M17xR4 Possible GPU issue...need advice

Hey guys,

So I have ran into this issue twice in the past week, while playing Company of Heroes 2 my laptop crashes to this grey screen as shown. Its hard to see in the pictures but there are vertical bars all over the screen. The only way to get out of this grey screen is to hold down the power button and shut down. I thought this might just be an issue with the game but when I try to turn my laptop back on the screen remains black. It requires several (3-4) power off/on in order for the screen to start working again. Windows then does its "windows did not shut down properly" recovery. My warranty is running out in the next week or two and I am growing concerned that my GPU may be going bad. I have fiddled around with the drivers a bit in the past but have never ran into this issue with the game that I have been playing a couple years. I am a beginner when it computer hardware so any advice would be helpful. Is this a hardware issue? or what else? Sorry for the possibly dumb question but I am dealing with final exams currently and thought this would be the best platform to get a quick response before my warranty runs out.

 

Your GPU is going bad. Send it into Alienware ASAP before you will be forced into repairing/buying a new GPU.

The 7970m is notorious for failing as is the 675m/580m.

If you do not want to buy another, you may be able to consider getting it reballed. Don't bake it, it isn't worth it. Save up some cash ($100 bucks should do) and send it into some guy who will reball it. The card should be back to normal, and if the guy used lead solder, it will last longer.

 

Definitely gpu is going bad @ayylmao is right.

7970M is much better than 6990M crap (Jesus I owned that thing) but it's still a bad card. I also recommend reballing if you want to save money or you can always switch to the Nvidia's GPU which are much more stable and drivers are much better. But they cost much more so, you know

And it's not dumb question. It's very important to let you know that AMD cards are failing much more often that the Nvidia's one. I had two 6990M and I will surely never buy AMD gpu again. If you are still on the warranty you can send this card and try to ask for the switch to the Nvidia, maybe they will give you NV card for free. They can also send you 8970M (7970M with more vRAM) or R9 M290 (next 7970M with more vRAM lol) that are more stable than the 7970M. Just don't accept 580M/675M as replacement and you will be fine.

 

Indeed, get the GPU replaced ASAP before warranty runs out OP.. This doesn't look good..

 

White screen and occasional boot ups - most likely a GPU issue, so go for the warranty ASAP.
7970M are not very reliable cards, although better than it's predecessor' horrific 6970M\6990M failure statistics

 

Send us an e-mail to [email protected] with a brief description of the issue and your service tag so we can help out with the parts needed.

 

Thanks for all replies. I should've filled you all in awhile back but I got it replaced with another 7970M on May 30th. (I didn't start using it till ~2 days after) which surprise surprise just died this week . Anyways, a great service rep (compared to the first replacement) has already scheduled another replacement hopefully the third time's a charm... keeping my fingers crossed