Anyone using Samsung Series 9?

augerpro

Distinguished
Aug 27, 2011
14
0
18,560
I just bought the 11.6", as shown but with a 4 cell battery (though rated the same). Anyway just wondering what others think of this machine? It is beautiful, nice screen, nice keyboard with backlighting, very snappy with the SSD. Really I love everything about this thing EXCEPT the battery life. It can't even idle 7 hours. Doing work I wonder if it will get past 4 hours. So I have a couple questions for you guys. I've set the power settings to be fairly conservative, what else can I do? Is there such a thing as an external portable battery? I'm going to call Samsung to see if the 6 cell is available.

I may return this, I hate to since it is otherwise a REALLY nice laptop. If I do, what would be a good alternative with a good 11.6" screen, SSD, Sandy Bridge and with 8 hours of battery life when used about 2 out of those 8 hours (screen off, with several programs pulling some data from the internet, nothing to high load)?
 

augerpro

Distinguished
Aug 27, 2011
14
0
18,560
These batteries are internal, not quickly changed "on the go." I am looking into getting the 6 cell though, not sure how much it will matter if capacity is rated the same though.

BTW does anyone know if the data on the Recovery CD is the same as on the recovery partition of the hard drive? The partition is using 20GB that I would rather have back.
 

AntiZig

Distinguished
capacity is typically rated by how many cells the battery has, which results in Whr rating, I'm not sure why would they be rated the same... The only thing I can think of is if the 6 cell has smaller cells than 4 cell one, so Whr is the same but it's able to put out higher VDC or W as opposed to 4 cell one. But my guess is as good as the guy next door.

thanks for pointing out that battery is internal, missed that. I'm not sure what you mean by "on the go" charging. The battery is a battery, all of them charge the same way once you plug in your laptop into the AC power.

Regarding the recovery CD, hard to say. Even if it's a dual layer DVD it's max about 8Gb of files on it, so if recovery partition is bigger, it probably has something extra on it.
 

augerpro

Distinguished
Aug 27, 2011
14
0
18,560
By on the go just saying with the internal battery is not easy to change, you have to unscrew the back panel, not something I'm going to be doing at work, or traveling in my car, etc.

I'm not sure why the batteries are rated the same either. Maybe a typo. I'm calling Samsung and newegg tomorrow.
 

augerpro

Distinguished
Aug 27, 2011
14
0
18,560
Ok found something REAL annoying. I uninstalled a bunch of Samsung EasyThis and EasyThat crap. Kept Easyspeedup, easydisplaymanager, and the recovery program, and update program. They all run at startup. And with Admin privileges. My main account is a standard account and now I have a bunch of UAC prompts everytime I log in. Anyone see an issue with changing .exe to not run under admin? Why do all of these need admin rights? I assume all the ones I uninstalled would have asked me also. Bit ridiculous to get a dozen UAC's when you log in.
 

augerpro

Distinguished
Aug 27, 2011
14
0
18,560
Maybe, maybe not, but if that is the solution Samsung it is pretty amateurish.

I'm waiting for a RMA from newegg. We'll see.
 

augerpro

Distinguished
Aug 27, 2011
14
0
18,560
Talked to Samsung and the spec: 6-Cell Lithium 5680 mAh on their website for the 11.6" model is a typo, it is a 4-Cell Lithium 5680 mAh. No option to use the bigger 6 cell 6300 mAh, at least that they support. Looking into whether the larger battery can be fit into the 11.6" chassis.
 

tigerck127

Distinguished
Dec 10, 2010
13
0
18,560
I have the 13.3 inch.
I love everything about it.
I just try to use it on power saving mode to lessen the battery drainage. including the low brightness