Samsung 15" Series 9 NP900X4C with Ivy Bridge CPU

I go under control panel\display\calibrate then go thru the wizard and slide down GAMMA pretty low. Makes a great difference. However, it does not seem to stick upon reboots? Every reboot i have to setup again. Anyone know how to get the color calibration settings to stick??

 

The intructions I gave was to change the calibration settings using the Intel video control panel.

Your issue is that you are changing the settings using Windows built in tools and these are getting overwritten by the Intel manager on reboot. You need to either disable the intel manager or just make your changes in the Intel manager.

This thread may be helpful to you: Custom colour profiles and Intel graphics chipsets

 

Okay so i reinstalled IRST and the blue icon is there and everything seems to be working great. Now the only thing is whenever I leave my laptop on sleep for a while it takes the 7 seconds to boot up, but whenever i have shorter periods of closing the lid its almost instant...is there anyways i can keep it from going to hibernation mode and only to sleep?

 

Uninstall IRST?

The whole idea of IRST is so that the laptop will go into hibernation after sleeping for a period of time. If you don't want this function and just want your laptop to sleep indefinitely.. there's hardly a reason to keep the software.

 

Right click on the IRST icon and select settings. You will then get a slider control for the time delay between sleep and hibernation. The offered range is probably 0 to 120 minutes. If that isn't long enough then go into the registry and edit the maxtimer value at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Intel\irstrt\Parameters. However, note that 1 hour of sleep approximately uses 1% of battery capacity so a computer left sleeping overnight drains around 8%. I use a 30 minute timeout.

John

 

A quick heads-up so people don't partially break their machine like i did -

both my girlfriend's np900x3b and my np900x4c have become so worn on the micro HDMI port that it takes 30+ seconds of careful adjustment to get the TV to hold the signal. We use our laptops to watch Netflix in the living room, so it is certainly a slightly harsher wear situation than a normal at-desk-with-laptop-staying-in-one-spot setup, but i did want to give people a warning!

i started designing a port dock to make plugging multiple things into the machine faster/easier, but i think it's actually best used to save your ports!

I posted it on my new website with some other tech products I designed and print at home here:
techneesh.com
right now there's just a np900x3b/c version, but if there's interest i'd be happy to make one for ours (15").

The site is mostly for Samsung products, as I just got the utterly awesome Galaxy S III

click 'products'

also, I've been designing custom things for people over at xda-developers. so if folks have any tech accessory dreams shoot me a pm!

 

What resolution does that come in at? And how's the quality compared to a typical DVD?

 

I could be interested in the Dockbox but a couple of questions: (i) Is USB 3.0 a possibility and (ii) how do you handle international shipping?

John

 

Trackpad reply from samsung, on the sensitivity. However, i don't see these screens. When i click options, i get the screen that you can turn off/on gestures and control scroll speed, double click and pointer speed??

We appreciate you contacting Samsung Electronics and being a valued customer. We understand that the cursor jumps all over the screen whenever you type something and you want to know if you can adjust the sensitivity of the touchpad. We are sorry for the inconvenience.

Yes, you can adjust the sensitivity of the touchpad by following the instructions below:

- Click Start and then type Mouse in the Windows search box and press Enter. (alternatively you can Click Start > Control Panel > Hardware & Settings > Mouse).

- Select the ELAN tab, and then click the Options Button.

- Click the Additional tab.

- Select Palm Tracking and adjust the sensitivity by moving the pointer towards Maximum or Minimum.

You can refer the link below to find the screen shots on how to adjust the sensitivity of the touchpad:

SAMSUNG's Digital World - Support

 

reply from samsung, this is crazy to try??

We appreciate you contacting Samsung Electronics and being a valued customer. We understand that you are having issues regarding the sound quality of your NP900X4C Samsung laptop.

We apologize for the issues that you are having right now, let me assist you with this one. For your concern follow these steps below to help youo solve the issue.

-Turn off and turn on the computer.
-Update the drivers.
-Set the default to bios.
-Perform a complete restore.

To set the default to bios.
-Restart the unit.
-Press F2 when you see the samsung logo.
-Bios utility set up will appear.
-Press F9 then yes.
-Press F10 then save and exit.

If this do not resolve the issue and you cannot access the bios. Go to the next step.

Note: Performing a complete restore will delete all user's data. So we advice you to have a complete back up before performing this process.

To perform a complete restore.

-Restart the unit.
-Press F4 when you see the samsung logo.
-The Samsung recovery solutions will appear.
-Choose restore on the options.
-Then Choose complete restore.
-Click the computer initial status and next.
-It will ask you to delete all data. Click ok then next.
-The restore process will start.(will take 30 to 45mins)
-After the restore restart the computer.

If the steps above do not resolve your problem,the device needs to send in for service so that we can further diagnose and correct the problem. Opening the device or screwing it will fall under out of warranty service. You can call our customer support center to process a service request for the device.

 

it's full 1080p which is twice the resolution of a typical dvd.

I can make a new version with 3.0, as a few folks seem interested

Some questions for you (and others):

-How many USB ports would you like to have?
-Do you like the HDMI coupler component? (Should I keep this in the next version)
-Would you like to be able to access the memory/flash drives?

John, international priority is typically about $8 extra

 

The only way I know of to access the sensitivity control is to extract ETDAniConf.exe from the touchpad installer package and run it. Samsung's installation is set up to use ETDSimpleUI.exe as the touchpad control.

Unfortunately for the users, a lot of problems are software based so most manufacturers want to see that a problem occurs with the software installation that they provided. You therefore have to jump through these hoops. This is where a backup program comes useful. You may be able to get the Samsung Recovery Solution to make a backup into the recovery partition which you can restore after testing that the problem still occurs with the Samsung factory installation. However, I would use a backup program such as Acronis True Image to put a backup image onto an external device.

I would suggest 2 USB ports which should preferably be USB 3.0 and have a wider separation than on the notebook. This would effectively add an extra USB 3.0 port and get round the problem that wider USB 3.0 flash drives are challenging to plug in due to the tight clearances. A fast memory card slot would also be useful given that the internal card slot is slower than a USB 2.0 card reader. But keep it small enough to drop into a bag.

I'll sign up for one.

John

 

Great tip on the ETDSimpleUI.exe thx works perfect!!

 

Just a FYI, the USB 3.0 drivers were updated on Aug 13.

Get the updated version here: Support - Notebooks NP900X4C | Samsung Laptops

 

I see a USB 3.0 firmware update. One previously popped up several months ago and then got delisted. I don't know if it is the same or a further update but the previous one improved recognition of flash drives.

John

 

Further than the strange noise, I'm experiencing malfunction about Samsung Easy Software Manager. It notifies 8 updates, but when I try to update it says that there is not connections. But of course there is... any suggestions?

I reinstalled the software, but still...

I'm in Italy.. maybe some issue to connect to sammy servers?

 

It's possibly a server issue. How do the version numbers compare with what is offered on the Samsung download site?

John

 

Mine are outdated

Of course I can download the updated version by myself, but I want this software to work properly

 

Keep trying for a day or two.

John

 

already passed more than 2 days
I googled, noted some users have experienced also, but no much details so far.

 

I have the same problem with the updates reporting inconsistent findings.

As well, on reboots the software tries to find updates, but then it fails.. gives an error message and constantly kills/reruns itself repeatedly while giving off an error message each time.

I couldn't see a fix for it online, so I just uninstalled the EasyUpdate since it wasn't making my life any easier. I'm just checking the site manually whenever it takes my fancy instead.

 

When you guys Skype, do you guy hear a whistling like noise that seems to cut in back and forth?
I think there's an issue with my microphone. Anyone else experiencing anything similar?

 

I had the same kill/rerun issue. After uninstall/reinstall it went well. But the connections error still...

I know you can download the updates by yourself man, but from a premium notebook I expect everything works absolutely perfect..

 

I think I've heard something similar but haven't tracked it down because I don't use Skype that often. It was as if there was a rotating table fan running at the other end of the Skype connection. I would agree that it's something to do with the audio system and could possibly be feedback problem because the microphone is on the side of the computer not far from one speaker. Go to the hidden icons in the notification area and right click on the orange speaker, which is the Realtek audio control panel. Click on microphone and try the different enhancements. Tell us if a changed setting makes an improvement.

John

 

has anyone else experienced this??

whenever I restart my computer I have to manually turn on IRST from the program list in order it to function...does anyone know how to turn it on automatically and permanently?

 

I have got C:\windows\SysWOW64\irstrtsv.exe running as a scheduled service.

John

 

Mine experiences this.

I think the problem was that IRST triggered the UAC warning and Windows just denies it since it's automated.

I'm pretty sure mine's set up as a scheduled service as well. I've read this article on how to set up an exe to automatically get approval, but it was rather lengthy. The overall impression was that it requires you to start CMD.exe through the schedule and run some commands through it (plus other bits and pieces).

In the end, I just settled with pinning the IRST shortcut next to my browser shortcut in the taskbar. I don't reboot that often anyway, and when I do it's one click away (two if you count having the close the pop-up that.. pops up).

yeah... me and my manual tasks. I'm one of those people who prefer the config page over setup-wizards.

 

ahh i see...so will that ensure that every time i restart it runs again? how do i enable this?

 

Look in Task Scheduler to see if there is an entry to run C:\Program Files (x86)\Intel\irstrt\RapidStartConfig.exe. If not, you need to create one - start with this guide. If there is an entry then perhaps it is not starting because of insufficient privileges. I think it needs to be started by a user with full administrator rights.

John

 

you are the man!! Thanks!

does anyone have any better colour settings going on?

 

You will find a link to a calibrated display colour profile in my X4C review. It's also in this thread - around 10th July based on the file date. Note that you have to disable a couple of Intel graphics services (igfxtray.exe and igfxpers.exe) using msconfig because they try to revert to the original profile.

John

 

I'm wondering if the same color profile would work on the x3c. Probably not.

 

John already was kind enough to post a color profile for the x3b in its thread linked here. http://forum.notebookreview.com/sam...g-series-9-13-3-np900x3b-168.html#post8510605

I used it for my x3b and it does look better. Probably will work the same for the x3c

 

FYI... I downloaded and installed the USB3.0 Firmware update dated August 13th (v.2.0.1.7) and my X4C no longer recognises my USB3.0 drive (which the last version, v.2.0.1.4, fixed).

So update to this version at your peril... here's hoping Samsung release a fix soon.

 

I had also installed the few firmware and checked that my USB 3.0 external HDD still works. After your post I checked my USB 3.0 flash drives. The Patriot Supersonic (which never was a problem) still works but the 7dayshop 64GB, which the previous firmware made usable, is no longer accessible as a USB 3.0 device. However, Device Manager still lists it under Disk Drives as a USB 3.0 disk drive so the message isn't getting through in Windows. There could well be an associated driver update which Samsung hasn't yet released. I've now discovered where the previous USB 3.0 firmware update went - it got incorporated into the driver package so the driver got updated before the firmware update was installed. Time to hassle Samsung...

John

PS: I emailed Samsung UK support who said that they had just been made aware of the issue (@ stefandyke did you contact them?) and have contacted the relevant parties to have the issue addressed ASAP.

 

Has anyone else got this problem? I just plugged in an external mouse and for some reason the trackpad stopped working. I went into the mouse settings and it says that its not disabled whenever another mouse is plugged in. Does anyone know how to fix this?

Thanks!

 

I have no problems with external mice. 1. Try toggling Fn+F5. 2. Have you installed a specific mouse driver (mine is reported in Device Manager as a HID-compliant mouse). A specific mouse driver might be trying to take over control.

John

 

Hello,

It has almost been a week since I received my NP900X4C-01 and I must say...I am very impressed. Coming from a five-year-old HDD laptop, everything is just so fast and smooth and I like how I time to time forget that I have a laptop in my backpack because it is so light.

Over the last two weeks, I have tried going over this thread plus other great posts by John and other experts that make this laptop even better and I just wanted to see if I have gotten down everything correctly. There were so much information and I am not that technically-inclined so any help to piece together the information would be appreciated. In a week or so, I will have time to work on reconfiguring my laptop and I just want to have an ordered list of tasks that I should follow.

In case I am not doing a clean install of OS:
1) have the system backed up using Samsung recovery Solution -> do "Complete backup" and "system software backup" into an external USB so that in case something goes wrong in the future, I can go back to the original state of the laptop. [DONE]
2) remove recovery partition and hibernation partition to get more memory space. My impression is that it is as simple as typing several lines of commands in command prompt and once both partitions are removed, there is a way revive the hibernation partition using Samsung software. It would be great if someone can link me to a detailed procedure for seried 9 with ivy bridge but I guess this shouldn't be that hard.
3) in order to improve boot speed and enable hibernation to keep battery from draining while not in use, go through reinstalling IRST as per John's post.
4) to improve the screen, use John's screen calibration program. This greatly improves the washed-out screen of 15in series 9 screen if my memory serves.
5) go through the mousepad calibration either on my own or following someone else's calibration.

That is pretty much everything I remember. There are only 5 tasks but to me, sounds like a very hectic list of tasks

Lastly, is it normal to see around 4 hours of pure online video playing time with 80% charge (limited by battery life extension option)?

Thanks!

 

Cool! I'll give this a try. Hope the x3b and x3c screens are exactly the same! Thanks for the link and thanks to John for the color profile!

 

Good morning, all:

I've been following this thread for quite some time; I've made a few posts along the way, but mostly I have just been absorbing knowledge from everyone else contributing here.

Well, I've finally snagged myself a 900X4C and now I am (feebly) trying to sift back through everything and find all the relevant/useful bits. At the present, this thread is 110 pages long. Perhaps it is common to think of a forum user who is unwilling to dig for information/answers that have already been posted before asking for them in a post as lazy. However, given the size and scope of this thread, maybe it is time to memorialize some of the practicable knowledge in a distinct location and in a condensed structure.

What does everyone think? I've seen others post questions that I know have already been addressed earlier in the thread, so I know it could be useful to many newbies, as well as a quick reference for anyone that needs to go back to the info. I guess it would be somewhat of an unofficial quick start guide, covering topics such as:

-Disabling the Rapid Start and eliminating the recovery partition

-Color gamut adjustment

-Swapping Ram

-Etc

I guess we could cut and paste everything, but I've also seen a number of forums simply create a collection of hyperlinks to the relevant posts and wrap them up into some sort of beginners' guide.

Well, it's just an idea!

 

Don't forget the SSD swap (unless you bought a 256GB model). I agree that it would be helpful to put together a guide. Unfortunately, some of us have to devote part of our lives to earning money to pay for the computers.

John

 

^^^haha. Maybe we can all pitch in and consolidate some place.

 

Just got a BIOS update, as well as easy software and easy settings update pushed thru - anyone know what was in the BIOS update?

 

Swapping RAM? What does this refer to, do you mean swapping the SSD?

 

I don't think that Samsung support people get to know what is in the updates, never mind the rest of us!

The X4 series has two SODIMM slots so upgrading the RAM is an option. Someone checked a few months back that 16GB works.

John

 

Hello All,

I've been following this thread for months now, and I purchased my X4C about 30 days ago.

I'm wondering if someone could help me out with an external display issue. I'm trying to run a 3 monitor setup (laptop plus two external monitors) as I have with my laptops in the past.
I've got a Zotac Dual Display adapter (Link: ZOTAC - It's time to play! - DisplayPort to Dual HDMI Adaptor) which I've used on previous computers, but they had a display port - Rather than the micro hdmi on the series 9.

I purchased a micro hdmi to female hdmi cable, which then hooks up to the Zotac-provided cable, which his HDMI to mini-dp. From there, the zotac splitter sends out two HDMI cables to my monitors.
This has been a plug and play process for me in the past, but I haven't had any luck getting it to work on the S9.

Not knowing what I'm doing, I also purchased an Audio Authority HDMI splitter, which does not work at for me either. (Link here: Audio Authority® - Product Details: 1392A)

When I connect with either of these splitters I don't get any signal sent to the monitors.

If anyone could provide me some direction on what I am doing wrong, or if what I am trying to do is even possible on the S9, I'd really appreciate it. I've spent a lot of time on this and have gotten nowhere thus far.

Thanks in advance for your help.

 

Hmm I don't see a new BIOS update. Connecting from Vancouver, Canada.

 

Hey guys, quick question:

The only time I was able to find both sizes of Series 9 laptops in a store BOTH units had trackpad problems. For example, the trackpad didn't "click" when I pressed in the middle -- it would only click when pressed in the bottom left or right. Has this issue been fixed? Or is it still a problem?

Basically, what's the status with the trackpad on the Series 9 laptops?

Thanks!

 

Mine clicks fine, no problems.

 

Have any of you been able to register for the Windows 8 upgrade program. I tried to register but it requires the Windows 7 serial number. However, no where in the supporting documentation did Samsung provide us with serial number. I used a program to determine what serial number is in the computer registry but I got an error when trying to register. If any of you know how to get this to work, please let me know.