need to install them all & see what happens.

I rarely keep anything plugged into the ports beyond a power plug.

No DVD in the drive.

Nothing is set to allow to wake from sleep (checked that via two help pages on related articles.)

Yes, I've tried sleep in both AC & DC power. Same results, -- nearly instant wake up.

 

Hmm ... I think I'll just install ALL of the ASUS extra apps from the DVD (incl Life Frame, etc) and see what happens.

 

The only things I've removed so far is 2007 office trial and trendmicro. It's actually home right now or I'd check some other things for you, it should be sitting on, with the screen off and downloading about 12348970734123 games on steam, on D drive! (I wanted fresh installs, normally I just move my steam folder over to a new computer but I didn't want all the maps and stuff on my multi games)

The camera Fn+V opens a program, so you know it's working. I don't remember an icon coming up but I had a few windows open when I was hitting the Fn+C.

 

Ah, educational. Now both of my hotkeys work. Perhaps it is Splendid that installs the color correction profiles for the hotkey. I don't know. Life Frame was needed to make the webcam hotkey to work (though it worked anyway in Skype, etc b4 this.)

As you said, I just installed whatever was offered except TrendMicro. Office 2007 I have.

 

Well I hope you get Steam to work for you. I have only about 3 games via Steam and NONE of them worked after download. Really odd. One very NOT graphics intensive (Monkey Island Special Edition.) Repeated downloads (Monkey Island SE & HL2, etc) and all failed on opening.

Then I bought (again) & downloaded Monkey I SE via Direct2Drive and the game played perfectly.

So let me know how well Steam games work on your notebook. I suspected it was Win 7 64-bit that caused the conflict, but never could figure it out.

I did get Fn+C to work now. By "icon" I mean any symbol that came up on the screen to show that a profile was being applied. For Fn+C, it is a little window with a profile name written below it. ... Useful!

 

Oh, Th@n@tos ... I'm healed!

After installing ALL of the offered ASUS programs (though some are just silly to me), ... the sleep mode suddenly works.

No idea why, nor do I care.

Thanks for your help!

I like my U30Jc. Fast for my needs and looks great. (I'm even nearly getting used to the screen with its impossible viewing angles & washed-out blacks. )

 

BTW, has anyone gotten the contrast & brightness controls in nVIDIA Control Panel to actually affect anything?

 

Quatro, I really believe you should start an owners thread. Your posts are very organized and helpful especially with your use of bold font haha


As far as screen quality goes, I am not a picky person. I have a Mini 9 netbook as my portable and my friends hate the screen but I think it's decent!

 

Bold Font? WHAT Bold font?

If we started an Owner's Lounge thread, only the 6 of us who actually bought a U30Jc (or finally found it in stock to buy) would be able to post.

How boring would that be?!

Soon enough, the UL30Jt will come out and everyone will forget there ever was a U30Jc. :cry:

 

Don't worry, I'll pop in every so often

 

Your double and trip posts are killing me, I guess it shouldn't but you definitely have forum ADHD or something! haha

Glad you got your stuff workin'

I got my junk loaded about halfway so far, I tried .avi movies (non HD) in high performance and it looks like it'd go for around 4.5 hours, maybe 5 on a loop.

So far on games I"ve tested are CSS, TF2, MW2, BF2 and should be able to test out FlatOut 2 and HL2:ep1 soon. They all run pretty smooth, CSS benchmark with everything on high yet no AA or AF and native res was 150fps. This laptop doesn't even think or begin to get hot (or hot to me). I was playing with the thing in my lap for a lil while and it was fine.

The Fn+C changes to different color profiles and they have names.

I haven't had a chance to try color profiles in Nvidia, really have no need to as I know it isn't going to fix the gray and black on the LCD but I can if you need me to.

Wireless card is pretty sweet, it will find quite a bit more then my other two computers I have here yet when it connects, it's running in like half duplex mode on transfers..I haven't troubleshot that down yet as you really wouldn't be able to tell unless you're transferring big files (wireless G connecting at 54Mbps transferring files no greater then 2.5MBps; and NO, it's not my internal network as my other computers are fine and get somewhere around 5-6MBps).

Speakers sound fine in a fairly quiet room but if you get to much background noise, you might as well hang it up. I haven't tried my headphones yet but will report when I actually do.

There's a lot more and I could go in depth but I'm exhausted and going to bed! Hopefully it helps others get somewhat of a better image on the laptop and clarify a few things for Quatro.

 

anyone still looking for this laptop, it's in stock at tigerdirect under $790 after BCB.

http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?sduid=843620&t=1989846

grab em before they're gone

 

omg must .... resist..... temptation! i have immunizations i gotta pay for! ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. this is seriously the best deal yet on the notebook!

 

must give in to this awesome deal before you regret it!

 

I had 1/2 day off, and I actually DO have ADHD in real life, so that may account for it(!) I can get obsessive when I'm working through a problem or a question so the impulsivity comes out in thinking-out-loud posts ... especially if I have free time. Sorry everyone.

You're right, if it's not right in a basic bootup black screen (in low light) then no Control Panel can fix it. Improve it a bit? Perhaps.

It's just strange to me why NVIDIA's control panel isn't affecting color brightness & contrast ... ever. I was curious if sliding the brightness bar over to white affected anything. On mine, only the Intel CP affects things.

Mine downloads at 5-6Mbps like my other notebooks so no idea why yours is not performing up to speed. Mine finds a crazy number of connections here (13), while my 1000HA (with Intel card) sees 6 and the Macbook sees 7.

Wish I could help!

 

Why didn't they put a 330M in it? I am more than willing to pay more for it.

 

$790!? Great price.

 

Still curious if anyone is daring enough to find out if the processor is socketed and if a Core i5 or i7-620 will work! I don't mind losing a little bit of battery life for what is likely a pretty significant boost in processing power. I'm planning to grab the U33 Bamboo (which is rumored to have no optical drive, giving them more room for cooling, which probably explains the 1Gb 310 as opposed to the 512 in the U30.), and if there's a socket and BIOS compatibility on the U30, there is likely to be the same on the U33 as they are indicated to have equal processor compatibility on the AsusWorld magazine scans!

 

mmmm the side view shots of the u30jc makes it look really fat. kinda off-putting

 

that was my first impression when looking at some pictures online, however now that im actually holding it and carrying it around it feels very nicely sized, in every way, actually. Maybe if your comparing it to somthing really thin like the MBP it might seem a little thick, but it weighs about the same. And compared to those ugly HP notebooks or dells, this thing looks beautiful IMO.

 

yeah i think you could be right. its because our school is full of macs and i awe at their slimness and its style. But i dont know, i think i might hop on the ul30jt bandwagon.

 

Although this deal doesn't work anymore, if someone was even remotely thinking about buying a U30JC and passed it up I'm going to have to say they have mental issues! I would have only been so lucky to save close to 100 bucks!

 

can anyone please take photos of the laptop and post it here?

 

What are you wanting to see that's different from any of the reviews and we should be able to help you out.

 

I bet you'll like the UL30Jt. It's just as thin as the MBP, about an inch, and with no optical drive, it's lighter (much lighter than the MBP). The battery life is rated at 10 hrs instead of the UL30Vt's 12 due, I think, to the i-series processors consuming more power.

The i5-520 isn't as fast as the i3-350 (2.26GHz) in the U30Jc (though TurboBoost & Turbo33 may push that up to close to the same speed), but it comes down to how much power you really need and what apps are pushing it and how much away-from-the-plug battery life you feel you need.

I think, if you want an i-processor and NO DVD drive and lighter weight, go for the UL30Jt. You won't be sorry.

Reviews on it, once it's released, should help you decide as well. It sounds like it really is coming out soon.

It's description on the ASUS page describe it as having a "fingerprint-resistant matte black metallic palm rest" so it's a matte plastic palm rest unlike the U30Jc's brushed aluminum palm rest (I REALLY like my aluminum palm rest.)

It sounds great to me. A tech person savvy in processor architecture can better answer your question about speed compared to a 2GHz C2D. I don't understand such things.

All I can say is that my i3 is plenty fast for me. Win 7 flies.

 

Yeah, my mouth dropped open when I saw the price w/ BCB. I paid $899 on Amazon just 15 days ago.

I'm still glad I have this notebook, just wish I could have gotten it for $100 less.

 

TheRandomGuy, were you able to look at these reviews? They include some excellent photos:

http://www.laptopmag.com/review/laptops/asus-ul30jc-1a.aspx?page=1
http://techreport.com/articles.x/18778
http://hothardware.com/Articles/Asus-133-U30Jc-Notebook-Review/

And don't be unnerved by seeing the U30Jc sitting atop the svelt, sleek & thin MBP ... the U30Jc IS about 1/4" thicker. But the MBP is in a design class all by itself IMO (although that Sony VAIO Z looks amazing).

The UL30Jt will be about as thin as that MBP, due to loosing that optical drive and will weigh 3.7 lbs compared to the MBP's 4.5 lbs.

But if it's photos you want, those review links have plenty, esp the Laptopmag's image gallery:
http://www.laptopmag.com/review/newgallery.aspx?id=41407

And here's a GREAT YouTube video walk-around (4 1/2 min) by GenTechPC without words showing the closeups and all sides of the U30Jc. We couldn't give you better than that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caVYPN5mmNg&feature=related

 

I was able to snag one, it should darrive on 04/27

 

Does asus sell like for the thinkpad an hard drive enclosure to repalce the dvd rom by a hard drive/ssd?

 

Sweet, I think you'll like it! :wink:

I haven't found one if they do. It's not posted up on their site anywhere to my knowledge and I searched around for a while on it at one point in time looking at backlit keyboards and such.

 

The ASUS U30JC is back in stock on Amazon.

 

If it was, it's sold out again... that was a whopping 10 min

 

i think you're able to place orders now but this message still shows:

 

http://techreport.com/articles.x/18778/3

i was just reading the review on techreport and as noted earlier, i had a question regarding 2-finger scrolling. it seems this reviewer differs from what you say, quatro

 

oh, I haven't seen where it wouldn't let you place orders. It's had that 2 to 4 weeks message up just about every day since they came out. LoL