Two problems with new P-6860FX (Battery & DVD drive)

I got two problems with my brand new P6860FX that so far, 4 chat sessions with Gateway have been unable to resolve. So I'm turning to Tier 2 tech-support -- other users. lol

1) To recalibrate the Battery, I'm supposed go into the BIOS, to the Advance Page, and select "Battery Auto Memory" or something like that... there's NO option on the advance page in the BIOS regarding batteries.

2) I've tried CD-R, DVD-R, a music CD (with no Sony copy protection BS) and a movie in my CD/DVD drive. For every one of them, I hear the drive spin up, the read-head move back & forth, and nothing happens. If I go into Windows Explorer and double-click the E drive (yes, that's the CD/DVD drive), it ejects the CD tray and asks me to insert a disk.

I want to reinstall Vista from scratch but a) want to back things up first and b) how can I reinstall it if the CD/DVD drive doesn't work? lol

I've never been able to use this drive. Megan_GWERsomethingssomething at Gateway logged into my laptop and removed the driver from Device manager, and reestablished it, but that didn't work. SO far out of 4 chats, she was the only one who was vaguely helpful. The others wanted me to send them my 1 day old laptop so they can have a look at it.

Thanks in advance,
Mike

 

just take it back to bestbuy if that is an option for you. i wouldnt be bothered with sending a couple day old laptop.

 

Anyone know what they'll say? I have a feeling it'll be something like, "sorry, you didn't spend $350 to buy our Geek Squad warranty so Best Buy isn't going to help you." But I can try. I've owned it less than 48 hours. Two hardware problems, numerous "this application has stopped" messages... me thinks me gots a lemon.

 

I would exchange it, I think you have 14 days to return/exchange it.

 

yes, u have 14 to 15 days to return. depends on where your at...take it back and get another. should be a very simple thing...just a pain in the butt for buying a new laptop though.

 

Thanks... going to take it back today. The place I got it has another one in-stock. Ironically, there's a new user-review at BestBuy.com (the only 3.0 that someone's given this laptop) and that guy has CD/DVD drive problems too. Hmmmm, anyway, taking it back for an exchange.

 

And let us know if the battery calibrate works with your exchanged laptop. From the questions I get, this may be a widespread problem. I really don't care, IMHO, like defraging; it's a really a waste of time.

 

people still defrag?

 

Yep, saw a thread arguing the pros and con just the other day

 

i think people like to see the pretty blue lines all line up nicely together or in nice rows close together rather...lol

 

It makes copying files to the floppy drive or zip drive faster.

I'm kind of anal about stuff like that. I always have to rewind my DVDs before putting them back in their cases.

:confused2:

 

not knocking what cha like to do in anyway shape or form...


but ummmmm, no it doesn't. maybe with windows 98.

defrag puts all the files together. when you start using them files...guess what....it needs more disk space to store them again.
people spend more time defraging temp files and folders than the actual programs they use. so if you delete temps first, you will see a big difference in speed and defrag time. (speculation of course)

 

I really can't find anything negative about defragging every couple months or so. It makes it so the computer doesn't have to look all over the hard drive to run a program, because all the files on the system level are grouped together already.

 

Uh...... I was joking?

I haven't had a floppy drive in one of my PC's in years and never owned a zip drive. I realize sarcasm doesn't translate well into text but come on... what I put should have been a little obvious. Modern hard drives have more cache than a floppy disk so its not like there was going to be much in the way of disk activity to begin with.

Rewind the DVD didn't catch your eye either? lol

 

Best defrag program out, and its free, it is twice as fast as widows defrag.

http://www.download.com/Auslogics-Disk-Defrag/3000-2094_4-10567503.html?tag+dl-blog

 

cant tell who is joking these days. and i work with people who have old computers who in fact do what you described. that's why i said..not knocking what your doing....

caught the rewind dvd's that's why i didn't say anything about it.

wasn't sure though...could have also been a typo.

and with out using the smileys....yes..it is hard to tell...*LOL*

im thinking using a flash drive is better than using a cd/dvd or are you still pulling my leg?

*LOL*

and vista can be loaded from a bootable flash drive as well...betcha forgot about that one....

 

damn you flynnaz, now i gotta go download that defrag and see how well it works. and sin eyou say it's good, then it probably is. and will have to recommend it to some of my clients. they love windows defrag...lol

 

This is indeed a great machine, unfortunately Gateway does not market it in China! They obviously think that Chinese people do not play big 3D video games on laptop maybe because we have PIRATED Xbox360/PS3/Wii games cost only USD 0.7 each!

To get this big muscle I had to beg a friend who's going to Japan to get one for me, the Japanese model called P-6861 JFX, with T9300 CPU, 8800GTS GPU(512MB), 3GB RAM, 250GB 7200RPM HDD. Priced at 179800 YEN Japanese money, which is not bad. To buy an equivalent spec-ed laotop would cost twice more for example DELL XPS 1730 costs USD 3860 in China!! Dell must think that Chinese individuals who can afford a gaming laptop must be damn rich by working for corrupted goverment departments and getting illegal money!

The thing is, if my future P-6861's CD/DVD drive have the said problem then I'd be screwed because Gateway China's service is sh*t and they'd just say "hey this big guy is not from our family you see all the sons we have here are hopeless C, desperate MT, depressing MX, and pretentious T, oh you P guy must be a bastard and we discriminate and boycott you !!!"

I am troubled and worried, friends, should I really get one?

 

I found out about auslogics defrag from Maximum PC Magazine. All defrag programs work about the same but this one does it alot faster.

 

yeah it does. trying the whole suite of their product.

it's easy and fast
rep for you buddy!

 

Johnksss, how in the heck do I install the laptop2go drivers, i put the modded inf file in the main that I extracted, it does not work?

 

matter of fact, im reinstalling mine now.
they seem to have messed up and started doing that downclock while on battery.

i know you know, but i gotta go thru it anyways..lol

download 64 bit 175.75 drivers
extract them to c:\175.75
take modded inf file and place it in c:\175.75
remove nvac.inf from c:\175.75 so as to cause no confusion.
then do one of two things.... install using the setup file or do it thru device manager and add a new device.

now this part is interesting....if you use the modded inf file, you get the down clocking while on battery.... but if you mod the original...it seems to be fine on battery.

ill let you know after this next reboot.


ok, yep clocks stay the same. so i would recommend modding the original (nvac.inf) and adding the strings for the 8800m gts.

 

Ok, I got it to work, I pulled the inf file out of a zipped folder inside the main folder. Works good so far

 

make sure you use gpuz and start a game up...then switch back to gpuz/sensors and make sure it's still at 500/799 while playing the game...it's easier to watch using window mode for the game.

 

Okay noob question...but why cant he(or anybody else) use the nvidia drivers off nvidia's website? is the case same for radeon's? thx

 

no, he got it to work

 

he got it to work???? i think you misunderstood me. i was referring to the post where flynnaz told someone "u can not use the video drivers from the Nvidia website, get them from laptop2govideo.com, or guru3d.com." i was wondering why this is the case and if the same thing applies to radeon cards.

 

Johnksss, now my tv tuner works better, rep for you too!

 

well...... as for nvidia...they only support drivers for the
8700m gt
7800m gtx
7900m gtx
7950m gtx
7900m gs

http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us

 

which tv tuner do you have flynnaz? i have the hp hd tv tuner myself

 

o okay...thx for letting me know =) im so noob.

 

if china has as few piracy as the rest of the world, EA's boss would probably be richer than UnCle Bill

 

no problem.

nope... we are all just in search of answers is all...

 

I have the usb WinTV-HVR950 Haupanage!, I works pretty good. I use it on my Desktop and laptop.

 

cool!

im looking for one that has the component video in...you have any ideas where to find one?

 

I exchanged my p-6860fx that I bought Sunday (6/1) with a new one tonight. This one doesn't have the "Battery auto learning" thing in the BIOS either, like the manual, gateway website and tech support person in Chat said it should. But the CD/DVD drive does work on this one - the main reason I took the old one back.

Fresh install tomorrow then I can install some games and put this thing to the test... looking forward to seeing how well it handles my games.

 

Why did I have to say the defrag word? OMG another thread...

 

Well, this puts Gateways "tech support" so far below zero I have to laugh, and the reason I posted earlier. I was on hold for 30 minutes while the "tech supervisor" was consulted with the "charge issue". Now what does support, as this, cost Gateway?

Gateway should just drop their tech support and and hire notebookreview.com?\

MtnMike, glad you got your drive working..enjoy.

 

lol

nah, we are good on defrag. matter of fact, i found a nice little defrag program for some of my customers. thanks to flynnaz.

 

LOL, I forgot to add the smileys!

 

How long did your computer last with Crysis? I am testing mine now, so far, everything normal, no shutdown but I am running with T9300

 

hahahahaha, just did it right now and it lasted 15 seconds