Problems? See this thread at archive.org.
My NP900X3F-G01DE has a strange issue:
From time to time the fan slowly turns up to its maximum rpm - when this happens, temperature is normal and CPU is idle.
It stays at max rpm until I press a key on my keyboard (for example Ctrl).
I guess there is some kind of conflict between keyboard and sensor resourcec - don't really know, but I hope this will get fixed by a BIOS update.
Anyone else noticing this odd behaviour?
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Hey John problem is i don't want to think about 3G dongle any more especially with 1000€ notebook and sometimes i forget mobile phone,but i never forget my notebook
But that is still maybe one of my solution: putting wifi router in cabin and antenna outside on the mast.
Second is: putting 3G dongle with antennas (like those from screen)inside 15" inch Series 9 ,exact place is in plastic part of notebook sidewards wifi antennas and connecting it with wires to one usb.
Thank you gizz.
I plan to buy this Monday something (i still dont know what) but if you are willing to make test then i will probably wait.
It would be great if you can send me private message what day you plan to make test so i know when to expect results.
Also it would be good to put now your question again under my post.I dont plan to bother you any more
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Yes John you are 100% right .Now i see those are ventilation holes.
Problem is that when i decided to buy ultrabook only and most important thing was to have WWAN and great keyboard.Now i totally forget about WWAN.
I use most of the time notebook with 3G dongle.So whats the point to have ultrabook when you have 5 inch dongle?Is that right.
Before two months i thought to wait and buy T440S but i saw a lot of people complaining about quality control on Thinkpads.What scared me most was that Lenovo send Lisa from MobileTechreview unit with bent and quirky screen.On that i can only say:FOR GOOD SAKE (or they have some kind of sabotage at factory).
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Thank you for taking your time, John.
I already checked HW Info - the system is completely idle, cpu is at 800Mhz and temperature at about 45°C.
What is really interesting: Even when I reboot the system (using only the mouse/touchpad) the fan stays at 100% - until I press a key.
I can also activate standby and resume the system to make the fan quiet.
So it really seems a hardware issue, will have to send it in
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The problem is, it may happen several times a day or even several times in an hour, but I also had days where it did not happen at all.
With the reboot I meant that it persists across a reboot once it started, but it is not triggered by the reboot.
Until now I have not found a way to trigger it on purpose. It seems to happen just very randomly while surfing the web and using keyboard + touchpad.
I tend to think it is triggered by some well timed keyboard presses as it stops as soon as I press a key.
I am not even sure if it can happen while idling, this did not happen *yet*, I think.
So it will be almost impossible to reproduce it in the lab - they would have to change whatever they think may be broken :-/
I think I will wait for the first BIOS update (the model is quite new and it seems to be the first BIOS released) and then I'll contact support again if it still happens.
Maybe I will find a trigger until then which I can document on a sheet of paper.
Thanks anyway. I keep you guys updated here if I find out more.
Edit:
Ha, SW update just told me about a BIOS update - let's see
Edit 2:
It did not take long time and the problem reappeared. After pressing ctrl, the fan got mad. Seems to be definitely keyboard related. -
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Hello,
I've got a NP900X3F and rather dislike the standard windows 8. So I've downgraded to Windows 7 but I'm in need of some windows 7 USB drivers. If anyone can point me in the right direction I would be most grateful.
PS so far the SW update app has been useless and the samsung site is also next to useless, the online chat has been down all week and no reply to my e-mail yet.
Merged:
Ok, having just read the very 1st post I've got my answer. Many thanks to the OP of the thread
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Hello everybody, I've written an in-depth comparison of Samung ATIV book 9 (NOT plus!) NP900X3E-K06DE (i7/512/4GB/FHD matt) vs. ASUS Zenbook UX301LA (FHD glossy, i7 4500U/8GB (4006)) (i.e. NOT the Iris version)
I have ordered both laptops, and briefly, I am both very disappointed and very pleased by these two machines. Let's get started.
For reference, I also compared a Sony Vaio X.
I will denote negative aspects with (-)/(--)/(---), positives with (+)/(++)/(+++), and neutral with (o).
1. Design:
ASUS:
(---) The Asus has a glowing Asus logo on the lid. This gives it a cheap, gamer-like look. Not elegant, not classy, and not at all business-compatible. This is really bull, ASUS.
(--) Even though the lid is perfectly crafted (no gaps etc), and opposed to other reviewers' observations, closes perfectly, the glossy glass finish (talkin about the back of the display) is too flashy-histerical.
(-) The keys have too large letters written on them.
(+++) Apart from that, the keyboard design however is wonderfully sleak, very fine, classy design, a pleasure to look at. No industrial-look, but minimalistic lettering (no "Return/Tab" written on the keys, very nice iconography etc.)
(+++) Touchpad and palm rest are realy nicely designed.
(+++) Overall design very balanced. Could be a little bit smaller and sleeker though (5 mm less in widh would be optimal for a balanced look of bezel etc.).
(++) Nice charger
((---)) My machine had one screw not tightened at all, at the bottom.
Samsung:
(+++) When closed, the Samsung is easily the most beautiful Notebook I have every seen. Wonderful grey-blue silky coloring, beautifully understated thin, delicate silver rim, *excellent* feel/build quality, extremely sturdy yet extremely thin.
((---)) My machine had a problem with an area that looked like damp but could not be rubbed of with a damp cloth, around the samsung logo on the back. Bad quality control.
(+) Even though there are color differences between the screen frame and the rest of the machine, this in fact looks like it was on purpose. It looks nice and the slightly differing colors match.
(--) The keyboard looks okay, the size of the letter written on the keys is very adequate, but the keyboard, in contrast to the Asus, looks "nervous", not smooth, and has too much stuff written on it. Looks too technical and doesn't really fit with the sleek design. Keys are not always alligned as nicely as on the Asus.
(-) The touchpad looks oversized on the machine. In fact, with adeqaute mouse pointer software, a reducion in size by 30% of the touchpad on the Samsung, and by 15% on the Asus, would help both ergononmically and design-wise. The silver rim of the touchpad, in contrast to the rim on the edges of the notebook, does *not* help the sleek, soft design, but catches the eye and looks distracting and not well fitted-in. The X3F does not have this, but it is said to have other design/feel issues instead.
Dimensions, weight, handling:
ASUS:
(-) Even though the ASUS is just somewhat above 200 grams heavier, this inded has, as others have noted, a huge impact. It is much more exhausting to hold the Asus in one hand, than the Samsung.
(-) As noted, the Asus is a bit too big for a 13" incher. It just looks a bit too heavy to be a sleek, slim ultrabook, and it also feels a bit too big.
(--) when held or on the lap, the bulge that protudes is somewhat disturbing and you can feel it. The old UX31 was probably better in this regard. The benefit is probably miminal when typing, but the distraction through the bulge is really stupid, even though it is nicely rounded and does not, like the Vaio Pro, "sting".
Samsung:
(++) Feels light, can be easily held in one hand. (Sony is lighter still, but very likely not that sturdy.)
(++) Dimensions, when closed, look perfect. When opened, the bezel in fact looks a bit too thin on the edges, especially because the bottom part of the bezel is large (not perfectly balanced therefore). Incredibly slim feel. Wonderful.
(++) when held, it is incredibly smooth and rounded at the bottom (hehe), and when on the lap, it's just as perfect.
(-) The lid moves its position even when just quickly picking up the laptop. Then it needs to be reajusted. I don't know about long term use. At the moment its just a minor annoyance.
Keyboard in use:
ASUS:
(--) The cursor keys are way too small. Will be tough to get used to this, but probably possible.
(+) The keyboard is noticeably more silent than the Samsung's, the keys go down very smoothly with just a little bit of pressure. A nice feel that allows for quick typing. However, the spacebar (and afaicr the return key) are noticeably louder than the other keys which is annoying. This could be fixed perhaps be putting some stuff underneath these 2 keys that will make them less "vibrating". All other keys don't vibrate. The keysboard, however, is not as silent as the keyboard on my Vaio X, and I consider the Vaio X's keyboard fine but still with some room for improvement in terms of noise. (the vaio has the issue with the spacebar too, btw). Bottom line, the Asus has a nice, acceptable keyboard that has a nice feeling and has a noise level that is fine provided one can get these 2 keys fixed somehow.
Samsung:
(-) I was disappointed with this keyboard. It is annoyingly noisy, and the keys require too much pressure for my taste and the pressure/response of the keys feels cheap, like on a cheap calculator: One needs to press against the pressure all the way down (instead of a feeling of a resistance at the beginning, followed by reduction of this resistance once the key is pressed down a little bit more. Either this, or an overall lighter, smoother press would allow much more comfortable typing). The feeling when typing, and the noise, are a bummer. Not a good feeling interacting with the machine. Note that someone complained about the ASUS being more noisy than his HP's keyboard.
Sadly, I think I have read that the ATIV book 9 plus' keyboard has even more resistance? But I remember conflicting reports on this one. If you can comment on both keyboards in comparison, please do so.
The loud, noisy keyboard ist the primary reason why I will probably not keep this wonderful notebook.
###!!!! If anyone has any ideas how to get the keyboard quiet, please post. I have seen keyboard covers of silicon etc. I fear they will look stupid (air inbetween, etc.pp.). I can't think of a solution other than replacing the keys' mechanical parts with better ones and reduce noise by avoiding plastic to touch plastic and prevent rattling thorugh better fitting parts etc.. One could scrape off some plastik at the bottom of each key
Samsung: What's the use of a silent mode with such a cheap, rattling keyboard? And why did not one single reviewer complain about this? I wonder if the X3F/or plus X3G is better.
Touchpad in use:
Note: on both machines, mouse pointer behavior was tested in FHD (100%) screen zoom, and with mouse pointer speed at max and accelaration switched on. Any other setting would make handling the mouse even more problematic on a FHD screen.
ASUS:
(+++) This touchpad, in combination with the software, feels wonderful. It's smooth like a lotus flower, has an almost perfect size (could be a little bit smaller so the buttons where even more easly reachable), and presing down the buttons gives a low, dark sound that sounds very good (like quality) even though it's just a tiny bit too much on the louder side. But still very fine and perfectly okay.
In terms of handling, the touchpad is not as oversized as the Samsungs, allowing for reaching the buttons rather easily.
(o/+) The mouse pointer software allows quick and precise placement of the cursor. Accelaration and speed are fast, but even stronger acceleration would help. Then they would require even less swiping on the touch pad. But it's perfectly acceptable and a joy to use. On my Vaio X, i installed a third party driver that would allow faster acceleration and using the touchpad there, in terms of speed/precision is fantastic now. -- Why just a o/+ for the Asus then? Handling the mouse pointer (operations) is poses a problem: When you place the cursor into text, then sait a while (1-2 seconds), a movement will NOT be recognized at first, and then the cursor will jump, forcing you to go back and forth. Annoying. This prevents problems with unintended dragging when rightclicking on the rc button, but as a side effect makes navigation jumpy in described situation. Not good. The could fix this by enabling this jumping behavior *only* when a hardware click was done. This would be quite easy to program.
Side note: I do not know whether windows effectively allows tampering with acceleration. I remember I only achieved better acceleration with a different driver.
(--) (*) The mouse was quite laggy at first, but I believe this was when energy saving mode (energy schemes). This may be problem, but one might be able to fix this with priority settings or allowing somewhat more cpu in the energy setings.
Samsung:
Note: Driver version was the shipped 17.7.9.5.
(o/-) The touchpad has noticeably less smoothness than the Asus, which in combination with the problems mentioned below, is a bit of a problem. It's not fun using this touchpad, event though it feels nice at first. But after a short time, you will notice handling problems, as opposed to the Asus'. Moving the mouse pointer up is especially uncomfortable. The problem would be acceptable if accelaration /speed is faster.
(---) The mouse software does not allow as fast speeds/accelaration as the Asus does. This, combined with the bad surface, is the problem. I cannot easily swipe the pointer diagonally across the screeen , as I can on the Asus. In fact, on my Vaio X, this can be done with minimal movement yet with NO deficits in precision whatsoever.
(-/++) The touchpad is too big (no use for that), with the clicking areas too low , requiring you to move your hands/arms too much just to reach the buttons, especially tedious when switching often between keyboard and touchpad. One could think that in some instances, one could substitute rightclidk by pressing the context menu keyboard button, but not even this is possible im many cases because the context menu botton is combined with the Fn key, effectively requiring 3 keys for a right cliick (tap to activate, then Fn, then context), and even this only works in some cases to substitute right click. The sound of the buttons is a tiny bit more silent than the Asus, but doesn't sound as classy/deep, but fine. However, using the button can be completely avoided by using tap for lc and 2-finger-tab for rc. This works extremely well.
(-/++) I have had problems with unwanted actions when trying to right-click e.g. folders on the desktop. Instead of showing the context menu, in 1 out of 5 cases, it would behave as though I had move the folder while rightclicking, therefore showing the "copy here" menu instead. This problem did not occur on the Asus. I did several tests that always yielded this problem on the Samsung, not the Asus. However, as you could read above, this comes at a price with the Asus (no precision in text), whilst the problem can be completely avoided on the Samsung.
###!! If there is a software that will allow faster mouse speeds on the Samsung, please post! Just like the keyboard problem, the slow,restistive mousepad is a big ergonomic problem.
When I pull the lever on the Asus to the middle (!), its as fast as the Samsung on Max.
Display:
ASUS:
(--) Thes ASUS' FHD display has a very noticeable yellow/brownish tint (I did try to optimize with the provided color tool). White is not white, but yellow-brownish. The tint is very bad at the bootom areas and inacceptable. Looks like sauce there.
(-) The ASUS' display is not as bright as the Samsung and is worse towards the edges.
(-) Glossy is a problem as soon as / if you do not work with stuff that has mostly white backgrounds, or if you have a window/light exactly behind yourself in an angle that reflects the screen. It IS possible to live with glossy even for glossy haters, you need to test this for your purposes with a friend's glossy screen in case you don't have one for testing. Glossy can be everything from fine to disastrous depending on circumstances.
(-) I found the touchscreen to be of no practical use. Of course, this verdict is given after switching off the incredibly annoying touch interface that simply has no place on a laptop with a keyboard and touchpad. Period.
(-) In fact, the Asus' screen was worse than the 2009 Vaio X screen, which was snow white and just as adequately bright. The Iris version might have a better screen. I triple checked that brighness was at max on the Asus and no auto brightness was active. I might have missed something. But I really looked everywhere. But even if it turns out it can be made brighter, the tint is the problem.
Samsung:
(+++) This is the most beautiful display I have ever seen. Wonderful matte, and white is snow-white.
(+++) Brighter that the Asus and even though noticeable, towards the edges the reduction of brightness is perfectly acceptable. Wonderful.
Fan and SSD noise:
Note: Testing was done only with no power plugged in, so far. However, sometimes, laptops will heat up when AC is plugged in.
ASUS:
(-) The Asus has a problem with its chassis. Slightly pressing against the chassis from below causes the fan to scratch against it, and this scratching may sometimes reoccur even when not pressure is applied to the chassis. This is a problem. However, I have not observed this long enough if very careful handling could prevent this problem completely.
(++) Thes Asus' fan was off most of the time.
(++) When stressed a bit, the sound of the fan was, apart from the abovementioned issue, pleasant, like a draft of air, a nice, deep, buzzing sound. Soothing would be too much to say, but it was not disturbing. Well done.
(o) The SSD is audible (I suppose it's the SSD) when holding your ear to the laptop. I was not longer able to hear it when 30cm (1ft) away. The SSD is replaceable.
(o) see (*) (laggy pointer when in energy saving mode)
(o) Vents are across the bottom so I believe it at least might be that having the laptop on your lap will allow for air to be sucked in somewhere at least.
Overall very good.
Samsung:
(-) Vents are exactly where your legs are, potentially preventing air to be sucked in.
(unsure ATM: ++/--) The Samsung has two fans. When the laptop does minor cooling, *both* (not just one, as others claimed) are running and give a rather silent yet high-pitched sound. This is not as loud and hi pitch as the Sony's which drove me crazy, but it IS audible when in a silent room and once it stops you have an epiphany: "true SILENCE". It's not loud. It's just there. I think it has the potential to become annoying when you work at night. I cannot see the point of this. It hardly does anything, and the laptop is often even when on idle practically. I did play with the silent mode, Eco mode, CPU throttle, and passive cooling policy. There were times where the fan stayed off despite some constant medium cpu work and vice versa. I cannot yet tell what the deal is with this fan. Needs more observation. There is hope that most everyday tasks can be done silent, not even with the fans on high pitch level.
As far as I can remember, one of the two fan will go up in speed, leaving the other one running at high pitch (unsure?). The one going up seemed to be drowning the other one to some extend, but not completely.
(o/+) The fan that becomes louder then starts to sound okay, but not quite as good as the Asus' but it's really fine. It's about as loud as the ASUS, but not that calm/deep. I think however, it's combined with the first fan that gives the sound stage an ever so slight high pitch by-note.
It is my impression that both fans have the same targets that they cool. Hence one can expect that once cooling is really necessary, one fan will come in stronger. In my opinion it is possible that one fan is of no use. I would *not* be surprised if cutting this fan off from its power supply will do no harm whatsoever. Options? It's idiotic to cool down a system from 50 to 45, when at other instances, you cool it down from 70 to 60 and this works just fine for extended periods of time. However, the benefit will be small because, the other fan will still spin at the high pitch sound!
Other observations:
Samsung:
(-) Whilst the ASUS exhibited lags in the mouse pointer during energy saving cpu throttle, the samsung had responsiveness issues too, I observed the settings center to stay unresponsive for very extented preriods of time, effectively preventing me for like 30 seconds to swith back to non-silent mode. This might be fixed by changing the cpu throttle level now. But the quasi-crashing behavior of the control center was not ok.
(-) The silent mode botton would not give feedback which mode is active ATM, whilst other functions did give feedback. There was no inline help that would explain "auto" mode.
Note: IntelliMemory was partly switched on during testing, now off. Perhaps this helps with fan behavior too.
ASUS
(-) The ASUS seemingly lacks a control center, at least I could not find it after much searching. I just found some half-baken settings programs that would tackle some of the stuff to be controlled.gizzmoffm likes this. -
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Once more thank you John.
However, ETDAniConf.exe does not help with speed/acceleration.
(I also tried the microsoft generic driver driver which was just as slow.)
I won't sacrifice my habit of navigating with minimal movements at the top of the touchscreen (which de facto can be just as precise and is much faster and more ergonomic). That's the most crucial part of how I interact with a computer. The Asus was just quick enough (2x the speed of the Samsung), though I would have preferred 4x the speed, like the driver on my Sony. I have seen (mouse) drivers that were 8-16x the speed, which were far too fast for me at their max settings. So I'm not talking insane here. The Samsung driver *is* too slow and one will have to make use of the whole touchpad, interrupting workflow/typing, and leaving you with dealing with the touchpad surface that feels uncomfortably resistive and could be *much smoother*. It always feels smooth for 30 seconds and then seems to suck up a bit of moisture / grease. One could deal with this if one only uses a minimal area thanks to speed. That's why my Sony Vaio touch works despite being about as resistive as the Samsung. I am now so spoiled by the Asus' silky pad I really feel bad about getting anything beneath this wonderful thing.
I think I read about someone who used a different touchpad driver for the 9 in these forums, but I cannot find it. But I might be mistaken. I also tried fumbling in the registry mouse settings which have no effect at all (I did reboot) (same on the vaio x btw). So if anyone knows how to speed up the touchpad, please do post.
So, I have seen *much* better keyboards and touchpads on laptops. I was so confident that input devices were a non-issue on the 9, I am tempted to say "thanks" to some Series 9 fanboy reviews and posts.
Note to self: Will not start researching laptops on the internet before having typed ond and felt the touchpad in a store first. Waste of time doing the other way round.
This is so sad. Just because they were too stupid to implement a greated range of pointer speeds, I will not get this notebook I really tried to get used to it but it drives me crazy (even more crazy).
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2013 Ativ Book 9 13.3" Ivy Bridge NP900X3E / NP900X3F
Discussion in 'Samsung' started by oled, Jul 17, 2013.
