Acer Aspire 8930G Owner's Lounge

[Sheldon-27]

Hmmm. I would prefer to buy the laptop in person besides ordering online. Just not comfortable with that type of purchase online yet. My family owns a place in Seattle so i would be able to get one there. Just have to worry about paying more tax crossing the BC border. Is the standard price of the Acer 8930G 1700?

[owais]

does 64 bit work ok with the 8930g?
i was looking to installing vista 64bit home but where would i downoad acer empowering stuff and other things from.

also i have 4gb DDR3 installed, how many ram slots have i got left which i can install stuff in?

i want to change my p8400 to something like a T9400, is it easy and stright forward to do, as im no good at complex computer things.

[steveyschoice]

Hi steveyschoice,

No problem, happy to help........ allow me to explain further.

Actually, I should have said that there are 4 partitions on the 320GB HD. Two of these are very small (3GB & 15GB), are totally hidden, and are for there for Acer's full system restore to factory box settings. I would not mess with these.......

The other two are nearly equally sized. These are the 'end-user' usable partitions, comprising the majority bulk of the HD space.

The first is the 'system' partition which is used by the operating system, program installations, etc. This partition is assigned drive letter 'C', and is factory named, "ACER".

The second is assigned drive letter 'D', and is factory named, "DATA". This partition is utilized by Acer's eRecovery Managment for end-user, full and incremental back-up's. From Windows Explorer, the files contained herein will be invisible, yet the space they utilize can be seen.

Acer's eRecovery Managment can be very helpful, and a real time saver, however this seems very inefficient on a single HD configuration. Unless, you have backed everything up to an optical disk (DVD), all would be lost given an HD failure.

Furthermore, I had a problem with the 'DATA' partition consuming nearly 135GB of my single 320GB HD. SO, what I did was install a second 'internal' Seagate 320GB 7200 rpm HD, into the second empty HD slot.

YES, there is a second internal drive bay, and YES, you have to take it apart, but you only have to remove a single bottom cover panel...... remove a few #1 Phillips screws, carefully remove the panel, plug the new drive directly into the empty bay SATA interface, re-install the panel, and WHAH LA, you're done! SUPER SIMPLE, and only 5 minutes of your time. (unpluged, powered-off, battery removed of course: )

With some manufacturers it is not so simple, requiring additional and costly hardware. (with HP's HDX18 for instance, over 100.-)

Anyhow, it's the drive formating, clone'ing, and set-up that is the most time consuming.

I then did a 'low-level' format of the second drive, cloned over the DATA partition, and reassigned it's drive letter.

If this is something you would like to consider, and you need further assistance, just let me know.

REGARDS!

Blimey that sounds pretty complex and I'd probably feel uncomfortable doing all that. But based on my understanding of what you said the D: drive is essentially a back up for the C: drive, so the user cannot really save or install anything onto that partition? For me I think the best thing would be to perhaps buy an external HD. If my understanding of this is correct it seems a bit silly to essentially lose almost 160GB that you cannot use, not that its put me off buying the laptop!

[plasma.]

Please post some benchmarks! 3DMark06, wPrime and HDTune please

[owais]

is it easy to do a cpu swap in the 8930g?
i wan to try and swap my P8400 for a T9400/T9800 soon when prices are low

[paten]

Blimey that sounds pretty complex and I'd probably feel uncomfortable doing all that. But based on my understanding of what you said the D: drive is essentially a back up for the C: drive, so the user cannot really save or install anything onto that partition? For me I think the best thing would be to perhaps buy an external HD. If my understanding of this is correct it seems a bit silly to essentially lose almost 160GB that you cannot use, not that its put me off buying the laptop!

No. The D drive can be used as another drive for what ever you want to use it for. The eRecovery software is setup to automatically use the D drive for backups in a hidden directory. You do no have to use it that way if you don't want to.

[plasma.]

When I go to to the US in April, I'm going to spend a least $1000 upgrading my system hehe. Australian prices for Tech is so expensive.

[owais]

i got 32bit vista with my 8930g and im from the UK. i was actually looking for 64 bit but i noticed only th highest model has 64bit

do other countries models come with 64bit because i notice a lot of your 8930g's have 64 bit

[steveyschoice]

Hey -=$tR|k3r=- & paten thanks for all the comments & sorry for all the questions I just like to know all the facts etc before I buy something. If the D: drive is still usable for storing files and/or installing programmes onto I think it should be fine for what I need. I already use an external HD for storing my music, videos, backing up documents etc so I don't need mountains of HD space.

[owais]

if i do a fresh install of vista home premium 6 bit, where do i download 64 bit drivers and applications like all the empowering technology and other acer things from?

i would actually do it if i knew where from.