http://wiki.eeeuser.com/howto:configurefromscratch

http://wiki.eeeuser.com/howto:changelanguage

most of the time.. I'm using my Eee for BT'ing leh.

Using external HDD.

Frankly, I dont' really see much use of a 1GB ramdisk

I'm gonna spam some crap here...

Going round the forums, I do see a lot of post saying things like Celeron M is hot lar.. Acer is hot lar..yada yada..

But here's some facts.

1) "my eeepc so hot, cpu at 50C is this normal?" questions. Temps are designed-in. In the Eeepc example, the bios will switch on the fan at 55C at half speed, full speed at 68C and turn it off again when CPU temp reaches 46C (which is impossible). So it IS normal, Asus designed this thing to run at 50+C to pacify the noise-adverse ang mohs.

2) Celeron M is so hot.. my whole laptop feel warm (this applies to all notebook including why Sony so hot questions). Bigger and more expensive notebooks have shieldings under the palm rest and wherever it may apply to evenly distribute heat while smaller thinner ones just doens't have enough space to add those shieldings and in the Eee's case or some other Celeron M lappies (which are cheap to begin with), cost is a concern.

And how are you going to find a mini-card flash module?

Based on the eeepc's bottom case design, a cooler pad does NUTS

Finding it on the web is one thing.. getting it retail is another.

That's what I meant... because 4GB Robson modules are also sampling di but getting it retail is not that easy as they're only available via system integrator.

Besides, I don't foresee mini-card flash modules "dropping" in price as they're still non mainstream.

Just my 2 cents. I don't mean to throw cold water. It's just so nobody has any false hope that they could go to a shop and spent $200 to upgrade their "SSD".

1) I agree that SSD's will be available in retail but this will be in the 2.5" form factor around end of 2008 to beginning 2009. There's the notebook upgrade market and the enthuasiast PC market that would want this.

2) However, mini-card form factor flash cards like the Robson(turbo memory) cards are already out there for more than a year di but are only available to system integrators just like DOM's (disk on module) which was out since the beginning of flash memory.

Reason being is there's no consumer applications that uses it except Intel's turbo memory which is factory fitted (not very well received also, low bundle rate due to the price and it's not like you could go to lowyat to buy one. Wanna buy a 4965AGN card also difficult), IPC applications (SI's again) and the around 50K+ units of 7A Eeepc that's out there in the market. Other than that.. zilch.

3) I agree that bigger capacity memory cards will be cheaper over time but this applies to USB, SD, CF etc form factors. For example:

1GB Turbo memory module (based on 1K unit quantity by disty) --> $23 --> RM76
1GB USB stick (based on 1pcs unit from Kedai Komputer Ah Kau) --> RM28 or less.
1GB SD card (based on 1pcs unit from Kedai Handphone Ali)--> almost don't cost anything
1GB CF card (Kedai Komputer Vijandran) --> almost cost nothing




That's why I don't see what's the fuss about for 7A's unless you're in the industry and can get your hands on things like minicard BT, minicard GPS, mini card HSDPA (then the sim reader is a problem) etc AND are willing to mod.

This post has been edited by sniper on the roof: Jan 3 2008, 12:09 PM

It's difficult to explain with a few sentence but the way the industry work is that cost.. even if it cost zero point something cent is very important. Let's say Manufacturer A takes 20 secs to assemble something and Manufacturer B takes 15 secs, Manufacturer A will get challenged from folks like Dell and HP etc.

As such, most mainstream notebooks costing less than RM3K (generally speaking) only comes with 1 mini-card slot which is for the WLAN. Only enterprise or premium machines comes with 2 mini-card slots mainly as cost reasons (more stuff you add to the board, the more layers it needs to have, the more expensive... let alone the connector cost)

At the moment, 80% of the market belongs to mainstream class. Just look around the market to see how many notebooks comes pre-bundled with Turbo Memory... and they have been around since June 2006. Personally, I don't see this thing taking off.

Furthermore, the average user (95%) of the market don't paham SSD. No offense the the respective forumers but in this very thread, we have someone asking if the SSD is 2.5" form factor and also people PM offer $300 for Eeepc because HDD very cheap. Remember, the Eee's biggest competitor is cheapo Celeron M+1GB+80GB+14.1" lappies.

Back to the article,

Turbo Memory 2.0 will be released together with the Montevina platform in Q2. Now it's up to 4GB (already sampling)... what Sandisk is offering is an alternative source of the module (currently can only buy from Intel at cutthroat price). Same as Adata, PQI and all the other flash doods... in fact they were showing this since last year's Cebit.

From the article,




This post has been edited by sniper on the roof: Jan 3 2008, 06:35 PM

Power consumption test.. measured with PowerAngel
- Eeepc 4GB
- including 8GB SDHC card (forgot to take out)
- Battery removed.

Off mode --> 2W
Wifi on... Boot peak --> 17W
Wifi on... Idle min LCD brightness --> 14W
Wifi on... Idle max brightness --> 15W
Wifi off... Idle min LCD brightness --> 12W
Wifi off... Idle max LCD brightness --> 13W
Wifi off... Orthos small fft --> 15W

Eeepc temps test

AVI run 12 hours --> 56C
Idle --> Depend on ambient temp of course

Surface temps with 12 hours 720p AVI run.

Keyboard letter G --> 37C
Keyboard letter L --> 38C
Keyboard letter S --> 35C

Palm rest left --> 37C
Palm rest right --> 37C
Touchpad centre --> 38.9C

Rating label --> 40C
Little white label --> 28C
Batterypack --> 31C

Seasonic Power Angel measured from the AC point
http://www.seasonicusa.com/power_angel.htm

And a thermal probe.

There won't be a RM500 notebook day lor.

By the way, what are you guys using your Eeepc for?

I'm using mine as 24/7 downloading machine.. downclocked to 450mhz, increased fan speed and connected to USB hdd.

Which OS are you using?
I measured the AC draw power consumption of the Eeepc before and posted somewhere in this thread (lost my notes though).

Basically just turn off the devices that you're not using lor.. like camera, WLAN (jimat 2W), LCD brightness turn down (2W difference between highest and lowest brightness).

I'm on Winxp and with net surfing... youtube etc... I get about 3hour+ battery life.

Now I'm also downclocking it using Eeectl.


Winxp nlited won't be too slow also

Quite some pages back, another user and I posted our bootvis screenshots but I forgot the exact time. I didn't bother these days, it's much faster to boot and shut down than my desktop so it's acceptable to me.

I think more or less also should have some difference lor.

Since I'm going to be pretty bored during CNY... gonna do some testing on the Eeepc under Mobilemark2005

At:

1) 450Mhz
2) Default
3) 900Mhz

Wifi on and Wifi off. Let's see how the clockspeeds influence the batt life.

Eeectl
http://www.eeelite.com/files/Software%20&%...ectl_0.2.0b.zip

It tells the cpu temp, control fanspeed on the fly also. I'm using 80% fan speed + 450mhz for 24/7 bittorent operation. Keeps the Eeepc nice and cool.
Just gotta edit the ini file for downclocking. Windoze only though

This post has been edited by sniper on the roof: Feb 4 2008, 01:04 PM

0511 is unofficial leh. I'll stick with official bios first.

I went with XP simply because it's a known entity and everyone has done it

Some small updates...

I can't install mobilemark2005 due as it requires 3GB free on the system disk to run the benchmarks

However, based on AC power draw.. I can confirm that running 450Mhz saves a grand total of 1W off the power consumption compare with default.

It might sound like very little but 1W out total system consumption of 13W idle is quite a bit.

I've been doing some intensive websurfing plus youtube for the past 45minutes using WLAN and battery meter shows 80% now. LCD on 1/3 brightness

I don't multitask a lot leh...

But here's the power figures...




Edit: adds cpu utilisation picture. The spikes are when different tabs are selected.



This post has been edited by sniper on the roof: Feb 4 2008, 11:59 PM


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