This is not a full review yet. This is just what I think of the laptop initially. I will post pics of the lappy and such later after x-mas. And NO!!! I didn't get a pic of the Fedex guy...as soon as I stopped roaming my house waiting for him, he shows up and the wife says there is a package at the door. I asked her if she took a pic of him. She said "WHAT!!!" you crazy or something. I told her yes, yes I am dear.
Anyway, the laptop is way bigger than I expected. This is not a bad thing. I guess I was just use to all my old Toshibas that I had.
The build of the laptop seemed very sturdy and very clean as far as no buttons here and there that you have to figure out. That is one thing that turned me off about the sager is that the digital lcd with all the buttons towards the front of the laptop.
The Fn button and the Ctrl key are very annoying at this point. I do a lot of programming and use the Ctrl key a lot during so. This Fn key is invading my Ctrl key space. I must write a program to change this!!! Will have time later to do so.
The originally installed os didn't even see the light of day. I went in to the bios and disabled stuff I didn't use like the parallel port, and went on to install a fresh virgin xp pro. The bios was already update to the 1.08 bios so I didn't need to flash that.
I had some initial problems after installing the drivers. First, the wireless was smoking dope as everyone elses. So I browsed the internet to find the solution for this. NOTE: During most of this rebuilding of the os bradc and I were helping one another with this. The solution was that they were suppose to connect the black cable to the "MAIN" terminal, not the "AUX". So instead of both of us trying this, one of us did it while waiting for the wifi results. Turns out the connection was better with the black connected to the "main" while the gray was just left hanging. Originally the black was hanging (not connected) and the gray was connected to the "main". So this fixed this issue. I will pull out the wifi card later and toss it when I get the 3com. Nees suggestions on convincing wife though...Craig...Brad?
The other issue I had was the ethernet controller drivers would not take for the ethernet controller. Everytime I installed it, it would install quick and ask to reboot. When I would go back into the DM, the ethernet controller was showing that lovely yellow icon. So I beat my head on this for a hour or so and then tried something else by installing the REALTEK Gigabit Ethenet NIC Driver driver that was on the utility cd. It friggen worked!!! I was floored. Did I get an instant gigahertz ether adaptor upgrade or something. If someone would like to enlighten me on this, that would be cool.
So I did all the service pack and patch updates for the os from windows update (NOT INSTALLING ANY DRIVER UPDATES THEY PROVIDED). Somehow MS thinks they can take over the world by providing ****ty drivers that don't even work.
So everything went fine and dandy after the ether/wifi issues got resolved. One thing I did notice is that the lip of the case just above the volume control (where the painted surface meets the black surface) and along that whole edge was not seated properly. So I just push in the black part and it popped back into place. The right side though up towards the vent (same area just opposite side of laptop) just to the right of the last usb port and above the port the edge with the case is not seated properly there either. I tried pushing it in, but there is something stopping it from giving. If anyone has see this or has taken apart their laptops to the extent of these two pieces, let me know how to remove this and properly re-set this please.
All in all I am a happy customer. I can see by the laptop that AW takes pride in their systems, but there is this strange sense that they are struggling on the boundry of pride in thier systems and making money at this point by the look of the laptops fine qualities and the minor issues (wifi, seated edge).
BTW, I have no f#$king clue what everyone is talking about washed out problems. Maybe it is my eyes, but when I first booted it up, it was a bit bright, but all I did was press the Fn key and then F7 or F8 to adjust this and it is fine now.
Well, until I post some pics, here is what you all have to chew on.
[Edited Part I]
The new ATI drivers eat pony peter!!! Tried to run C&C generals with those driver...at main menu screen...lappy lock-up tight. Then when I went to shutdown the (Hard boot) lappy, I pushed the power button and the lappy came on but no screen!!! I was like AHHHH!!! So I pulled the power plug from it, then pressed power again and it came on. This took three times until I figured on pulling the power plug on it. So if you run into this situation, pull the power plug.
Un-installed the ATI crappy drivers and installed the Omega drivers. I then started up C&C Generals, and now I am a happy camper.
Until next update...
[Edited Part II]
So I couldn't convince the wife that I needed to spend as much money as the 3com xjack was worth, so I settled for the Linksys Wireless card instead. The signal on it is great!!! That is compared to the internal wireless pci card, which I took out of the system completely. I couldn't see having the card in there if it wasn't going to be used. I can now roam around my house, upstairs or down without loosing a signal at all. I love it.
[Edited Part III]
Took back the Linksys card, it was smoking a lot of dope. Dunno why, beside I will save up for the 3com. I have also send my laptop back to the aliens for repair as the case is bulging on each side like it wasn't put together properly, not to mention the blue screens that I get no matter what drivers I install, or how many times I freshly install the os. Will have more after I get my lappy fixed.
[Edited Part IV]
So, today I got my laptop back. I was so happy to see her again. She is just as beautiful as I remembered. Well, here is the low down and dirty of what went on with it.
I was really depressed that my laptop case was bulging on both sides like the case wasn't put together properly, and the blue screens no matter what I did, they haunted me. So I wrote a nasty as hell email, feeling cheap and dirty about all this. Before I sent the email though, I forward it to my dear redneck friend bradc972. bradc972 spruced the email up for me quite a bit to make it sound like he was complimenting them while holding a gun to their head telling them to fix my laptop. bradc972 has a very professional PR talent, I have learned a lot from his advice on how to handle people in the future. Thanks bradc972!!! Anyway, I got a response from the Assistant manager of the customer service department. The AMCS person told me that they are sorry that I had to go through this and they will do whatever they can do to right all the wrongs with this laptop for me, all while canceling the horrible wireless card and giving me $150 worth of Amazon gift certificates. Can you say WHOAAAAAAAAA!!! I didn't expect a response like this, mostly because all the horror stories (Sonic) that I heard was that they completely ignore you in every way shape and form. This did not happen here. The AMCS person told me that they would also give my laptop VIP treatment while in the Depot service. VIP treatment means that they have a 5-business turn-around than a 17-19-business day turn-around time for repairs. I of course was grinning ear to ear about all of this.
So then I got my laptop back, installed all the games like, Battlefield 1942, and application software like Visual Studios .NET Enterprise Architect. The laptop has not hiccupped since I got home and turned it on. In fact, I have not turned it off yet. No BSOD, and the bulging is all gone on the sides of the case. I feel really happy.
So you ask what I am going to get with the Amazon gift certificates? Well, now I can get my 3COM Wireless card http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...002146-4426560
and a book that I have wanted to get. I ordered these already and will have them by next week. I will create another thread on the review of the wireless 3com card if people so desire.
So, the moral of this story is…be polite, yet firm and you most likely will get what you want, if not more. Be an a$$ and rude, and you most likely will get what you deserve, if not more.
Anyway, the laptop is way bigger than I expected. This is not a bad thing. I guess I was just use to all my old Toshibas that I had.
The build of the laptop seemed very sturdy and very clean as far as no buttons here and there that you have to figure out. That is one thing that turned me off about the sager is that the digital lcd with all the buttons towards the front of the laptop.
The Fn button and the Ctrl key are very annoying at this point. I do a lot of programming and use the Ctrl key a lot during so. This Fn key is invading my Ctrl key space. I must write a program to change this!!! Will have time later to do so.
The originally installed os didn't even see the light of day. I went in to the bios and disabled stuff I didn't use like the parallel port, and went on to install a fresh virgin xp pro. The bios was already update to the 1.08 bios so I didn't need to flash that.
I had some initial problems after installing the drivers. First, the wireless was smoking dope as everyone elses. So I browsed the internet to find the solution for this. NOTE: During most of this rebuilding of the os bradc and I were helping one another with this. The solution was that they were suppose to connect the black cable to the "MAIN" terminal, not the "AUX". So instead of both of us trying this, one of us did it while waiting for the wifi results. Turns out the connection was better with the black connected to the "main" while the gray was just left hanging. Originally the black was hanging (not connected) and the gray was connected to the "main". So this fixed this issue. I will pull out the wifi card later and toss it when I get the 3com. Nees suggestions on convincing wife though...Craig...Brad?
The other issue I had was the ethernet controller drivers would not take for the ethernet controller. Everytime I installed it, it would install quick and ask to reboot. When I would go back into the DM, the ethernet controller was showing that lovely yellow icon. So I beat my head on this for a hour or so and then tried something else by installing the REALTEK Gigabit Ethenet NIC Driver driver that was on the utility cd. It friggen worked!!! I was floored. Did I get an instant gigahertz ether adaptor upgrade or something. If someone would like to enlighten me on this, that would be cool.
So I did all the service pack and patch updates for the os from windows update (NOT INSTALLING ANY DRIVER UPDATES THEY PROVIDED). Somehow MS thinks they can take over the world by providing ****ty drivers that don't even work.
So everything went fine and dandy after the ether/wifi issues got resolved. One thing I did notice is that the lip of the case just above the volume control (where the painted surface meets the black surface) and along that whole edge was not seated properly. So I just push in the black part and it popped back into place. The right side though up towards the vent (same area just opposite side of laptop) just to the right of the last usb port and above the port the edge with the case is not seated properly there either. I tried pushing it in, but there is something stopping it from giving. If anyone has see this or has taken apart their laptops to the extent of these two pieces, let me know how to remove this and properly re-set this please.
All in all I am a happy customer. I can see by the laptop that AW takes pride in their systems, but there is this strange sense that they are struggling on the boundry of pride in thier systems and making money at this point by the look of the laptops fine qualities and the minor issues (wifi, seated edge).
BTW, I have no f#$king clue what everyone is talking about washed out problems. Maybe it is my eyes, but when I first booted it up, it was a bit bright, but all I did was press the Fn key and then F7 or F8 to adjust this and it is fine now.
Well, until I post some pics, here is what you all have to chew on.
[Edited Part I]
The new ATI drivers eat pony peter!!! Tried to run C&C generals with those driver...at main menu screen...lappy lock-up tight. Then when I went to shutdown the (Hard boot) lappy, I pushed the power button and the lappy came on but no screen!!! I was like AHHHH!!! So I pulled the power plug from it, then pressed power again and it came on. This took three times until I figured on pulling the power plug on it. So if you run into this situation, pull the power plug.
Un-installed the ATI crappy drivers and installed the Omega drivers. I then started up C&C Generals, and now I am a happy camper.
Until next update...
[Edited Part II]
So I couldn't convince the wife that I needed to spend as much money as the 3com xjack was worth, so I settled for the Linksys Wireless card instead. The signal on it is great!!! That is compared to the internal wireless pci card, which I took out of the system completely. I couldn't see having the card in there if it wasn't going to be used. I can now roam around my house, upstairs or down without loosing a signal at all. I love it.
[Edited Part III]
Took back the Linksys card, it was smoking a lot of dope. Dunno why, beside I will save up for the 3com. I have also send my laptop back to the aliens for repair as the case is bulging on each side like it wasn't put together properly, not to mention the blue screens that I get no matter what drivers I install, or how many times I freshly install the os. Will have more after I get my lappy fixed.
[Edited Part IV]
So, today I got my laptop back. I was so happy to see her again. She is just as beautiful as I remembered. Well, here is the low down and dirty of what went on with it.
I was really depressed that my laptop case was bulging on both sides like the case wasn't put together properly, and the blue screens no matter what I did, they haunted me. So I wrote a nasty as hell email, feeling cheap and dirty about all this. Before I sent the email though, I forward it to my dear redneck friend bradc972. bradc972 spruced the email up for me quite a bit to make it sound like he was complimenting them while holding a gun to their head telling them to fix my laptop. bradc972 has a very professional PR talent, I have learned a lot from his advice on how to handle people in the future. Thanks bradc972!!! Anyway, I got a response from the Assistant manager of the customer service department. The AMCS person told me that they are sorry that I had to go through this and they will do whatever they can do to right all the wrongs with this laptop for me, all while canceling the horrible wireless card and giving me $150 worth of Amazon gift certificates. Can you say WHOAAAAAAAAA!!! I didn't expect a response like this, mostly because all the horror stories (Sonic) that I heard was that they completely ignore you in every way shape and form. This did not happen here. The AMCS person told me that they would also give my laptop VIP treatment while in the Depot service. VIP treatment means that they have a 5-business turn-around than a 17-19-business day turn-around time for repairs. I of course was grinning ear to ear about all of this.
So then I got my laptop back, installed all the games like, Battlefield 1942, and application software like Visual Studios .NET Enterprise Architect. The laptop has not hiccupped since I got home and turned it on. In fact, I have not turned it off yet. No BSOD, and the bulging is all gone on the sides of the case. I feel really happy.
So you ask what I am going to get with the Amazon gift certificates? Well, now I can get my 3COM Wireless card http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...002146-4426560
and a book that I have wanted to get. I ordered these already and will have them by next week. I will create another thread on the review of the wireless 3com card if people so desire.So, the moral of this story is…be polite, yet firm and you most likely will get what you want, if not more. Be an a$$ and rude, and you most likely will get what you deserve, if not more.
, tho half of it is cuz I dont have an AW to look at yet. 
I did order the wireless card tho, would I have been better to get one from best buy?
