Acer Aspire 5740G Owners Lounge

Originally mk1freak suggested that I started Owners Lounge for this model.
I've been a bit hesitant (read: lazy) but now I see there are at least several threads concerning graphics, Bluetooth, performance, BIOS updates etc and it's getting difficult to follow them all. Additionally good information is scattered in different threads, so I finally decided to start this thread.

So as not to leave the first post with "hello" only I prepared some screens of tests and benchmarks. This thread is going to be updated by me and hopefully other owners (mk1freak is kinda forced to help as it's been his idea in the first place)
If you got any requests for benchmarks or questions go ahead.
I will answer those if I can- I don't own all the games in the world so demos with benchmarks are preferred

First of all my config:
Acer Aspire 5740G-434G50Mn
434G50Mn means:
43 stands for Core i5 430 2.27GHz 3MB cache
4G stands for 4GB DDR3 1066MHz (mine made by Samsung)
50 stands for 500GB 5400 rpm drive (Hitachi in my case)
M stands for Multi drive- meaning DVD-R/RW/RAM (TSST TS-L633C)
n stands for Draft N Wi-Fi card (whereas "i" stands for 802.11g)

The rest of relevant specs:
Mobility Radeon HD5650 1GB DDR3 (core 550MHz, memory 750MHz)
15,6" 16:9 LED backlit, 1366x768 LCD (mine is AU Optronics AUO22EC)
6 cell Li-ion battery, 4400mAh
Wi-Fi Card Atheros AR5B93 (two antennas but capable of 300mbit/s)
LAN card 10/100/1000 Broadcom NetLink BCM57780
Realtek HD Audio ALC272

That is all running on Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

GPU overclocking
Mobility Radeon HD5650 is the same exact card as HD5730- the only difference is that 5730 is factory overclocked. As this card has very low TDP and 5740G has good cooling system overclocking is something you must do if you play games.
AMD GPU clock Tools is used for that (from version 0.9.26 onwards)
How much can you overclock depends on your particular unit but all 5740Gs so far had no problems with achieving stock clocks of 5730 meaning 650MHz core and 800MHz memory.
Some people have better memory chips and can achieve memory freqs of up to 1100MHz. Mine runs fine at 900MHz but gives artifacts at 950MHz.
As for core mine is perfectly stable at 670MHz in gaming as well as in stress tests.
All tests provided below have been performed with GPU set at 670MHz core and 900MHz memory. I will not test with default clocks- it's waste of time and GPU potential.

BENCHMARKS
All tests performed with Catalyst 10.3 Beta with default settings under Win 7 Home Premium 64bit and 670/900 GPU clocks
3DMark06
1280x768, default settings


Crysis
1280x720, all details set to HIGH, 64bit, DX10, 30fps


Call Of Pripyat Benchmark
Tessellation is OFF by default also in DX11 test. I kept it off so you can compare this score with other benchmarks. For the same reason I provided benchmark score for 1280x768. As for tessellation it subtracts 2fps from every score (day, night etc) so you can kinda calculate it on your own, right?


1280x768




1366x768



GTA IV
Custom settings
1366x768,
Texture quality: HIGH
Reflection resolution: MEDIUM
Water quality: HIGH
Shadow quality: OFF
Texture filter quality: LOW
View distance: 24, Detail distance:36, Vehicle density:22
Shadow density:0 (dynamic shadows are disabled- only static are on- just like in console versions)
Definition: ON, Vsync: ON

Game banchmark: 38fps
In reality framerate measured with FRAPS is similar (a bit higher though).
No slowdowns during car chases and such. You can probably improve on my settings and still achieve smooth playback- it's not really finetuned.
I decided to switch off dynamic shadows because I don't really pay attention to them during car chases. Similar thing with view distance and detail distance- you can't really see that far in the city so there is no point in keeping these values too high.

Resident Evil 5 benchmark
Default high settings, 1366x768, Average 61 fps



Call of Juarez DX10 benchmark

1280x720, Default high settings (that includes 4xAA) Average 27 fps



1280x720, Custom high settings (that is high settings but without 4xAA) Average 33 fps



Batman Arkham Asylum
Benchmarked by ZStriker with default clocks.

Heaven Benchmark 2.0
Heaven Benchmark 2.0 (DX11) (OCed 670/900)

Mafia II & Lost Planet 2 benchmarks
Benchmarked by me OCed 670/900


CPU and GPU temperature and stress tests

If you are afraid that OC may damage your card or that this laptop has poor cooling system- here is the proof to the contrary.

FurMark test 670MHz core and 900MHz memory
max temperature 71*C
[Image=200]http://i46.tinypic.com/347wdfl.png[/Image]

Prime95 stress test temperatures


When CPU reaches 80*C fan kicks in at "panic" speed so there is no way it gets any hotter.
Interesting matter is that Turbo Boost doesn't work like it should in this laptop. It actually works better
If I'm not mistaken Turbo Boost should work only when one core of the CPU is under load, so when there are four separate threads in Priime95 and CPU is maxed out on all cores and threads CPU should run @2.27GHz.
For some reason mine run at 2.46GHz most of the time. Not that I'm complaining...

HDD Benchmark
HD Tune 4.01
Average speed: 63,3MB/s
Good speed especially for a 5400rpm drive.



Battery test

Real life
Tests performed eith power saving profile and LCD at the lowest brightness (it's still enough though)
Notebook lasted some 3h 30min while browsing via Wi-Fi.
Nothing really intensive just the usuall morning routine- websites, forum, e-mail and so on. Something got downloaded, something else got updated but no hard tasks, no flash videos etc.

Battery Eater Readers Tests
Same settings as above, WiFi on.
4h 8 min

 

Separate post for updates and solved problems:
(to be updated)

Update your BIOS to 1.16. This BIOS changes battery critical level from 3% to 5% and battery warning level from 5% to 7%.
If you don't update you risk that battery level goes too low and lithium cells die. The battery would not charge after that.
WARNING: BIOS update takes more time than usual with this laptop so don't be impatient and do nothing until you see login screen after the computer had restarted.
Please do not ask whether you need to update your 1.09/ 1.10 BIOS even if your battery is working fine. This question has been answered so many times. Yes you do. It will stop working eventually, so just do it.

BIOS 1.22 is available and updates ATI VBIOS (Discrete) & Intel VBIOS (UMA). Anyone having GPU problems or artifacts should consider this one.

In case something goes wrong and you need to recover you notebook after a bad flash Crisis disk is here and instructions on how to use it here.

<table style="width: 100%; background-color: rgb(219, 232, 233);"><tbody><tr><td>Driver and application updates</td></tr></tbody></table><br>
Most updates can be downloaded from manufacturer&#8217;s website (Realtek audio and HDMI, Broadcom LAN, ATI Catalyst from 10.3 onwards) but some cannot and new sources are going to be posted here if available.
Drivers and apps are for Windows 7 64bit.


<table style="width: 100%; background-color: rgb(219, 232, 233);"><tbody><tr><td>Mobile Catalyst 14.4

Win 7 64bit


<table style="width: 100%; background-color: rgb(219, 232, 233);"><tbody><tr><td>Webcam</td></tr></tbody></table><br>
Current:Chicony WebCam Application 1.1.192.810 (Aspire 5552G download page)

Older: Chicony WebCam Application 1.1.164.323, 1.1.156.128, 1.1.149.115 1.1.158.203

<table style="width: 100%; background-color: rgb(219, 232, 233);"><tbody><tr><td>Power Management</td></tr></tbody></table><br>
Current :Acer PowerSmart Manager 5.01.3002 (Aspire 5553G download page) This works as a replacement of Acer ePowerManager

Older: ePower Management Application 5.00.3000, 5.00.3002 5.00.3003

<table style="width: 100%; background-color: rgb(219, 232, 233);"><tbody><tr><td>Touchpad</td></tr></tbody></table><br>
Current: 16.0.2.0 [updated August 5th 2012]

Older: Synaptics Touchpad driver v 15.3.4315.2.7, 15.0.24.0 15.0.17.4

<table style="width: 100%; background-color: rgb(219, 232, 233);"><tbody><tr><td>Networking (Wi-Fi & LAN)</td></tr></tbody></table><br>
Current Atheros Wi-Fi: v 10.0.0.274 added on January 2nd 2014[/I]


Current Broadcom LAN: Broadcom LAN Driver 15.6.0.2 (Broadcom website, choose system version and accept the license. You need to install manually via device manager) [added on August 5th 2012]

Older: 12.4.0.3

<table style="width: 100%; background-color: rgb(219, 232, 233);"><tbody><tr><td>Other drivers</td></tr></tbody></table><br>
Intel(R) Rapid Storage Technology 12.&#8203;5.&#8203;0.&#8203;1066 [added on June 6th 2013]

Older: 10.8.0.1003 , 10.6.0.1022 9.6.0.1014 10.&#8203;1.&#8203;0.&#8203;1008 (contains SATA AHCI driver from Intel)


Acer Backup Manager 2.0.0.63
I don't recommend using this application. It creates a hidden folder inside every folder you decide to back-up. You are going to see those folders if your settings are to show hidden files. Another thing is it somehow messed up thumbnails for music albums in my case and I had to manually set them up again.

Intel® Turbo Boost Technology Monitor v 1.04

Broadcom Bluetooth driver update here (thanks subrotobasu)

Launch manager v4 does not install on 5740G at the moment


<table style="width: 100%; background-color: rgb(219, 232, 233);"><tbody><tr><td>Solved problems</td></tr></tbody></table><br>
How to disable the annoying beep on power cord disconnection- read here (thanks aylafan)

Stuttering in games- game freezes every couple of minutes for a second or two? Here's the solution. Use this app and disable APM. This is a problem that occurs mainly or only on WD 500GB HDDs. (thanks Osiyo)

Switchable Graphics on 5740G Work in Progress Please do not ask silly questions- let it be a technical thread. If you can contribute please do if you can't just wait for results without annoying anyone

How to control fan speed? Read here. (Thanks liviu009)

 

great work! i will be contributing my tests as well and if anyone needs, my review on my model is here! though downloads has pretty much answered the most important questions! +rep to you my friend

Also if anyone wants a game benchmark let me know as i pretty much have most games

 

Does this version have bluetooth?
And I have a question, does the 6979 have bluetooth? It's the only version I could find in the U.S...

 

No, mine doesn't. I didn't need it but no version with BT has been available where I live when I bought mine a week or so ago.

EDIT: 6979 doesn't have BT either. Source

 

I picked up the 6979 from newegg a week or two ago... and I'm loving it so far. I can play most of my favorite modern games (dragon age, Dawn of War 2, Mass effect 1 and 2, etc) on high settings (although I usually leave AA off)... performance is smooth.

The build quality is actually quite a bit better than I had anticipated. The keyboard and touchpad are quite nice. The screen is large and vibrant.

Only partial negative is the 5400 RPM HDD.. it's not the fastest, but to be honest I only notice this when I'm installing games off my server.... and on the plus side the HDD is big.

This laptop seems like an absolute steal for the price (799)

 

yea i wasn't happy with the 5400 rpm hdd so i swapped it out for an ocz vertex

 

How about Sims 3?

And also, I'm considering buying this. It looks like I could get it for $749.99 on Buy.com anyone ever buy from them? Are they reliable?

 

That's not a problem- Sims 3 high settings frame rate is above 130fps according to this

 

Thanks for the quick reply Downloads! Being on a budget, I'm really starting to lean towards the 5740G-6979. My big concern (and I may have asked you before lol) is the build quality. I've heard a lot of negative things about Acer in general with their lower-end notebooks, and it's got me a little scared. I know with a low budget I can't have it all, I just don't want it to feel cheap/plastic-y. How does it feel to you?

 

Honestly- build quality is great. If you read any opinion on this matter in this thread or in the mk1freak's original review everybody says the same thing.
I had also recommended this laptop to a friend and after I've asked him how it was his first answer has been about good build quality rather than gaming performance (which was the reason he bought it in the first place)
The shop I bought it in has 14 user reviews on this notebook and all have 10 out of 10 scores.
In my opinion build quality of Acer notebooks have greatly improved since gemstone series came along. It's the old "silver" series (I can't recall how that series was called) that earned Acer a bad reputation.
I cannot guarantee it's going to be fine in a year or two but it seems to be well thought- even plastic at the bottom beneath the DVD drive is thick enough so it doesn't flex when you hold a notebook in one hand in this place.

 

That sounds good enough for me. Thanks for all of this info! Hopefully I can buy it this week sometime...

 

Sorry for double posting, but I'd like someones opinion on where I should buy it. Buy.com and J&R seem to have it in stock for $749
http://www.jr.com/acer-computer/pe/ACE_AS5740G6979/
http://www.buy.com/prod/acer-aspire...-i5-430m-2-26ghz-4gb/q/loc/101/213655643.html

I've never bought from either, so could I hear anyones experience/opinion about them? Thanks

 

i think due to acer being a major Olympic sponsor, they really stepped up the quality of their machines in the past year(s) reviews have steadily gotten higher and higher which is one of the reasons i ended up going the acer route. Coming from a background of gamin machines in the 1.5k+ price point and basically "downgrading" i don't feel that way at all. i still play my fav games at high settings AND have some money in my pocket. In Fact, i canceled my g73jh-a1 preorder and this acer has now become my desktop replacement, sitting on my cryo lx and hooked up to the 24 LCD

 

Well that's a recommendation!

BTW: New Catalyst 10.3a (that is more recent driver than WHQL 10.3 that's due to be released in a week).

 

How is the battery life on this laptop?

 

Do these notebooks include switchable graphics like the newest Lenovo's Ideapads?

 

there's no need for switchable graphics on this one, ati has powerplay which downclocks the gpu when not doing anything graphically intensive(gaming) such as surfing the net or office work

 

Still I don't get it why there is no switchable graphics- chipset does support it, Core i5 does contain a graphic chip, hell there are even Intel VGA drivers on 5740G support site. There is only one little thing- switchable graphics is not enabled- same goes for Asus notebooks. Don&#8217;t know why.

I am yet to test battery life but it's boring so I'm kinda postponing it

 

Just ordered the 6979 off of J & R for $749.00. Hopefully it'll ship today or tomorrow. I can't wait