LG P310 - 13" - 9600GT 512mb ddr3

private cowboy, once you have had some time with the laptop, could you comment on heat and noise? I am going laptop-only but I am really used to my silent watercooled PC. I find the whining of small fans pretty annoying..
Guess I'll find out soon enough though..
Moreover, what are the video connections? I saw there is HDMI, is there DVI or VGA? thanks

 

Now I've got my p310 and my first impressions are quite good. Temperatures and fan noise are in normal mode very very moderate. That's very good. You hear only the access events from the HD. I try to get used with the vista OS. Actually, I don't want to downgrade to XP. The lcd is not as good as I expected. Brightness and resolution are very good for me but I would like to compare with the Sony Z-series to see which is better as to viewing angle and sharpness. The external dvd drive is ok, but a slot-in version would be more comfortable in handling. The silvery keyboard is perfect.

I miss only a sleeve or bag for protection while transporting it, because this glossy lid surface is a little damageable. VGA and HDMI are there, no DVI.

 

So an update for people on this side of the pond, I pestered LG Canada for some more information and this is one response they were nice enough to send me:

 

Ok, a few more updates...

- The noise level is very nice. On 'silent' it's basically inaudible and the hdd is the loudest part on the whole system. The hdd noise is not annoying either (unlike the XPS1330). So on 'silent' the P310 is as close to passivly cooled as you can prolly get. On 'normal' the fan is audible but not annoying at all. The 'normal' setting is also not as loud as the silent setting on my Sony SZ2. Unlike the P300 you cannot force the 'cool' mode anymore, you can only switch between 'silent' and 'normal. The 'cool' mode is noted in the BIOS though so my guess would be that it is forced when things get hot under load.

- The heat is not bad either. Under full load doeing Prime95 the CPU gets to 60 (Celsius that is - you do the conversion) and stays there. Those 60 are with base voltage as no control tool does support the Centrino2 yet. Undervolted I'd expect some 55 Celsius under full load. That's not bad at all given the fact that my SZ2's T2500 runs 60 Celsius under load and undervolted. I've not stressed the GPU yet so I cannot comment on that.

- The built quality is really really good. It's plastic (so some Sony's with aluminium and magnesium alloy feels better) but built like a rock. You cannot squeeze any part at all. There is not wiggling or anything. I'm really impressed by that given the fact that it's not built from metal. That would be the ultimate treat but the price would have jumped quite a bit I bet. I've to say the P310 is built slightly better then my SZ2 despite the SZ2 using aluminium and magnesium alloy.

- The design is ... well normal. It's nothing fancy like those gamer laptops with orange plastic or green glowing applications but not a MacBook either. It's grey and black, that's it. The black display cover is of that super shiny piano black. I hate that because it gets scratches when you even look at it but you have to live with that. I'll never understand that most built hardware with that crap these days.

- The speekers are surpinsingly good once you turn SRS on.

- The screen is insanely bright (level 5 of 9 is the same as the max on my VAIO SZ2) and colorful. However on max brightness the black level is not as great - black is more a grey. Just turn down the brightness to 6 or 7 and you're set. The angles are ok for me. They could be better but I can live with it. There are better displays out there but those are built into systems much more expensive or much less powerfull.

- There is HDMI and VGA (no direct DVI). You get 3 USB-ports and a mini-USB (S-LINK), mic and headphone, a card reader and an express card slot.

- Battery runtime is ok given the power in there. I reached 4 hours today working with reduced brightness. I bet using undervolting and disableing a few unneeded parts (network) would get you even more.

The P310 is a powerful system in a small package that weights very little. What more can you ask for. Ask away if you have any questions.

 

Would it possible to see some photos?

Did you buy it in German and you did translate the SO to english, maybe? Because I´m thinking to buy it in German online and translate the SO (XP and Vista, in two partitions) to Spanish, but I´m not sure if it´s possible.

Thanks and regards,

Usi.

 

I got mine from Germany indeed. The OS is english by nature and is translated into different languages if you want that (using a MUI disc). When you first boot the Tarsia it will ask you what language your Vista should be (Vista is preinstalled). You can choose english (as I did) and everything will be fine and dandy (and english).

The XP-Downgrade (or upgrade as you like it) is english too when you first install it. The second XP-disc then customized the english XP into other languages. But you just can leave it in english. Spanish should be an option but I've not tried that yet.

So the german Tarsia is english through and through. Only the manual is german as is the keyboard layout (y and z etc).

What surprises me quite a bit is that the XP install does not ask a key (there is only a Vista key). The XP disc uses a volume key in an unattend.txt file. The huge problem with that is that this key (as other volume keys) is 'well known' and will likely fail the wga check. I've no idea how this is supposed to work...

A few images (although not from my Tarsia)...

 

Ok, thank you very much, it´s very heplful. Just only two questions:
- MUI disc and second XP-disc are with the Tarsia?
- In wich shop did you buy it and how many time did take it to arrive to your home?

Oh, and sorry for my bad english.

Thanks again!

 

You get an XP install disc (which included SATA drivers and SP2) and a XP-MUI-disc (which changes the language of the english XP that is installed by the first disc). I've no idea what languages the MUI-disc covers though.

On top of that you get two driver discs, prolly one for Vista and one for XP.

Delivery for me took two days. But I live in Berlin, Germany atm so that is normal. Inside europe I'd expect a week. The shop was www.cyberport.de

 

Ok, thank you. Cyberport it´s in German, but I found notebook.de, also in English, so I think I´ll buy it at there.

Thank you and enjoy it!

Usi.

 

Whatever floats your boat. I know Cyberport well and bought from them because they have a store in town that I could pick it up from. It meant faster delivery and not delivery costs and there is a store in town I can talk to in case I need help someday.

ATM I'm struggeling a bit preparing for the XP install. The XP disc that comes with it is SP2 only. I've one that has SP3 included already. However this one need the SATA-driver so I need to slipstream it in. And then there is the key issue. The LG-disc uses a volume key. So I cannot use that key for my OEM install and the volume key does not pass WGA anyway since it is 'well known'.

Quite a few cliffs to work around atm but when all falls into place the Tarsia is one hell of a machine.

 

Sounds great, A shame about the XP volume licence key, however I'd expect most people to have a copy of XP somewhere (got mine through college).
But really, this is the only laptop I know of to still offer XP and i find this to be a very nice touch.
Your description has made me impatient

 

I now read that you can install an existing XP (from another PC ) and get it activated with your downgrade license. This way you would pass WGA too.

I can think of little else then DX10 that would make Vista worthwhile. XP is faster, consumes less battery, is slimmer and everybody knows the tweaks. DX10 in games is also more or less not worth it so I don't really see anything else but XP on my Tarsia.

 

Does anybody know where can I purchase this laptop, to be delivered to Japan, or to Ireland? Because amazon doesn´t ships to this countries.

 

You can try at www.cyberport.de or www.notebook.de

 

I've done some toture testing today to see how the temps hold up and I have to say they are not bad at all. I used multiple runs of 3DMark06 to heat the system up (Finding prime numbers alone stresses the CPU but the GPU does not even clock up so the inside stays cooler - stressing all system components is the worst case here and the better benchmark in my eyes) and monitored and logged the temperatures with Everest.

This is the result...



I've several page long list of logged data but the stat sheet should give you an idea. Ambient temperature in the room was 22-23 degrees celsius. I'd say during the hot summer months this might get a bit worse but we're still a mile away from the 70s alone. And given the fact that little of my games heat up a system as bad as 3DMark06 I'd say that under everyday circumstances it should look slightly better.

When the load drops the temperature drops too quite quickly. Those 64 max on the GPU happened only very rarely, the normal GPU temp running all those 3DMark06 tests was in the low 60s (60-62), the CPU was in the high 50s under load but spiked to 61 doing the 3DMark06 CPU-Test.

I don't think that this is bad at all given the fact that there is no optmization in place yet (undervolting, XP instead of Vista and so on). Notice the CPU of the Tarsia does overclock slightly under load too!

I've seen cooler laptops (temperature wise that is) but given the fact that the MBP of a friend of mine idles in the 60s and nearly goes triple digit under load I'm not too worried at all.

I hope that gives you an idea.

 

Translating from Google:

I´ve seen it here:

http://forum.zwame.pt/showthread.php?t=366614&page=3

Somebody has this problem?

 

Haven't noticed that. On the other hand, the Forceware driver that comes with the Tarsia has a few problems (external monitor not syncing and flickering etc) that are cured by installing the latest 180.48 - so maybe this problem is driver related too. But once again, I have not seen that here.

 

Has anyone bought them in this webs? Cyberport is only in german and can´t understand it, and notebook charges a lot for the shipping.
Any experience?

 

You can check ratings on www.geizhals.at

They'll have german keyboards though.

 

I'm thinking of getting the Korean version of P310 with T9400 CPU instead. Is battery life going to be a lot of difference compared to the P9500 available only in germany?

 

I know Cyberport and it's one of the best retailers in Germany. They have good prices, good service and delivery is fast. Also they accept credit cards, which does not happen too often in Germany. The Tarsia from Germany will have a Germany keyboard layout despite coming with an english OS, keep that in mind.

I would not take a Tarsia with a T-processor. The T9400 also has 2.53GHz BUT has a TDP of 35W instead of the TDP of 25W that the P9500 has. The P-series consumes less power and emits less heat. While both the T9400 and the P9500 come with the same clock speed the P9500 will run cooler and given the fact that the 9600GT emits enough heat under load I'd prefer the P9500 for sure. 10W difference may not sound much but every bit helps under load.

I would not be to worried about the difference it makes on battery runtime because the battery eaters are elsewhere. The 10W difference on the CPU is not goeing to hurt the runtime much. The additional heat emmited into the case would make me prefer the P9500.

I did some more testing (under XP this time around) and the Tarsia really flies under XP...



The 6000 are breached when you disable NVidia Powermizer (which clocks down the GPU when no load is present). Because the Powermizer does not react instantly to load the delay between load and GPU clock rise causes some performance loss. It's not likely to be noticeable in everyday use but I wanted to see what the max is with stock drivers.

The temps were not bad at all either...



Naturally the Tarsia runs a bit hotter without Powermizer but when you're at home on a good notebook cooler and want the last bit of power you can get it. The unibody MPB of a friend of mine runs close to 90 on CPU and GPU under load so the cooling here works very well.

Idle temps (office use so to say) are also quite low with the GPU in the mid 40s and the CPU in the low 40s. I configured mine that way that when I switch the fan to silent mode the CPU gets forced to its lowest clock (which is 800MHz) as well as the GPU - then the temps of both barely eclipse 40 and the fan is inaudible. I though I hear the fan but it is the hdd.

I'm very happy with my Tarsia to say the least. So much performance in such a small package is incredible. And it looks really classy too. The built quality is rock solid. I already said that but I was surprised that every part fits like it was custom made.The screen is almost too bright for me (I run 4 our of 9 and see that as normal), on full brightness I get a tan.

I hope you'll get your Tarsia too soon. It's one hell of a machine, especially under XP. I don't really get though why LG is selling the top end Tarsia in Germany only as it seems and some lower speced models elsehere. Why???

 

I don't know but the more I read about it the more I want it. And I would be willing to put down good money for it if not for the whole not being sold in North America thing.

 

Thanks for the post Private-Cowboy. Interesting stuff

 

I ordered off notebook.de for delivery to Ireland with no problems, from ordering to dispatch and delivery was 7 working days. €75 delivery is steep but well worth it.

The QWERTZ keyboard isn't much of a problem if you're a touch typist. Of course I had to buy myself a replacement cloverleaf cable to go into the power brick (as the one provided came with a Euro plug). The other alternative was a plug adaptor.

By the way great job Private-cowboy on the stats.

 

Excellent work, Private-cowboy. Thank you very much!

 

Nice to hear that, did you pay de 19%vat? Notebook.de ships to japan but I find 290€ for the shipping too expensive.

 

You can change SATA access mode from bios to IDE, then XP will install fine (at least it worked for me).

I got my P310 on Wednesday, ordered it on Cyberport.de. They took them 2 day to send it, and in 2 other days I had it at home (in Italy). Site is all in German, they didn't answer to my English mail (and to a lot of my Germans too) but with a little help from my friends and Google translator I made it. Keyboard is German but its layout is very similar to Italian's so I'll keep it for now (until I'll discover how to get an English one for a good price).

I couldn't use it a lot until now, but first impressions are great. Weight is amazing, performance seems superb (just tried Fallout 3 and runs really good), it's a little hot but I guess it's normal (GPU goes up to 75° after 15 min of playing). I'll take some time to test it before saying more.

 

Private-Cowboy, thanks for your reply and fantastic review... a few more questions:

1) Does the P310 Tarsia comes with International warranty (outside EU)?

2) What is your battery performance with Wifi on? Can you watch a full length DVD movie (with wifi off)?

3) How is Notebook.de compared to Cyberport? I know their prices are higher (about 30 EUR) but they've English website and possibility of getting an English keyboard!

Thnx!

 

here are some photos: *click*


saint

 

I did my own Tarsia-XP-Installation-Disc. I simply took my XP-Pro-SP3-disc and slipstreamed the SATA-driver from the LG-disc into it (NLite). It works perfectly and gives a clean XP Pro with SP3 without goeing back to IDE.

I'm not entirely sure about the warranty. The warranty for Germany is 2-year-pickup-and-return. I'll check the warranty card out and let you know about the international stuff.

The battery performance is quite good. I did some testing in silent mode (with CPU forced to 800MHz) surfing the web and doeing office work (the 800MHz are way enough for that) and I got over 1 hour with close to 70% to go. That was with medium brightness. I'd says with those settings you should get 3-3.5 hours out of the battery. Gaming I would expect something like 1.5-2 hours. Watching movies (bright display setting, more CPU power but not wireless) I'd say close to 3 hours. Should be enough for most movies.

I don't know Notebook.de from personal experience. I read some good things about them but never used them. So I'm not the right one to comment on that store.

If you want to do some serious gaming I'd suggest you use a notebook cooler. I don't do gaming on the road anyway and at home I've a ZM-NC1000 - that keeps any 13.3 inch notebook comfy - huge controllable fans that cool the entire base of a laptop. And that's the part that gets the hottest - if not as hot as any MacBoot by a mile.

 

do you know if it's possible to install the sata driver after the xp installation?

do you really feel the difference using one access method instead of the other?

 

No, you should not feel that. The IDE-Barrier is way higher than the speed of a single HDD. The IDE interface allows 133MB/s, normal notebook hdds cannot even sustain half of that. So there is little to worry about. If you notice anything it would happen when the hdd is burst reading from the cache. But even then IDE is enough for a single hdd. The SATA interface is more or less only useful if you're using multiple drives in RAID.

And yes, you can switch afterwards - as far as I know.

 

thanks a lot!

 

Not sure about the layout of the German keyboard, but you should be able to remap it the way you want via free software or direct mod of the Registry key. A quick google produced this site with a nice overview of remapping resources.

I second compliments to Private-Cowboy on the great info.

 

Thanks for the nice words. You can remap the keyboard via software tools without any problems. It takes some getting used to though. When you're good at typing blind than this is not an issue but if your visually searching for a key from time to time and they are not producing what's printed on them it might get odd.

 

And also there are things like this:

http://cgi.ebay.com/SPANISH-TRANSPA...2531274QQcmdZViewItemQQptZPCA_Mice_Trackballs

I´ll use one like that.

 

There's no need to remap the keys if you go with a straight Vista install although remapping some of the symbols etc. to match the keyboard could be useful. The initial setup allows you to pick your language and regional settings which takes into account the keyboard layout, so absolutely no problem.

 

Well I stopped waiting for new dell's ghost laptop, and purchased this amazing one. Can't wait for it to arrive!!!

 

XP runs great on it

all driver are on the orange CD..

 

very great i think:

 

Wow.
That's nice. Does the laptop get very hot when gaming or stressing the GPU (3DMark etc)?
I'm still waiting for a "new Dell XPS laptop" but if nothing happens in January then the p310 seems a very nice option.

 

I wrote about that just two pages ago. Check page 28 and see a temp chart that Everest logged. The max GPU temp I ever say was just a hair below 70 degrees celsius (69 to be exact) and the max CPU was in the mid 63.

If you know the temps of a MacBook or XPS1330 you know that those temps are not very hot at all given the power.

By the way, have you tested the brand new NVidia mobile driver? I've read a few good things so far but have not tested them myself. Those drivers (179.28) are hot from the oven.

 

I'm curious on the generel loudness levels and how the fan sounds, is it annoying or smoth sound?

 

You can put the fan in silent mode which is..well..silent. But the fan when it speeds up is a constant smooth sound. I've done some gaming and the under side gets quite hot but the fan doesn't become annoying or very loud, they stay constant.

The fan on my old S series Vaio used to go up and down in volume all the time, very annoying.

 

The issue is not that simple, but may not be too much of a problem The German keyboard has an extra key. Basically, the left shift is shorter to allow an extra key. Additionally, the layout on the right side is different, so even with remapping, one of the keys will be in a different location. It can get very annoying when this is not the only keyboard you type on.

 

I have asked about this before. You might want to make sure that they are referring to a US layout, and not a UK layout, as the 2 are not quite the same.

 

True. Received my LG P310 with a US keyboard a few days ago despite requesting for a UK keyboard (Invoice shows UK keyboard as well). The Enter key is a smallish rectangular shape and I end up pressing the "\" button above it at times - not sure if other layouts are similar. The switched " and @ is a bit of a bugger when coding since I instinctively go for the "2" button for quotes.

Despite these small annoyances, it's an amazing small laptop that packs a powerfull punch. Been trying out Age of Conon (AoC) and the laptop can handle it easily with tweaked high setting on stock drivers. Heat dissipation is amazing with such a small form factor. In comparision, my HP dv2523ea generated almost the same heat on idle as the LG P310 on full load in AoC according to HWmoniter; though it could be due to dust build up in my HP.

Been ebaying for some filters to stick under my cooling pad since I notice the fans under the pad tends to get very dusty after a few gaming sessions - the dust likely will blow into the laptop and cause it to overheat internally.

Last but not least, happy christmas to everyone.

 

Just got mine also but it's the Korean version with T9400 instead... Best X'mas present I bought myself in ages Anyway the found some updated drivers for it:

1. Intel Turbo Memory 1.7.0.1029
2. Intel Wifi 5300 12.1.2.0
3. Intel LAN 8567V 9.52.18.0
4. Realtek Audio HD 6.0.1.5755 (R211)

Installed above and seems to be working fine with Vista32 Ultimate...

BTW anyone tested the new nvidia 179.28 (beta) driver yet?

 

Is the S-link a firewire port? Does this laptop have one?

 

No. It's USB and there is no Firewire port and no eSATA.