Can somebody please help me with my Swift SF314-41

Here is what's happening. I'm not sure what's caused the trouble though so please bear with me. I bought this laptop January 2020 from Harvey Norman. I have never been one for windows and instead I like Linux. So I wiped the drive clean (including the recovery drive) and installed linux. I quickly learnt that it would freeze soon after loading and with a bit of googling around I found out I needed to add 'nvme_core.default_ps_max_latency_us=5500' to the boot sequence. I changed between windows and linux quite often without any problems and had always kept a cloned drive of windows 10 and later upgraded to windows 11.

Sometimes I duel booted and other times I just ran one OS and that was usually linux (various distros). I'm not quite sure how it happened but the other day I noticed the top of my screen was slightly cut off. The screen seemed to be actually shifted down and to the right?

I have googled around but couldn't find an answer. I have stuck a pin in the ultra tiny hole on the bottom to reset the battery, waited for 15 minutes or more and restarted. I even opened the laptop and disconnected and removed the battery for around 30 minutes. Still the same only now it tells me my battery is fully charged but as soon as I remove the power cord it dies? On the side both my lights are blue which is supposed to indicate a fully charged battery?

So in sequence here is what has happened:

Screen started being cut off at top.
Reset with a pin the battery in the hole on the bottom.
Laptop is very slow to use (either windows or linux) and removing power cord laptop shuts down.
Removed the battery and replaced (same battery) after awhile with no change.

So if anybody has any idea on what might be causing this please help me out. Any ideas would be helpful.

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William_mk2

defossil

I am really sorry for the inconvenience.. Let us do the basic steps first..

Doing the power drain and bios defaults will really help. Kindly follow the steps given below:

Turn off the laptop. Disconnect or unplug the charger cable, devices or any other cables connected to your laptop. Close your laptop. Turn it upside down. On the bottom of the laptop, you can find a pin hole. It is a tiny hole. You can a find a battery symbol indicator next to the hole. It is like a + and – sign symbol as though somebody is trying to shift the battery out. Insert the pin on to the hole for 30 seconds. Remove the pin. Flip the laptop. Connect the charger cable, turn on the computer. Only on laptops where the battery is inbuilt you can find the battery reset hole on the back of laptop.

If you don’t find a pin hole on the back of laptop then you might be using removable battery. There is no need to unscrew anything to remove the battery. Turn off the laptop. Disconnect or unplug the charger cable, devices and any other cables connected to your laptop. Close your laptop. Turn it upside down. On the bottom of the laptop, please look at the top or bottom depending on the way you look at it. You can find a long door. It is a battery removable door. Just below that you can find a latch. If you move the latch you can remove the battery door. Once the battery is removed, flip the laptop. Open the top cover, press and hold the power button for 1 minute. Connect the battery back on the back of computer. Connect the charger cable back and then turn on the computer.

If you don’t see a reset pin hole on the back of laptop or if you are not able to remove the battery (if it is inbuilt) then please unplug all the cables and devices out of laptop. Hold the power button for 1 minute. After releasing the button you should wait a while before plugging in power. Just because the button has been pressed doesn’t bleed off all the residual electricity on the motherboard. Wait 15-30 minutes before plugging in power. Then once power is connected wait for a full battery indication before turning the system on. That allows the battery to fully reset it’s internal statistics.

Connect all the cables back and restart the computer.

While turning on the computer, tap f2. It will go to bios. Press f9 once. It will show load bios defaults with a yes or no popup. Press enter. Popup screen will disappear. Press f10 once. It will show save changes popup with yes or no. Press enter. Computer will restart and it will load into windows.

It might also be the issue with battery, charger or power outlet. Try to use the charger in a different room on a different power outlet. Try to bypass the surge protector and connect it directly to power outlet. Try to use an alternative charger if possible. Try to turn on the computer without the charger and check it ( as long as the battery is not drained out )

Try windows x

go to device manager

expand Battery

right click on all the items below battery – uninstall

Restart the computer

It should work fine..

William_mk2

defossil

I understand you say "Laptop is very slow to use (either windows or linux) and removing power cord laptop shuts down"

I am suspecting issue might be with the battery, so it's likely the battery meter needs to be recalibrated. If your Acer Care Center does not have the option to calibrate the battery meter, follow these directions

With the laptop turned off, connect the AC adapter and wait for the battery charge LED to turn from solid orange to solid blue.
Turn the machine back on.
Disconnect the AC adapter.
Use battery power until the battery-low warning appears.
Reconnect the AC adapter and fully charge the battery again.
Follow these steps again until the battery has been charged and discharged three times.

William_mk2

defossil

Here are some of the steps to speed up your computer ( windows )

Try windows + r - on the run window - type msconfig - click ok

click on services

check - hide all microsoft services

click on disable all

click on startup

disable all the startup items

click on apply - ok - restart the computer. Loading process will be very fast now..

Note: You can always enable the services and startup items later or set it to normal startup from selective startup later on the General tab

Try windows + r - on the run window - type appwiz.cpl - click ok

it will show you the list of programs

remove all the unwanted third party programs.

Please don’t remove any drivers.

If you are not sure , please don’t remove it.

Try windows + r - on the run window type temp - click ok - it will show you the bunch of files - try ctrl + a - select all files - press the shift key and click on delete files

Try windows + r - on the run window type %temp% - click ok - It will show you the bunch of files - try ctrl + a - select all files - press the shift key and click on delete files

If you are not able to remove some files - click on skip and then click click on continue..

Try windows + r - on the run window - type cleanmgr - click ok

click on all the boxes except recycle bin and thumnail

Delete the items which are checked

Try windows x - on the menu - chose command prompt admin or power shell admin

click on yes

on the blue or black window type sfc /scannow

It will be running till 100 %

Try to do a chrome reset

open chrome

click on three dots on top right corner

click on settings

Scroll down - go to advanced

click on restore setting to default

you will see reset settings - cancel

click on reset settings

Open chrome

it will work faster now

If it is still not working then we have to do a refresh and reset

click on start - settings - update and security - recovery - reset this pc - get started

or

on start - type here to search - type reset this pc - click on reset this pc on the top - click on get started

It will show you keep my files and remove everything

chose keep my files

chose the account - type the password - click on local reinstall - click on reset

It will be in progress..

login to computer and start using the computer.

If it is still not working

click on start - settings - update and security - recovery - reset this pc - get started

chose remove everything

click on local reinstall - just remove my files - click on reset

It will be in progress

Note:

If you do refresh ( keep my files ) - all your personal files like pictures, music , documents , videos will still be intact. Only the applications will be lost

If you do reset ( remove everything ) - you are doing a factory default. It will become like a day one computer. It will wipe out everything and take your computer to day one like a new computer.

You can also do the recovery in an alternative way..

There are two alt keys on the keyboard. If you look at the bottom row of keyboard you can see the one on the left side of space bar and the other on the right side of space bar. The alt key on the right side will be looking like alt, alt gr or alt car. Turn off the computer. Hold the alt key on the left and tap f10 continuously. It will go to repair mode. It will show you chose an option, continue, troubleshoot. If it is not going to repair mode, turn off the computer. Turn on the computer. Hold the right alt key ( alt gr or alt car or alt ) and then tap f10 continuously. It will go to chose an option continue and troubleshoot..

It will show you chose an option, continue, troubleshoot

Go to troubleshoot - click on reset this pc

click on keep my files ( only applications will be lost ) chose your account and type your password - click on local reinstall - click on reset

It will be in progress

If the keep my files option is not working

Go to troubleshoot - click on reset this pc – click on remove everything – click on local reinstall – just remove my files – click on reset

It will reinstall windows.

If the just remove my files is not working..

Go to troubleshoot - click on reset this pc – click on remove everything – click on local reinstall – Fully clean the drive – click on reset

It will reinstall windows.

Note: You can also go to chose an option , continue , troubleshoot by holding the alt key + tapping f10 or alt gr + tapping f10 on the keyboard while turning on the computer. Once you see the troubleshoot option, you can stop tapping the f10 and stop holding the alt key. Then you can try the keep my files and remove everything ( just remove by files and fully clean the drive ) by following the steps which was mentioned above.

defossil

Thanks everyone for all these helpful tips. I used the pin/reset battery on the bottom and waited for about an hour then started it up. Battery seems fine and it's charging/discharging okay.

The big problem is I still have the small gap at the top of my screen. It even shows in the bios screen. I plugged it into an external monitor being a tv as its all I have and its fine in that. I think somehow when I was cleaning the screen the other day I may have pressed a bit too hard on the screen. I only used a dry lint cloth and no water or chemicals. Maybe I moved or pinched a wire or something?

billsey

It's very unlikely to be a physical issue with the screen. Does it happen with both OSes? Typically a slightly shifted display is due to a timing issue without the video output, it might be running at something other than 60Hz or at a resolution slightly off from the 1920x1080 native.

defossil

billsey said:

It's very unlikely to be a physical issue with the screen. Does it happen with both OSes? Typically a slightly shifted display is due to a timing issue without the video output, it might be running at something other than 60Hz or at a resolution slightly off from the 1920x1080 native.

Yes it happens with all OSes both windows and linux. It sometimes displays a little flicker right at the top of the screen. Displays are set at 1920x1080p and 60Hz. Why does it also happen in the bios screen? Also when I plugged it into the TV it worked fine with absolute full-display? This computer was only made in October 2019 and I bought it in January 2020?

It just seems to me to be a hardware issue and not software which doesn't say a lot for Acer!!

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