Official MSI GX640 Owner's Thread

hey guys i just recently bought an msi gx 640 with folowing specs
ati 5850m
i5 430
4gb 1066ghz ram... and the rest is not important
my big problem is that it has 4 gb of ram but windows says that only 2.98GB is usable, so it means that basically i cant use all of my ram. what the hell?
is anyone here encountering same problem? does anybody know how to fix this? i hope it doesnt have any chipset limitations.\
help will be so much appreciated! thank you
and i do have a 64bit OS win7 home premium

 

that's a windows thing, not a this laptop thing. Search the windows subforum of nbr, there was a similar issue recently

 

the link dont work

also why u say use at your own risk?
because that vbios was official release from MSI for all GX640 notebook

 

gx640_vbios_030.zip

try that. I say use at your own risk because any bios/vbios update can brick your hardware if you do it wrong. It may not void your warranty but if you need to RMA it cause you screwed up your motherboard or video card then don't white about it.

 

Thanks for the link

ahh.. ok


hm.. that problem with the 5850 is from GX640-098US or GX640-260US or both?

also i dont know if my notebook is 098US or 260US
my brother buy it xD.. and i see only a GX640 Logo

 

it doesnt matter, both models are identicle minus the cpu

 

which is the last ?
BR36533.006
or
BR35701.030

 

im doing this steps for making a bootable usb driver

How to format a USB memory key

but there is a step a little wierd for me

Step 2 - Download the Windows 98 system files from HERE. This is a zip file that contains all of the system files that you will need. Create a new folder and extract these files into the folder that you just created. Make sure that you preserve the directory structure.


i dont know if that is correct, i mean Windows 98 system files????
that is F***ing old xD
the notebook have Windows 7 x64.. also i dont know if the DOS system of GX640 works with w98 system files

 

Sweet. Thank you for the really detailed info. I really appreciate it! But I have one question what does Cas Latency mean? I see it under ram memory info. Its always Cas Latency followed by a number: 9,7,or5.

 

It is correct, I have followed those same instructions to make my bootable usb stick and I use it to flash bios.

 

The lower the latency the "better" although the majority of us won't notice any difference whatsoever. Why pay attention to these numbers then? Because if you are using two sticks of RAM with different timings then they will run at the lowest common denominator and it doesn't take a math background to see that number will be extremely high.

 

i have a BIG PROBLEM

when the notebook is connect to the AC
the GPU temperature get ULTRA HIGH over 100c and the notebook shutdown

when is only with the batter the temperatures are between 30c-50c

this happend after flashing the Vbios correct

 

Clean out the vents?

 

the notebook is almost new

 

you can flash back to the old vbios, TreeBurner was having issue with the new vbios raising his temps.

It could be a lot of other things:
Are you OCing?
What kind of surface are you playing on?
Is the room dusty?
Whats the ambient temp?
Humidity?
Other applications running?
Vents blocked by anything?

 

1-No
2-In the Air.. i dont know how explain xD
3-1%
3- 15c
4- i dont know...
5- Everest for see Temps
6- No.. like what?

 

LOL Ambient temp of 15C and you're getting 100C?

With those temps I would roll back to old vBIOS. Do you know what your old temps were?

 

15C... really? that's one chilly room.

blocking vents as in:
laptop on a bed = bad
laptop on carpet = bad
putting your leg right up against the intake vents = bad

 

Hello,

Im writing you about my 2 months old MSI GX640 notebook. After 2 months of use I've noticed few issues which I'd love to solve.

First of all: my notebooks temperatures are kind of high. GPU's (ATI HD5850) temperature on idle is ~68'c and CPU's (Intel i5-450M) idle temperature is ~59'c. My rooms temperature is 20'c so not too much for the notebook I guess. A fan on the rightside of the notebook is blowing hot air all the time.

Second problem relates to sleep mode of my notebook. When I close the top, notebook goes to sleep mode, but when I open it again, screen won't change from black. Only way is to shutdown the notebook from the button.

I've searched solutions to these problems from internet and understood that BIOS/vBIOS update would fix these problems. There is a thing: I dont understand the difference between vBIOS and BIOS and I don't understand instructions found from internet well enough. So I don't dare to flash the BIOS in afraid of crash. And answer to question which probably is in your head right now: Yes, I'm newbie with computers and speacially with notebooks. What should I do?


In a wait of your answer
sebazukowksi

 

Hello and welcome to NBR.

Problem 1: Those temps are warm but no where close to dangerous (100C+). If you're noticing a gradual increase in temps over time then it's likely that the inside of your laptop has gotten dusty and needs to be cleaned. The easiest way is to clear the vents with some compressed air. The more thorough way would be to open it up proper and use compressed air to clean out the dust buildup.

Problem 2: I know it can be a pain, but honestly just leave it as is and don't put your computer into sleep if you can help it. If you're not comfortable flashing a vbios DON'T! The devil you know is better than the one you don't. More things can go wrong than go right, especially if you're not sure what you're doing.

 

Thank you for the fast answer and warm welcome!

I'll try to clean the crap from the vents tomorrow. I think I'll not open it up totally because of warranty sticker on the bottom(?)

And yes, I think you're right. I better not to hustle with stuff I really don't know a damn thing Maybe I will get touch to friend of mine, who works on computers.

pleased
sebazukowski

 

You can open up the back cover there's no warranty sticker

 

There is a warranty sticker on the top screw on the back for a lot of people. It isn't really a big deal though because you can upgrade parts without voiding the warranty. Just email MSI with a request to get permission to upgrade your RAM or something. They'll just tell you the normal legal mumbo jumbo that they obviously aren't responsible for the parts you put in it, just the ones that came stock with the machine. Then ta da you're free to access the inside.

 

Hmm odd I don't have any warranty stickers on mine until I pop the case open.

 

The warranty sticker for my was right on top of the screw closest to the battery

 

Few things I learned from my own mistakes with vbios:
1. Flashing in Windows is asking for trouble;
2. When flashing fails, reflash it until a clear "OK success" will be given.
3. If flashing goes wrong - NEVER restart the unit.

Those mistakes gave me some time to think about them while my notebook was in warranty service.

As for your case: If you happen to have a tech-savy friend or relative who owns a relatively new (so that gpu would fit properly) dual-gpu clevo (sager), you can boot that computer from a working card and reflash yours.
I know what happens when vbios flash is screwed - only blue lights are up, fan is spinning, some load on HDD for 3 seconds and that's it. This means the notebook is not going through POST so it cannot load further and thus you cannot blindly flash your vbios.
If your's happen to load properly (only without screen), then you can reset bios by disconnecting the battery connector after opening the back cover (bios battery is under wireless module - track thin red/blue cable to the connector from there).

In any case - it's a mess
That was my lesson and RBE and vbios editing is a NO NO for me

 

thanks. yea i think i learned my lesson on this one. i wish i knew how to make a bootable cd with the vbios so i could do it that way. because when i start it with a disc in it the disc will start spinning like its loading it up.

 

I'm sure you can find plenty of tutorials how to make bootable cd for flashing bios. Basically, all you need to be different is to put Atiflash.exe and vbios.rom file instead of bios files mentioned in those tutorials. And after the disc will boot up (or you think it will boot up cause there's no view on the screen), you can try to blind flash it.

 

Hey guys, d'yall remember the good ol' hinge cracking that occured on previous generations of GX series laptops and AlienWare laptops from Dell?

Bad news, the GX 640 has the same problem. Last night as I was closing the lid, I heard a sharp crack. Upon investigation I saw that the back cover of the screen is raised by about 3 mm above the normal place for it. So the cracking issue is back!

I never mistreated my GX640 physically and it cracked out of nowhere.

Time to get out the WD40 guys...

 

Does it occur on the GX740 chassis as well?

 

I dont know as I only have the 640

 

Well this is quite unsettling...

 

Hey guys, I just did a quick forum search and couldn't find anything, does anyone know how to change the program that the p1 button goes to?

 

Go to the taskbar and right-click on the System Control Manager icon. Select "User-defined key" and voila!

 

thank you very much oj287.

 

NP (10 char)

 

sorry another issue. I have my power plan set to high performance, and in that setting I have it set so it never goes to sleep, the screen never turns off, and it never dims dispay. Strangely enough it always turns off the display at about five minutes and sleeps ten minutes after that. any ideas on how to fix this?

 

did you play with any of the profile voltages?

 

I did not.

 

Did you set it to never turn off on both battery AND plugged in?

 

Does anybody know where to get a good deal on a TRUE barebones gx640, meaning without a graphics card (i dont know where people get off calling them barebones when they have a gpu) maybe without an LCD?

 

Is it ok if I hit about 96* while play Black ops? this is everything, Cpu, Gpu, THRM (whatever that is)

 

TRUE MSI barebones, as You call it, will have an LCD, chassis, cooling system, MoBo(with LAN, modem and sound), GPU, sometimes ODD. You will be able to customise CPU, RAM, WiFi, HDD, sometimes ODD, OS.

The GX640 comes with M5850 in every configuration, so this GPU will be included in the barebone version of the laptop. You shouldn't have any problems with selling it on the aftermarket though.

MSI barebones without the GPU and/or LCD are not available.

 

Is there any place I could get a motherboard from a GX640?

I wonder if it would be possible to stick the motherboard from one of these into my GT627, get a new heatsink, CPU, GPU (470m?) and ram. would it work?

 

It might be possible, but at that point you might as well buy a barebones GX640 and call it a day.

Might have some difficulty getting a 470m to play nice with it though

 

Most likely RK Computers-MSI-Asus-Sager-Clevo-Compal - Custom Gaming Notebooks - Custom Gaming Laptops

Eurocom Corporation - Number 1 in Desktop Replacement Notebook Technology sells 470m.

RK Computers-MSI-Asus-Sager-Clevo-Compal - Custom Gaming Notebooks - Custom Gaming Laptops
www.frostycomputers.com

 

Hello all new member here,

I purchased this laptop (used $850) and I hope you guys can help me with a few questions/directions:

1. What is the first thing you suggest I do/check for?
2. I have 2 x Intel X25M SSDs that I'd like to run as RAID0. Is this possible?
3. Can somebody point me to a guide where you mod the Optical drive bay to use a HDD?
4. Would I have to reinstall Win7 and everything else or can I simply slap the drives in and see what happens?
5. The seller already has a 60Gb OCZ vertex and has included the 250Gb Magnetic drive as well. Plus, I have another older 5400rpm Laptop drive laying about. Is there some way I can get/make a small footprint external storage box with all these drives?
6. How does the 5850m compare with my desktop HD4870? Is it a downgrade? I'll mainly be playing CoD4.
7. This laptop has an i5 430M ES chip in it. I'd like to go the quad route sometime in the future. Do all quad's work or is there a specific stepping I should be looking to get?

Thanks!

-Septimus

PS#
----
Sorry if I am asking stuff that has already been addressed. I am lazy (but honest!) to scan through 250 pages of threads. Apologies.

 

Firstly. Welcome to the forums! And congratulations on your purchase

Secondly. Cross-posting is frowned upon here. It's enough to post your question in one thread ( forum rules)

And Thirdly. The search is your friend. Use the search

I don't know the answers to all your questions but I'll try to help...

Cheers

 

Thanks man!

I removed the cross-post in the other thread. Sorry about the search (was too slow, good p0rn dl'ing) but I'll use it in the future.

The seller mentioned problems with hibernation i.e black screen on resume. Does this mean I have an old BIOS/VBIOS? I really don't care for hibernation. I prefer to shutdown rather than put to sleep.

Re RAID: I thought the H55M Chipset supported RAID? If there is no BIOS option, can I do software RAID? Is it risky?

Maybe I should clarify about Win7. The purchase is a barebones assembled setup. It comes with no OS. I simply want to migrate my desktop installation as is, with adjustments for drivers etc. I have a Norton Ghost image of my current desktop setup already in place.

Thanks for everything else!

 

Software RAID may be possible but I don't know of any of us on the MSI who have really tried to implement it. Might want to ask moral hazard, i know he was looking into it on the gt627. The chipset may support it but the hardware is another thing.

You probably have the old vbios but if you don't use sleep or hibernate then it's really not an issue. I'm still on the old vbios and dont plan on updating anytime soon.

If you have an image ready from ghost then you can just restore everything off of that and be done with it. That would be a more backup program specific thing that anything particular to do with this laptop.