Alienware 17 Keeps Freezing

Hi all,

Can anyone help with this? I have run the pre-boot scan and it reported all was OK (CPU, MOBO, Drives, RAM etc.). I have also updated to the latest (A14) BIOS and updated to the latest Intel RAID Drivers with no success.
I have read that disabling ASPM in the BIOS might help, but my BIOS is locked, so can't do that

Finally, this started about a week ago (literally a couple of weeks AFTER my warranty expired, and I can't afford $300 to extend it!!) So I don't have access to DELL's support hotline.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, as it is my main computer and only works for 10-15 minutes until it freezes.

Regards

Shando

PS: the laptop is running two WD 750GB Drives in RAID0 with a 80GB SSD as a cache.

 

Have you tried a backup and reload yet? Could be a corrupt driver, Virus or even still a hardware failure. The tests are decent but they won't rule out hardware for sure.

 

I´d reinstall the operating system at first. It could solve the problem and is free to try
Regards an good luck.

 

Well on what you are saying that it boots all ok it cant be corrupt windows files , and happens after 15 mins sounds more heat related to me , or poss hard drive issue , first thing i would do would be to check temps on cpu and gpu , does it do it regardless of the scenario , i mean sitting in desktop or is it just games ? , it could also be driver related as certain system files are not loaded until you actually need them , it could also be a power issue , i would start with temps first especially cpu , do the fans run all the time ?

 

Hi all,

Thanks for the replies.

I haven't tried a re-install yet, as I wanted to see if it could be something else first.

With regards to temps, the CPU stays around 55C and the GPU around 45C, and the freeze happens no matter what I'm doing. I've mainly been surfing the web, and using Notepad++ (nothing heavy). Also, I have the power connected most of the time as I use the laptop as a desktop replacement.

The only thing I have noticed is that there is a sound (like a double click) from the DVD Drive every so often, almost like it's being polled by something, and it is usually straight after one of these that it freezes. I've also run "scannow" and the file system checker in the Win 8 tools, and they both keep finding corrupt files etc. so, my guess is either a drive is failing, or there is something wrong with the RAID driver?

I'm away on business most of next week, so won't really be able to do much until I'm back, when I'll try to rebuild (preferably without the RAID setup).

Regards

Shando

 

Request a replacement maybe? Sounds like a failing gpu/mobo.

 

Yeah hard drive is one of my choices , could also be something to do with the caching drive i take it you mean msata not ssd, maybe its corrupting the data , i would remove that first as it will run fine without it , but you need to take it apart to remove it , plenty of guides though ..worth a shot

 

Well, I had a similar issue. I have the Alienware-17 with the following specs:
Nvidia Geforce GTX 880M (8 GB GDDR5), 1 TB HDD, 256 GB SSD, i7-4710M (upto 3.5 GHz Turbo)
The issue I had was that my laptop used to freeze continuously after 5 to 10 mins of operation and restart automatically when operated on battery power only. After disabling the auto restart from settings it stopped functioning and used to stay frozen until I forced shutdown.
The diagnosis reports displayed that everything was fine. I tried a couple of other things like disabling the SupportAssist, Recovery, Factory Reset, re-seating the battery, HDD re-installment, SSD re-installment. It didn't help though. Finally, after much tinkering I figured out that the issue was with software and not the hardware. My recent update to the Nvidia GTX Version 361.43 was causing the issue. I downloaded the version 359.00 from Nvidia's website and the issue was finally resolved. So if you are running the Nvidia version 361.43, try rolling back to some previous version. Hope it helps...

 

Dude, you're replying to a thread created in April.... Driver 361.43 is the latest Nvidia driver... While his issue could have possibly be related to driver corruption as well, it is certainly unrelated to your own situation

 

Ohh!!! My bad bro. I didn't check the date while posting. Anyways, the issue might have been related to driver corruption or probably specs compatibility; however my post on the tag "Alienware Keeps Freezing" was pretty germane; since that is what used to happen in my case. Can you explain why you think it's unrelated?; because I think I posted it under the tag 'Alienware 17' and I didn't quote or allude to anyone's issue here. The assertion I made was straight and generic over the laptop's freezing issue or perhaps a delineation of my own issue. Perhaps if someone is having a similar issue, it might just help him; since this thread is the first result one gets after looking up for "Alienware Freezing" Do you want me to start a new discussion for the same issue ? I'm genuinely asking since I recently joined this community.