Acer 8371/3810 Owners Thread

lewism · 16 Aug 2011 at 13:15

kevpuk said:
Think one just sold in the MM for circa. £185 ? Not chris' but.....

Meh. Was looking at an Ipad but I think i'll just take out Acer Care and get another couple years use out of it yet. Considering punting Vista though and get an SSD when the 30gig ones become cheap enough. I only ever use this for browsing and anything bigger than 60gb seems hard to justify.

Azza · 7 Sep 2011 at 16:02

Finally bothered to sort out a return for my laptop.

Just need to find a box for it now.

dragonuk · 15 Sep 2011 at 16:32

Not sure if anyone still has this laptop or the 3810 but if you do, I found a better modifed bios. Works for 3810 and 8371 models.
Bios is version 1.28

It was created by a russian person called mask89 and they seem to know a lot more what they are doing compared to me. So I think its better than my modded bios. I am using it personally.

Here is what it does:

* Unlocked hidden tab and Advanced Power InsydeH2O Setup Utility
* 3 modes of operation switchable graphics Switchable graphics / Intel Only / ATI Only
* Changed the temperature threshold for the fan and its speed (new Thermal Table)
* Updated NetworkBoot (PXE (http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/PXE)) BIOS network card Atheros AR8131 c v2.0.0.8 to v2.0.2.7
* Unlocked Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology (EIST) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpeedStep) for IDA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Dynamic_Acceleration) on 2 cores, using ThrottleStop
* Added temperature sensor chipset (GMCH) (displayed in the monitoring programs at a temperature> 40 ° C)
* Hardware acceleration of ATI 4330 up to 550/750 MHz for the core / memory
* Supports bootup from card reader
* Changed BootLogo (still says Acer just slightly different)
* Win 7 support (Slic 2.1)

To see all items, change the User Access Level option in the Security tab from Limited to Full.

For longer battery life, change BIOS Boot Performance Mode from Max Performance to Max Battery. A little slower loading the operating system, the performance of Windows when loaded is not affected!

There is 3 folders in the .zip you download. Each contains a bios. You only need to flash the one you want.

JM31_FAN - This is all the tweaks but without Graphics overclocking or booting from card reader
JM31_FAN_GPU-OC - Same as above but with added ATI Graphics overclocking
JM31_FAN_GPU-OC_CR - Same as above but with added support for booting from a card reader and ATI Graphics Overclocking

DOWNLOAD FOR TIMELINE 3810 - http://rghost.net/5595411

DOWNLOAD FOR TRAVELMATE 8371 - http://rghost.net/5697221

tbz_ck · 15 Sep 2011 at 23:36

nice find. applied the bios, seems to be working fine. Where do I overclock the ATI chip???

Azza · 16 Sep 2011 at 02:19

Hopefully get mine back from Acer after the weekend. I'm not sure what to do with it though. Since I'm at home for a year, and I've got a PC and my TouchPad now I don't think I'll be using it much at all. Might sell it and then just get a new laptop when I go back to uni.

How much have people sold theirs for?

dragonuk · 16 Sep 2011 at 13:53

tbz_ck said:
nice find. applied the bios, seems to be working fine. Where do I overclock the ATI chip???

The ATI graphics are overclocked by default when you install the bios.

If you get a program like "GPU-Z" when you run it you will see the ATI graphics are running at 550mhz core and 750 mhz memory.

The default is 450mhz core and 600mhz memory.

Don't forget you can overclock the cpu to 2ghz instead of 1.4ghz by overclocking the fsb to 250mhz instead of 200mhz.

You just run this exe and its done. Simple. You have to run it everytime you restart your PC though.

Download - http://www.mediafire.com/?k5lz3qaijq8wunm

bastic · 16 Sep 2011 at 17:54

nice with this BIOS and overclock

is there a way to change how much of RAM is assigned to intel gma ?

ryu · 16 Sep 2011 at 18:13

thanks for sharing this update dragonuk. i bought a 8371 from these forums about a month ago, immediately read through this thread and updated to your modified bios which i appreciate and also run the auto overclock exe. just downloaded this newer bios and gonna update it very soon.

im very interested in putting a ssd inside the laptop besides the current 2.5", does removing the casing of any ssd make them fit? or are there specific models? or is it just the mini 1.8" drives that are needed?

ryu · 16 Sep 2011 at 18:31

i was unsure what the CR meant so did a google translation

JM31_FAN - basic tweaks
JM31_FAN_GPU-OC - added ATI overclocking
JM31_FAN_GPU-OC_CR - added support for booting from a card reader

dragonuk · 17 Sep 2011 at 17:25

Sorry I forgot to mention that .

Azza · 20 Sep 2011 at 01:24

Azza said:
Hopefully get mine back from Acer after the weekend. I'm not sure what to do with it though. Since I'm at home for a year, and I've got a PC and my TouchPad now I don't think I'll be using it much at all. Might sell it and then just get a new laptop when I go back to uni.

How much have people sold theirs for?

Still saying it's "under repair".

MasterPlan1 · 20 Sep 2011 at 09:53

After updating the BIOS to the one where I can have just intel only graphics, I've set it up as a Linux laptop, working fine - the Intel graphics can handle QW and QLive fine, so it's perfect for what I'm playing right now.

And still getting ~3-4.5hrs from it.

Azza · 22 Sep 2011 at 10:24

Looks like mine has been repaired. Anyone have an idea of who this is -

Carrier - Walk-In

Or who they use to ship stuff back to you.

Azza · 22 Sep 2011 at 13:06

Turns out it's Yodel and I was out when it was delivered, so it's coming tomorrow now.

Azza · 27 Sep 2011 at 13:13

Finally got my laptop back today! Seems to be working fine at the moment.

AmyJNelson · 27 Sep 2011 at 20:11

It's really looks Awesome. But I want to know about it's prize.. can you have some idea about it?..

playagiron · 4 Oct 2011 at 07:58

Hi,

really like the new BISO dragonuk found.

But I wonader are there any news regarding the small size SSDs that could be installed besides the standard HDD?

The Kingston - SSDNow V-Series 30GB still costs 80 EUR or more, which seems very much for such a small and slow SSD. Would be great if other SSDs would work also as I feel my machine gets slower and would like to speed it up. Any experiences with other SSDs??

Cheers
playagiron

Azza · 13 Oct 2011 at 09:52

Since getting my laptop back after the screen repair I've noticed that it isn't fully charging any more. The max it goes to is ~87% charged, even if I keep it on charge all night without the laptop on. Anyone else had the same problem?

dragonuk · 15 Oct 2011 at 22:14

Azza said:
Since getting my laptop back after the screen repair I've noticed that it isn't fully charging any more. The max it goes to is ~87% charged, even if I keep it on charge all night without the laptop on. Anyone else had the same problem?

This issue used to be caused by the old bios versions.

If you were on anything lower than 1.28 it would do this.

Are you on bios 1.28 ?

If you have an Acer 3810 it might not be 1.28 version. But make sure you re on the latest version of the bios.

If you are try reflashing the bios again, see if it solves it.