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IshouldGo

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Everything posted by IshouldGo

  1. Excellent. Great job jmhdj!! I'm still working on mine. Obviously andrewff2 - if jmhdj has his working well that is the best investment to go with. Very nice. I may have to take a summer break shortly for school but will hopefully get mine in order in August.
  2. ok, so I removed the video card (empty vga slot now) and reassembled and powered on the system. I get the wifi light on the front base, and the keyboard rest shows the caps and number lock on solid, as well as the 3 lights in that upper left panel. tapping the caps lock key does nothing. no lights changing, no hard drive light showing. I didn't touch the 460m vbios. actually, the card looks pristine. I've been very careful, and the card looks fine, but removing the x-bracket was the most traumatic thing I've done to it so I presumed it would be the issue. In hindsight, I realize it was really stupid to start changing the modded vbios with a hex editor back to the original vbios to see when the internal lcd kicked back on (as it worked with the original vbios) since I have no idea what I was changing. (live and learn, I guess). If it's true that the vbios is also tied into or stored within the sbios also, that may be how I've screwed up the system. again, i'm completely guessing here (my donkey ears are flapping) so any brainstorming or feedback is greatly appreciated. maybe i'm completely wrong. I do see clips on ebay to allow in circuit reprogramming of bios chips, so maybe that is a better way to go than just replacing the chips? but if replacing the vbios and maybe even sbios chips will solve my problem.... i'm all for it. jmhdj you also mentioned that i'll lose my win7 key from the sbios if I replace that. thank you for that info. I do have the sticker with the key number still on the bottom of the laptop base, so I'm thinking if I go that route and I should just be able to retype the key in? (like on a desktop). I downloaded an iso file to do a clean install on the ssd drive and used that key and it worked, so hopefully I can do this when I replace the chip? if it isn't the vbios/sbios chip then I don't know what the issue. the system looks pristine otherwise and I have been really careful...but who knows.....
  3. Score!!! you're much further along than I am...lol.. I backslid and am still awaiting a resolder on the vbios chip. I am thinking I may need to reprogram/replace the sbios since I get dark on both screens with both video cards now and didn't before. do you know?
  4. Nice! I have to admit, the asus line is really nice n i dont think anyone can touch them on styling, but for this level of investment, to have company reps refuse to help or provide any info to modders(who are ok w no warranty etc) when other companies will help you keep your investment by at least sharing what they know to upgrade-- processor replacement, video card, etc, and that they have competitors for the high end market that DO upgrade now, I think ASUS has really shot themselves in the foot with this attitude. When I think of a future high-end new laptop purchase, as much as I like this laptop, I simply cannot justify purchasing their product over a company that will help extend the life of my purchase for this kind of money by sharing knowledge of what can be done or actually doing an upgrade---either by the user or sending it in to a rep, etc. this really should not be a 'throw away' purchase it this level of expense----- especially when there are multiple competitor companies that are now helping and doing upgrades on systems theyve sold. i think asus needs to wake up that they are cutting themselves out of the high value market with this approach. pity too, i really like their laptops...
  5. lol, no. I bought it used and it was like that already. apparently it's a known weak issue with this design. (maybe it being on the back would have been better?) but I couldn't charge a battery or run on ac without it switching modes from ac to battery to ac continuously and this solved the problem. now the jack is rock solid and the little cable doesn't wiggle at all.. now, all I need is the video card upgrade to work.....that video bios thing again.....
  6. Ok, since I'm cooling my heels for a bit....thought I'd post the last few things I changed with info for future searches Upgrading the DVD drive to Blu ray: Very easy: The DVD drive is just held in by a single screw, accessible from the bottom of the case if you just take off the panel that accessed the hard drives and lower memory sticks (see pic of bottom panel removed w red arrow showing screw). i just picked a good bd-rw to upgrade. it needs to be a slim model and a sata connector. To do it: flip over the laptop, remove the rear panel, and unscrew the screw. push the drive out using a flathead screwdriver or something and pop in the new drive the same way. The cover plate on the drive you'll want to pop off whatever model you get and use the one from the ASUS laptop, because nothing else will match the case or look right. DC power jack replacement: Major pain in butt (with potential to screw up computer without a static mat and some caution): The pins on the bottom are for the G73 not the G53 (different pinout). I needed a 40W soldering iron to get it off (a 25W wasn't hot enough to work). I also deliberately destroyed the connector with pliers and wire cutters and then just used pliers to pull out the pins with solder wick to get the extra solder off. Not destroying the connector proved to be impossible to get all the old solder off to get the pins out. Plus, the old connector wasn't needed anymore... I changed it out because the adaptor was a little wiggly in the slot, and it would switch continuously from ac power to battery and drove me crazy. The dc jack adapter I replaced it with has a more robust inner pin so may put up with the tension on it better. Now it works great. ---Note on this one, that little jack is buried at the bottom of the laptop, so those brave souls who've already changed this one know that you literally have to take the entire laptop apart and the motherboard out of the case to get to it....if you've got other mods and projects you want to do, you may as well do them all at the same time if you're getting this one done. One pic shows top w new adapter, and other shows bottom w places to desolder. button is the power button next to it. Hindsight: Don't use threadlocker on the screws--- using threadlocker blue was a really bad idea. i can tell asus used some type of threadlocker on their screws, so I tried to do the same, but the commercially available blue threadlocker was much stronger than the little nuts in the plastic and basically pulled them out and may have even melted the plastic on some areas of the case.
  7. now both internal and external screens remain dark with both video cards. hmmm, I'm seriously thinking the bad vbios I flashed affected the system bios somehow. ideas welcome. still waiting on a new vbios chip for the clevo 670m. As a side note, it seems to be that the obvious video card choice would be an ASUS 670M that they use in the G75 series. Has anyone tried that? Thoughts?
  8. thanks. ill look.
  9. thx. I have bootable usb or pendrives for windows and dos. my problem is that the system isn't even looking for a usb/pen drive or a cd rom. I tried the blind flash w a spare internal hard drive shrunk to 4GB and formatted to FAT32 then set to boot to dos with NVFlash -4 -5 -6 olbios.rom in a modified autoexec.bat file in the bootmgr to force a blind flash (I think I get the 'E' for effort on this one, or maybe "D" for determined....or simpy "D" for "Dumb"....lol). oh well, so I'm still primed to swap out the vbios chip with a preprogrammed one. I have 2 issues here: 1): I need a new vbios chip (I do have a programmer w an adapter, but to be honest haven't used one in ages and will probably screw it up) so preprogrammed is the way to go; and 2): I have NO idea which chip on the board is the vbios chip. lol. if anyone knows......help would be appreciated here (laughing). I think I'm going to go have a beer....
  10. yes. thx for considering. unfortunately i cant boot off usb, so im shrinking a hard drive partition to usb size to try to blind flash off that. its ready, i just have to go do it (crossing fingers). when i was booting to dos on a usb stick n flashing vbios i restarted after to boot into windows n removed the usb stick n the bios deleted the usb boot priority as an entry. so it wont even look for a usb drive. it may not even be posting at this point, since both internal n external screen are dark i cant tell.
  11. nice! i may end up doing similar w mine until its working correctly. i got an adapter to make the vbios chip easy to remove n program, but i noticed theres not much room on the board for it. wires seem to be the way to go. plus i really like that you dont have to dissassemble each time to remove the chip.
  12. no updates from me. i'm still waiting on a vbios chip and in the mean time attempting methods to force an extra hard drive to pretend it's only 4GB, and then dos boot from it with a modified autoexec.bat file to make a successful blind flash and restore the vbios to a um....working... state. lol. no success yet...I'm guessing at the command I had to type to force the flash. I think it was 'YES' since the image won't match, otherwise it was just 'y'. but, I can't see the screen....so...who knows? I also realize I've been pushing the button to reset the laptop which I now understand to be the cmos reset button? and not an internal power button....lol. so maybe that's a good thing, and maybe not.... but hey, glad your internal lcd works! maybe you didn't damage the motherboard, maybe the connections need to be a little cleaner (flux?) or just check that they're all good solder connections? are you going blind yet from all that teeny soldering? ...lol
  13. hmmmm....evidently I seriously date myself here.... in the archaelogical prehistory of motherboards they either had agp or pci adaptors and were married to either nvidia or ati (radeon) video cards, some crossover occurred. but mostly intel cpu compatible boards mated with nvidia graphics cards and amd cpu compatible motherboards mated with ati cards only. then crossover started (with some intel cpu boards accepting amd video cards, and amd cards accepting nvidia boards, but they were the rarity). and even then, the chipsets on the motherboards still weren't completely compatible, even when pci-e hit the scene. and then it was sli for nvidia or crossfire for ati graphics cards (but specifically one or the other, not both). and even then the motherboard chipset (specifically the via chipset i think, but this is from memory) would glitch with some motherboards and some graphics cards, causing many to suffer....all very ancient history apparently...especially it appears since the core-i7 cpu's now reign king. (i still love my amd quad-core desktop, though my laptop is i7). I'm not complaining that times have changed and motherboards are finally playing nicely with both types of video cards, just pleasantly surprised. this is of course a field where a lowly 2 years creates massive change. which is good.
  14. I hope so...that would be nice...and about time too! I hit it last when building NVidia on amd board n processor. lol. (that's about the time i'm cruising manufacturer sites for compatibility, and forum reviewers calling out quirkly, underreported bugs). I know intel's 'i' series took part of the northbridge and put it on the processor as the 'qpi' but they do still have a northbridge and a chipset, whether they've bought the licensing (NVidia) for it or not, or ironed out the compatibility isn't/wasn't always what the manufacturer is forthcoming about. I know some boards do now but if they all do I wasn't aware. good news.
  15. ok, so I can't pm these, but i can upload to post...lol. jmhdj: Here's the 2D lcd screen connector cable pics: plz let me know if you need further (before i reassemble it. lol) andrewff2: the quick guides to the mods you asked about...LCD screen upgrade: to remove the cover to replace the lcd screen- just the 2 screws under the little rubber pads at the bottom L and R corner, then pry off the plastic panel around the sides on the front --it holds on the outside edge of it, so the point of the pic is to show prying off from the inside edge (where it touches the lcd screen) and the outside little holders will just 'pop' off and on. then it's just the million screws around the side brackets that hold it in place. if you do upgrade or replace your lcd screen, do your best not to touch any of the little chips under the plastic on the bottom of the backside of the actual lcd panel (the side you don't see when its assembled), they're very static sensitive (usu covered w clear plastic to protect.) - - - Updated - - - Color keyboard mod: Use a small flathead screwdriver to pry off/pop out the 3 flanges at the top of the keyboard, then just pull off (held on by 2 sided tape) be carefull not to pull cables. can either leave in and just be careful or can remove 2 cables from adapters on motherboard and reinstall later (on each adapter there's a little holder, find the edge on each side and use a little screwdriver or push it backwards away from connector. cable then comes out, when reinstalling cable, just put cable in then pop it back in.) on back shiny metal side of keyboard- remove 2 tiny screws. now make color panel. 'color gels' cheap plastic films for theater lighting or photography works great. i ran out of decent tape so used crappy tape and it still works fine. you can even have the arrows of the wsad keys one color n the rest of the key another. so can get as creative as you want. make 2 little holes so the 2 back screws will go back in and slap it all back together. put the cables back in (if you took them out) and put keyboard back on backplane (bottom edge first, then top will pop back in). Bluetooth module addition/ upgrade: Really easy to add in a bluetooth module if yours didn't come with it. the little connector for it is on the topside of the motherboard at the lower R side corner (same side as power adapter, hdmi, etc near palmrest area). just buy one and plug it in. i just taped the little module to the case bottom, it's really tiny. the one i got was spec'd for asus and bluetooth 2.0 so i know that one works, others may or may not. --FYI -there is a software bug w win 7 x64 using blutetooth stereo headphones so you just need to go into the device manager and activate it as stereo headphones, then it's fine. (or if it suddenly stops working, same thing-check device manager bluetooth, it gets deactivated w some software changes so just re-enable it.) otherwise plug n play.
  16. also might be worth mentioning if this is your first build.... most motherboards have a chipset that is compatible with either amd or NVidia (gpu) based video cards. this is in addition to the major design for an amd or intel cpu (main processor).. some are made deliberately to cross over (eg -an amd processor but an NVidia video card or an intel processor but an amd video card). so if you really are in love with a video card, you might take that into consideration when choosing your motherboard. some claim to do both, but a quick check of user reviews on a more educated site will reveal lots of builders finding bugs when using video cards on motherboards that have their chipsets based on the competitor brand chips...lol, so it's worth checking compatibility there as well....
  17. also, from what I understand you don't need to mod all the inf files, just any one of them. (follow the link I posted to mod your own).
  18. Here's a link that shows you how to put your hardware ids into an existing inf file to make it work for your device. worked for me. (aka you just mod your own inf file):https://forums.geforce.com/default/topic/513621/installer-cannot-continue-the-graphics-driver-could-not-find-compatible-graphics-hardware-installer-/ I did try some of the drivers from laptopvideo2go with the inf I modified from this link's steps to take. some driver files worked better with the inf mods than others. very straightforwards steps.
  19. well, I think I just bad-flashed my vbios. black lcd and vga screen. I put the nvflash command with the good bios into the autoexec.bat on the bootable usb drive. I don't even see it being accessed. I've tried all 3 usb ports if that makes a difference. I may be missing some key pressing or detail about activating the blind flash so it isn't working but I don't know. so if anyone does....please post. otherwise, I've found a site on ebay that sells the vbios chips I need, and they even offered to preprogram them with my vbios if I send them the file..... looks like I'll be taking a break while the new chips arrive.....
  20. Yes! a beer crate is in order for svl7 once this is done. maybe 2?...maybe 20???? 200????>>>>>>>
  21. my 2 cents - buy online: the 'egg' is my go to online site for desktop builds. they have an excellent rma policy if you have probs with a bad part. the 'tiger' also has some good deals from time to time. in terms of price drops, there seems to be a 'sweet spot' between getting a really good deal on a great cpu/gpu/motherboard/ram whatever, that's still a high-performing solid system part--that went on a big sale because the 'newer models' with some (not always dramatic) performance boost have hit the scene. the really high-end components suck a lot of buck for a tiny boost, so if you don't ''just have to have it'' then scaling back just a bit and putting the extra bucks somewhere else is a sound investment. i would add check reviews for a rock-stable motherboard and memory combo. then you can overclock if you want (or not), but you'll have fewer problems overall. power supply - definitely go (way) above your required specs--pay a bit more for a good/better one and definitely with isolated rails. I scratched my head over bsod issues and 'bad hard drive' screens until i upgraded a good brand power supply rated above my specs to a great one way above my rated specs and all my probs dissappeared. under load it couldn't maintain spec or noise isolation like the manufacturer claimed. so throw a few extra bucks into this one, it'll stop problems that may appear to be caused by other components. (also, if that 'next video card' wants to suck even more power you're safe here). cooling - important. very important. if you get a top end cpu or video card, they tend to really run hotter than the more middle road or lower end. (here i'm thinking of my 3.4 Ghz quad core compared to the 3.2 Ghz of the same model). Huge heat increase. i ended buying one of those closed-system water coolers for it. (OK, I tend to game when its 110F outside, and 84F inside, lol). completely worth it. not only is the cpu cooler now, but the heat goes outside the case, so everything is cooler now. it's a no maintenance system and again, on the eggy/tiger sale, cost about $40--less than what I originally paid for the fan cooler. with the isolated cpu and gpu water coolers out now, you don't need to go the whole water cool system vs air, you can mix and match. or you can start with one and then upgrade later, like I did. also, thermal paste is a BIG deal IMHO. i didn't believe it until I threw out bucks for the expensive 'diamond paste', and watched my temps drop 4 - 6 C under full load for the gpu, and 10C for the cpu. (my laptop cpu/gpu temps dropped even more-but the thermal paste there had broken down). upgrading - ok, for example.: i usually build on a budget. so I dream of the top stuff, and then prioritize. this last system I bought 8 GB ram, and later upgraded to 16 GB (when I had restored my wallet, and prices dropped). I started with a 2 core cpu, and then later upgraded to a faster 4 core. ... (for the same price I orig paid for the 2 core due to price drops/sales). then I realized that the new cpu was much hotter, and so I dumped the cpu aftermarket massive fan cooler, and replaced it with a closed system cpu water cooler (for less than I paid for the awesome cpu fan cooler...due to... price drops and sales). the upgrades were probably about 2 years later, so that has been my time frame for seeing significant price drops. the cpu/mobo/ram you need to have really matched. and get a case and power supply to put them in. then you can use your old parts from your current pc and then upgrade to the new stuff as you find it/can afford it. focus on the things that are important to you - on the motherboard for me it was a lot of usb ports, great stability, sata speed, etc. for the case it was - air flow, ability to add drives, etc (and then the 'cool appearance factor' did play a part.) i have a mid tower but i wish i had gone full tower. much more room, much more air flow. i don't move mine so i don't need portability, but I needed to fit it in a certain space and i liked the particular model case i got (they didn't make it in full). but for expansion ability and video cards, and ease of working on it? definitely go full tower in my opinion (unless you move it a lot). also, heavy steel cases rock. they are solid and in my experience are generally better manufactured (you're less likely to get a bad/damaged case and have to rma) are closer to spec, and are just higher quality overall. (goes for storebought models, too.) the little details - really important to me are the peripherals - great keyboard, monitor, gaming mouse, headset, mousepad, speakers.--completely trivial in terms of long-term build, and you can add pieces and upgrade over time. but these parts to me are what make the system truly enjoyable--great sound w good mic quality on a comfy headset, feeling like I'm really there playing on the big screen and having customized keys and mouse settings with a good hand feel. but you can add those at any time (given enough usb ports, lol). i'm a huge fan of playing in the dard using a backlit keyboard (and a comfy chair). I did upgrade to an ssd for the os, and I completely agree-- just the faster boot is really nice. i thought they were pretty gimmicky as well; now that I have one, I will not be returning to a spindle os drive. and i really dig the bigger, higher resolution monitor. critical to performance? no. greatly increases the fun factor? yes.
  22. jmhdj would know more about the 680m. I do think both our issues are the same, some vbios setting. like I said I chose the 670m since for me it is an upgrade and I got it for just over $130 (hard to pass that one up) so it was affordable on a tight budget. so for a 'maybe' go or no go attempt it was doable for me. that G73JH heatsink, even though it's made for an ati card, is almost perfect for the 670m series. that was a great tip. from reading forums about the higher end card upgrades that had higher power draw and heat dissipation specs, I know some folks said they had probs w over heating and auto-shutdown during intense gaming and the power draw might be higher than what the motherboard was made to support without additional modding and bigger power block. battery use might also be too low power for the higher end card. it just depends on what you want and are willing to give up to get that. so I believe the 670m and mx match the current system (for old card) heat and power specs, the 675m was a bit iffy and the 680m might need some additional modding for power draw and cooling. I'm sure jmhdj will figure that out once its up and running. it sounds like he's up to the task. so if you want to maxx out your system sounds like he'll know the hardware aspect of that. I want better gaming but would like to stay closer to the current power and thermal specifications and battery life. so I think your mod should meet your needs, which may be very individual. for my mod it's just the card, the heatsink w a few small changes, a modified inf file so the driver will load (some are premade, I modded mine, its not hard). the sticky part now is the vbios, which it looks like svl7 made quite a few changes to, so while I can see it in hex editor, other than a few small things to try, I don't know enough to correct that or tweak it to work. definitely a team effort.
  23. sure but here it is. (firefox works to upload pics, ie doesn't for me). just a few pieces needed to be snipped off, and a little bit of filing. this is interim, the gobs of thermal paste will be replaced by thermo epoxy to copper shims once the software is tweaked enough.
  24. Just an update: I'm just going back and forth between the modified vbios (internal lcd not working--external vga working) and the original vbios (internal lcd working and external vga working, but windows not successfully fully loading/hanging during driver load-now with modified inf file to accept new card.) just a slow mod back and forth process to get windows to load while keeping the internal lcd screen working. jmhdj, since you're taking a break, i'm holding re-disassembling the laptop again until I have the software worked out. then I want to do a last disassembly to use some thermal epoxy to glue on some additional heatsinks for some of the little ics not covered by the modded plate. I'll get the pics then if you still need them...I can feel the finish line it's sooooooo close... and, of course, any (positive plz) suggestions are always appreciated...
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