M14X Shuts Down on Battery

The original battery would be sent back to Dell. A return ship label is provided. You wouldn't be able to keep the original battery - well you could but you would end up with a charge to your account.

 

Unless you are playing a Blu-Ray, video files are typically encoded at 60 fps. DVD's for example were often encoded as 2x 480i@30 interlaced, but the player would output that as 480p@60 to the display. Any broadcast over cable or satellite will be coming out of the tuner at 60 Hz as well (at least in the US).

You can run into issues with judder and artifacts when trying to display lower frame rate sources on displays which aren't speically configured to handle it (eg. modern 120/240 Hz TV's which can display native 24 fps input from Blu-Rays rather than doing a 3:2 pulldown interpolation as older 60 Hz TV's did). When trying to display a native 24 fps source on a 60 Hz display, the display essentially displays each frame of the input 2 or 3 times (alternating between 2 and 3) in order to translate it to 60 fps. Because this isn't an even translation, you get problems. Modern displays have solved this by refreshing at multiples of 24, like 120 Hz. That way you just display each 24p frame 5 times and get an even 120.

 

add me to the list of people who has shut down problems unplugged. before i tried playing Metro 2033 unplugged before changing the battery setting to high performance instead of balanced on the GPU and it ran fine.

After changing it to high performance unplugged after crashing once the 2nd time running the game the system shut down and wouldn't turn back on unless I was plugged in...

This is very weird... anyone have luck figuring this out? Looks like AW has a lot of returns or fixes on their hands and this system JUST released..

It has been bad luck for early adopters lately, I jumped on m11x with the bad hinges, i5 sandy bridge with chipset problems, now this shutting down problem with the m14x. I am sure I am missing something else but yeah having problems lately :/

 

Dell will get on it eventually. Give them time. It's most likely a GPU problem. If it is, They'll most likely release a bios updates that redistributes the power so the GPU gets enough and does not shout down.

 

well given enough time for us "guinea pigs" to test the initial release. I bet the better one will be the R2. I hope they find a fix before my 20-day return window or else they will lose an m14x customer.

 

LOL. That's why I decided to wait after a few people got it just to make sure it runs smooth. A little patient saves u in the long run.

 

Just make sure you guys paid by credit card, if it is still not fixed after 3 months legally you can ask for the money back. No need to worry about the return window at all.

 

Scratch that. It just crashed. Dell is sending me a brand new replacement. hope its fixed by the time I get it

 

Some of the people who are voting "no" to the crash issue, are you testing at all? Has anyone successfully played Crysis 2 on battery at 100% performance for CPU and GPU?

 

I really doubt the issue is going to be fixed by the time you get a replacement.. since they are probably just aware and working on finding the issue.. this is happening with most of the 14's I didn't have the problem until I went and actually changed the balanced to high performance GPU on the battery setting.

 

how the hell are they sending you a brand new laptop??!?!? they said I would have to buy another one, then send mine back and then I would get a refund.

 

I talked to tech support for about 35 min, and they transfered me to returns/exchanges. They transfered me to EPP returns/exchanges. Tech support never saved any notes under my account. I explained that I was upset that no notes were made and I had no more patience to talk to tech support again. I explained this is a faulty issue and I want to return my laptop, or have a replacement sent to me before I send the old one back. They emailed me with my new order number 15 minutes later. Next day shipping.

 

So you guys think that this could be fixed by a mere bios update?

or will it be a motherboard replacement?

Or we all got defective batteries..

 

It does not only shut down, it crashes, random hang up!
I have 8 chrome tabs open, photoshop, 2 explorer windows, wireless mouse plugged and 1 external with its own power source. What the heck is going on with this machine?

 

WOW. Didn't know it did that. Thought it was just while gaming on performance mode. That sucks if it crashes while doing regular tasks like that. Sounds like a piece of junk to me. Dell better get on it with a fix soon.

 

Yep happened in Age of Empires online, (thought it was running on intergreted graphics but not sure) and bfbc 2 in like the intro movie.

 

I am starting to believe that it has to do with the motherboard..

 

In that case I am shocked Dell is still selling this computer. Potentially they may need to recall every unit and cost more to get it fixed.

 

Well that sounds like a recall

 

We should let DellChrisM know about this. It's like the power is not properly distributed to motherboard and the GPU to work with insufficient volts causing a random shutdown or a Lockup in the system.

Oh the photoshop and explorer thing that I posted above? It happened TWICE. I tried to replicate the situation, and it worked. I bet it will do it again once I start working.

So, DELLChrisM, If you are reading, please report this to the AW engineers so we will all be happy to have awesome Alienware laptops.

Thanks.

 

You guys all need to relax with the doomsday talk. Give Chris and Engineering a chance, they have only had this for a few days. If something is wrong, its going to be resolved quickly.

 

Doomsday talk, haha nice one!

I hope you're right. *fingers are crossed*

 

Keep in mind, according to the poll, 8 people have no shutdown issues with gaming on battery. If it was a motherboard issue, support would be filled with troubletickets and this forum would be lit up like a christmas tree with posts from every 14x forum member.

Its not a motherboard or hardware defect.

 

Some of the 8 guys changed mind after the poll, so it is not really an accurate result.
It is likely they have not changed to Max Performance in power settings and claimed it is working fine.

 

Wouldn't this suggest it's the CPU crashing w/ insufficient power and not the GPU?

Can someone run a simple test with a java infinite loop to max out the CPU to 100% leaving the GPU idle?

 

We'll soon find out.

I don't want to call Dell Tech Support until DellChrisM has a report on the root and cause of this issue. I still have my hopes up.. I have 17 more days.

Makes me want to go back to school to study Computer engineering.

 

^

It's easy to miss a circumstantial issue.

 

That's what i studied built me a full system computer in CAD that operated at a whopping 11mhz or 22mhz with the turbo button!!

 

This one of those issues where that problem may exist on my m14x, but I simply haven't come across it. I don't game on the battery and usually just take my laptops to game in my hotel rooms. Hopefully they will fix it, but for me it will likely never be an issue. I can certainly understand why others are far more concerned with the issue, however.

 

LIKE! hahah.

Off topic: I failed the math entrance exam. That's why it didn't work out for me.

 

has anyone installed Win7 SP1 before gaming with battery?

 

well i installed win 7 sp1 and have not yet gamed with battery. Tons of plugged in gaming, but no unplugged

 

Yes it only took them a Year to figure out a simple Mechanical hinge problem.

Give them ttttttiiiiiimmmmmeee.....

 

Unless I've missed something, the fact that the system cannot be powered back up unless it's connected to the wall or the battery is physically disconnected implies to me that it is the battery's internal over-current protection.

lithium-ion batteries in consumer devices always have overcurrent protection since a runaway li-ion battery is extremely dangerous... there's a lot of energy packed in there.

It sounds to me like the overcurrent protection in the battery was not designed to handle the max system draw. The most likely "solution" from dell (imho) is going to be a bios update that enforces underclocking the gpu on battery.

Removing the overcurrent protection is likely not an option since it leads to overheating in the battery itself which not only greatly reduces overall battery life, but if allowed to continue can result in extremely energetic fires... ;-)

 

Sounds like a plausible theory. We can only hope it's only the battery.

But would this "issue" decrease battery life already?

 

That depends.... in general, if whatever you're doing takes over an hour to drain a li-ion cell, then you're within its design tolerances. If you're pulling enough energy from it to drain it in under an hour, most cells start to get hot.

I don't know what the gaming battery life is on an m14x when you don't set it to max performance... if it lasts say at least an hour and a half, you'll get a reasonable life from the battery... (hundreds of cycles). if you're draining it in just half an hour, say, then I'd imagine you'll notice battery wear pretty quickly (noticeable wear within 50 full cycles).

I suspect that when everything is at "max performance" the laptop is drawing 130+W which paired with a 63Wh battery gives a battery life of under half an hour, so the over-current protection is preventing the type of damage to which i was referring.

 

The 'issue' (if it is the issue) is due to the battery's internal resistance, something that's present in every single battery (but is higher in some than others) and is pretty much unavoidable.

Basically, while on a lower current it shouldn't be a problem (as said above, you're perfectly fine if it takes more than an hour to drain). However, start to drain that power faster, you increase the current, which also means the battery starts to waste more energy across itself causing serious heating and possibly a fire. That's why the safety mechanisms are in place and why it is only rated for a certain current.

It's quite possible that when gaming in high performance, it exceeds this current limit. The vast majority of higher performance laptops will underclock CPU and/or GPU on battery, as the battery cannot physically supply the same power as the mains without exceeding its current safety limits. I know my old M17's battery can only provide about half of the power of mains at maximum load (at which point it still only has 45 minutes of battery life, but still running with GPUs seriously underclocked).

If the M14x's components are running at full power on battery, like they would on mains power, that would almost definitely trigger such a shutdown.

But, to answer your original question, the effect on battery life in low intensity tasks would be negligable.

The question now is whether Dell can actually solve this issue by bringing out a better battery, or if they'll limit the maximum power draw of the CPU and GPU on battery (by underclocking them). Unfortunately, if the battery is the problem, there is no other solution; Dell either has to release a battery capable of higher current output, or underclock on battery. People can complain all they like about it, but the same thing applies to almost every other gaming laptop out there as I've said above (and the ones that don't underclock on battery are the ones with less powerful components).

 

Very good insight there sir. So you're saying the (almost) perfect balance is with the M11x, having an ultra low voltage CPU and a middle class GPU that even at underclocked or stock situations can still perform up to par or even a little bit higher in gaming while on battery.

Well, If the battery is the issue, we will see. Since someone in this forum will be receiving his battery anytime soon and I hope the user will test and post the results whenever he can.

 

Now you guys reminded me, when I swapping the hdd in m14x I have compared the battery to m11x R2. They are identical!
Considering m14x consume few times more power than m11x, this isnt really a surprise

 

Performed a clean install of Windows 7 w/SP 1. Installed default drivers from DELL provided disk. Unplugged the laptop, set refresh rate to 60 hertz, set the graphics to high performance via Alien FX, and ran Furmark as recommended by an earlier post. Within 10 seconds, my computer shut down. I had to plug in the adapter to turn it back on. I was hoping to be the exception to the rule... I'm looking forward for a fix/compensation for this issue. Please don't disappoint me DELL!!!

Alienware M14X / i7 2720QM 2.2GHz / 6GB DDR3 / 900p (1600x900) / 1.5GB DDR3 NVIDIA GeForce GT 555M / 256 Solid State Drive

 

Hmm, I just ordered my m14x 2 days ago. I hope my unit doesn't do this.

 

and you already voted no in the poll?

 

lol why did u vote then?

i'm 99% sure yours is gonna do it, unless yours comes with a fix already in it.. then lucky u !

 

If really underclock gpu will lower gpu performance. Maybe they will send battery replacements?

 

Just got off the phone its an Nvidia bios issue they expect fix on or around may 19th

 

thanks for the info! +1rep

 

so which is it then?

the card drawing to much power or the battery not providing enough power?

I'm hoping it's the battery cause I would hate for the gt555m to be downclocked and voltage reduced

 

I have no idea but I am in the same boat its screwed up my m11x can run higher on battery than this

 

Either way I would be happy to have a rock solid system on the go. I just cannot imagine working on important documents while travelling and suddenly the power cut, potentially this problem could cost the user way more than $10k+

 

Of course we all want a rock solid system with no flaws. But we paid for what was advertised and featured. Which is a gaming laptop. (yes i understand gaming should be done while connected to an a/c adapter) Now, if it comes down to having to downclock the video card substantially to where it hinders performance while on the go, that would be disappointing to a lot of people. It would also suggest that alienware didn't do sufficient testing on the laptop and most probably, which i'm not hoping for, is that the laptop doesn't meet the requirements that it was advertised at. Maybe it cannot support a Gt55m.