2013 Series 7 chronos / Ativ Book 8 15" owner's lounge (NP770Z5E / NP780Z5E / NP870Z5E / NP880Z5E)

Trying it out now, will report back momentarily with the result

EDIT: First of all, uninstalling Settings actually just disables light in the keyboard altogether. So this is actually sort of a solution. I then installed 2.0.0.49 and it installed just fine and works now. I don't see any additional settings that would enable me to do more than with the old version. However since turning the lights all the way down I haven't been able to get it to automatically turn it on again. I'll just try a reboot and see.

EDIT2: After reboot it still is turned off entirely and seems to be working as intended. I'll post back after some more usage, as I've never had much luck trying to force the lights to change when I want them to. Tried covering the sensor and turning off the lights in my room without luck.

EDIT3: In case people are wondering, I have the NP770Z5E-S02SE and I installed the version from NP880Z5E-S02SE. Everything seems to be working well with this version so far.

 

So basically keyboard backlight issue in 770Z5E is fixable installing settings version from 880? Where canI get this version?

 

Originally Posted by Dannemand
@Repsac: You can use the Find Model feature in SW Update to locate drivers and utilities for any Samsung model and save them locally using the Export feature.

Of course there is no guarantee that it will work on a different model, but we've used that extensively to try different drivers when Samsung was slow in pushing them to other models. I'll personally be trying that new Settings on my old NP700Z3A.

 

But with this new settings are u still able to turn on and off the keyboard backlight manually....or is it off entirely? The backlight is actually an annoyance and i think i prefer to have it constantly off than on so if it works that way i give it a try.....

 

if i get laptop with 3rd gen i3 and amd gpu with no option of dynamic/fixed mode in the bios, will it run crysis 3 with auto switching? 2nd gen processors gave dx11 error..!!

 

Yes you can still turn it on manually with the new version

 

Hey guys, I have the future shop 8870 version. When i try to install WiFi driver 15.8.0.5 i get an error(-10) in SW update. I am currently on 15.5.6.48 since that gives me no limited connectivity issues. I even tried installing 15.6.1.20 then 15.8.0.5 with no luck. Are you guys having the same issue?

Thanks!

 

Well, I played crysis 3 on mine with intel 3635QM and AMD 8870m so I suppose it should work. And I haven't seen those options in the BIOS.

 

I also responded to you here and deleted some of your other numerous cross posts. I also send you a Private Message with further guidance.

That aside, welcome to the forum

 

I picked up a NP780 a few days ago and I'm really enjoying it. The only problems I'm having after initial set up are with the catalyst drivers. My computer has trouble rendering native windows 8 apps (flickering black boxes, graphics won't load until I mouse over them, etc.) on 13.5 beta 3 and 13.6 beta. Otherwise the beta drivers seem to work. When I install the catalyst drivers through SW Update my problems go away. Is this normal for everyone? I also ran into the glitch where I couldn't change my brightness, but that was an easy fix.

I agree with the sentiment of an earlier poster who said he's not normally a forum lurker, but with this laptop you kind of have to be. The cost savings are worth it to me over a MacBook Pro. Nevertheless I'm glad this forum and you people exist to help out.

 

Yes, we all have the flickering issues with the beta drivers. I've reported it to AMD, as I expect many others have aswell. I use the beta driver anyway.

 

Btw an update with regards to light on my keyboard since upgrading to Samsung Settings 2.0.0.49:

From testing it seems like you now set the scale from dark to light and then the sensor is just on/off and doesn't use a scale. What I mean is, you chose how bright you want your keys and then the sensor turns them on when needed. If you chose the darkest, they are just shut off all the time. If you turn them all the way up, they will either be turned entirely off during daylight and then turned on 100% when you're sitting in a dark room. I hope my explanation makes sense. At least this is the behaviour I seem to experience myself. I like it so far.

If someone else can confirm this, perhaps we could get pranktank to add it to his first guide/post in this thread.

 

Great! So if I understand correctly the sensor can't be disabled fully yet? It's definitely a big step in the right direction.

I'll add it. Where do you think it's best? Under updates, FAQ or additional tutorials?

 

hi,

I had the same issue on the 870Z5E. The apps would only function as expected on stock drivers.

This fixed it for me on 13.5 beta 3 Try it, see how it goes

 

I recently bought a Series 7 770Z7E-S01UB, and I believe I'm having overheating problems. About 15 minutes into gaming, frame rates drop to an unplayable level. I haven't actually monitored my temps yet, but I'm assuming this is due to overheating. Is this a known problem? I'm not using a cooling pad either, so if this were an overheating problem, could that make a big enough difference?

 

Heat throttling can make a huge difference. Lifting the back a bit to improve airflow can help a lot. Monitoring your GPU and CPU temps could help find the specific problem.

 

I always keep my laptop lifted during usage, and while gaming my temps stay at around 70-75 for the CPU and 60-65 for the GPU! Lifting it helps a lot!

Anyway, it's not fair that the ATIV books have 8 GB soldered RAM... >_>

 

Ok so I can confirm installing the 2.0.0.49 version in the best buy model is working. I searched for NP880Z5E and used the model number NP880Z5E-X01UB. What I did was:

- Uninstall settings, restart when prompted
- Install 2.0.0.49 version
- Restart (even though this time it didn't prompt me)
- Profit

It seems to be working fine although right now there's too much light here so I can't really test it very well, I'll check later. I do see a new setting that wasn't there before (at least for me). Under Display there's now an option to disable adaptive brightness, whereas before I had to do it through Power Settings in Windows.

On a side note, I found this keyboard skin cover and it says it is compatible with this model. I live in Mexico but they say they ship worldwide so I might give it a try, but has anyone else bought from that store before?

 

I just installed 2.0.0.49, and unfortunately it doesn't seem to behave any differently than before. I'm on an NP780Z5E-S01UB. If I set the slider all the way to dark, it does shut off, but as soon as the sensor detects a change in light, that value seems to get overridden, and the backlight comes back on... *Sad face*.

Just to note, I am sitting in a dark room, but the light from the screen is enough to read the keys with the backlight off, quite readable. As soon as the keys are backlit however, they become unreadable as they are practically the same shade as the shine from the screen on the key surface.

 

Yea, that actually helped a lot. Thanks. Would there be any benefit as far as performance goes to installing that 13.5 beta driver for the 8870m?

 

Yes. It's a BIG difference.

 

Is there any service in services.msc that controls the backlight? If yes then it can probably be stopped.

 

Sadly I have to say that this seems to be the case with mine too. Even though the software installed fine and it detects everything correctly, the kayboard backlight still changes on its own some times. However, it does seem like they're trying to improve it, maybe they changed the sensor detection levels or something because now it seems to the detect the light from the screen and keeps the backlight off, although changing to a darker window still brings it up again. Anyway, full manual control would still be the best case scenario, and at least it seems like they are trying to do something about it, hopefully they'll get it right.

There is a Sensor Monitoring Service but stopping it never changed anything for me.

 

I also did a little experiment. Uninstalled Setting entirely, rebooted and the function keys no longer work, obviously, but the keyboard backlight still functions in the same way. If I go into a dark room, the backlight turns on, and then if I shine a flashlight at the sensor, it goes off. This makes me wonder if it's not tied directly to the sensor values via the bios. That would also explain why turning off the sensor service, removing drivers for the sensor etc seem to have no effect...

 

a new NP870Z5E here

support 16Gb ram?
should KINGSTON SODIMM 8GB DDR3 1600MHz PC12800 - KVR16S11/8 be a good option ?

 

Yeah that happened to me too, even with Settings still uninstalled they keyboard backlight was on during boot.

 

Ok, so the keyboard backlight issue finally drove me crazy enough to take action...

I decided to see if I could take off the screen and get to the ambient light sensor to physically disable it or something. As it turns out it is pretty easy to get to.
Bear in mind that if you do this, other functions tied to the light sensor will not work, but it is reversible, so no worries.

The touch screen is basically held in place by some very light push clips, so all you need to do is pry it a little between the top bit of plastic and the rubber seal and it will pop right out. That plastic at the top is extremely soft though, so use something equally soft or you will damage it. I used a thin guitar pick, which worked fine. You only need to pry the top edge as the touchscreen is bendy, so you will be able to get to the sensor by holding the gap open with a finger, or wedging something in there. Unfortunately the sensor is just soldered on a board there, so you can't disconnect it, but it has a little square rubber seal that prevents light coming in from the sides, which is GREAT as it makes for a nice little surface to stick something over the sensor.

I macgyvered myself a little rectangle of a postage label, and left a bit of overhanging backing paper like a tab so that I can pull it off easily should I need to, then stuck it right on there. The screen just pops back in (double check here that you haven't let any dust or anything drop between the touch surface and the screen as that'd be annoying), and done No visible difference on the outside, and the backlight can still be controlled by the function keys. Woohoo!

Anyway, just thought I'd share as this issue for me was pretty much the only thing I disliked about this laptop.

 

If I remember correctly Pranktank tried the BIOS mod, didn't he? Did you try to disable automatic keyboard backlight from there?

Sent from HTC HD2 with Tapatalk

 

Woah haha, we should mail that procedure to Samsung so they see how annoying their little "feature" is... I'm not that desperate yet, but I am seriously thinking on buying the keyboard skin I posted on the previous page ( here it is again in case someone missed it), I'm guessing that if it fits, it should help with visibility.

 

Thanks for sharing the keyboard skin. I didn't even think of trying one of those. I might also buy one to see how it is. If you do end up getting one you should share some pictures with it on the laptop.

 

Did you order it?

 

Not yet, I want to but I don't feel too confident about it, especially because it might take a long time to get to Mexico if it ever arrives

 

Level of details, res, FPS???

 

Still trying to find these in the US. Anyone in here from the US? If so where did you purchase one of these?

 

It was a pretty long time ago so I don't really remember. Something medium-high 30 fps in 1080p I think.

 

Hello!

Have noticed that after installing ATI Catalyst 13.5 I have no HDMI device in playback devices. And the saga continues....

Best regards

 

Why don't you try new 13.6b2?

 

I've heard that 13.6. were slower than 13.5. Is b2 any better?

 

The features of b2 vs b1 aren't very different so I don't think they'll be much different in terms of performance.

13.6 beta features: AMD Catalyst 13.6 BETA (13.101.0.0 May 23) - Guru3D.com Forums
13.6 beta 2 features: AMD Catalyst

 

Hi there,

i'm a proud owner of one 770z5e for several weeks now but i just can't figure out what is going wrong with updating my graphics driver.
I fully uninstall the Catalyst delivered by SW Update, reboot and install the 13.6b2 as told in the first post here.
Everything is fine, brightness control is working but when i get into a game it seems the only working thing is the HD 4000 IGP which is no fun anymore then.
I tested it with Guild Wars 2 having 45-50 FPS at high settings at a position i don't change for testing purposes with the SW Update driver and have around 15 FPS after updating.

I tried it multiple times beginning with 13.5b3, then 13.6b1 and today with 13.6b2 and it did never work as it should.
At first i thought i might need to update the Intel drivers aswell but if i do so i can't control brightness anymore and the problem is still present.

Before this one I had a notebook with a Nvidia card and Optimus and that was always working without pain after updating.

If you might help me, that'd be great.
Maybe there's even someone who tested or might test it with Guild Wars 2.

Thanks alot.

 

Best Buy has had the NP780Z5E-S01UB model for some time now, but it's using the AMD 8770 GPU. Models with the 8870 were never released in the US. Some members have bought the NP780Z5E-S02CA model from Futureshop in Canada, which DOES have 8870.

Samsung Chronos 15.6" Laptop (Intel Core i7-3635QM / 1TB HDD / 16GB RAM / Windows 8) : 15" Laptops - Future Shop

You can read more about members who bought these (or considered buying) in the thread linked below. It's huge, so use the Search Thread feature. Googling site:notebookreview.com/samsung futureshop 8870 should give some hits as well.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/samsung/702308-introducing-2013-series-7-chronos-amd-hd8870m.html

If you can wait a few weeks, Samsung is likely to announce updated Haswell models. John Ratsey, our resident Samsung oracle, cleverly predicted that these models might release very quickly in the US since there is not a large inventory to clear.

 

Hi Morv

Just to be sure... you did right click your desktop, configure switchable graphics and added the exe file for your game and set it to high performance?

 

Hi,

i checked this multiple times.
What i don't get is that these settings are still the same in 13.6b2 as i set them in the SW Update version.
Shouldn't they also be gone when express uninstalling everything?

Oh and another thing with GW2: When i start it and get to the character selection i have 60 FPS(far less with IGP) but as soon as i am in the real game they go down to 15 FPS. But only with the newer drivers.

Thanks.

 

@Morv: Try using your task list in Windows when running the game, to locate the actual exe file the game is using and ensure you've dedicated this particular exe file for high performance.

On another note, I've run into some performance issues myself. I'm getting low fps in Starcraft 2. It looks like it might be throttling due to CPU overheating? Units seem to not react a lot and it's very sluggish.




And yes I realise it says Intel HD4000, but I assume it just can't figure out that the graphics card is changing. Also I do realise that SC2 changes the executable, so I've also added the SC2.exe that it's actually using.

 

LOL! My "predictions" are only intelligent guesses. The Ivy Bridge version of this new model has enabled Samsung to both create market awareness and make progress with debugging the graphics so getting a Haswell version into production and onto shelves should be easier than with a completely new model (the process worked quite well with the Z5C a year ago). All Samsung need is enough Intel and AMD chips.

I would add that while Haswell has been launched, in reality it is only half launched. The mobile chips released so far are the quad core parts. As noted in several places in this forum, Samsung have announced a premiere for new products in London on 20th June. Perhaps some of our uncertainties will then be answered.

John

 

I apologize if you didn't like that characterization. But I was dead serious: I thought it was a brilliant angle when I first read your post with that US release prediction. That hadn't occurred to me at all: Why else would they be holding back the 2013 models in US, as they have until now? But of course prediction is a risky business, so intelligent guess it is

 

So....now the key question is whether to start a NEW countdown thread to June 20, or revive this one.

-Matt

 

Hello!

Dunno how you managed to install ATI 13.6 drivers but mine installation process is always stuck at "detecting hardware". I've tried downloading application for auto detect HW (ATI) for installing driver. It suggested me mobility 13,1. But after they were downloaded it reported some error and can't be installed. I believe I'm currently on 13.4. or 13.5. I have same problems before so I've stayed on 13.4. (13.5.)

This is me driving me crazy and so fat the biggest minus of my laptop. And I can say that ATI drivers are the worst I have ever seen in all my life. Would be much better with NVidia...

Have do you know if your dedicated card is working? When I right click in tray on Graphic properties it only shows me Intel 4000 2 times.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

 

Pranktank kindly sent me the bios image so I could take a look and see if there might be anything relating to the keyboard backlight. Unfortunately I could not find anything directly relating to the keyboard, but there are a couple of settings of note referencing "Backlight" and "ALS Support" (ALS stands for Ambient Light Sensor).

I've attached a couple of images of what/where those settings are in AMIBCP in case anyone is feeling brave and wants to try changing them/reflashing. I don't think I'm going to as I've already stuck tape over the sensor.

Anyway, here's the images.

Thanks again for sending the image over Pranktank!

 

Have you done the exact steps in post 1?

Great find! Disabling "ambient light sensor support" definitely sounds promising!