My girl just got an ASUS laptop, what now?

[Arcanz]

As the title says, my girlfriend just got an ASUS laptop, yay. But as everyone knows, laptops spawn from a fiery pit in hell with shitloads of fancy programs you hardly use. So my question then, what do I need to keep the different features working, like the webcam and so forth, and what can i safely uninstall. A little list of programs I found in the install and uninstall programs list:

ASUS AI Recovery
ASUS AP Bank
ASUS Fancy Start (Yeah you might think I'm making this up, but I'm not)
ASUS LifeFram3
ASUS Live Update
ASUS MultiFrame
ASUS Power4Gear Hybrid
ASUS Smart Logon
ASUS Splendid Video Enhancement Technology
ASUS USB2.9 UVC VGA WebCam
ASUS WebStorage
ASUS_Screensaver
ATK Package

Some other programs I don't know what are and never heard of:
ControlDeck
CyberLink LabelPrint
ETDWare PS/2-x64 7.0.5.9_WHQL
Fast Boot
SRS Premium Sound Control Panel
Trend Micro Internet Security (Think it is trial, should I just get AVG?)
WinFlash
Wireless Consol3

Well then, does anyone know how good these programs are? What do they do? Do I need them?

 

[Guest_Star]

Problem with a lot of laps it that they come with OEM-versions of the OS, bundled with all kindsa shit.
My advice? Reformat and clean install if ya have a proper OS-disc at hand.
Or just go for Ubuntu. She's a girl, she wont be gaming anyways. j/k

 

[Arcanz]

Problem with a lot of laps it that they come with OEM-versions of the OS, bundled with all kindsa shit.
My advice? Reformat and clean install if ya have a proper OS-disc at hand.
Or just go for Ubuntu. She's a girl, she wont be gaming anyways. j/k

Ah, but it is a gaming laptop you see. She needs it for gaming, already have TF2 ready.

Edit: Didn't see the "j/k", I suck. But anyways, would rather not reformat. As I said, some programs are needed for such things as the webcam and so forth

 

[FinalDream]

Last time I bought a non-apple laptop the, well lets face it, the c**p came on a separate installation CD. Wipe the laptop find the Windows installation CD and re-install a clean OS. If you don't have one you can always contact ASUS. You paid for it so you deserve the windows disc.

 

[Keava]

Two options: Either format away and do a clean OS install or just leave it as it is, eventually you can try fiddling with Run->msconfig to turn all those programs off from autostart and see which ones actually do anything.

 

[Ironic Pirate]

I'm not a computer expert, but I have an Asus and the stuff works fairly well, didn't bother uninstalling anything.

No idea if that answered your question or not though.

 

[Arcanz]

I'm not a computer expert, but I have an Asus and the stuff works fairly well, didn't bother uninstalling anything.

No idea if that answered your question or not though.

Think you answered better than most. Just a few questions, wich one of these do you use, on my list? And what do they do?

 

[Ironic Pirate]

I'm not a computer expert, but I have an Asus and the stuff works fairly well, didn't bother uninstalling anything.

No idea if that answered your question or not though.

Think you answered better than most. Just a few questions, wich one of these do you use, on my list? And what do they do?

I recognise most of the names, but not many functions.

I'm pretty sure the screen saver one is either the screensavers it comes with, or the way it cycles betweeen a few of them.

I recommend AVG, I got and it works really well. Also, on mine it said it had Word, but it was actually a trial version, so check that. Open Office works pretty well if you got screwed over like me.

After some googling, Multiframe allows you to control different windows and have a couple of them onscreen at once.

 

[007dog900]

If you dont want to do a clean install: Dual boot ubuntu and windows; use ubuntu for day to day things, and Windows for gaming

 

[Bobzer77]

As the title says, my girlfriend just got an ASUS laptop, yay. But as everyone knows, laptops spawn from a fiery pit in hell with shitloads of fancy programs you hardly use. So my question then, what do I need to keep the different features working, like the webcam and so forth, and what can i safely uninstall. A little list of programs I found in the install and uninstall programs list:

ASUS AI Recovery
ASUS AP Bank
ASUS Fancy Start (Yeah you might think I'm making this up, but I'm not)
ASUS LifeFram3
ASUS Live Update
ASUS MultiFrame
ASUS Power4Gear Hybrid
ASUS Smart Logon
ASUS Splendid Video Enhancement Technology
ASUS USB2.9 UVC VGA WebCam
ASUS WebStorage (could be useful, probably not though)
ASUS_Screensaver
ATK Package

Some other programs I don't know what are and never heard of:
ControlDeck
CyberLink LabelPrint
ETDWare PS/2-x64 7.0.5.9_WHQL
Fast Boot
SRS Premium Sound Control Panel
Trend Micro Internet Security (Think it is trial, should I just get AVG?) Yes get Avast! Home Edition
WinFlash
Wireless Consol3

Well then, does anyone know how good these programs are? What do they do? Do I need them?

I didn't cross out half as many as I thought I would... I would suggest leaving the rest and only un-installing the ones that get in your way. Most of it is probably useless but you never know.

Or you could un-install everything with ASUS in front of it except ATK Package, ASUS USB2.9 UVC VGA WebCam, ASUS Power4Gear Hybrid and ASUS AI Recovery, although not being an expert with ASUS stuff I wouldn't do that un-less they gave you a cd to re-install it all.

 

[Wolfram23]

Honestly I'd delete all of them, except the Webcam one, and label print. I'm not sure how fast boot or fancy boot works... might be worth a google first. Same with Control Deck... could be useless might be for audio or something which is fine.

Assuming you have the install CD for all these, I'd pretty much delete as much of them as possible and maybe just read over the install manual to see what these do. I hate bloatware tho, so yeah I keep it bare minimum.

 

[red alert447]

I have had my Asus in six months, everything is working as it should. You can safely uninstall everything exept
ASUS USB2.9 UVC VGA WebCam and WinFlash

I also recomend having wireless Consol3m,Power4Gear Hybrid and AI Recovery( You don't actually need these, but they are good programs
You can uninstall Ai recovery after you have made a backup disk, that way you can reset your computer to YOUR factory state of windows 7( with programs you use etc.

Power4gear: You can select different modes, from battery saving to high performance. I like it because the computer is very quiet when i use battery saving.

Wireless consol3: i don't know why yet, but my brother said it was a good program( he is a computer engineer)

If you want something you uninstalled you can always download it from www.asus.com - global - asus support site -download

I can't say much more other than support @Bobzer77: get avast! + @Guest_Star and @007dog900: dual boot ubuntu

Good luck!

 

[Your Fearless Captain]

DELETE FUCKING EVERYTHING!!!! But seriously do that and reinstall windows.

 

[nexekho]

I agree with the notion to install a fresh copy of Windows - I have a low-end laptop and performance is very noticeably improved by a format, also because the non-OEM drivers are considerably better including many features it seems HP intentionally stripped out of their custom drivers like multitouch on the pad.

 

[Esotera]

Why is everyone saying dual-boot Ubuntu? Just reinstall Windows and that should do the job, or alternatively you could uninstall them one by one via control panel. The webcam will probably work natively in windows, if it doesn't then you can always read the manual and reinstall the correct driver.

 

[ripdajacker]

Do a clean install of Windows, and for antivirus get NOD32, it's fast and has a quite good engine. If you don't bother paying the license, get one of the free antivirus programs, they work just fine for most people.

As for the included applications: Most of them have free alternatives. The power management tools are a kernel-level feature of Windows and are therefore replaceable with a power profile in control panel.

If you really want control of the power settings get the application called Notebook Hardware Control, it too works great.

 

[TheJesus89]

She should break up with you, obviously.


Shame on you for letting her get an ASUS.