Samsung 15" Series 9 NP900X4C with Ivy Bridge CPU

I use HWiNFO. The wear is given under the battery properties. If your better shows significant wear then run the battery calibration utility in the BIOS. Using the battery life extender option in Easy Settings (which limits the charge to 80% od the full capacity) appears to be effective in reducing wear if you do not need to use the full capacity.

John

 

Does anybody know how I could fix the slow startup of the TouchPad driver accessories? As far as I can tell it's ETDCtrl.exe that's the culprit. This seems to be started under the control of the main touchpad driver, and the issue is that for some reason it decides to start it quite a bit after login. In the meantime, no touchpad gestures work, and I don't even have a right-click. I would really like to have a fully functional touchpad right after login. I looked at all the services, and the way startup items are processed, but I can't figure out how this is controlled.

 

A quick question:

Would this generally be a right way to upgrade an SSD?

1) Get the laptop.
2) Open up bottom, remove screws, replace with new SSD.
3) After closing bottom, connect external CD/DVD reader via USB.
4) Insert Samsung-provided recovery media.
5) Just follow instructions.

Would this be correct? I am receiving mine tomorrow and would like to upgrade to Crucial M4 256gb.

Thank you!

 

I've noticed that problem on my X3B but not on the X4C. You can try fiddling with the boot options in Easy Settings although I can't see the Elan driver on the list.

Unless I am mistaken, the Samsung recover media is a standard Windows installation disc pre-activated for Samsung notebooks. Your step 0 should be to use Samsung Recovery Solution to make a backup of the Samsung software and drivers. Then, after installing Windows you run this disc and it will load Easy Software Manager to guide you through the rest of the installation.

If you haven't read this thread about Series 9 mSATA upgrades then you may find it helpful.

John

 

Big thanks. I will make sure to do that.

 

Tried that, but it doesn't help. To be honest, I don't even know what these boot options are supposed to do, let alone why only part of my startup programs appear there, and what happens depending on what checkmarks I activate. Oh well, we have established by now that Samsung's software sucks...

Anyhow, by now I have found out that the gesture functionality seems to be triggered by the loading of ETDCtrl.exe, but if I then log off and log back on again, then the functionality is there immediately, even though, again, ETDCtrl.exe is loaded much later. In addition, I can see that if I manually enable ETDCtrl.exe to be started at login, then something disables that startup entry within seconds. I still suspect it's the touchpad driver that does that, but I'm not sure. It's also possible that it's EasySpeedupManager that does this: Watching the task manager, I see that ETDCtrl.exe is loaded right after EasySpeedupManager is loaded, and this is in turn loaded as a scheduled task at login. For reasons that are unclear to me, however, it takes roughly twenty seconds or so from the moment I am logged in to the moment when EasySpeedupManager is started. All of this started after I updated the BIOS and the sound driver, not that I could see what either of these have to do with anything...

My next step might be to just uninstall the touchpad driver and then reinstall it, but I'm going to make a system image first.

Update: I reinstalled the touchpad drivers, and now I'm back in business: All of the touchpad features now load at login as they're supposed to, and the startup item for ETDCtrl.exe is enabled and remains that way. Shrug...

 

I used to have the same issue as you, but then after some re-installs/upgrades, I too have found that the touchpad drivers now load on startup as you'd expect them to.

 

Does anyone know the current up-to-date WIFI driver version?

 

Im in need of a bit of help here...long time mac user coming back over to windows...i (like an idiot) deleted my recovery partition without backing anything up...i figured that the disk included would be just as good...but now i see that it is only windows...is there any possible way for me to revert what i have done short of sending it back to samsung and having them re-image it (i saw that option on this thread somewhere)...is there possibly a download link or could i even order factory recovery disks from samsung?...I made a backup image pretty much right after I deleted the partition but that wont give me an out of the box experience...any help is greatly appretiated!

 

Does anyone else have a wobbly power cord connection to the laptop? I have just noticed it. It seems very much on the unstable and wobbly side of things. Also under battery of HWiNFO it says Lithium-ion, but the box says Lithium-polymer. Are these the same? The internet is full of 8 year old articles about the two batteries.

 

I'm using 15.2.0 from the Intel website. I think it performs a bit better than Samsung's current offering.

You are not the first and, no doubt, won't be the last. You can download the essential drivers and software from the Samsung support site. Once you have installed the basic Windows then download and run the firmware updater program to make sure you have the latest BIOS. After that download and run Easy Software Manager. This will then lead you through the essential and optional downloads. One thing that's not downloadable but was on your computer, but I'm told it's not essential, is the Cyberlink YouCam package. Getting the Intel Rapid Start Technology can be a little challenge as discussed in this thread. However, unless Samsung have fixed it recently, it wouldn't be working correctly out of the box.

The socket is slightly loose in the case. Probably by design to reduce the likelihood of breakage. It;s not directly soldered onto a board but is connected by cable. See the internal photo in my NP900X4C review.

Lithium-polymer is a variety of Lithium-ion. The internal chemistry is the same but the polymer part enables the construction of thin batteries. HWiNFO probably works out the chemistry but can't detect the packaging.

John

 

Anybody else having Bluetooth issues with their machine? I ask as I purchased the Microsoft Bluetooth Notebook Mouse 5000 after seeing John mention it worked pretty well for him and every now and then it seems to just randomly lose the connection, however I cannot for the life of me pinpoint the cause. Most of the time turning Bluetooth off and back on again seems to solve the issue but this evening it didn't and I had to reboot the machine before the mouse would work again.

It is slightly frustrating to say the least and I've ensured I have the latest driver installed but if anyone has any suggestions I'd appreciate it.

Cheers,

Stefan

 

That mouse holds its connection very well for me but it can occasionally (not every day) drop the connection (but usually picks it up again). Usually, when it stops it's an indication that it's time to change the (rechargeable) batteries. I have a bigger issue with the touchpad not waking up after resume (for which my fix is to close the computer, wait a minute and open it again - might work for the mouse as well). Try installing the latest WiFi/Bluetooth driver off the Intel website - it's newer than what Samsung is offering.

John

 

anyone have any idea why my easy software manager wont work...either gives me an error or says disconnected from server...once in a while i can get to the updates but they fail everytime..

 

People have been reporting issues with it for a little over a week now. I don't think it's your machines. Sounds like the Samsung servers aren't working properly.

You can always go to the download area and grab stuff manually.

 

Hi John, I downloaded from the link you posted then saved and ran it. But when I checked the Wifi driver version in the Easy Settings, it still lists as 15.0.0.75
Must I do an additional step to upgrade the version?

Thanks!

 

Normally I use a wireless mouse via USB receiver but yesterday whilst doing some Google Earth browsing for work, I forced myself to use the trackpad exclusively for a few hours. Summary pretty diabolical, kept jumping places and doing things I didn't want - i.e. at the end of a two finger zoom it jumps a few steps in the opposite zoom direction. I know it takes getting used to but after several hours it did my head in and I reverted back to the mouse.

Same problem also with after resume, it will drop out - with same fix as you mentioned.

I also find it a tad too big (especially when typing and setting off the cursor) and slightly too far to the left - ideally the middle of the two buttons is where the left button should be. Pretty good if you are a left hander, but for the other 80%.....

I have the so-called "advanced" settings enabled, sensitivity at low etc but still it's not a premium track pad and this is reflected in the shonky configuration panel. In fact the whole trackpad feels kind of cheap. Just my $0.02 worth.

 

Simple answers to the connection question and the battery question. Thanks.

I rather enjoy 8 hours of battery, but have decided to be grown up about it and sacrifice 20% of that with the battery life extender. I don't know how i feel about it yet, but I was wondering do we know that it does extend the life of the battery. I assume it has to do with the function of the chemistry breaking down during charges, but has anyone used this software long enough to realize its effectiveness? Once Windows 8 upgrades take place will Samsung provide a suite of software as well. Or. Is Samsung software so wonky that a clean windows is better anyway regardless of what Samsung does? The other question would be is there a standalone battery extender software that can be installed?

On another note. Are most of you deleting the recovery partition, for the space, but keeping the hibernation partition for the speed? Or have I read between the lines of this back and forth incorrectly?

 

I love this touchpad. It's a cliche to throw love in there, but I don't have any of the issues with it I read about. Under the elan settings I have all the sensitivity sliders set to the fastest and most sensitive possible settings. Except for one finger scrolling and four finger swipe I have checked the rest of the swipe functions. It did take a bit of time getting used to a two finger right click. Sometimes when I intended to scroll the right click feature would pop up, but it was a matter of realizing the sensitivity of the function. Anyway. I have the latest driver, I think, 10.17.16.1, and am very impressed with the touchpad.

 

I don't think Easy Settings is aware of the sneaky driver update. Check in Device Manager. Mine is 15.2.0.19.

Have you got drag-and-drop enabled or disabled? People find disabling that feature helps the other features work better. Thanks for indicating that you also have the touchpad / resume problem. I think I will get back to Samsung trying to express the problem more clearly.

I've had my X4C nearly 3 months and the battery wear is sitting at 0%. However, I should note that the battery has only had serious usage on a few occasions, not a daily basis like some people do. Your assumption about the battery chemistry is correct. A lot of the wear to the chemistry occurs when trying to squeeze in the last amount of charge (some wear also occurs when the battery is getting close to empty).

See this Samsung page about Windows 8 support. There's also a Series 9 Windows 8 thread in this forum.

Yes, some of use are deleting the recovery partition in order to get more space. Ideally one makes a full disk image onto a backup device before deleting this partition because it's not easy to rebuild. And most of us keep the hibernation partition. Read this thread to check if your IRST is working properly.

John

 

To be clear here, in regard to your 0% wear and rare serious usage, do you use your laptop plugged in most of the time, or do you not use the laptop very often?

If it is the former, does that mean keeping the laptop plugged in has little effect on the overall life of the battery? I write from home. Should I keep it plugged in whenever possible? I have been using it on battery every day and charging it in the evenings while it's not in use.

 

If I install the release preview now, will I have to go through the whole mess again in October, or will it be as simple as just paying for the upgrade to legitimize the copy?

 

Yes, it is the former. The machine is on for >12 hours/ day and left plugged in except when I need to computer away from a power socket or there's a power cut.

i haven't a clue about that but I would hope M$ wouldn't make it difficult.

John

 

You'll have to re-install from scratch.

 

Would keeping it plugged in as much as mossible harm the battery life? Would it be better to do a full charge then unplug until charging time again?

 

ok, mine is as you said. However, would the 15.2.0.19 automatically override the Easy Settings version or the X4C only goes by the Easy Settings versions?

thx!

 

Oops. I actually meant to post this question in the Windows 8 thread, but thanks for the answer. I think i'll just wait and do it once.

 

Just leave it plugged in with the battery life extender option enabled. The battery seems to be able to handle the small top-ups to 80% without incurring significant wear (note that charging stops when the battery reaches 80% and does not restart until the charge has dropped a few per cent). Fully charging the battery and then fully discharging it is what causes the wear. It will be the way some people operate because they are away from a power source all day (so their batteries tend to die sooner) but when have power just leave the computer plugged in.

I think Easy Settings has its own database and isn't aware of the WiFi driver update. In fact, I don't think the Windows Add/ Remove programs knows either because it just looks at the whole Intel WiFi installation package.

On a separate subject, I put 2 x 4GB 1.35V RAM into my X4C yesterday replacing the factory supplied 1.5V modules. Ivy Bridge supports the lower voltage. Measurements of power drain (using HWiNFO) before and after indicate a decrease in idle power consumption of about 0.25W and a decrease under load (running the SiSoftware Sandra memory bandwidth benchmark) of about 0.6W. So there's nothing earth-shattering. Maybe an extra 15 minutes in 8 hours of battery time.

It's possible that current production X4Cs already include 1.35V modules (HWiNFO will reveal). Samsung do make the modules but the Crucial ones are currently the only ones that are easy to find (in UK).

John

 

I have the 1.5v Samsung modules in my AO3US.

 

Thanks. So Samsung must be selling their 1.35V modules to other people (like they sell their SSDs).

John

 

Hey, I was just wondering how easy it is to delete the recovery partition and use the space... Deleting it seems straightforward enough but I'm not sure how to merge the unallocated space because it's apparently non-adjacent or something... Is there an easy way to do this?

Any help would be much appreciated.

Thanks,

 

I set out some steps here but haven't tried them myself.

John

 

My wireless card is acting up again. My driver: 15.2.0.19. Such a good laptop. Such lousy connectivity. I can not stream video without buffers, and lately saving to cloud storage hangs. General web surfing is okay. Everything else is less okay. What is strange is that the up speeds are not affected, but under a myriad of speed tests i'm getting about 5% of my down speed. The old dell next to me is getting about 5% more. Is there a better way to test the card? I wonder if just changing wireless cards is an option?

 

What signal strength does InSSIDer report? The WiFi is a weak link. The fundamental cause is that the antennae are along the back edge of the chassis where the casing is plastic but there's still a lot of metal in the vicinity. The mitigating measures you can take are (i) In Windows power management make sure that the WiFi power is set to maximum; (ii) set the router channel width to Auto 20 / 40 MHz (if it supports this); (iii) in Device Manager make sure that the Channel Widths are set to Auto and transmit power to maximum; (iv) use InSSIDer to check the WiFi congestion in your area and set the router to use a channel where the frequency isn't congested.

However, most likely you will find that WiFi performance is still sub-optimum. Further options include (a) fitting higher gain antennae to the router, (b) changing the WiFi card and (c) using a USB WiFi adapter. Last week I tried option (b) using an Intel 6230 card (note that your options are limited because you need a half height WiFi / Bluetooth combo card) but the Intel driver couldn't handle the small difference between the two cards and wouldn't configure it properly. Broadcom also make a compatible product. I've been keeping option (c) in my bag as backup for the past couple of months - this device gives a noticeably stronger signal.

John

 

Irritating. I have a wife analyzer app on my phone and have followed every mitigating measure including finding the least congested channel. Why do other aluminum laptops not have this much trouble? What I find most troublesome is that I can tweak and optimize how and where I use the laptop at home, for a mostly stable experience, but I won't be able to control the environment as much elsewhere. I wonder if my router, Linksys e4200v2, is incompatible with this laptop?

I will run inSSIDer when I get home tonight.

 

Which "wife analyzer" app? - I could do with one!

Some of the other metal-bodied notebooks have a plastic section at the top if the display where the antennae usually are. However, I suspect Samsung didn't want to go down that road because the antennae, the associated cables and the extra metal to be added elsewhere would add to the thickness.

The reservation I would have about that Linksys router is that the antennae are internal and probably give a sub-par signal.

John

 

Assuming you don't use an iphone, here is the link. As to the internal antennae of the router, every other device on this network functions at robust signals and speeds, even my seven year old Dell, but I am not forgoing the possibility this laptop and that router don't like each other.

 

Thanks for the link. In my case (Samsung Galaxy Note) it's providing signal strengths in the same range as InSSIDer.

As I've commented before, one aspect that is puzzling me is that my X4C has about a 10 dB weaker signal than the X3B (with Intel 6230 WiFi). The antennae arrangement looks similar but is not identical. My attempt to try the 6230 in my X4C failed because the WiFi driver couldn't handle the small change in WiFi device type and wouldn't reconfigure it properly so I don't know if the worse signal strength is due to the antennae or the WiFi card. That 10 dB difference makes a noticeable impact on the data throughput.

John

 

My SSIDs start with Glo, and they are different names they just begin the same running from a dualband router. I tend to connect to the 5.4 band, the yellow line. The blue line is my 2.4 band. To the right of the inSSIDer is a speed test. I often get lower speeds, but today it is down to 10% of what it should be while the up is right on track. The signals do look good, right? My galaxy tablet, my old Dell, my gsiii, all connect with more than adequate speeds. The xbox, the desktop, both wired in, have no issues whatsoever. So, like I have said. Irritating.

 

Those are poor results. My X4C, with the router around the corner is at -60 dB and 14 MB/s download speed. Since you haven't got a signal strength problem suspicion has to fall on the driver. I can't remember if I already pointed you to the newest driver from Intel. If not, get it installed. If you have got the newest driver then the problem must be with the settings. Try the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands separately with the other disabled.

John

 

What is the latest driver? Is it 15.2.0.19? When I follow the above link it wants me to install a 15.1.1.1

Edit: It is hopeless. I uninstalled then re-installed the wireless driver. Now I can't access the 5ghz band, nor can I link to the router at speeds over 54. Something isn't right.

 

I think it is 15.2.0.19. I wonder if the driver settings are messed up. In the adapter properties > Advanced, make sure the first two entries are Auto and n mode is enabled.

John

 

I think the card is messed up. It is acting as if n mode is disabled. The advanced settings are correct, auto, auto, n enabled. I turned the 5ghz band to mixed and the card connected at 54. I turned the 2.4ghz band to n only and it refuses to connect. I have tried uninstalling the driver to no avail. I also set the computer back two days and still nothing. Yesterday the wireless signal started acting really funny, and now it's a very stable signal, but it's stuck at g speeds.

 

Mystifying. If I could find in Intel driver cleanup tool I would recommend it. The best I can recommend is to try to completely uninstall / reinstall the Intel WiFi package. I doubt if the hardware itself has a problem.

John

 

Hi John..should the Roaming Aggressiveness be set at 5 under the wifi advanced tab?

 

Here is Intel's guidance on the settings (there are other useful links on that page). I read somewhere that Roaming Aggressiveness is the willingness to hunt around other routers for a better connection so the recommended setting is 3 or lower. For anyone stuck at 54Mb/s then this may help.

John

 

ok.
I also noticed that the Intel Wifi update link worked, but it is a fairly big file at 25MB

Also, which is most beneficial 1.35V or 1.5V regarding RAM ?

Thanks again

 

I suspect that the package probably covers a range of WiFi adapters and numerous languages.

1.35V gives a reduction in the power consumption. However, as the RAM is only one part of the system the overall impact is likely to be less than 5%. Perhaps 15 minutes increase in battery run time.

New subject: It's taken me nearly three months to notice that I have one dead pixel near the right side of the screen. I thought it was a speck of dust but it won't wipe off. It's black, so rather less noticeable than if stuck with a bright colour.

John

 

John..I dont see the setting in the Power Management to increase wifi to maximum. Is this in the Easy Settings?

 

Is there any other impact? Why use the 1.5V, if battery consumption is a key selling point? Or does the 1.35V hinder other function somehow?