W3J, same issues as W3V?

It sounds like some lucky people are getting their W3Js very soon. Be it a review by one of them or just someone knowledgable, I was hoping someone could answer this question:

Will the W3J share in the issues widely reported with the W3V? Specifically, the W3V was said to (1) get pretty hot, and (2) have mediocre battery life < 3 hrs., even with the 8 cell battery. Will the W3J suffer from these issues?

Just to add this, I've already committed even knowing these issues might exist with the W3J -- I still think it will be an awesome machine. I ordered my W3J from ProPortable this past weekend and can't wait. But I've been curious about this for a while so I thought I'd ask. Thanks in advance!

 

What issues???

Who said mediocre battery life? It has great battery life, plus the new W3J's videocard uses less power than the old x600, so it should be fine.

Heat is subjective. Some found it hot as heck, but others found it fine. I got to play with one that was on for HOURS at an Asus display event, and it was pretty warm, but you can always run it in lower power modes to run it cooler. This display model was probably on max settings for the whole day, which would heat up any notebook.

If you want one, get one, these issues are not issues at all.

Cheers,
Mike

 

Well, what do you expect?

Can't expect it to be cool and long battery life, knowing the specs of the machine beforehand.

I'll bet it will be warm, and loud, when using it under heavy usage, but, is isn't going to be a surprise.

 

You can use the optional 6 cell optical bay battery. I know I am going to be useing it. Heat never bothers me much.

 

Can't be as hot as a 17" running GF7800GT.

It's been said to have 4-5 hours of batt life which is very good imo

 

Depends on which notebook you're talking about. However, 17" notebooks allow for better cooling systems since they're than a 14" notebook, so I'd say a 17" notebook would probably run cooler.

 

First, most people who *****ed about the W3v being hot were expecting far too much...... but with that said, if you think the system will be any cooler with a 256mb ATI x1600 graphics card in it... you'd be nuts...... I'm have and will continue to stress this performance comes at a cost and that cost obviously isn't the physical price and it's most likely going to have to come at cost of comfort because that graphics card can pump out some heat. Until I have a final production model in my hands that I can use for a long period of time, I'm not going to be able to say otherwise, but I believe there are ways to crank that gpu down and therefore, under normal use, it shouldn't be a problem...... but while gaming that SHOULD get pretty hot - albeit, it's still obviously under the fail point by a long shot....... but it should certainly get hot.



But basically the worst things said about the W3 should be multiplied based on the new configuration.... and if you're not satisfied with that, you shouldn't get one...... I loved the W3v for the 9 months I used one and I thought everyone who said anything bad about it was out of their mind (I know a lot of other people felt the same way as me), but with all this performance has to come a certain understanding...... A ultralow voltage system witha 4200rpm hard drive and integrated graphics is not going to run the same way something like the W3 will run......... it's impossible....... but for what's coming in the W3j, it's going to be on par with what it should be doing.... if that makes any sense.

 

since we're at it,
just to confirm,
is the w3j gonna have the same screen that the w3v has?
or has asus used a diff screen manufacturer (no longer fujitsu)

just wanted to know if i read reviews on the w3v screen, or go out there and take a look at the w3v screen, i can expect the same from a w3j?

 

People keep saying that the more powerful GPU will make things hotter than before with the x600, but I'm pretty darn sure I read that it draws less power and runs cooler than the previous generation GPUs.

Sooooo, if I read correctly, heat should be similar if not less than the previous W3V.

 

The terms "draw less power and runs cooler" are subjective... maybe they mean clock-for-clock... but what if the new GPU is clocked higher? Maybe "previous generation" means 2 or 3 generations ago...There are many factors other than the ones we can see...

I'm sure it'll be just as hot as the W3V... which isn't really that hot. People make too big a deal out of it.

 

Just don't keep it on your lap. The upper right side (where the vent is) could give you a leg waxing (with out the wax ).

 

I tend to think the hard drive area gets the hottest... (which would be near your crotch when on your lap...)

Sperm beware!

 

Well for some that's a bonus. Asus should add its a male contraceptive to the specifications.

 

Perhaps Justin or Primetime could awnser this. What was/is the actual battery life of the W3V. I think its fair to assume the W3J will have around the same. And how much did the battery life increase with the extra bay-battery?

 

the battery life of a w3v is 3-4 hours. when underclocking and undervolting. 3.5 hours is easy to get.

 

So does this mean that without underclocking and undervolting, it might run less than 3 hours? I read reviews on PCMag, Laptop Mag, CNet, etc., and they all reported sub-3 hr battery life for the W3V (w/o the media bay battery). I'd also suspect the battery life will be similar in the W3J, but of course it has a Core Duo and an x1600 -- I've heard a lot of conflicting ideas about whether they draw less or more power than the W3V specs.

As far as heat, I'm sure it'll get hot and it doesn't bother me enough for me to NOT get a w3J -- like I said I already ordered one b/c its performance sounds like it will be 150% worth it -- but I was just curious. And of course so are my sperm. I don't think there is any way that an x1600 will run cooler than an x600. It may have better power management and draw less power overall, but I have to think its higher clock will pump out some heat.

Speaking of which, anyone have info as to whether the x1600 will be underclocked in the W3J, and by how much? Obviously it can be changed, but I'm thinking maybe they underclocked because otherwise you'd be able to fry eggs on the case.

 

Heat production is proportional to power use. Power in = power out, and in the chip there is conversion from electrical to heat while it's doing its work. Less power consumption means it basically can't be producing more heat AND doing more work. So if this is the case (that it consumes less power than the x600) then it won't be hotter. Maybe as hot, but not hotter.

Jay

 

I get around 3 hours an 32 mins on my laptop with brightness turned down to 50%.

The GPU is also a factor in the battery life, so install PowerPlay and configure the settings to compensate for when the laptop is running on battery. I also noticed that the GPU is the hottest thing running on the laptop. Cause when it's running full blast, the temperature of the laptop jumps up. I think it's because the CPU and the GPU only have one vent allotted to them.

The hot air from the GPU increases the ambient temp around the CPU so the reported temp of the CPU is high.

 

Battery life will vary person to person based on their useage, but I see it vary day to day depending on my settings......... The backlight honestly takes up a lot of power and there are some crazies out there who insist on leaving it at 100%... but under normal use, I think 50-60% is way more than enough while in any indoor situation and 25%-30% being WAY more than enough for a dark room at night..... the higher levels are for really REALLY bright indoor spaces or outside.

3-4 hours is normal for the W3v... some can get 5.. and some will get 2.5 (say maxed out settings and maybe using a hitachi 7200rpm drive)...... but I'd say 3.5 is what I see on an average basis.

The new chipset and cpu is using less power, and the new gpu should in reality use more power...... so I think it'd be decent to expect around the same life....... but certainly not more. If we can get more life out of the new one, it would be amazing... but at the same time Asus wouldn't use the x1600 in it if the life would end up being worse... but they'd be ok with the same life.

 

Dont trust those Cnet tests. One the default for asus laptops is to run near full blast. Of course if you dont try to concerve power its not gonna get 3 hours. No laptop will. Other than a ULV. You have to underclock it thats what the intel chips are made to do. the w3v has better than average battery life. as for underclocking and undervolting it should be done. Who wouldnt want a cooler running laptop. I dont understand why intel doesnt have a program like CHC. But doing office work and internet. underclocked with 100% brightness you can get 3 hours.

 

CNet might not have the best reviews and they certainly aren't immune to making mistakes, but you should read how they test Windows laptops. In particular:

Anyways, I'd expect the W3J to get about the same battery life as the W3V, the X1600 has a higher max TDP than even the X700, but hopefully the improved Powerplay means it won't suck up as much juice when idle.

 

another problem for W3V is the sound volume when playing DVD. It's much weaker than normal laptop sound volume. Hopefully, W3j don't have this issue.

 

the speakers in the w3v are just extremely weak. I think it will carry over but i could be wrong. All i know is the v6va had AWSOME speakers. and its a thinner laptop. wish they could do something for their new notebooks.

 

See my post in the W3J benchmark thread for a partial explanation why DVDs are quieter than other sounds. It is possible that the W3V is weaker than others in general, but DVDs are deliberately quieter by nature.

Jay

 

Its best to go into the dvd player software and changing it to loud enviroment setting. Makes a tad louder.

 

DVD playback volume is a software issue........ media player and many other dvd decorders volume is a LOT lower than most would enjoy... Nvidia's player has always worked the best for me, but it's still some what lower than a cd would play..... but like I said, it's not just a W3 issue... or an Asus issue.....

 

I used the same PowerDVD player on my gf's NEC laptop and my old dell laptop, and the dvd playback volume on those two machines are much better than my W3V's. It could just be a software problem that W3V doesn't work well with PowerDVD. I guess I should start looking for another media player.

 

another minor problem with my W3V is the paint on the palm rest (left hand side) started to fade after some extensive gaming (Guild Wars ) for two months. I guess I shouldn't have taken the sticker off so that it can protect the paint. But the sticker really destroy the cool look of W3V. I have been trying to make the paint of the rest of the palm rest to fade as well so that the color looks a little more uniform (don't try this at home !!!). In fact, I kinda like the color after the paint has faded, because it is a little darker and it matches well with the rest of the machine .

 

But it can't be denied that the Asus W3V has weak speakers compared to the rest of the competition. It is one of it's weak points.

 

I almost never post, but I read this forum a lot and I get fired up about the DVD/volume issue, because it's the only thing that bothers me about the w3v, which is an otherwise awesome laptop.

It can't be just a software issue for the DVD volume. I agree that DVD volume is always quieter than for CDs, mp3s, etc., but that doesn't excuse not being able to hear a DVD movie being played. I bought a little $30 external USB sound card from Turtle Beach. It's the size and weight of a little thumb drive, just a few ounces. I can plug my basic cheap-o earbuds into that and watch a movie with plenty of volume, I have to turn it down from max volume or it will hurt my ears. Using the same earbuds and the same software with the exact same settings, but when plugging my earbuds into the laptop's headphone port, I can hardly hear the movie, especially dialogue in a fairly quiet room. I tried this on both AsusDVD and WinDVD. I have cranked up every single setting available inside and outside of the software and it's still not acceptable. These same earbuds with the same software on my old Compaq and my gf's ****py Dell laptops had perfectly acceptable volume and I didn't have to tweak every setting I could find, you could easily hear a movie with headphones or without.

I mean, when I'm at my desk, plugged into external speakers, they get plenty loud and the sound quality is very good. It's not a sound quality issue as much as a volume issue. But don't expect to watch a movie on an airplane without super expensive headphones or an external sound card on this laptop. I doubt they will fix this issue on the w3j, because most people deny that it's a problem.

 

Does anyone know if 'thekingdavid' has addressed this point in the 20-page thread going on the W3J?

 

Just thought I'd throw this out to everyone complaining about battery life on the w3v.. I've used Many laptops ( mainly dells ) and NONE of them even get 3hrs battery life... so if this thing gets 2.5 - 3.5hrson average that is AWESOME!

Maybe i'm the crazy one but here is roughly what i get:

d600 = ~1hr 50min
d800 = ~2hr 30min
inspirion 8200 = ~ 2hr
sharp mv13(?) = ~1hr
fujitsu s6100 = ~1hr

both the sharp and fujitsu are beat up p3 laptops so i'm sure they got better battery life in their prime.

 

The D600 one is definitely off. You must have been using the low capacity 4-cell battery or the battery must have been badly degraded. I've used the 600m, D600 and D610 with the 53Wh 6-cell main battery and they all get over 3 hours with the screen at max brightness (150nit screens). The Dell's 48Wh modular bay battery adds another 3 hours.

 

I have a very simple answer for you. No and No. The reviews you have read were not very accurate. The w3 never got any hotter then any of other asus laptops and the battery life was exactly what it was expected to be. Again i caution where you read reviews and who they are written by. Not to say that i write the best reviews but i do speak for 99% of people when i do write mine. Here is plain proof. Out of a few hundreds of z63a's sold in a 9 month period we have had a combined rma of 2. One was for a scratched lid which was done by the customer after assembly the other was for a faulty wifi port which was not faulty. A piece of green tape was stuck to one of the pins in the port. So in all after one year 0 defect rate. Compared to the z70v/a which has about a 5% defect rate (mostly minor issues not even including ghosting). So i must say most reviewers out there really dont know what they are saying and what is standard and normal. Just to recap. There never was any problems with heat, overheating harddrives, or whatever. The only real issue and again depends on the user are the eraeable palm rest. Over the course of the year the z63 and w3 were by far the most realiable.

 

thanks geared2play, glad to hear asus laptops are that realiable b/c i am thinking of picking up a w3j myself.

 

I cant speak for the w3j but i can say the w3v and w3a (z63a) were most reliable last year. Infact to reliable. They dont break. It may be becuase women love them and it wasnt very popular among gamers. Most (well above 50%) rma we get are machines that have been used by kids or young adults. So its likely that any machine that is not popular in that demographic will have a better life span and will be more reliable.

 

Very interesting take on that Eddie.

Yes the Z63A/W3V are freakin' solid all around. The heat issues depend on YOU the user. There are tools out there to keep the heat down, and built in power modes in windows to keep the heat down. Remember you are NOT going to be running the notebook at 100% performance all the time, only when gaming or something like that. So heat should NOT be an issue, I have used both Z63A and W3Vs and they're acceptable.

As for the battery issue, I really, REALLY never heard about this until rumours of the release of the W3J. What battery issues????? My friend's Z63A gets close to 4 hours normal use and this guy in one of my classes had a W3V getting similar battery life as the Z63A because he used Powerplay built into Ati's CCC software to lower the clocks to save battery life.

Hrmm. If you are going to buy any W3 chassis notebook, you're in for a treat. The thing is SOLID, as if built from one piece of material, instead of several parts, like the bigger notebooks that creak.

Anyhoo' hope that helps you potential W3J buyers out there, it has the same chassis as the Z63A/W3V, so go for it~!

Cheers,
Mike

 

Hi, Eddie & Mystic Golem ... I have a question for u guys... but forgive me if this is already been aswered somewhere...

I want to get w3j/a8ja/a8jm right now... can u tell me a8j and w3j's casing is made of? is it aluminium? or carbon fibre? I searched this forum but I can't find any answers...

Thanks a lot !

Btw, this is my first post... at last! I joined this GREAT forum few months later.. but until now, I'm unable to post, dont know why.. lol Oh yeah, I'm Indonesian currenty studying chinese in China, so... Nice to meet you all !!

 

I honestly have no clue. Never touched either one of those. I am guessing some of the overseas guys would be able to tell you better. I am guessing the w3j is still partial aluminum and cf alloy. Its just a guess.

 

Okay, thanks Eddie, I asked some guys that sells Asus here, and they dont know it either, but they did tell me that W3J is similar with W3V's casing, and W3V's casing is mainly just aluminium? no carbon fibre at all? i tought the lid's cover was a carbon fibre? Can u clear this up
Thanks

 

The lid was the only part made out of metal. With the w3j who knows maybe they will make the top cover with palm rests aluminum .... who knows.? Why dont you wait for a review when its out. Chill with the anxiety

 

Well, the reviewers I was referring to were from CNet, PC Mag, Laptop Mag, and Tom's Hardware. Not exactly the Bible, but I wouldn't say they don't know what they're doing.

I'm sure the W3J is very reliable. ASUS build quality is generally exceptional. I mean, I've already pre-ordered mine so obviously these concerns didn't stop me. But the W3V is known to heat up, mostly b/c of the dedicated GPU and high-end processor. So the heat is just the trade-off for performance. I just hoped maybe someone knew of some doohickey ASUS invented to get around that (other than underclocking or undervolting).

As for the battery life, obviously that's just a trade-off as well. The W3V (according to those sources I named) rated at about 3 hrs. Not bad, but not great compared to other thin & lights that can hit 4+ hours. Of course those thin & lights often have miniscule screens and certainly don't have such high performance. But again I was hoping ASUS had the silver bullet for the W3J. And maybe they do -- the jury is still out on whether the new dual core CPUs and the new GPUs can save power by automatically stepping down when not in heavy use or whatever. Anyone have hard info on that?

 

Of course the core duos can save power by stepping down. its the whole centrino thing. and the gpus all the old ones did as for the new ones why wouldnt they? and as for thin and lights getting 4+ hours battery life those dont have anywhere near the power of GPU so there is no silver bullet. you can expect about 3.5 hours. but you forget you can put two batterys in the w3j and get 5+ hours of life. and unvolting and underlocking is a good thing to do because it will not just releave some heat but will increase battery life.

 

Well, I've heard differing reports as to whether that stepping down actually saves any significant amount of power. Same goes for the GPUs. in fact, the GPUs are supposed to need less power and produce less heat because they are moving to smaller processes, 90 and 65nm as opposed to 130. But I haven't seen any hard data on whether that's actually true either, and mixed qualitative reports on that. So again, I'm wondering if anyone actually has put a W3J through these paces (probably not since it sounds like only the UK has them) or if someone knows of a review or something that actually compared two rigs to see if the new dual cores and GPUs really do save power/heat.

As far as that second optical drive battery goes, to my understanding it is a 6 cell and not an 8 cell like the main battery. It should theoretically have 75% of the juice, though in real life it will have less. If CNet, PC Mag, etc. are right about 3 hrs, then that would mean the optical battery would give you maybe 5 hours max. Also, my experience with a dual battery setup (on an Acer though) is that the batteries don't drain sequentially that way so you lose some battery life to inefficiency, so 5 hrs would be too much to expect. Still, that's not bad battery life with the dual battery setup.

Unfortunately, for me at least, the main worry for battery life is watching DVDs or gaming on long flights (I travel a lot for work). In both cases, you typically need the optical drive for the DVD or CD. Obviously I can try to hack a rip, but I'm just lazy and don't want to have to bother if possible. Same reason why I don't want to bother with underclocking.

 

Underclocking and undervolting on a Pentium M or newer processor isn't like doing something 'out-of-spec' as if you were trying to overclock; at the very least, not the underclocking. Undervolting too far at a given clock can cause you to go below spec. These features (P-State Transitions / SpeedStep) are built into the processor and are meant to be used.

The only reason why its mentioned specifically here is because by default, the tools that are officially supplied (Power4Gear, etc) aren't the most efficient at doing the underclocking/volting on their own and don't dynamically change clocks based on load.

The Mobile X1600 has been said to have a maximum TDP of 17 watts. The X700 was 14 watts; the X600 wasn't the same architecture as the X700 (because it was based on the previous gen), but is significantly smaller and lower performing so one would expect it to have a lower maximum TDP. Also note that you have to take into account the doubled RAM. Given all that, I would expect that at maximum load, you might find ~50% increase in heat generation (not the total system; just the GPU). You should realize that Asus is not likely to have engineered something for you that would overheat so easily, so even if this increase in heat is true it should still be well within acceptable limits.

Personally, when my W3V is at full load (i.e. playing a 3D game) it does get warm, but never too hot to touch. I would expect the W3J (if nothing at all has changed in the cooling department) to be slightly warmer. In addition, at 'normal' loads I wouldn't expect it to get warmer at all - the new generation's additional power-conserving changes should mean that the power consumption will not have increased, if not having gone down. One last thing; all this depends on what clockspeeds Asus has decided to use on the X1600...

 

Fact... if you take the same design and move it to a smaller process, you WILL reduce power consumption. Smaller transistors = less power.
However, not many will port a design directly; they also want to increase performance at the same time, so there's a tradeoff. That's why you may see inconclusive reports, because there's no direct comparison to be made.

Fact... clock rate is proportional to power consumption (it may not be as linear as it used to be with the way CPUs/GPUs are designed, but it still is generally true). Therefore, stepping down DOES provide significant power savings; if not alone then certainly if you undervolt at the same time (which is, really, the whole point). There are specifics to this - you need to use the P-State transitions and not just On-Demand Clock Modulation to get significant benefits (on Centrino); that may be why you've heard differing reports. You can take your laptop and put MobileMeter on it and watch as the power consumed changes directly with your clockspeed and voltage. It's a good idea to put it in regardless of what your intent is, and it's not really what I'd call a 'hack'. If you're gaming, you might not get a huge benefit because the CPU / GPU isn't going to be given a break; for DVD playing, you will get better battery life.

When all is said and done, I don't think you should expect the battery life to increase significantly, if at all, over the last generation. However, you should expect much, much better performance out of your games...

 

Mystic, thanks. Your last two posts were very helpful. As far as the heat issue, I know it won't have much if any impact on the life of the system or its components. It's purely a personal preference; it is just uncomfortable to use a hot laptop on your lap, obviously. Some don't care. I do, but not enough to not buy the W3J because, after all, I already pre-ordered! Same goes for battery life. It's fine, just not great, and is one of the few areas where the W3J doesn't just beat the pulp out of everything else. But as you said, the performance is certainly going to be nice to have.