Dell :: Artifacting, Not Fixed After 5 Repairs And A Week With
Nov 17, 2007
So about 3-4 weeks ago now I had to have my 7900GS replaced due to artifacting problems, and this ended up being a problem that was not fixed even after 3 repairs and replacements of the GPU itself, motherboard and screen, all got replaced about 3 or 4 times.
I rang up Dell for the 4th time, and asked to have a replacement but was told this was not possible until it gets to the stage where they need to take it in to the workshop. Anyway, the next day the technician came out and replaced the motherboard, GPU and screen again, and the problem was still there. I was sure that this would be fixed now, because they wanted to take it in to the workshop, which they did.
Now, I believe the problem has resurfaced, I was playing Crysis tonight and I had some more artifacting, the same type that I was getting before but, just in smaller areas instead of the whole screen. Here are some screenshots of the issue:
Screenshot 1
Screenshot 2
This has been happening on and off tonight, room temperature has been cool and I didn't notice any overheating.
Now I haven't noticed this within the last hour or so of playing, and goes away if I alt-tab then get back in game. The only other game I have been playing is Counter-Strike Source and I haven't noticed any artifacting in that, but that could be because it's nowhere near as graphically demanding.
I'm worried that the problem will keep coming back and possibly get worse, I have not overclocked nor plan to overclock and keep my machine in a very well ventilated area. This is not user error.
Using official Dell video drivers, was reformatted just week as well.
Do you think it's worth ringing Dell about this and try getting a replacement?
"Aero" seems to don't like my video card or even me,
The Artifacting blink SOMETIMES when I minimize or maximize (open new one also) any window, explorer or any software... It happens only sometimes, but it gets very anoying to see... and I'm worried about if my card is damanged, if so, I really want to replace while I'm still on it's 1 Yr Standard warranty.
I'll be trying to get some picture (which is hard, because it just 'blinks' on screen) or maybe even some video of that.
Thanks for any suggestion / information.
EDIT: By the way, I'm using the latest driver by nVidia, "MobileForce M6" enhanced. In my device properties it says:
Total available graphics memory: 1023MB Dedicated Memory: 256MB System video memory: 0MB Shared System memory: 767MB
Why it says shared if nVidia never said anything about sharing memory with this card model?! Is there any way to disable this sharing? I believe that sharing a 767MB DDR2-533 with a video card isn't that beneficial.
plurator picked it up around 4:30 pm, so i start using my 2nd computer, i sign on msn messenger with my account, at around 9:15pm i see this message that you have be signed on messenger from another location im like? i remember the laptop i sent had msn messenger installed, it has my saved hotmail id and password,i quickly change my username and password, do you think someone in plurator is messing with my laptop now?
I just spilled a large pepsi all over my 9300 and called tech support and they are having me send the laptop to the depot and then said I should get it back in 5-8 business days. Do they even have the parts laying around to fix my laptop? The thing won't even power up anymore. The tech had me remove the hard drive from the laptop and even it was still a little damp! That means that even if they do fix the laptop and I get it back in say 2 weeks, if the hard drive doesn't work when I reinsert it I have to wait another several days for a replacement hard drive!
I have been with dell for 15 years and owned 9 of their laptops throughout the family.
My M1530 has been a disaster. I have had the GPU replaced, the motherboard replaced, the battery replaced, the DVD drive replaced, the speakers replaced, the palm rests replaced, the heatsink and fan replaced, and now the speakers have gone bad again.
Just got off the phone with a dell technician for cpu whine. Last month my computer died, they sent over a tech and he basically replaced everything in my laptop. The whine got ten times worst. I am on the phone with tech now and he is offering tech to come back and replace same exact parts or send it into Dell Depot for them to take a crack at it.
Is it worth sacrificing my laptop for 2 weeks? will dell likely tell me the whine is something "generally found in laptops" and i should deal with it? or has someone had their laptops successfully fixed by dell with respect to whine...
BTW they already rejected my request for an upgrade from my t7500...
I did a factory restore on my XPS m1530 laptop a while ago. Afterward it starts giving my blue screen of death. The most common occurring BSOD is memory management upon start up. Then the last time it gave me a pfnlist BSOD.
I have started this separate thread to get more visibility (for now) but this can be merged into the master 1558 thread eventually.
I have the laptop for 1 week now
Pros: •Great screen, 1080p screen is easily the best thing about the laptop. Very bright and sharp.
•I5-520m is quite fast. Good enough for most task and even some gaming, I ran the beta of Starcraft for a dew mins and it ran at mid to high settings for most (I have 4570 GPU)
•6200N is a good card and is much faster than the g card I was using in Vostro. Connects to the router in about 10 secs if I turn it off and then turn it on while laptop is on.
•9 cell battery performance is decent, I think I get about 4 hours of use with light to middle load of use. With very light use I should be well over 4 hours.
Cons:
•Slot DVD player is noisy, makes one loud clicking noise when every you boot the laptop. Sometimes there are two clicks.
•Froze one time when I booted up one morning, had to reboot again by holding the power button. Not sure what happened there.
•Biggest issue is heat for me, coming from a 14” Vostro I thought this will produce less heat but it seems to produce the same amount. The touchpad is quite hot to the touch as well as the bottom area just below the laptop. These external temps do not fluctuate much with the change in the core temps, at least that is what it seems to me. My core temps have not been too bad. 35-38C idle, 40-46C with light use (internet surfing), ~50-55C watching youtube etc. 70-74C when stressed 100% for 5 minutes. So what can be done about heat as that is my biggest concern and I have to decided if I want to keep this laptop. I opened the bottom cover and saw the CPU is smack under it. CPU is quite small and the heatsink as well. I could not see where the fan is but it does not seem close to the CPU so no wonder you cannot get heat to get out. Has anyone tired put a larger heatsink over the CPU or put thermal paste?
•Fan Control is very poor but I am optimistic that eventually DELL can update bios to address that. Fan turning on and off every minute is not acceptable.
•Has anyone noticed some light vibration around the touch pad area, when you put your hand to feel it? My laptop seems to have it and it is the highest close to the touch pad area. Not sure if it is the fan or CPU or the DVD player.
Anyway need 1558 users advice as I would like to make the decision on this laptop if I want to keep it. I got it as refurb so the price is quite good for the specs but I do not want it to die after a year and a half.
I'm referring to the Dellienware M17x. I wanted to post this here because I will be purchasing this laptop from Dell Canada.
I was wondering if you guys could tell me how I can save money. I am aware of the EPP 7% discount. IS there any other discount that I could get?
I bought a m15x last year and sent it back since it was defective, I was offered a 5% discount on my next alienware purchase. I called Dell Canada's sales reps and they don't know anything about applying a credit from Alienware.
I sent the email with 5% discount to 5 different reps and they all said that they would send it to their managers and get back to me ASAP. well none of them have gotten back to me .....
i5-520m 4gb 1066mhz 500gb 7200rpm ATI 4570 1080p backlit keyboard.
I'm obviously excited about receiving it, however.... after close to a week... it's still in "pre-production."
I've called a few times. First time I was told "It could take up to 48 hours to get out of pre-production and into in-production."
Fair enough. 48 hours later it was still in pre-production, so I called back and they told me it could be a payment issue. So I called the verification department and they told me everything was 100% good to go.
Anyway, different people telling me different things, finally I landed on some honesty. A representative told me that the problem is that there is a part on back-order and so that is why it hasn't moved into production yet. I'm guessing it's the processor, what do you guys think?
Anyway, the original delivery date was projected as February 4, 2010. The guy on the phone today said that I should expect the order to be moved into production within 48 hours (I'm not so sure I believe this) and that the delivery date will probably move to February 9, 2010.
I have absolutely no problem with this, part not in stock = no problem. My issue is, different reps telling me different stories. If it comes down to waiting till February 9 and I get my laptop then, I am fine with that, but if this drags on farther, I would rather cancel my order and purchase from another company.
What do you guys think? Also, has anybody actually received their 1558 yet? What do you think of it?
I really need to know if i can get them to give me a break from being just a week after the 30 days warranty, should i tell them about the B.B.B.?
Would that matter, cuz i have many heat issues with my sxps16? I don't think that's fair to get a new one and take the chance of getting their refurb parts
I ordered the 14z about a week ago and I dont remember them offering a free Windows 7 update. I guess I assumed it was included. I went to the website a few minutes ago and I see that its in red as an offer.
Do you think if I call Dell and tell them I want the upgrade or I will just cancel my order and reorder they will give it to me? Its seems silly for them to stop production of my laptop just for a free O.S. upgrade.
I have a fairly new (purchased 8/2013) Lenovo ThinkPad T431s with Windows 8.1 Pro 64-bit. It has a very tricky error coming basically 8 / 10 boots: Windows is Scanning and repairing drive... (see attached image). Â Error details from Windows Event Viewer: Â A corruption was discovered in the file system structure on volume ?Volume{f62db2cf-efe4-4b55-a3f7-0e7db991a984}.
A file on the volume is no longer reachable from its parent directory. The parent file reference number is 0x2000000000002. The name of the parent directory is "<unable to determine file name>". The parent index attribute is ":$I30:$INDEX_ALLOCATION". The file reference number of the file that needs to be reconnected is 0x400000003db80. There may be additional files on the volume that also need to be reconnected to this parent directory.  What is wrong (my personal analysis): To me, it seems that for some reason there is one (all the Event Viewer details point to similar error) corrupted / missing Windows (System) file that is causing this, but what the file(s) is/are.  Other symptoms on my laptop is that after loggin in and using whatever app (Windows delivered or 3rd party), the whole laptop jams totally for say 30-240 seconds and all apps go to "Not Responding" state untill Laptop recovers AND I can continue using my Laptop "normally".
What has been done trying to fix that: Â 1) SSD disk has been changed (image from previous SSD copied back) -> no solution, error remains 2) chkdsk /F /R -> no solution, error remains 3) SFC /scannow -> no solution, error remains 4) dism /online /cleanup-image /restorehealth -> no solution, error remains after a few boots 5) TRIED using "Update & Recovery -> Refresh Your PC without affecting your files" -> Inserted the Lenovo "Operating System Recovery Disk Windows 8 Pro (OEM Activation 3.0 Required)" BUT Windows did not accept that DVD claiming "The media inserted is not valid"... ??? 6) Ended up calling Lenovo Support and they instructed me to order the Recovery DVD from [URL] ..... -> Waiting that to arrive...
I'm deciding between Dell XPS m1330 and the Sony VAIO SR, and have been slightly leaning towards Dell! yay! However, I'm kinda worried about the GPU problem I've read about. So I was wondering if I buy the XPS m1330 in say June (I'm going USA for college then), will I have the NVidia graphics card which does not have a design flaw? And also, about the heating issue, has Dell done anything about that? Or will I have to do the copper mod thing if I buy this laptop?
I think. Ran Prime95 with 8 threads and CPU-Z reports 1.7291 GHz consistently with 13x multiplier. Screen brightness was on max. Is there a GPU test I can run also?
My new Latitude E6500 has been suffering from a "stuttering" problem. The symptoms: 1. When watching videos on the web (CNN.com, for example), the video and audio would stutter and pause, with "breaks" occuring multiple times a second.
2. When moving windows around the desktop, they would jerk along rather than gliding smoothly.
3. Most windows and programs would open slowly (for example, opening the control panel would take several seconds).
4. Task manager would never settle down to 0% or even 1%, but rather bounce along at 2-7%.
I tried re-loading the OS (Windows XP SP3) from scratch. Drivers, etc. Three times. Same problem.
Things seemed to run fine without Control Point software, which I was prepared to dump--but I do like some of its features.
But I discovered that choosing a Control Point power managment scheme was the problem! The solution was to select a regular old Control Panel power managment preset (one without DELL in the name). Problem solved! Task manager now settles down to 0%, videos run smoothly, etc.
My E6500 specs: P9500 4GB RAM Nvidai 160M 260 GB HD
I finally fixed all my problems (kinda) I have sound, wireless card, can go stadby hibernate, ethernet device works etc etc, Don't know how I did it because I went to so many different sites and google it thousand times!!!
I've noticed that sometimes you can't get the right drivers from dell even with the service tag number, I got some drivers from dell, but not from my specific model drivers download page!
The only problem I have now is that my hotkey: fn+esc don't work, it doesn't put my computer into standby like it should, the other hotkeys work just fine, Anyone know why? I also would like to get an older version of quickset because the new version that I got now I don't like it, its 7.1.8, I've been looking for the version that came with my computer from the factory but I don't know what version is! I liked that one better.
I'm about to buy one of these and Dell sales assistant told me that the original 1330 was shipped with incorrect BIOS settings and this caused problems..
He assures me that current laptops are shipped with updated setting and there won't be any problem. If there is they will replace the laptop.
Over the last few days I've read countless posts abt the same problem as I've been having with my Acer Aspire 5920G. It all started a week ago. I had shut down my laptop the night b4 and in the morning as usual I pressed the power button to start it up, it started up, completed POST and then powered on with a blank/switched off LCD screen and I could hear it going all the way up to the Vista log-on screen...... all this time with a blank screen that had no power. I kept it for a few minutes and then switched it off.
When i tried to restart,........the laptop powers on, the Bluetooth light comes on and the Hard drive led flickers a couple of times and then it'll just sit there unable to load the BIOS! Naturally I thought something was wrong with the BIOS for it to not start or complete POST. But I had absolutely no idea where the BIOS battery was located, so I couldn't do very much abt it (now I've some idea where it is, after a week of tinkering with the motherboard.)
But just to be on the safe side, over the last week I checked the RAM (which was OK), took out and reseated my GPU board (seemed OK, the GPU could have been the culprit coz of the blank screen), removed the Heat Sink (which was covering the CPU and which also acted as a Heat Sink for the GPU) and checked the CPU. The thermal paste that was covering the CPU had melted all around it, so I replaced it with new thermal paste after I cleaned it. Then I disconnected and reconnected the Heat Sink Fan and put it all back together. It didn't restart! The same symptoms as b4 appeared again. But this time after a few secs, it went into an infinite loop of powering on and restarting every 5 or so seconds.
So I thought, I'll give it one last go b4 chucking it for a new laptop! Since the first symptom of the whole problem when this all started was a LCD screen that wasn't working...... I removed all the coverings of the screen and detached and reconnected the two LCD inverter cables connected to the inverter boards thats located just below the screen and then after removing the back covering of the LCD screen, I detached and reconnected the LCD cable just behind the screen. The attachment of this cable is very fragile and flimsy. I've a feeling that this is what caused all the problems. It did seem loose!........
I just bought a new U310 , the system is good as of now , but only issue which is bothering me is that it has a week wifi signal Is there any way to boost up the wifi signal.
I have an Inspiron 9300 that recently started having 100% CPU usage all of the time. After a lot of wild goose chases, the reason turns out to be that 3 out of 4 of its temperature sensors (CPU, Video, and soDimm) think that it is 255 degrees C inside the unit.
Error Code 3900-0626 Msg: Temperature Sensor out of range, temp=255C, min=10C, max=100C
As a result, the CPU steps down to preserve itself. I get perhaps 250MHz core speed rather than the 1.6 GHz the unit is rated for.
In any event, all other hardware diagnostics are fine, the machine runs ok (though very slow), and is otherwise healthy.
The Dell guys say that I need a new Motherboard, but I was wondering the following?
1) Whether the thermistors can be replaced by a shop that does motherboard repair 2) If getting an XPS Gen 2 mobo is worth a try. Would I still have to get new batteries, bios, etc if I planned to keep my existing graphics card? Can I do it without spending too much more money now that I would have to spend anyway on a stock mobo?
I was curious if Apple has got its fan speed problem fixed for windows yet.
I know alot of people need their fans working good in windows for games and I would hate to have to boot into osx to set fan speed to high just so i could boot to windows to play a game.
My Envy has the i7-720QM processor. I noticed significant reduced performance when running on battery.
RealTemp, Sandra, i7Turbo, Intel turbo boost monitor, cpuid, etc.. all report the multiplier at 7 (~930MHz), and won't move from there no matter what I do on the machine.
The multiplier seems locked/fixed at 7 regardless of load. As soon as it is unplugged it dives to 7.
I've changed the power plan to high performance and set min/max power management to 100%. This made no difference.
Is the BIOS forcing this? I believe 7 is the low frequency multiplier but shouldn't this kick in only is there is no activity (to save power?). If I am doing work, I expect the processor to at least run at the minimum frequency specified.
This behavior has been confirmed now by other members of the forum. Previos BIOS releases (F.05 and F.06) have been tested and showed the same issue.
I attached two screenshots, one the system running on power, and the other one on battery. Both running prime95 small FFTs.
