TravelMate 8204 Reviewed - Page 2

Not a stipid question at all. There was a day (long ago) that I didn't know the answer to that.

Yes you can do it with out losing any data. It is adviseable to back up any unreplaceable data in the event that something unforseen goes wrong (anythings possible).

It creates a restoration CD and it's bootable (kind of has to be bootable to constitute being a restoration CD).

Thank you. Glad you liked my review.

a) Sure have. It feels fine when it's on my lap.

b) I think it will hold up fine. It doesn't appear/feel to be over heating at all. I actually expected it to with only 1 vent. I tried Centrino Hardware Control because I was curious about the temps, but it does not support Dual Core processors and crashed my system hard. I posted a warning about it. I totally forgot about SpeedFan to be honest with you. I will see if it works.

c) I have never had to call Acer customer service with this or my Acer Aspire 2020. I've heard they're decent. I certainly haven't heard bad bad things like you hear with Dell, Gateway, and the like. Although I kind of like Gateway customer service, for me they were always extremely friendly and helpful. I can't stand Dell's customer service.

d) I probably won't be able to do that. At least not right now. I have too many large projects I'm currently working on. The thought had crossed my mind though because from what I read it should extend the battery life for sure, since this problem is suppose to be with WinXP SP2 only. I wanted to confirm that to be true. If I get the chance I will try it, but just don't count on it. Sorry. There should be a fix coming down the road soon anyway (I hope).

Hope that helps.

Good luck!

8204 CPU temps

Ok, the SpeedFan is ironically enough not detecting the Fans. It is however registering the HD and it's running at a solid 35c-36c no matter what I'm doing. The processor runs at a solid 35c on battery and under load and with the processor set to High Performance it's at a solid 52c and only fluctuated to 53c once under load. What I did to tax it was start video encoding and then started running some filters in Illustrator CS2. What's cool is the one processor shot to full capacity working on the video encoding and you can see the other is chewing on the Illustrator task. I couldn't catch the hard drive or processor in time but both moved 1 degree and then right back. The second screen shot is after it has had a minute to cool. You can see, no change. Pretty good cooling if you ask me. It was cool to see the two cores going at it and the temp really didn't budge Man I love this thing. My M680 would have went from 62c to 73c in 2 seconds like it was trying to win some temperature race.

I would leave it to you to decide how well it compares. You can reference my results above under load. While gaming the fan can kick on but it's far from loud. I don't usually notice it. Fans are a sensitive issue and I care not to get into them because everyone's sensitivity to them is different. Suffice it to say, I have zero problems with the fans. I am literally right as I type using a dual monitor setup with a bunch of Internet Explorer windows, Firefox, Illustrator CS2, PhotoShop CS2, Acrobat Professional, Outlook 2003 and various other programs and I can't hear a thing coming from it and the temp is still 52c. Come to think of it, I don't remember hearing them kick on when I ran the above test. Anyway, maybe some other 8204 owners would like to chime in too so you can get a broader range of opinions.

Right now the touchpad is not hot at all. Maybe slightly warm. The palm rest to the right of it is slightly warm, I've been using it quite heavily for the last 4 1/2 hours. But I would definitely vouche for niether of them being hot. That would drive me nuts! I probably would have sent it back if that were the case. I gotta be happy with this for a long time. The flames of my next laptop purchase have been doused with the water of my oldest needing braces in about 10 months Who'd of thought with a perfect smile there would be so much wrong on the xrays. Oh well, she needs them in 10 months and after insurance my share is $5,000 Good night nurse! It'll probably be a couple of years before I flip the bill for a new laptop. Glad I got this one now. Few...


Hope that helps.

Good Luck.

...and I would drink it .

Glad I could help.

Good Luck.

I actually have been wanting to try that but the only place I care to is at work since I have 2 additional LCD's on my desk.. The problem is I've been so pusy I haven't had the chance. You're right, in theory it should work and I thought that very same thing. I will update you just as soon as I try it.

Interesting. I'll definitly let you know what I come up with.

Well I guess that answers that about the Dual monitors plus the laptop LCD. I'm a little disappointed as I already had it worked out in my mind how I was going to rearrange my desk Oh well, Being able to hook up two external monitors is pretty cool anyway. I've never had that flexability before. It's always been the laptop screen and one external monitor.

P.S. My processor is actually running at 32c right now. I guess it does go lower than 36c. I just hadn't noticed. Pretty "cool", pun intended.

I know. Yesterday when I was on battery it was running at 35c. I hadn't seen it go lower until this morning. I didn't mean to imply that it was on A/C and I hope I didn't.