Acer 3830TG-6431 Teardown

I was recently informed that the Acer 3830TG-6431 may have some thermal issues and that replacing the thermal paste with a higher grade paste may alleviate the issue.  I did not think I was having any problems, but I decided to see what was involved in replacing the thermal paste.  Hint: It isn’t very easy…
Here is my step-by-step tear down guide for the Acer 3830TG-6431.
Disclaimer:  Opening your laptop in this way will likely void your warranty.  It is very easy to damage one of the small cables/connectors and make your laptop inoperable.   I am providing this information as-is and I am not responsible for any damage/mayhem you may cause if you try to follow along at home.  I have done most of the documentation from memory- so I may have missed a screw/plug/etc.  If you are experienced in working on laptops, use your common sense when you are following this.  If you have never opened up a laptop before, I would advise that you do not start on this one as there are several awkward cable placements- and several easy to damage plugs.
With this in mind, it is time to get into the gutty-works of the laptop:

1. Remove the single screw in the center and remove the bottom plate of the laptop
2. Remove the following from inside the laptop
     a. Hard Drive
     b. SATA board connector for Hard Drive
     c. Mini-PCIe Wireless Card.  The two wires are mini-coax and should snap on/off without much effort.

3. Disconnect the battery switch connector cable from the motherboard

4. Remove the eleven (11) 2.5mm x 7 screws from the bottom of the laptop

5. Use a plastic pry tool (see recommended tools at the end of this post) to carefully release the snaps around the edges.  This will free the top cover containing the keyboard

6. Slowly separate the top of the laptop from the bottom; there will be 5 cables to disconnect before the two parts can be separated:
     a. Power Switch connector
     b. Trackpad connector
     c. Keyboard connector
     d. Bluetooth connector
     e. I/O board connector
All but the Bluetooth are ribbon cables and can be pulled out (or clip retention released).  The Bluetooth connector is a keyed connector and it should be carefully removed so the wires are not pulled from their socket.

7. Disconnect the left and right speaker connectors from the motherboard.  These are keyed sockets and very small and easy to break.
8. Disconnect the display connector.  Pull the connector straight up- do not attempt to pry this from the side as this can damage the connector.
9. Remove the one screw from the motherboard and the four screws holding in the battery bracket.  (The motherboard is beneath the battery bracket)

10.  Lift the front edge of the motherboard up to expose the connectors at the rear of the board (close to batteries).
11. Remote the three connectors:
     a. Power connector
     b. Battery connector
     c. Daughter board connector
Note: The battery connector is also accessible from the bottom of the system.

12. Remove the motherboard from the chassis
13. Disconnect the CPU fan connector
14. Remove the two (2) screws in the NVidia GPU heat sink area and the four (4) screws over the CPU area.
Note: The four numbers on the heat sink are the tightening order sequence for re-installing the CPU heat sink.  The numbers are opposite corners so to prevent over stressing one side and damaging the CPU core.  I would also suggest doing a gradual tightening in rotation to further ensure the CPU is not damaged.  For example:
   Just barley start screws in sequence #1-4
   Go back and tighten 1-4 in sequence to about half way
   Go back again and snug screws 1-4 in sequence
   Finally go back and fully tighten screws 1-4 (yep- in sequence).

This is a picture of the factory applied thermal compound.  It doesn't look like they used the good stuff:

15.  VERY IMPORTANT: clean off all of the old CPU compound before applying new thermal compound- from both the CPU and the heatsink!
PCB flux cleaner is great to get off troublesome thermal paste (found at Fry’s)
16. Make sure the tacky pads contacting the Chipset Processor, the GPU RAM and the chokes around the CPU don’t have any dirt/junk in them.  This could affect the heat transfer from these systems to the heat sink could cause damage/failure over time.

 

17. Once your new thermal paste is applied, do everything in reverse to put the system back together.
18. Fini

Here is a reference picture of the bottom of the system board:

This is the laptop bottom chassis with the system board removed; daughter board is still in-place:

This is a detail shot of the battery power switch and the Mini-PCIe WiFi card:

You will probably notice that the wire and connector from the battery power switch is missing.  I did not find this connector until I was into removing the system board- and the connector didn’t come out correctly.  Hindsight is always 20/20 and that is why step #3 is included above.
The system board power connector is pretty small- and almost impossible to deconstruct as Asus has added glue to the back of the connector (I am assuming this is to prevent possible terminal end pull-out from the housing?).  It took me about an hour to get the cables stripped, tinned and the terminal ends out of the housing.  It took another 30 minutes to get the damned little thing back together and soldered.

After all was done, one of the solder points broke from the switch board after the system was put back together.  I was not going to take the laptop apart again to fix. I ended up stripping a length of wire and shorting the connection on the board inside the connector (and covering with electrical tape); this connector is so small that even the micro-sized hard drive jumpers are too large to fit inside the connector!
In review, I do think the laptop is running cooler.  I did not take an accurate measurement before, but the system seems fees not as warm during normal use. I have even had the cooling fan switch off for 15-20 min at a time- and event that never occurred prior to replacing the thermal paste!  :)
Recommended tools:
You will need a small screw driver and some plastic pry tools, such as these:

A plastic spudger tool is also invaluable for this kind of work:

Acer Aspire TimelineX 3830TG-6431

I have been on a quest for a decent gaming laptop for several months now.  I had a gateway P6860FX that was very awesome, but it 17” and way too bulky to carry around everyday.  There are some very cool new Sandy Bridge laptops coming out from MSI, Asus and Gigabyte- but these will all be $1000+ laptops.  Some of these can support up to 16GB of RAM (via four SODIMM slots), have dual SATA hard drives capable of RAID0 and offer full 1920x1080 HD resolution- oh, and a couple also have nVidia 3D or the new Samsung passive 3D.  :)

I was looking for a light weight laptop with a decent CPU and a decent discrete GPU; I came up with the Acer Aspire TimelineX 3830TG-6431.
The 13.3” screen is only 1366x768 (a very common resolution for 16:9 displays) and it can only hold 8GB of DDR3 RAM in its two SODIMM slots.  It uses an average Core i5-2410M dual core CPU clocking in at a native 2.3Ghz per core.  Where it shines is the GeForce GT540M (1GB dedicated memory) and an 8+ hour battery life (during normal use- definitely not gaming time).  USB 3.0, 1.3MP webcam and Bluetooth 3.0 and WiFi B/G/N are also nice added perks.

There is no optical drive on this model- but it only weighs in at a little over 4lbs!

Oh- and the battery is non-removable… WTF?

The device achieves 8+ hours of battery life by creating a hybrid display integrating the CPU embedded Intel HD 3000 and the discrete GT540M so the later is only used when needed- like what apple did with the MacBook a few years back.  This seems to work pretty well (save for MineCraft as it is all Java and CPU driven; OpenGL does not appear to help much) and I have seen an average use time of 6-7 hours during normal browsing/video watching/etc.  This drops down significantly when gaming that uses the nVidia 3D rendering.

Note: it does not appear to be possible to download the generic nVidia GT540M driver and install on this system; I get ‘supported hardware not found’ when trying to update to the latest & greatest driver.

Overall, I am very happy with the performance of the system for gaming.  I played Dungeon Siege III, Trine and Bioshock all with very high graphics settings.  The video was flawless; no frame skips or lag.  The bottom of the laptop stayed relatively cool, but the heat coming out of the left of the left fan exhaust was pretty hot.  :)

Not to happy with Minecraft performance; it is chunky and gets slower as you play.  I would be quick to blame this on the damnable java that this application uses for everything.

Note: this is with a Seagate Momentous XT Hybrid hard drive; the stock HD was a 5.2 rating.

Here are a few shots of the actual system:

Keys are separated; non-backlit.  Keyboard is not too bad, but the trackpad is very easy to hit while typing- which will drop the cursor somewhere inconvenient in the document you are typing.

There is a ‘P’ button on the upper right of the keyboard; when you unplug from the charger it auto enables.  I assume this is some kind of ‘power save’ mode as the screen dims and an on-screen green battery icon appears when the button is physically pressed.
There is also a little battery button on the front of the laptop.  If I press it while on battery it will turn blue for a few seconds; not exactly sure what this does.

The ‘user manual’ included the recovery DVDs you burn (three for full restore or just one for drivers & apps) is a ‘Generic User Guide’ for all models of the Aspire TimelineX series; the 30MB file has about 60 pages in English that cover computer safety, making recovery discs and the other Acer branded applications that are bundled with the unit.

The memory and hard drives are accessed by removing a single screw from the bottom of the laptop.  (Yay!)

Memory is easily upgraded to a maximum of 8GB with two 4GB DDR3 SODIMMs.  I replaced the standard 500GB WD hard drive with a Seagate 50GB Momentous XT hybrid hard drive.  I didn’t try one, but it looks like there is adequate space to fit a 12.5mm hard drive (like the Seagate 1TB 2.5”) in here- if anyone really need to know, let me know via email and I will test.

On the right side of the laptop there are solder points on the board for a Mini PCIe card, but no header was installed.  There also appears to be space for a SIM card slot, but again nothing was installed in this model.

One clever adaptation for this model is since the battery is non-removable there is an on/off switch integrated into the removal of the bottom of the laptop shell (switch is located to the left of the bottom SODIMM).  This switch disables battery power when the bottom is removed for service.  It can be turned back on for testing, but should (of course) remain off when replacing memory, HD, etc.

Note: FN+F3 toggles through and enabling Bluetooth and WiFi in some sequence (I think it is All Off/WiFi only/WiFi+Bluetooth/Bluetooth Only).  I took me a while to figure this out.

All said and done, I am very happy with my new laptop.  Is is basically a larger sized netbook with a real (i5) CPU, a decent amount of memory upgrade (8GB) and a dedicated GeForce GT540 GPU.  It is zippy for everyday work and very decent for real gaming.  The only thing I would really like to change would be a slightly better screen resolution (1440x900 would be nice, 1920x1080 would be awesome!).

UPDATE: I did a teardown of this system to apply some good thermal paste (I used Artic Silver 5).  I did not think there were any thermal issues before, but I have found the laptop runs MUCH better (and quieter) than it did prior! Most noticeably was in Minecraft- which is very CPU intensive.  I am going to assume that the thermal paste used by Asus wasn't very good so the heat was not being adequately transferred from the CPU to the heatsink/heatpipe- and this was causing the CPU to throttle..

Laptop Deja Vu

I was in the market for a new Netbook (to use with my new Clear WiMax connection) so I did some minimal research and found the Acer AO751h. It has a news (and slower) Z520 Atom processor, 2GB RAM, 160GB HD and a beautiful 11.6 screen with 1366x768 resolution (which is the same as most 720P LCD panels). It was on ‘sale’ at Fry’s for $469 with a bundled 2 year service contract. I would never use a service contract (‘I Void Warranties’ is a very fitting T-Shirt for me to wear) and the sales person insisted that the laptop would not be any less without the contract.

I purchased the unit, went out to my car and found the same laptop for $399 on Amazon. Even better, I found a similar version (1GB RAM, Win XP, Extended Battery) for $379. I ordered the $379 (a $20 RAM upgrade is well worth the extended battery) and made plans to return the $469 laptop in a few days.

Once home, I replaced the HD (via an easily accessible panel) and installed Windows 7.

From the start, the laptop speed sucks- very badly. Opening Firefox (3.5) is very slow, Flash on websites is very slow (Hulu is unplayable), and my when I tested WoW (all effects turned to low) I had to disable the sound as it couldn’t keep up (i.e. broken record sound). I was averaging 2fps in the non-populated areas of Durotar.

A lot of people will say ‘A Netbook is not made to play WoW’- and I would disagree. My initial Netbook (an Asus 8.9” EEE PC) was able to play WoW at around 5-6 FPS; my second one (Acer AO150) was able to play a little better (8-10)- but the AO751h was hitting a ceiling at 2 FPS (even when forcing the resolution to 800x600).

I happened to be in BestBuy a few days later and chanced upon the Gateway LT3103u; Very similar to the Acer (which makes sense as Acer now owns Gateway) with the same screen, keyboard, memory and HD configuration- but with an Athlon 64 L110 CPU and a Radeon x1275 GPU- and for the same price ($399).

Similarities between Acer AO751h and Gateway LT3103u:

• 11.6” screen with 1366 x 768 resolution
• 2GB DDR2 RAM
• 160GB SATA HD
• Large keyboard
• 802.11b/g Wireless
• 3 USB Ports
• VGA Out
• 10/100 Ethernet
• Multi-in-One Card Reader
• Multi-touch mousepad
• Integrated Webcam
• Easy access panels for HD, RAM and Wireless cards

Differences between the Acer AO751h and Gateway LT3103u:

• CPU: Intel Atom Z520 1.2Ghz vs. AMD Athlon 64 L110 1.2Ghz
• Video: Intel GMA 500 vs. Radeon x1275
• Battery: 2200mAh vs. 5200mAh

Gateway is owned by Acer, so I would assume that some of their lines will have similar products. The screen, keyboard and basic layout of the two are almost identical:

The power bricks for two systems are identical (30W- 19.0v, 1.58A) and the batteries are interchangeable.

Moving away from the form factor/aesthetics, there is a pretty sizable difference in performance.

Windows 7 Rating for the AO751h:

The Windows 7 Rating for the LT3013u:

The limiting factor on both systems is the CPU, and the gateway Athlon offers about 20% more performance than the Intel Z520 CPU. The gateway also can offload some additional graphics rendering tasks to the integrated Radeon x1275 GPU. The Radeon does not have dedicated GPU memory, rather it uses shared system RAM (384MB default).

Both systems come system maxed with at a single 2GB DDR2 SODIMM.

I did a basic CPU+GPU performance comparison by filming the opening screen of World of Warcraft and putting them together with Adobe Premier:"

For comparable systems, the Gateway performance is MUCH better than the Acer; the trade-off is battery longevity- the Acer can use a 3 cell battery and obtain an estimated 4 hours of runtime (or 8 hours with the optional 6 cell battery) while the Gateway boasts about 5 hours with a battery that is twice the size (the included 6 cell battery).

This was a really tough decision for me as I wanted the Gateway, but I hate their support (see my earlier post on my experiences with my other Gateway laptop). In the end, the technological advantages has over-ridden my distaste for Gateway.

I have returned the Acer and upgraded the HD in my Gateway; if anyone is considering an Acer AO751h for the larger screen- go look at the Gateway instead…

Fuck Gateway

I purchased a P6860-FX laptop about a year ago (5/30/2008, to be precise) as a ‘gaming laptop’ for about $1350.00. The laptop is decent, but I have been trying to get VMWare Workstation or Microsoft Virtual PC to run- and both complain that ‘Hardware Virtualization’ needs to be enabled in the BIOS.

I have verified that my CPU (an Intel T7700) and my motherboard chipset (Intel PM965 Chipset) should be able to support Intel virtualization technology (VT-x)- but there is no option to enable/disable such a feature in the BIOS. In fact, the BIOS is pretty bare- looking a bit like Gateway went a little over-zealous when customizing the BIOS…

I contacted Gateway to see if VT-x was a possible [Incident: 090603-000372] or if a future BIOS would allow for this. Their response was:

Response (Arunkumar_GWSI686) - 06/03/2009 01:27 PM
Dear Bruce ,
Thank you for contacting Gateway. I apologize for the inconvenience that you have experienced.

As per our records we see that your system is out of Warranty.

I would like to inform you that your warranty started on 05/04/2008 and ended on 05/04/2009.

If you need further support concerning the hardware visualization issue, We do offer a phone-based support options for Out of Warranty products that also covers "How Do I" questions as well.
"Answers by Gateway" is a convenient and affordable fee based technical support service that is great for answering "how to" questions or technical issues once the product warranty has expired. With your purchase of the service you would have instant access to our Highly Trained agents.
You may call 1.800.229.1103 . However, it's a fee based support. Calling cards are available for 30 minutes ( $59.99 ), 90 minutes ( $129.99 ), or 15 issues ( $199.99 ) and the validity will be 1 year.
Another option is that you can approach a local technician.
For further clarifications please feel free to visit our web site http://www.support.gateway.com
Thank you for contacting Gateway.
Have a great day!
Respectfully,
Gateway Online Technical Support

So basically ‘Arankumar’ at Gateway support has informed me that:

1. My Gateway warranty started 27 days before I purchased my laptop.
2. My Gateway system is out of warranty and I will get ZERO help from Gateway
3. If I do want help, I can get it for the low price of $60 for 30 mins (and no Vaseline)

If the system was dead/broken/not working, I can see this response- but for a simple yes/no question, Gateway can keept their non-English speaking ‘support’ employed for some other person to be annoyed with.

I guess I should have listened to everyone else when they said ‘Don’t buy a gateway’…

So- if you have a Gateway system, I feel sorry for you . If you are thinking of purchasing a Gateway system- just don’t… unless you want to be lied to about your warranty coverage and have some third-world flowchart reader tell you that Gateway just doesn’t give a fuck about you.

No more Gateway systems for me- or anyone I can influence!