Nearly new cf-29 mk4

Long time no post, fellow addicts.
Got me a mk4 off lease and I am VERY happy. Let me tell you the story.... The wife and I went to Alaska on a cruise. I took along the 28 mk3 to empty the 8gb camera card because I knew my wife would use it up (3973 pictures she took). I did not even consider my A*us, plus I love the way TSA looks at the 28 when I toss it around. Dumping the card was no problem with the reader inserted into usb Pci card, but when I got home after a 5hr flight, 45 min drive and Alaska to Atlanta jet lag, I was not mentally prepared for the upload of 18gb worth of data. Tried the usb-pci to external drive and it kept freezing, maybe it's a bad pci card, what the hell i'll use the onboard usb.......4hrs!!!! After an hour and a half of my wife saying "Where's the pictures?" every 5 min, I removed the hd and put it in an external enclosure. Plugged it into the A*us usb and bang 11min total upload time. While she was looking I was too (for a new CF relationship). I decided to get the SBC crap, did I mention the strained relationship with the 28? Alas! Tiger Direct had a new one, an off lease 29mk4. I figured if I jump now I just might get a good one, after all I did just win $350 on slots just before the casino closed for good the day before. It arrived yesterday and wow! I don't know if this is a SBC or not but it looks brand new, 2 small scratches on the bottom and ...... well thats it. Brand new yellow tab battery (lasts about 8hrs!) flawless touchscreen, keyboard, palmrests, door seals even the power jack cover looks new. SP3 and most of the mk4 drivers. It's fast, bright, sounds great, wireless has better range than any computer I have ever had and it even has the internal verizon Sierra card. The only cons are that it came with a floppy and no GPS but I do have the DVD in my 28 so I guess only the no GPS then. I think I am in love! The more I fondle it the more I'll ask questions. Sorry for the long post, but I had to tell ya'll about my new fix. Mmmmmmmmm it feels so good............

 

CF-29LQQGCBM DESCRIPTION:
Intel Pentium M 778 1.6GHz LV (Centrino), 13.3" Touch XGA, 512MB, 80GB, Intel 802.11a+b+g, Win XP SP2, Verizon EVDO, Dual pass through, No Drive

With a Verizon EVDO onboard it is definitely not SBC/at&t.

Enjoy! :yes:

 

have a cf-29L and have been tinkering with it, replaced heat sink rubbers and put in engenious plus card, got it all working and have been monitoring temps with cputhermometer eventually temps get up to lo 50's. initially they would start out 50's on boot up but now 30-40 C but temps get up to the low 50's, checked on specs of the M 778 cpu and says its in range of "normal". at this time noticed that the operational hours were 960 in bios and they don't seem to have changed. I know that this feature is incorporated only with the mk 4's & mk 5's, but was wondering if there is a way to "look at" this and see if these numbers could be changed or to reflect a different than actual hours of uaseage. point is, could someone change something in the bios to read different than truly what was there and how would you know? any ideas on this one? .........Driller

 

Driller... A few pages back you'll read how to change the model number to reflect what is correct on the machine after modding. However... I think the hours are in a place in the BIOS where you cannot go... And if you find out... We cannot publish it here.

 

Driller -

I remember a similar issue I had with an old NEC laptop I owned; it turned out the counter ONLY counted hours running in the OS. Time spent working in BIOS was NEVER counted; even when I left it on for DAYS.

Dunno if that is what's happening here, but maybe...

mnem
It's his time... it's running out...

 

Yeah... Mine only counts actual hours worked. If it is in suspend, hibernation or sitting idle it doesn't seem to count towards hours used. Otherwise I'd be at 100,000 hours by now. I start mine every morning and turn it off at night. Sometimes I leave it on all night.

 

understand what you're both saying, not looking to change anything, was trying to see if perhaps someone else did or if I may be truly be in" suspended animation" myself i.e. I'm not paying close enough attention to see if the clock is really running while I'm in the OS surfing or working on other programs. now that I have about 10 of these trusty little laptops I'm beginning to not know what "child" I last spoke too. anyway, just did another heat pad replacement and engenious card swap and am trying to get the wireless hooked up on the "sister machine" identical to the first one I did. it seems the new card pulls a more stable signal even when it says it has low connectivity signal strength and pulls data quicker when I'm online doing my attention deficit disorder thing, hopping from site to site, if I get in trouble getting this on I'll go to threads and stickies to create a new neural pathway in the old grey matter, thanks, Driller

 

Sounds like a nice find and welcome back to the board from a fellow Georgian. I had a lot of fun modifying my CF-29N and I trust that you will as well.

 

Is the samsung 160 still the fastest hd for this machine???? Would there be any improvement with the enginous over the stock intel Pro 2915 ABG card?? I have been working 14 to 16 hr days for two weeks so not much time to feed my fix.....

 

No and yes. No, the newer 5400 rpm drives are said to have similar throughput due to newer technology, plus lower power consumption. Yes the Engenius card is an improvement.