power issues 3120US

[JT Moree]

My R3120US is flaking out. I guess it's about time. These things don't
seem to last very long. I think it was overheating because the heatsink
was full of dust. I cleaned it out but the 512M stick of RAM is giving
memory errors on memtest. I'm left with only 256.

For the last week--even before the overheating--the power suddenly drops
and I'm on battery. I have to pull the plug and put it back to get it
to go back on power. I suspect the internal connector is breaking.
Some of you have had this problem right?

- --
JT Morée
PC Xperience, Inc.

[Constantine 'Gus' Fantanas]

Post by JT Moree
My R3120US is flaking out. I guess it's about time. These things don't
seem to last very long. I think it was overheating because the heatsink
was full of dust. I cleaned it out but the 512M stick of RAM is giving
memory errors on memtest. I'm left with only 256.
For the last week--even before the overheating--the power suddenly drops
and I'm on battery. I have to pull the plug and put it back to get it
to go back on power. I suspect the internal connector is breaking.
Some of you have had this problem right?
--
JT Morée
PC Xperience, Inc.
_______________________________________________
LinuxR3000 mailing list
http://lists.pcxperience.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/linuxr3000
Wiki at http://prinsig.se/weekee/

--Oh, yes. I have experienced all of the above in the first R3xxx I
bought in October 2004. First it was overheating (unfortunately, I did
not catch the problem in time, so the no-questions-asked return period
expired and I got stuck with it). The firs two time HP failed to fix
it; the second time they replaced the "system board" and I had the
problem with the DC plugin... So, back to HP for further repairs. The
third time they replaced the "system board" (second time, so now I was
in the third "system board") but now if I turned it off, it would not
turn on unless I let it sit for many hours and/or totally removed the
battery and AC adapter. So, eventually they gave me a refurbished one.
I wish there were lemon laws for computers! (Yes, their customer
service was very helpful and one of their managers extended my
interest-free credit period by several months --the equivalent of the
period I could not have use of the laptop-- but still, a very nice
customer service dept. does not make up for a product that obviously had
design flaws.)

I remember somebody posted here a couple of years ago about how to feed
DC power through a connector on the right, so you can bypass the failure
prone DC connector on the back.

CF

Post by JT Moree
--
Running 64-bit Linux on AMD64

[JT Moree]

Post by Constantine 'Gus' Fantanas

Post by JT Moree
My R3120US is flaking out. I guess it's about time. These things don't

I remember somebody posted here a couple of years ago about how to feed
DC power through a connector on the right, so you can bypass the failure
prone DC connector on the back.

I googled and searched the wiki and list but don't find anything like
that. It seems the docking station has power so I could get one and
connect the laptop to it. That might solve my power problem.

Has anyone ever used the docking station for these models?

They are selling on ebay for up to $100.

I hate to put money into this machine since it seems to be on it's last leg.
- --
JT Morée
PC Xperience, Inc.

[Jonathan Berry]

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Hash: SHA1

Post by Constantine 'Gus' Fantanas

Post by JT Moree
My R3120US is flaking out. I guess it's about time. These things don't

I remember somebody posted here a couple of years ago about how to feed
DC power through a connector on the right, so you can bypass the failure
prone DC connector on the back.

I googled and searched the wiki and list but don't find anything like
that. It seems the docking station has power so I could get one and
connect the laptop to it. That might solve my power problem.
Has anyone ever used the docking station for these models?
They are selling on ebay for up to $100.
I hate to put money into this machine since it seems to be on it's last leg.

You don't need the full-up docking station. There is a "media cable"
that plugs into that same port that has ports on it for audio and
video out, but also includes a power connector. I have one and it
worked fine when my R3000z was working. It is an XC 1000 HP Media
Cable. Mine is not doing anything for me, if you are interested in
one.

I also have a 12-cell battery and a power adapter. There is even the
Athlon 64 3200+ CPU which I think is still good (though I have no way
to verify that now). I've scavanged about everything else.

Jonathan

[JT Moree]

Post by JT Moree
My R3120US is flaking out. I guess it's about time. These things don't
seem to last very long. I think it was overheating because the heatsink
was full of dust. I cleaned it out but the 512M stick of RAM is giving
memory errors on memtest. I'm left with only 256.

If I can get the power worked out I'd like to add a little more RAM to
this machine. Is there anyone who has a dead machine that would would
sell me some RAM?

- --
JT Morée
PC Xperience, Inc.

[John Jason Jordan]

On Sun, 11 Feb 2007 12:05:16 -0700

Post by JT Moree
If I can get the power worked out I'd like to add a little more RAM to
this machine. Is there anyone who has a dead machine that would would
sell me some RAM?

When I got my R3240 it came with two 256 MB sticks. I replaced one with
a 1 GB stick and I still have the 256 MB stick left over. If you or
anyone else can use it, make me an offer. It's gathering dust doing no
one any good.

[Alexandru Cardaniuc]

My R3120US is flaking out. I guess it's about time. These things don't
seem to last very long. I think it was overheating because the
heatsink
was full of dust. I cleaned it out but the 512M stick of RAM is
giving memory errors on memtest. I'm left with only 256.
For the last week--even before the overheating--the power suddenly
drops and I'm on battery. I have to pull the plug and put it back to
get it to go back on power. I suspect the internal connector is
breaking. Some of you have had this problem right?

Well, now I have this problem too :-( HP Pavilion zv5260 2.5 years old -
warranty long gone. Everything else works fine. So it'll be a waste to
get rid of it just because of this problem.

Does anybody manage to solve this problem? And how?




P.S. In general after these years, are you people satisfied with this
line of laptops?

[John Jason Jordan]

On 20 May 2007 15:35:34 -0700

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
P.S. In general after these years, are you people satisfied with this
line of laptops?

I haven't had any power problems with my R3240, except that the brick
needs a decent power outlet. My favorite place in the university
library has outlets that I think supply 80 volts on a good day. The
battery monitor keeps coming on, I reseat the plugs, a few minutes
later the battery monitor comes back. Elsewhere there is never a
problem.

I love the features of my R3240 for the paltry amount I paid for it
($800 two years ago). But I am very displeased with the quality of some
of the components. I've had keyboards lose keycaps, hard drive
connection is flaky, the paint on the top plate is scratched and ugly,
and I could go on. Plus, it is a brick at 9 lbs with the 12-cell
battery -- essential unless an hour and a half is long enough for you.

[Vadim Garber]

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[JT Moree]

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
Does anybody manage to solve this problem? And how?

Yes, someone on the list sold me a media cable that has power input. his
system had died. I think I saw some on ebay too. cable plugs into the
right side on my system.

- --
JT Morée
PC Xperience, Inc.

[Alexandru Cardaniuc]

Post by JT Moree

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
Does anybody manage to solve this problem? And how?

Yes, someone on the list sold me a media cable that has power input.
his system had died. I think I saw some on ebay too. cable plugs into
the right side on my system.

Can you be a little more specific? What kind of media cable?

This one?

http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-media-cable-XC1000-PA925A-DV318A-359680-001-seattle_W0QQitemZ190114968517QQihZ009QQcategoryZ116331QQcmdZViewItem

HP media cable XC1000 ?

[JT Moree]

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-media-cable-XC1000-PA925A-DV318A-359680-001-seattle_W0QQitemZ190114968517QQihZ009QQcategoryZ116331QQcmdZViewItem
HP media cable XC1000 ?

That looks like it.

- --
JT Morée
PC Xperience, Inc.

[Alexandru Cardaniuc]

Post by JT Moree

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-media-cable-XC1000-PA925A-DV318A-359680-001-seattle_W0QQitemZ190114968517QQihZ009QQcategoryZ116331QQcmdZViewItem
HP media cable XC1000 ?

That looks like it.

Got it from ebay for ~$50. Works well so far... I even connected the
laptop to a TV and watched several movies with it ;-)

[Yannick ROGER]

Hello,

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
I even connected the
laptop to a TV and watched several movies with it ;-)

What kind of drivers are you using to do that ?
Does it work with Free (as in freespeech) ones ?

Yannick

[Alexandru Cardaniuc]

Post by Yannick ROGER
Hello,

I even connected the laptop to a TV and watched several movies with
it ;-)

What kind of drivers are you using to do that ? Does it work with Free
(as in freespeech) ones ?

I don't know if it works with the free "nv" driver - didn't check it. I
use the non-free "nvidia" driver that is included in debian amd64
non-free section, I think.

[Marcelino Mata]

Can you post your xorg.conf file so we can see you TV-out settings? I
have the same cable but I have not had much luck with TV-out...works under
Windows :-(

Please also list distro and Nvidia driver release (assuming nvidia not
opensource nv driver). I am running Ubuntu 7.04 with Nvidia 1.0-9631

Thanks,

Marcelino

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-media-cable-XC1000-PA925A-DV318A-359680-001-seattle_W0QQitemZ190114968517QQihZ009QQcategoryZ116331QQcmdZViewItem

Post by JT Moree

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
HP media cable XC1000 ?

That looks like it.

Got it from ebay for ~$50. Works well so far... I even connected the
laptop to a TV and watched several movies with it ;-)
--
"We are usually convinced more easily by reasons we have found
ourselves than by those which have occurred to others."
- Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)
_______________________________________________
LinuxR3000 mailing list
http://lists.pcxperience.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/linuxr3000
Wiki at http://prinsig.se/weekee/

[Alexandru Cardaniuc]

Can you post your xorg.conf file so  we can see  you TV-out settings? 

Basically, the only thing that I changed is the "Device" section.

######################################################################

Section "Device"

Identifier "nVidia Corporation NV17 [GeForce4 440 Go]"

Driver "nvidia"

BusID "PCI:1:0:0"

Option "NoLogo" "1"

Option "UseFBDev" "true"

# TV Out Setup

Option "TVOutFormat" "SVIDEO"

Option "TVOverScan" "0.6"

#Option "ConnectedMonitor" "TV"

EndSection


########################################################################

When I connect the computer to TV, I just uncomment
#Option "ConnectedMonitor" "TV".

After restart the primary and only display is the TV.





I tried with TwinView in Clone mode. But I made modest progress. My
plasma 32inch TV has a prebuilt resolution of 862x1024. And I cannot
manage to create a resolution like that in xorg.conf

So I decrease resolution to 1024x1024. And a part of the Desktop is not
visible on TV. But I use it only for watching movies, so it's not a
problem, because it seems that fullscreen totem resizes the screen
automatically to fit the TV size and I get the full picture without
losing any parts of the picture "outside" of the screen.

I have the same cable but I have not had much luck with TV-out...

No result at all ?

works under Windows :-( Please also list distro

Amd64 Debian Etch (stable distribution).

and Nvidia driver release (assuming nvidia not opensource nv driver). 

1.0.8776-4 included in debian etch amd64 non-free repository.

I am running Ubuntu 7.04 with Nvidia 1.0-9631 Thanks, Marcelino

Ask if you have any other questions. And don't forget to write about
your progress. Especially if you, actually, make a progress ;-)

I am still thinking how to make it work with TwinView the best way.

Did anybody manage to connect it to a TV ? I am only watching movies on
a TV. What is the best way to connect the laptop to a TV ? Using
TwinView or using TV as the only display? Or TwinView in a clone mode ?

Is it actually possible to have 1280x800 on my laptop and 862x1024 on TV
simultaneosly ? Obviously, not in a clone mode ? AFAIK, laptop screen
has to be secondary and TV primary?

Did anybody successfully do something like that ?

[Alexandru Cardaniuc]

Post by JT Moree

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
Does anybody manage to solve this problem? And how?

Yes, someone on the list sold me a media cable that has power input.
his system had died. I think I saw some on ebay too. cable plugs into
the right side on my system.

HP media cable XC1000 ? This one ?

http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-media-cable-XC1000-PA925A-DV318A-359680-001-seattle_W0QQitemZ190114968517QQihZ009QQcategoryZ116331QQcmdZViewItem

[Hedley Robertson]

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
Well, now I have this problem too :-( HP Pavilion zv5260 2.5 years old -
warranty long gone. Everything else works fine. So it'll be a waste to
get rid of it just because of this problem.

I am also running into very similar problems. I researched a bit and it turns
out that the heat sink on these laptops eventually leaks coolent.

http://hedleyrobertson.com/?p=33

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
Does anybody manage to solve this problem? And how?

Using linux (There may be similar things you can do under windows) and a
utility called ncpufreqd I am able to continue using the machine by speed
stepping it down when it reaches 65C and speedng back up when it cools down
to 50. It jumps back and forth between 1800 and 800 mhz all day long, which
is less then optimal but lets me continue to use the machine without lockups
or melting my memory.

Post by Alexandru Cardaniuc
P.S. In general after these years, are you people satisfied with this
line of laptops?

I'll never buy another HP laptop, this is my second 'lemon' laptop from them.

Cheers

- Hedley Robertson