I have fixed this issue on the Asus Zenbook UX21E running Windows 7 Home premium 64 bit but I also believe the UX31a is also affected by this sudden shutdown issue. The issue is that if the power is removed the and the laptop placed on battery it crashes. Complete system sudden shutdown no warning just turns off. There is also an issue where if powered up on battery the laptop runs from 100% to about 85% then you get the sudden shutdown, again with no warning. The laptop can also crash when going from battery to mains power. To make it worse the power connection can be a bit wobbly so causing a
sudden shutdown if the Asus Zenbook UX21E is moved (and the power interrupted).
There is more than one repair here because when the first repair is applied it can cause the second fault that then needs repairing!
The first repair
This is an update to the laptop Firmware and BIOS. This can be downloaded from the Asus website.
http://support.asus.com/download.aspx?SLanguage=en&m=UX21E&os=30
It can be applied from within windows, but the Laptop must be on mains power and must not be interrupted during the process as this can severely damage the laptop to the extent that it may be unrecoverable. Also shut down everything you can within windows including the antivirus and disconnect from the internet / wireless network. You want your laptop concentrating on just this one job. It should not take more than a few minutes, but let it finish. Personally I keep moving the mouse every few minutes to stop the screen from closing or the screensaver from coming on.
If you are not comfortable with this update get someone who has performed BIOS updates before to help, or use your local PC support firm.
Once the BIOS update has completed you then need to test that the system will survive a power disconnect. IT should be OK now and you may find that suddenly your battery has gone from 100% charged to only 40% this is normal as the battery will now charge properly and then system will work correctly on battery. The machine I worked on the battery originally had a very short battery life of only 10 minutes and would then suddenly shutdown even thought the battery appeared to have 85% charge. The client originally brought the Asus Zenbook UX21E in to me for a replacement battery thinking that was why it would crash. Once these fixes had been implemented the battery life returned to over two hours battery life (I only tested it for two hours at the end of the test it still had 38% battery).
The second Repair
Now this may not affect your laptop I am just documenting the fixes I had to make on this particular Asus Zenbook UX21E . Once the BIOS had been updated I then noticed the USB 3 ports had stopped working. On checking device manager the Fresco Logic XHCI (USB3) controller FL1009 series had loaded correctly but the Fresco logic XHCI (USB3) root hub had a USB3 error and had not loaded the drivers. Checking on the ASUS website there was an update to the USB 3 drivers to the Fresco USB3 driver version 3.5.42.0 and as this was mentioned in articles I read on different websites I applied the update hoping it would fix the issue, it does not. There is however a newer version of the driver on the Fresco website. If you download the FLUSB3 driver version 3.6.4.0 and install this driver it removes the old drivers and installs with no errors. The driver can be downloaded from the Fresco website here: http://www.frescologic.com/support.php
Your Asus Zenbook UX21E should now be working as it should.
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