T510-4313CTO Catchup

[fhaber]

It's been a while since I've set up a T series for a client (t43?). I have before me a freshly unboxed I7 machine with the 16x9 screen. There's lots of good, and some weird about it, and, being behind the curve on TPs, I have some questions. Why did he buy just before Sandy Bridge? That none of us will never know.

I'm surprised by the quality of the screen. Contrast, sharpness and color are good, although it goes TN-dark at a shallower down angle than I'm used to. I'm tall, so I'm not complaining (g).

There's no autoswitch from the NV3100 to Intel. I see a feature in BIOS, although I'll need an explanation before I try it. Recommended, or forget it?

I only get 10fps in Furmark at 16x9x32, no AA. GL benchmarks are about the same. Is that what I should expect?

The front left USBs are a bit flaky with my older 16GB thumb drives, init-ing intermittently. Can they supply 500 mA? Is the one on the back high-current?

The keyboard is still FABULOUS. The pad and Trackpoint seem to work very well. Where can I find out about what multitouch features are there?

The owner has just retired, and he will no longer be administered. This is his machine now. I turned off the Intel creepy-peepy stuff in BIOS. Any downside?

Updating the TP accessories and drivers took 90 minutes or so on a fast connection, plus SP1 time for Win7 Pro (40 min?). Grumble.

The CD shutdown thing was very irritating. Wouldn't power up, even when I ejected the drive and replugged! Updates + turning off powerdown seems to have fixed that.

McAfee. Ahem. It's better than I remember, but c'mon...

Thanks for any advice,

-Frank

[fhaber]

Sorry for the doublespacing. The editor here started getting St. Vitus' Dance on me after a window full, and I pasted from Notepad.

-f

[JaneL]

Frank,

I fixed the double-spacing for you - hopefully someone will chime in on the questions!

Jane

[Colonel O'Neill]

Is it the HD+ screen? The HD+ screen is supposed to be fairly good. The FHD more so.

Early T510's don't have switchable graphics, but I presume since you see a BIOS option, it is Optimus enabled. How do you mean there's no autoswitch? It should switch automatically based on GPU demand. Possible that the drivers are installed wrong. (Just to make sure, Windows 7, right?)

Flaky USB isn't a great sign, though. The one on the back is a Powered USB, which means it can charge devices when the computer is off. Not sure if it means it gets an extra circuit from the battery.

I'm pretty sure you get pinch, zoom, and rotate on the T510 multitouch (a bit flaky, supposedly). The textured touchpad is considered good by some, and fail by others. I personally love the textured touchpad.

SP1 took about half an hour to install for me.

LOL McAfee. Switch ASAP?

[fhaber]

Ah, much less flaky in FF 3.6 than in IE8, for some reason.....

Thanks, Jane, for the edit.

Can anyone point me to an advanced users'/admin guide to the machine. I can't figure out the multiswipe, and I have no idea what the BIOS Optimus stuff actually means. All diagnostics point to nVidia being used all the time, and I haven't touched anything. "Operating system knows about such things and can fiddle" came OFF out of the box, and remains off.

[Q-Ball]

In regards to Optimus:

"There's no autoswitch from the NV3100 to Intel. I see a feature in BIOS, although I'll need an explanation before I try it. Recommended, or forget it?"

So it just has the options 'Integrated only', 'Discrete only', and 'Switchable'?
Or does it have 'Integrated only' and 'Optimus'?
*I'm guessing the latter since it was just purchased, though I've seen techs get it wrong and install different models, so...


If it's the former, you'll need to use the Power Manager to switch. It's a worthwhile feature, since it gives you more control over when you use which card- though there's only one potential bug with it but I think it's fixed in drivers by now.
(I believe the 'hangs on resume from standby' bug has been resolved in a driver update. If it happens to you, just set it to either 'Discrete' or 'Integrated' (whichever one you want) in the BIOS which will fix that issue, then, update your drivers.)


If it's the latter, no further input is required from you- the cards will switch automatically when you're using a program that uses 3D mode. This feature isn't all that intelligent, though.
The kicker with Optimus (which incidentally makes it almost totally useless) is that it considers Aero (the Windows 7 window manager) a 3D application that requires the 3100M.
So, if you have it the way you'd want to use it, it won't switch, in my experience- it just keeps the 3100M on just because, for applications that would work just fine with the Intel.

Also, that 3100M card is pretty much junk. I haven't used it to test with FurMark, but I do know that it's only one step up from the integrated (I believe it's functionally equivalent to a 9400M or something like that- not powerful at all.)

I don't care for the loose USB implementation on the T510 either- I just usually use the eSATA/USB combo since the plugs fit much more snugly then the other ports.

Multitouch: Check the Synaptics utility: if they haven't been installed, Fn+F8 should bring up the UltraNav control panel: select Settings, or if they have just go to 'Mouse' in the control panel. Hit the tab at the back, and then 'Settings' (I believe) and that should bring you to the main configuration for the TrackPoint and Touchpad. If you go into the Touchpad settings you can enable/disable the Multitouch on the pad, as well as see little movies on how to use each function.

The USB plug on the back isn't high current, but is designed to charge things when the laptop is off (I believe it's still 500 mA as are all the other plugs.)

No downside to any disabling of any strange Intel stuff.

Also, try Microsoft Security Essentials for a free antivirus (free, updated regularly, integrates well, actually works, etc.)

[fhaber]

Thanks, Qb, nice answers. And aha. If Aero keeps the dumb thing on, I'm going to forget about the whole thing, especially simce the machine was just picked up. I think I saw one spinner with integrated/nV, and another below it for Optimus. I touched not, since I didn't know what I was doing.

What we need is a good red book. Fat chance, eh?

I'll see it again in two weeks or so, and stuff another 4G in it, just because. I will be sure to sing the praises of MSE, which I also favor.

[Colonel O'Neill]

The NVS3100m is about equivalent to a GeForce 310M; you can install the GeForce drivers on it and get more performance in games.