2013 Ativ Book 9 Plus owner's lounge (NP940X3G)

Dear all,

I have owned an NP940X3G/Ativ Book 9 Plus since August 2014, to my great satisfaction until very recently when to issues popped up, more or less at the same time:

1) Malfunctioning spacebar: It seems somehow "stuck" and it needs to be hit hard in the center of the bar for it to function;
2) Malfunctioning battery: Battery life overall seems to be still OK, but when it reaches approximately 30% of (indicated) power, the system will shut down without warning, luckily after auto-saving documents in use.

The ultrabook has been in HEAVY use for the past 21 months (average of 8 hrs per day is a fair estimate) and has been used both laptop-style and connected to external power, monitor and keyboard (replacing desktop).
As you can imagine this all very highly annoying and I am on the brink of purchasing a new ultrabook (any suggestions for similar system ?).

I'd greatly appreciate of anyone can let me know if he/she believes these issues can somehow be resolved/repaired ?

Cheers,

Edwin

 

1. Run a piece of thin cardboard round the edge of the space bar to help ensure it is sitting centrally in the hole and no dirt is restricting its movement.

2. For the battery, fully charge it and then go into the BIOS and run the battery calibration which fully discharges it until empty, then recharge it. This should allow the chip in the battery to recalculate the voltage - capacity relationship.

Any recommendation for a replacement needs to be done in the knowledge of your location and your budget. At the moment I'm using a Dell Latitude from Dell Outlet. These have the advantage of being relatively easy to repair should the need arise.

John

 

2) I had the same malefunction and had a bad cell. I replaced the battery after I found a good source shipping also to Thailand: http://www.ebay.de/itm/371182698119?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

I also think about replaceing my Samsung because it is not running smoothly with windows 10. At the moment I focus on the Dell XPS 15.

 

Finally, I found out what these symptoms caused: The crucial crucial M550 512GB, M.2 SATA SSD was responsible for the delay from the energy saving mode.

Before sending the notebook to Samsung (still under warranty) I reassembled the original SSD and copied my image back. With the original Samsung SSD the 940X3 runs well.

 

I'm using the M550 (mSATA version) in my Samsung NP900X3B and haven't noticed any problems.

It's possibly caused by a power setting such as Link State Power Management. Also check you have the latest SSD firmware.

John

 

I have the latest firmware for the crucial M550 installed and i am using the Samsung Energie settings.

Very strange that Windows 8.1 was running without any issues, only Windows 10 gives me this trouble.

 

How's everyone Ativ going ?

Mine is working beautifully and typing this message on ATiv Book 9+

 

Back to the original Samsung SSD and the mashine works well.

But thinking abut buying a Dell XPS 15 ...

 

My Core I7 8GB RAM equipped with the 256GB Samsung SSD after 14 months is still going strong. Windows 10 is performing trouble free. Great ultrabook.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy Note5.

 

Ditto ehosey2. Just did the W10 "upgrade" and don't understand why they had to make getting around so different largely, it seems, to be different, not more convenient, powerful or efficient. Pisces me off that I need to learn how to do so many things that were second nature to me since 7 and 8.1. The irony: MS had to make W10 to replace 8.1, which people felt was a total (and unwanted) paradigm shift I UI, yet the desktop lying under 8.1 was the full and complete W7, just with faster bootup, better security and a very handy set of touchscreen utilities. (Oh yeah, you had to pay $5 for a third party start menu.) I find W10 to be a needless change to the UI of an OS that served millions well since W7. Thinking of changing back to 8.1!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk

 

Having seen this just now, and finding W10 to be a nuisance to use vs. 8.1, I think you've convinced me to revert to 8.1!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk

 

The XPS 15 is almost the successor to the old NP900X4C. Their plan dimensions are almost identical although the XPS is thicker. I can say this because I now have a Precision 5510 (business equivalent of XPS15 9550) and immediately noticed the similar size when I put the new machine on top of the old X4C.

John

 

I bought a 7265 AC to replace the stock 7260 N card a few months back and couldn't get it to work, even tried reinstalling a fresh copy of Windows so there wasn't any old drivers interfering with it and it wouldn't work. I just bought an 8260 AC to see if the same thing would happen, which it did. This time though, I went a step further and booted a copy of Linux Mint 18 off a USB stick. The card worked flawlessly in Linux, so that leads me to an assumption that Samsung is doing something (blocking?) to wireless cards that did not come stock in Windows. I'm a little frustrated at this point as I really wanted to take advantage of AC speeds this time (and I don't really want to have return another card).

I've heard of people taping up pins 20/51 on the old mini pci-express cards and getting them to work. Funnily enough, I have another Samsung laptop (a series 7 from '13 I believe) that had a mini-pcie N card that I replaced with a 7260 AC and it worked flawlessly without needing to tape pins. Different connectors for the wifi cards between the laptops, but still... Would like to know what Samsung is doing that's stopping us from replacing the 7260 N cards.

 

I think you've diagnosed the problem. It's not whitelisting in the BIOS in the way that some manufacturers do, but hard-coding the WiFi card ID into the BIOS which Windows then reads. This shortens the BIOS boot time because there's no need to probe the hardware. People discovered this problem when putting an FHD panel into an older Series 9 and got a garbled display in Windows but the display was fine in Linux which does its own hardware detection. The fix is a BIOS edit and the challenge is to know which bits/bytes to change and what to change it to.

John

 

Hi all,
I've been using my NP940X3G-K04US (Ativ Book 9+) for about 2 years now.
A few days ago I tried entering the BIOS setup to reconfigure the boot order, only to find that there's a system password, which I do not know.
I've tried all methods of recovering from this (CMOS battery, main battery, re-flash the BIOS), but no luck. And then it suddenly asks for the system password even when I don't request entering the BIOS (this after reflashing). So now I have NO computer.
Any ideas? Help?

 

We have known the anti-theft system to cause a few headaches but I do not recall a precedent for the BIOS password problem. Even if I knew the fix for a BIOS password (which I don't) it is against forum policy to allow such information to be published as it would be of use to criminals who want to break into a stolen notebook. You will have a contact Samsung support who will need convincing that you are the owner before they will offer to help.

John

 

Yes, I understand the policy.
I have contacted Samsung - they want me to send in my laptop. That's problematic on several levels...
I also wish I knew whether this is some kind of virus, bug, or me being senile.
In any case, with all these bios/uefi issues, various other bricking problems, and hurdles like the 7260 being somewhat unreplaceable and mediocreLinux support, I doubt I'll be buying Samsung again.

 

Hi,
I recently bought a used 900X4G that doesn't turn on. The battery has been replaced, but when pushing the power button, the only thing that happens is the blue power LED turning on and the fan working for maybe a second.
I removed the back cover and found that the CMOS battery is missing. I'll try to replace it to see if maybe that's where the issue comes from. However, I have no idea which battery I need. Does anyone know what battery I should buy?

 

Hi everybody,

I have had this notebook for over 2 years now with no issues. Now however the notebook has started shutting off by itself. It slike the power instantly cuts off. I have narrowed down the problem and it looks to me its a hardware issue, where the backplate is coming in contact with some other metal inside. Its definitely not a software issue, I did a fresh install of windows. This shutting down happens by itself after a while when the backplate screws are really tight (I replaced the SSD for a 512GB Crucial one last year) or when I move the laptop, e.g. lift it up. It's getting really annoying. Everything works perfectly without the backplate

Has anybody had a this issue and can help me?

 

I had this issue about a year ago. Had to send it back to Samsung who replaced the motherboard. For me the issue was more prevalent when picking it up from the side

 

Before considering a mainboard replacement, I would do a disassemble / reassemble. Sometimes these intermittent problems are caused by a bad connection (which could be disturbed by some pressure on the base) and the reassembly cleans up and tightens those connections.

Disassembly/ reassembly is actually quite easy - I swapped over the mainboards between two versions of the NP900X4C a couple of months ago. Most of the connectors pull apart but the ribbon cables are fixed by hinged flaps which are released by lifting the side of the flap away from the cable. While you have the machine in bits look carefully at the mainboard to see if is any signs of any part which is vulnerable to slight pressure or movement.

John

 

Thanks guys, I think I found the problem. The battery was screwed in too tight. I could localize the pressure point which made the laptop crash and it was the right battery screw. After fiddling around with the ribbons there and loosening the screw, the laptop doesnt crash anymore when lifted up.

Its weird because I never touched the battery screws. The motherboard is fine and not visibly broken anywhere.

But now I have the problem that the left portion of the keyboard illumination doesnt work anymore.... sigh..

Well I can live with that for now as long as the laptop works

 

Thanks for the update.

The keyboard backlighting most likely gets its power through the keyboard ribbon cable. Disconnect and reconnect the cable in case the cable isn't inserted quite right.

John

 

Nah I'll just live with it now. I dont want to mess with anything anymore. I'm just happy it works. Thing is i broke off the plastic attached to the ribbon and its prettu hard to put into the connector now.
I appreciate all your help

 

When my board was replaced the symptoms for me were that half the keyboard didn't light up and that it sporadically powered off. They also replaced the keyboard for me which included the whole top pad (I no longer have the side sync etchings on my case). For some reason they also had to replace the power connector.

 

Hi all,

This is probably a basic question but I'm struggling to find the information. What is the most current BIOS/firmware for the NP940X3G? I have the NP940X3G-S03US specifically if that makes a difference. Alternatively if there is an easy way to figure this out, I'd be happy to get pointed that direction as well. I'm having some issues with SW Update, which is why I ask.

Thanks!

 

Use the Samsung BIOS Update software as explained here.

John

 

Thanks so much!

 

I recently got a Samsung NP940X3G for free, and two things that I've noticed: in Windows 10 the track pad was very sporatic, and the little power adapter gets VERY hot after just a few minutes of use. I've rolled back the Elan driver to version 15.7.0.1 and disabled tap, and that seems to have fixed that problem. With the newer driver version the mouse would freeze and tap would work, but sometimes move the cursor a few inches away instead of tapping what I was selecting (could just be me though). Aside from those two things, I really do like this machine; I'll be looking around for a different power adapter. I dont see any Samsung labeling on it, so could be this is 3rd party one.

 

Hi @diggy,

Congrats. Always nice when you can get an AB9+ for free

I took the liberty of moving your post to this thread, where you are more likely to find like minded owners.

 

Check the CPU utilisation (Task manager) and speed HWiNFO. This type of laggy behaviour can be caused by the CPU being fully loaded or locked down to the minimum speed. A hot PSU suggests the former except it would also need to be recharging the battery to get fully loaded. Alternatively, as you have already identified, is that the PSU itself has a problem. Do you see any touchpad problems when running on battery? Some people are averse to the 3rd party PSUs although I've not encountered problems with them but have had a couple of the Samsung PSUs die.

John

 

Thanks for the feedback, John. There's nothing loading the CPU - that was the first thing I checked. Its weird behavior and happened whether it was charging or running on battery - it will work fine for a few minutes, then become real spotty. I've even had an USBmouse connected and it worked fine, when the track pad wouldn't work at all. Since I've rolled back the driver and turned off tap, its been working fine.

 

Thanks for the update. Might you be running Windows 10? It's very aggressive in updating drivers beyond whatever is recommended by the manufacturer so you might have to keep rolling back after each Windows update although I think there's an option somewhere to block specific updates.

Now to try another PSU and see if it doesn't overheat.

John

 

Hi,

Has anyone needed to replace the battery on a NP940X3G-K01US yet? Mine's getting kind of weak and I've been looking all over for one. There are a number of knock-offs, shipping from China for the most part. I'd really like to get a genuine Samsung replacement and have checked out samsungparts.com (which does have them in stock), but it looks like they are solely B2B. That's the only place I could find a Samsung-branded battery. BTW, the part number I have for it is BA43-00364A. If anyone can help I would be most appreciative. Still love this laptop!

 

Hi All, my NP940X3G-K04US no longer turns on, the screen stays black but the blue power light on the top left hand corner stays blue.
I've tried taking the internal battery out, leaving it and powering it on only using power cable, but still doesn't work.
Have tried holding power button for 30 seconds several times and still nothing.

Have taken the SSD out and powering it on, still nothing.

Can anyone advise please?

 

After you press the power button to turn it on and the light stays blue, could you try closing the screen then reopening it back up. When you do that, does the screen turn on and have a white dot in the top left that stays on (made up of maybe 9 pixels)? If so, you are experiencing the same problem I have and I haven't found a solution.

One day last week I was using the exact same model and mysteriously the screen shut off. I thought the battery was dead, so I plugged it in, tried to power it back on, and this issue started.

 

@liquidfusionv and @fishsticks23 : That's an interesting coincidence. Which version of Windows do you have?

My initial thought on seeing one occurrence of the problem was bad RAM, which blocks the BIOS from loading, but if you are running Windows 10 then I wonder if it has installed something incompatible. Whether this or something else, read through this thread about unbricking solutions.

John

 

@fishsticks23 - I'll give that a go when I get the chance again
@John Ratsey - Windows 10 (updated from windows 8 long time ago)


Ok so I been playing around with it all night and it seems very intermittent.

When you put the laptop to sleep it wakes almost every time, however when you shut down, move the laptop around, it almost never powers on again, just a black screen.

But if you put the laptop on it's side, or fully push the screen all the way down (180degree angle) it turns on 7 out 10 times.

Very weird.

I've emailed Samsung to see what they say about the fix.

 

Windows 10 sometimes breaks things by updating to an incompatible driver. However, your problem might be a bad connection for the diaplay cable (so disconnect / reconnect where it connects to the mainboard). One test would be to conneuct to an external display and see if that shows anything. However, while I think that HDMI should work once Windows is loaded (but you might need to step through the display device selector - Fn+F4 or similar), only VGA may work for the BIOS screen unless the BIOS was updated to support HDMI.

John

 

Could you please let me know the email address you used? Thanks

I also went through that thread John Ratsey linked and none of those situations applied to me as well.

 

I went through the Samsung website to and filled out the online contact form, there wasn't any emails.
Samsung replied and said because it's out of warranty, I would need to send it to one of their service centers and there will be a cost.
Knowing this laptop isn't worth much now days and them trying fix an intermittent problem would probably cost more than the laptop itself, so I will probably just stick with it until it completely dies.
Won't shut down, will only put it to sleep from now on. (It restarts happily when in Windows)

I don't think it's a bad connection to the board as I had tried a micro HDMI cable to the tv and there was no output either.

 

There are two problems. As you tend to open and close the laptop it places stress on the video cable and connection. As he suggested pull the laptop apart and reconnect the video cable internally, if that does not work you may need to replace the cable but that could be permanently attached to the display meaning you have to replace that as well.

 

Hi,
yesterday i have finish my "battery replacement process"! That process remains due April 2017 till now.
First, and like you did, i've searched all the web for the battery with no success. Then i've decided to talk with samsung support, because the laptop has only 3 years old, so it must be supported. Well, e-mails, phone calls, facebook posts and 'voilá' the battery appears.

Two weeks ago, a battery arrives but it was a wrong model. By the way the Samsung reseller used the ref number that you say BA43-00364A, but with that ref the battery that arrives was a AA-PLXN4AR. This one has only 6200mAh and dont fit our laptop. The model of NP940X3G battery is AA-PLVN4AR, so use always the two refs BA43-00364A/AA-PLVN4AR

So i wish luck in this battle, i've pay for the battery aprox. 129€.

i will give you an address where you will find the battery, i think they have an warehouse in Europe (Holland), but i dont know anything about them, neither the prices.
the site is http://www.cameronsino.com

 

Hi you all,
i have a NP940X3G-K01PT, and i've replaced my battery.

Everything is working perfect, with windows 10 'creators update' installed. Now and because its a new battery, i will try to care of it!
But i cant find 'battery life extender' aplication for my model. Why?

I've tried to install it, from the download page of NP900X4C, but with no success. The installation process aborts with "DRIVER NOT INSTALLED" error.
What is that?

A battery driver? do you know if i can find it anywhere? or how can i install 'battery life extender'?

I need your help.
thanks

 

@João Martins, welcome to NBR.

The Samsung Settings app contains power management and other essential drivers, such as keyboard and brightness control.

You install it (or save it for later installing) through the Samsung Update utility, which you can download here. You generally won't find updated drivers on samsung's website.

To my knowledge, Battery Life Extender (BLE) is not available on the AB9+.

BLE is a BIOS feature on older Samsung laptops that stops charging at 80% in order to prolong battery health. Being a BIOS feature (as opposed to a software feature) it works even when the laptop is turned off. On models that have this feature, versions of Samsung Settings prior to 2.1.x provide a switch to toggle BLE. But no software will make it available on models that do not have BLE in BIOS.

Edit:
The BLE software you found for NP900X4C is probably a standalone utility from before Samsung combined everything into a single Settings utility (in fact before they combined it into their Easy Settings utility for Win7). If so, that utility is outdated by several years -- and still won't provide BLE on models that don't have it in BIOS.

 

Ok thanks for your answer.
"BLE is a BIOS feature on older Samsung laptops that stops charging at 80% in order to prolong battery health.", so newer models dont need BLE?
Or theres a BIOS Update that unlock BLE for NP940X3G?

thanks again.

 

Samsung claimed that their new battery technology didn't need BLE and that's why they stopped providing it. I am not sure evidence has quite borne that out. But in any case is there no way to enable it on models that don't have it in the first place (as far as I know).

 

Ok so i will stop my search!
thanks a lot!

 

Keyboard problems

Hello all. So glad to have found this forum. wish I’d known about it before.

Have largely been happy with the machine (less so w some of the built in Samsung proprietary stuff, and let’s not even talk about Windows 8)

I have scoured the forum and found some other posts that relate to keyboard issues, but I’m specifically wondering if anybody has experienced keyboard problems related to a bad driver (chipset, keyboard).

Model NP940X3G-S03US

Running windows 8.1

During an overnight update, Windows update “failed”.

Next morning, the built in keyboard was nearly completely unresponsive – the “5” key seemed to be stuck, inputting 5555555555555555555555 5555555555555. So couldn’t log in or enter BIOS.

Got the 5 key up and didn’t spot any obvious problems. Blew air all around inside the keyboard as possible. No luck.

Managed to boot into BIOS using an external keyboard (for F2) tried various repair and restore options to no avail. At one point I managed to log in normally and the 555555555555555 issue stopped being constant and was just off and on, so was able to look around a bit. (Touchpad was still responsive, also touch screen and onscreen keyboard). No errors in device manager.... updating drivers didn't help, nor troubleshooter.

The 5555555555555 issue returned intermittently and other problems started to show up: unresponsive touchpad, screen brightness changes, freezes and slowness.

Eventually from BIOS I tried to refresh, and then reset the machine. In both cases windows reported that it was unable to refresh / or reset the PC.

So I eventually did a complete clean reinstall from a bootable windows USB (btw getting the BIOS to boot from an external USB was a real quest).

Following the clean reinstall the system behaved perfectly. Except the keyboard. The 55555555555555555555 problem was gone – no reoccurrence. But the built in keyboard was still unresponsive.

I disabled Windows update and first walked through a number of core updates using the Samnsung proprietary update utility. They all installed fine except a chipset driver update which kept failing. Eventually it too installed.

Then ran Windows update and updated everything.

Still no keyboard.

I tried updating the keyboard driver and unistalling it etc. Also ran the Intell driver update, as well as an external utility (Driver Booster). Nothing.

I’ve been thinking it was a corrupted driver but then booted the machine on a bootable linux USB (once trying with mint, another time Ubuntu).

Keyboard unresponsive also in Linux….

So I guess it is a hardware failure in the end…. Any thoughts on that, or is there some hope it might still be a driver, or something else? (I find it a bit odd that before clean OS install the 5555555555555555 issueac was there and that after clean reinstill it was gone…… but perhaps coincidence.)

Also, I am not finding the full replacement top piece ( BA97-03991A Samsung Assembly Case Front-top Model) for sale online.

Does anybody have any experience with the Chinese replacements that are easily found on eBay? Good/Bad?

And does anybody have any experience with PC Doctor and might its keyboard test help me definitively pin down keyboard failure before opening the machine up>

Thanks for any advice or recommendations.

A little peeved as while it is now nearly four years old, something as expensive as it was back in the day shouldn’t just flake out so soon it seems to me.

 

If you are having keyboard problems in the BIOS then it's definitely hardware. If the BIOS thinks you are holding down the 5 key then it could well get confused.

The one possible hardware fix I would try is to remove and replace the keyboard cable in its socket as sometimes contacts deteriorate with age. It's a ribbon cable and is held in the socket by a hinged flap. You'll need a good quality Philips size 0 screwdriver to remove the screws on the bottom of the computer.

If you can't find the complete keyboard + palmrest unit (expensive as a new part but you might find one salvaged from a dead notebook) then the only option is the replacement keyboard. A few people have gone this route and it's one I would try in the circumstances. It may also be worthwhile searching for X3B / X3C / X3D / X3E / X3F keyboards as well as X3G. They could well be the same as Samsung stuck to the same chassis design for several generations.

John