9262 finally here!

woohoooo

finally got mine yesterday, met the ups man just in time!

plus coincidentally my 1tb lacie external also arrived in the same shipment, bonus!

I don't have time for a detailed review right now, but I will have one shortly/ geared at workstation applications such as maya, rhino, autocad, adobe cs3...etc

specs in sig,

initial thoughts:

sweet. but bummed out

well I'm not going to elaborate yet... there are problems I am having:

-have had a couple of fatal errors in the few hours I've had it so I am going to reformat... but I have been searching at have not found a step by step for reformatting windows xp pro in Raid 5, which I need to do ASAP (i'm currently helping thesis' out, and they need as much help as they can get right now)

any links? suggestions?

-hard drive constantly being accessed every second, the indicator light blinks every second, always... dont know what this is, but hopefully a reformat will solve this...

-dead pixel, about 2 inches down, 3 inches from the left... crappy
alot of my programs are black-background, sure pokes out like a sore thumb

soooo any help will be appreciated, the quicker I solve these, the quicker I'll post a review w/ good photography


thanks in advance!

 

for XP installation with RAID:
- you will need to get the SATA RAID drivers and put in on a USB Floppy (or pendrive formatted as FAT), then hit F6 during the XP install ask you to

OR

- you can get the drivers and slipstream them into a new XP disc using nLite (very simple... and wont require you to use a floppy or anything)

______________

for HDD activity
... usually Vista is infamous for having a lot of crap running in the background by default.

Thread here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=292702

______________

As for the dead/stuck pixel:
...if its a stuck pixel (non black), you can still revive it

Thread here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=281086

Note: you also have the 30 day full satisfaction warranty on your side, so if you cannot revive the stuck pixel, then you can get a new replacement unit... at the cost of shipping it back only.

 

I'm running xp pro, so thats not it/

but back to re-formatting: In the bios I set cd-rom above the rest for boot sequence, but it doesn't do anything when the xp pro disc is in, it just continues to load windows normally... It's the shiny gold main windows xp pro disc right?

 

if you are running XP pro, that thread still applies.

XP still needs some tweaking to disable some resources.

make sure to press a key when it says "if you want to boot from theCD, press any key"

 

you do not need raid drivers on the 9262. they are built into the raid controller itself.

you do not even need to go through the f6 option with windows. just go into the raid utility configuration and set up the raid options that way. then format and instal the OS normally.

 

but just re-installing windows is problematic for me, the cd's in, the boot order is correct in the bios, but there just is no prompt to 'press any key to boot from cd' or anything of the sort

should I configure raid first, then install windows? what order should I be doing this in... should I uninstall windows first?

sorry, it's just that i'm out of time and need to have this up and running tonight with everything installed on it

 

go into your raid utility and delete the raid 5 you currently have. it will give you a warning that all the data will be lost, hit yes. then re-select a raid option of your choosing, like raid 5 again. then make sure the boot order is correct where the dvd drive boots before the hard drive(s) or the raid array and go on installing the OS from there normally. you do not have to hit f6 to assign special raid drivers or anything like that with this machine.

 

I've done that; delete the current raid5, re-create a raid5, made sure boot order is correct in the bios, started installing windows, then got error that "setup did not find any hard disk drives installed on my computer"

the bios see's the drives, correctly configured... suggestions?links?

 

i don't know then. i guess i can only suggest the basic things like make sure all 3 hard drives are selected for raid 5. if that does not work try 3 hard drives for raid 0 just for testing purposes. maybe your raid controller is malfunctioning.

i guess if you can shoot a short video clip of what you rae doing and upload that to youtube maybe we can help you out further.

 

called up, said fatal errors could be a memory problem, so now im running a memory test... recommended for 4 hours...

tried installing windows but in fact I do need to do the f6 thing to assign special raid drivers with a floppy, thats what he said through the phone conversation

special way to do this? as of know i have just copied and pasted the raid .exe file from the driver cd provided onto a usb stick

this really sucks... definitely not the definition of a smooth start

 

i have had an alienware m9750 and this sager 9262 and they both share the same rait utility. i did not need to copy raid drivers to floppy disk to get to set up the hard drives and OS.

yeah not smooth start. you will need an external floppy disk drive to put the raid drivers in there. the exe file may something that extracts the raid drivers onto floppy disk for you. not sure about that.

you may want to try raid 0 or other raid setups to see if they are smooth for testing purposes.

keep us updated.

 

slipstreaming the drivers is easier... no floppy needed.

 

Got my 9262 from xotic today. When I opened the rather large box it had the standard laptop bag in it along with a Targus XL backpack which I didnt order or pay for, nice bonus though. Anyone else get the free TargusXL??? Everything seems to be in good working order. I installed the new 179.79 driver and it works well with crysis. I ran 3dmark06 right after the driver installation and got a 14232..... good, bad, I dont really know lol.
Question.. .when I hit the print screen button: where does it save to??? I wanna post some crysis benchmarks, but dont know where to find the screenshots. Thanx for any help!

 

Your score looks good and congrats on the Targus.

Print screen goes to the clipboard.

 

the Print Screen makes a snapshot of whatever is on the screen
- then now you open a picture editor (like Paint) and Paste it.

 

Can I just ask an idiot question which is at least tangentially on-topic since it relates to RAID?

Well, since no-one said "no" , what's the point of having a RAID setup on a notebook (or, for that matter, an ordinary desktop), particularly with a software RAID controller? Having browsed through an awful lot of threads in the last two years or so here, I've read many, many, many posts (and complete threads) going through a veritable litany of RAID-related problems, but almost no threads mentioning, even in passing, how RAID saved someone's butt (which is the primary point of RAID as far as I know)?

Given all the grief that installing and setting up RAID seems to give most people here, and the scant help it actually seems to provide, it just seems to me that going through the grief is just not warranted for the lack of real benefit that anyone seems to derive.

Or, as usual, am I just missing the obvious?

 

glad to hear you got the targus... makes me feel worse, seeing how i paid july 17th and just received it yesterday haha... the only compensation i got was a one level shipping upgrade, pretty pitiful if you ask me, especially with all the problems i've had so far


anyways... i would also like to hear response to shysters question...

and gophn: your saying slipstreaming the driver, how do I go about that?

using nlite? so use my xp pro disc and make a copy, using nlite to put the drivers in the disc? or can i just use the original install cd

bleh...

 

http://www.nliteos.com/

and here is the guide:
http://www.nliteos.com/guide/index.html
- step 2 page is the driver slimstreaming section.

 

thats a nice little program there

but the raid driver they included is a .exe, and even when i extracted it it's a .ima - in nlite it only uses .inf driver files

is there somewhere where I can get the drivers online?

 

I have just finished getting a replacement from exotic and evidently you have to pay for return and back. Plus theres no more student discount for back.

 

IMA is a floppy image file.
Here ya go.

I extracted the IMA file and compiled this zip.

http://rapidshare.com/files/141452400/D901C_XP_RAID_AHCI-Gophn.zip.html

enjoy.

 

thanks gophn i really appreciate the help

did all that, put the drivers on a disc with nlite (plus everything else needed)

but still didn't see the hard drive...

i called up support again and they are going to email me the drivers needed (perhaps they're different?) and write a step by step guide for me...

thanks though

ill let you know how it turns out

 

so you slipstreamed the drivers into the XP disc, burned the new ISO and the drives did not show up?

make sure to enable a RAID array and/or enable ACHI in the BIOS.

 

ok make sure in the BIOS that under the advanced tab there is a SATA setting; make sure that is set to RAID and not the other two options (normal, ACHI) otherwise the hard drives will not be detected if you set them up for raid.

if this works and it detects the hard drives do not go through the F6 route of external raid drivers. let me know if this works.

 

yeah did all that, the SATA mode is raid, sees the 3 320gb SATA drives everythings good to go...

still waiting on that email from xotic's support, said 10 minutes an hour ago


edit: while "setup is loading files" in the setup, i do see a few raid controller drivers being installed... i get to the next step, but then still doesn't see the hard drive

edit again: Here is the response i got

"Hello Daniel,

You can download the RAID/AHCI driver suite from:
http://64.208.175.44/ftp/misc/08Raiddriver_D900C.exe

Unfortunately, this requires a floppy before you can use nLite to
slipstream it. (Amazingly, there is not a single computer with a floppy
drive available in the office). Once you run the "F6Floppy" utility, it
will copy everything necessary to a floppy diskette (but ONLY to a floppy),
and you can then point nLITE toward the floppy to slipstream the driver.

You may want to check the driver disc, just to make sure there is not a
RAID folder with something OTHER than "F6Floppy.exe" inside it. If not,
use the F6Floppy.exe to create the floppy, as described above.

Thanks,

Thain Tiernay
XoticPC Support"

He says a floppy is needed, but Gophn you already gave me the extracted files that the floppy would have created, right? So this should work?

 

it sounds like you need to rma this laptop

you might want to try installation with maybe only 2 of the hard drives in a raid configuration for testing. maybe one of the drives are bad or something. also, you might want to try normal drive setup without any raid, again for testing to see if the OS can instal.

 

yes, use my files... I extracted the drivers from the 08Raiddriver_D900C.exe that they gave you.

 

sorry to keep bothering...
Gophn when I am using nlite, I get to driver integration options and this:

Mode:
-regular PNP driver
or
Textmode driver (with options below)

_intel 631xESB/632ESB SATA AHCI Controller (server/workstation ESB2)
_intel 631xESB/632ESB SATA RAID Controller (server/workstation ESB2)
_Intel 82801FBM SATA AHCI Controller (Mobile ICH6M)
_Intel 82801FR SATA AHCI Controller (Desktop ICH6R)
_Intel 82801FR SATA RAID Controller (Desktop ICH6R)
_Intel 82801GBM SATA AHCI Controller (Mobile ICH7M/DH)
_Intel 82801GHM SATA RAID Controller (Mobile ICH7MDH)
_Intel 82801GR/GH SATA AHCI Controller (Desktop ICH7R/DH)
_Intel 82801GR/GH SATA RAID Controller (Desktop ICH7R/DH)
_Intel 82801HR/HH/HO SATA AHCI Controller (Desktop ICH8R)
_Intel 82801HR/HH/HO SATA RAID Controller (Desktop ICH8R)


so wow... which one?? i would assume one of the mobile RAID ones... but last time i selected the "regular PNP driver" and that was a no go

That's probably why it didn't work before, but I don't think its a good idea to include all of the above

 

You did select F6 during the setup, right? Even though I slipstreamed my drivers on the CD for my Toshiba, I still had to add the drivers for the installation. FYI select all the drivers

 

meaning from a floppy? i don't have access to one, is there a way to do that with a usb stick?

 

I'm going to have to make a CD later on in the day, I swore I had to press f6 so the drivers would be added to the installation process. I didn't use a floppy, as most floppies don't even work with this process. It will do just as yours is doing now, fail to find the floppy when it's time to install the operating system. I'm really surprised that you would have to go through this process anyway, considering the BIOS options of your unit. You can't first install the operation system, then setup RAID?

 

YES!!!

ahhhhhhhhhh it's working, with no F6!! wow... i don't want to jump the gun or anything but so far so good! setup is now formatting (610477mb free)

big +rep to Gophn, who was loads of help(lifesaver) (compared to the support service... i mean seriously... slow and not helpful so far, just as a first impression)

sooo the only drive i slipstreamed was the raid drivers, and that means I'll still have to install the rest like video card, etc?

i am psyched, period.

review to come shortly, that is once i help with the thesis projects that I should have been doing these past two days


side note: I'm almost re-considering my decision on a laptop... I know it's the best of the best for laptops but I'm just not to sure it'll be enough juice...
the computers in our lab each have 4gb ram with a q6600 quad and a quadro fx 3500, and seem sluggish with the 3d modeling im doing...

I know my setup is better, i just hope it's better enough... can someone elaborate on how the quadro fx 3500 compares to the quadro fx 1600m? hopefully somewhat comparable...

 

well yes... i suppose I could have just went about it with 3 hdd's with no raid, installed the OS, and then switched them over to raid, but I just don't think that would work - because the raid utility requires the HDD's to be wiped clean


perhaps a software raid, but the hardware raid with the 9262 is much better, IMO

 

UPDATE: glad it worked for you.

just slipstream them all

but if youre wondering, you will be choosing:
_Intel 82801HR/HH/HO SATA AHCI Controller (Desktop ICH8R)
_Intel 82801HR/HH/HO SATA RAID Controller (Desktop ICH8R)

no need to choose, XP setup will auto detect it for you since the drivers will be apart of the XP disc now.... its automated.

 

the Quadro 1600M is equivalent to the Geforce 8700M GT in performance

and the Quadro 3500M is about the same as Geforce 7950 GTX

so there will be a slight difference in 3D rendering... but texture rendering and conversion will be using the CPU's power.

You can upgrade later when the Quadro 2700M and 3700M becomes available for this system.

 

Wait until you actually see it installing the operating system, then you can be pretty happy it might work. But formatting the drive(s) is no indication it’s going to work, but I hope like heck it does.

 

XP is just tricky with SATA/AHCI/RAID because you have to use a floppy or slipstream.

after that, driver installations and utilities is a breeze.

In the end, learning to slipstream is actually very useful stuff.

 

Yeah, I’ve made one with all my drivers for my 570 and added the software. I guess it’s nothing different that what the manufactures have been doing with their OEM disc, it’s just nice to have everything on one DVD.

 

wooooooo

windows is up and running

side note: i did not change the boot order, actually i left cd-rom out of it


so now I am installing all the drivers included on the cd provided, I should be doing this right? chipset, video, audio, wlan, etc...


thanks for all the help, really appreciate it

 

alrighty, programs up and running

i'm actually second guessing myself on this purchase now... I really don't think it has enough juice

i know its the king of laptops, but i'm not so sure it will hold up for my school work, so far i've already got an 'out of memory' error while trying to do a rendering, and upgrading the quadro card to the best mobile will not fix that


but it sure is a quick machine, although for some reason my startup times aren't that impressive, even with it tweaked out, i stall on the bios screen for a few seconds


maybe i was just expecting too much also, anticipation got blown when it wasn't working the way i wanted right out of the box

also:

The quadro fx 1600m, it doesn't seem to have an antialiasing setting (2x, 4x, 8, 16x) but only an anisotropic setting... can that be fixed?

can some point me in the direction of spec'ing out desktop systems around the same price (3700.00), how much power will I really gain? probably alot...

 

for 3700 you can have a simply SICK desktop.. actually for prob half that...

 

welllllllllll then, i guess i got 30 days, right? ugh

i'll see how it holds up for a week or two...

 

I have a question on the page file limit, it seems to be 4096mb

but there are ways to overcome this/

seeing how I have 3 hdd's, would setting the page file to more than that amount be helpful for my memory problems? my total memory and PF is not being even close to exceeded before i get memory errors, here's a screenshot of my numbers

errr i don't have img hosting, so ill just list them:
Totals:
Handles 8890
Threads 539
Processes 42

Commit Charge (k):
Total 1737000
Limit 7436000
Peak 2357000

Phsyical Memory (k):
Total 3405768
Available 1564900
system cache 115100

Kernal Memory (k)
Total 138000
paged 55600
nonpaged 82300

Commit charge: 1696M/7262M


these are about the stats I have when these errors occur

 

do a memory test with MemTest86+
- let it go through 1 full run, if anything is listed, then the physical memory needs to get swapped
- if no errors (red lines) are listed during the run(s), then its a software conflict.

... if its a software conflict, check your memory dump file to see what the culprit is.

 

did the memtest86 for four hours before when i first thought something was off, got no errors

and this memory dump file is where...?

 

Are you sure your system is a Sager rather a PCMicroworks? (Sarcasm)

Trance

 

Can someone point me in the direction of a good customizable online desktop business?

I have 25 days left to decide, and my options right now are:

_upgrade to 8gb ram, with vista64
_upgrade to a better quadro video card, the quadro fx 3700m (who knows if/when that will happen)
_and is the q9650 the last processor to be able to fit in the 9262?


OR

Buy (not build, I really don't have time) a really sick config for the same price
-Minimum 8-cores, 8-12gb ram, i think would put the quadro fx 3700 in it

so I'm just looking for suggestions on where to customize a setup like this, but not at dell, hp, lenovo...

thanks!


one last question, would putting vista64 on my machine help out with my OOM errors? xp pro can only utilize 2gb of ram per program, right? so that would mean if I have a 64bit system it would be able to allocate all 4gb that i currently have?


thanks again...

 

...anyone?

 

so you want a dual quad-core and a quadro?

Why not build it yourself?

 

look at this motherboard... its your best bet: