Netbook freezes randomly

Anyone seriously considering a Class-Action over this?

 

Won't happen even if there were interested parties. Why? Because there are over 30 pages on this issue with no absolute clarification of what the problem is caused by. To take acer to court, you'd need to prove where they were negligent allowing a defective item on the market, or, acer know the true nature of a problem and are unwilling to fix it.

I had a problem with a samsung mobile phone that only ever played up when i got the phone home. They obviously told me they couldn't replace it when they couldn't witness the problem occuring. They wouldn't simply take my word for it.

 

Hum, this is a completely different situation. The netbooks ARE faulty and could be demonstrated.

 

I would suggest everyone that has this freeze/lockup issue send it in for repairs. Shipping and insurance costs about $25 one way and if they return the device without actually fixing the problem, they are on the hook to pay for returning it again (and again and again). The profit margin on these devices is so slim that a single return to depot cost them real money and multiple returns trips begins to hit them where it hurts. Mine is on the way back for its second visit with notes indicating that the original repairs (i.e., replaced hard drive) left the device in a worse state than before.

(If I'm going to end up with a useless device, the least Acer can do is treat it do a life of travel and adventure

 

I wonder if the lemons among the 751h and 1410 originated in a specific manufacturing plant and were distributed within a fairly narrow marketing channel (not specific store). The Amazon customer reviews are either being culled of horrible-computer reviews or Amazon received a problem-free batch or a batch with a very very low rate of freezes.

Amazon reviews for 1410:
http://www.amazon.com/Acer-Aspire-AS141 ... geNumber=1

 

OK, how did that work out for you?

So, your advice is to send the machine in for repairs that cost time and money. Repairs that not only don't fix the problem, but actually make matters worse. Brilliant.

 

I've now read all of the customer reviews on Amazon and found (a) the more stridently negative reviews seem to be presented last among pages 1 thru 7, and (b) a purchaser on page 7 (link above) mentions that his 1410 freezes with Skype.

 

I'm surprised to say that this actually seems to work. I tested this by scrolling up and down for a few minutes on a website (http://www.hs.fi/) where doing that would usually crash the computer in less than a minute. I also tried scrolling in Word 2007, previously another source of frequent crashes. Also the scrolling felt smoother than before.

Before I could also get the computer to crash even faster by playing a game called Star Defender 4 that came pre-installed on the machine. However, it seems to use DirectX since it won't start now so I can't test it.

Earlier I tried replacing the RAM but that didn't work (tested with the aforementioned game).

I'll be sure to report back if this improvement turns out to be a fluke.

 

It seems the issue is not in one certain place. Each version have come with different freezing scenario. Sorry, the remedy I found, might not work for everyone.

 

** UPDATE on my 2nd attempt for Repair

I sent it out on Oct. 22nd Thursday and didn't pay shipping costs since I had a previous service repair request which they didn't fix and only replaced the HDD.

They emailed me today that they are going to ship it back to me, I was surprised because this one was faster. The first repair took approximately 14 days.

So I called and what they told me is this...

My netbook's LCD has been replaced -- WTF??!?! And I asked why. The Customer Rep. said that they found gray horizontal lines so they replaced it. I never saw gray lines ever since I bought it so its something fishy.

2nd, they said they replaced the webcam and it works now. - I'd still have to test that.

Freezing issue -- the Rep just said all tests have passed and it is working properly and they have updated the BIOS -- which they didn't checked because I have already updated it.

I'd have to test it out again and if it doesn't work, then I will send it again for repair and not pay for the shipping costs until they finally fix it.

Right now, I'm not thinking of the hassle anymore, but I'm going to rip off Acer and let them spend a lot of money fixing this unreliable netbook. Sounds like they are the ones going to suffer in the end and not the consumers.

So I advice anyone who has the same situation as mine to send it also for repair as early as you can and even if it will take 10 trips to their
service depot... DO IT.

 

My new 1410 will arrive (from seller) Friday or Monday. Seems that if I and others experience these freezes, we'd be well served to have a witness or several sign affidavits describing the problem - preferably notarized. This might help in regard to freezes that take longer than the Acer test-programs can identify.

???

 

Who made the machine?
Acer
Who warranted the machine?
Acer
Who is on the hook for fixing the machine?
Acer
How many parts are likely to need replacing?
5 (Mobo, HDD, RAM, WiFi, camera)
Who puts it in the box and sends it back?
We do
Wash and Repeat as needed.

Ah, I feel so much better.

 

Grr... I replaced the HDD the first day with a 500GB WD Scorpio Blue that works fine (I've run it on three different computers) and don't have the original anymore. They'd better not try to replace the HDD.

 

I have yet to swap out my ram but am doing it soon hopefully

but I thought I would let anyone interested in knowing that I can cause a freeze in my system anytime I want. All I have to do is play a wma, divx, xvid or x264 video file in wmp11, after 5 or 6 seconds it automatically freezes. In my tests it also somtimes causes a bsod refering to symevent.sys. If i rememeber correctly from my old school dos/9x A+ training that either a) ram is being accessed that is all ready in use or b) a program or a faulty driver is trying to accompolish something that it is not intended to do. I think that both the ram module and the gma together are causing the crashes on my system. That would explain why some people swaping ram has shown no benefit. I have also been able to stop the random freezing of my system by creating a small 10gig partition and moving my swap file over to it. Whether this is a coincident or not reamains to been seen. Any thoughts appreciated. Will update after I have had time to complete more tests.

 

Just a little update on my netbook.

For many months I was frequented by random lockups, specially when using Yahoo webcam, transfering large files from USB memory stick, etc, making my acer close to unusable.
It was in the category among the worst described here.

I finally got a breakthrough when I replaced the memory module.

After replacing the 2GB Kingston with the 1GB Nanya that originally came with my machine, it was suddenly usable. No more problems with webcam, file transfers, or doing anything at all. I installed programs and was for the first time able to use and enjoy it.
After testing for 2 weeks, I had 3 freezes. All when the netbook was idle.
It was now in the category among those here that has a freeze once in a while but not really a problem.

The last 7 days I have been testing a 2GB Hynix 800Mhz module. I chose this because its one of only 2 that Asus approves for overclocking their Z520 based netbook.
Though I still have a long time of testing left before being able to draw a final conclusion, I have a very good feeling now that I am in the category among those who never have freezes. But only time will show.

For others that are looking for a RAM module to try, I think the Hynix looks good. Unfortunatly, its not among the cheapest, but if it solves the problem, I dont care.
I will rather spend a few extra bucks fixing it than fighting Acer and pulling all my hair out in the process.

So if others are willing to try, the pic in this link will show the exact module:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...19109&_sacat=See-All-Categories&_fvi=1&_rdc=1

I did not buy here. I managed to source it from a local supplier and saved a few bucks. Seems this guy raised his price when the rush of Asus OC'ers started.

Talking of OC, I OC'ed to 1.6Ghz for 2 days time, also without issues. Passmark Benchmark gave me 18% performance increase on all tests except HDD (8%). Did not run it very hard though, but I will try more in a few weeks time if everything keeps looking as good as it does now.

 

FWIW, I purchased my 751 from Amazon in August and have only very occasional freezes. Enough that it's annoying & I'm following this thread, but not enough that it's a big problem for me.

 

For all the people who think it is faulty RAM, have you tested your RAM with a software utility? I don't know too much about that sort of stuff, but know that there are programs that can test the integrity & functioning of a RAM module.

Anyone?

 

Yes, I ran tests on the Kingston RAM that made my 751h unusable. Everything ok every time.
I think its more about design/compatibility/functionality than the module being defect.

 

Ok, thanks. I'm curious to hear others' responses as well.

How often was your 751 freezing? As I stated above, it only happens to me every couple weeks or so.

 

With the Kingston RAM, it was usually at least a couple of times a day. But sometimes it could behave a day or 2. But if I tried using the webcam in Yahoo, it would freeze after 30 seconds to a few minutes. Disabling DEP helped a little on this, from 30 minutes to a whole day.

With the Nanya, though I only had it in for 2 weeks, it seemed similar to what you are describing. All applications worked fine, but I had 3 freezes during those 2 weeks. All when system was idle, so not really a problem. But still.