M17xR4 with 880M crashes on battery

It works fine when plugged in (I think I have had two instances where the screen goes black for a millisecond and then comes back to inform me that the display driver crashed and successfully reset, nothing serious).

Performance, temperature, everything is fine.

When I unplug the power to run on battery, the screen goes black, it seems to try to show my desktop (blank white windows as if they are unresponsive, etc) then a bit more black before it stays there and freezes (usually the screen is entirely black except for the mouse cursor somewhere on the screen).

It seems to me that it's 99% likely something to do with the graphics card/driver in some way, but of course I'm open to suggestions about a faulty battery or something else.

Is it some kind of power issue? Can I reduce it to a level where it is stable on battery?

 

Anyone? I literally can't allow the power cord to ever even fall out for a millisecond or my laptop crashes.

I tried updating to the latest NVIDIA drivers (344.75) but I had the same issue (although I got BSOD instead of just freezing and going black; I forget the exact file that it quoted but it was indeed the graphics driver, something like "nvdmmkm.sys"). I have now rolled back to the 337.88 driver.

 

Does it crash if unplugged in safe mode? Can you boot to Windows on battery? Any modified anything (vBIOS, BIOS, ETC.)? Any overclocking software? Are you running the 120Hz screen? Might wanna try forcing the laptop to the dGPU if you've got the normal screen and see if it still does it. Can you reinstall on a spare drive with just drivers installed and see if it still does it? Any warranty in case it is a hardware problem?

First priority is figuring out if it is a hardware or software issue. :thumbsup:

edit: Also what OS?

 

Thanks, Dave. It ended up being something that should've been fairly obvious to start troubleshooting with, but it wasn't until I saw your post that I even stopped to consider it.

I was using svl7's custom vBIOS from techninferno. All of the feedback for it was positive and I seem to recall reading that it was actually essential when I was researching 880M compatibility in the M17xR4, so I somehow overlooked this very significant factor (derp). I flashed my backup and everything is magically fixed (although it is running 10-15 degrees hotter, so I'm certainly not doubting the thermal/performance improvement that the custom vBIOS provides).

Happily running on battery now
I might even really push my luck and try the latest NVIDIA driver again.

 

Glad to hear that fixed it!

I wonder why that causes it to crash though... maybe something with Optimus not liking the modded vBIOS? Can you disable the built in iGPU and only run the dGPU to see if that works fine switching to battery? I'd say a 10-15C temp drop would be a great reason to troubleshoot why it isn't working. Maybe post in the R4 owners lounge and see if anyone else is running that setup without issue?

 

The R4 has always been flaky with the 880M.. The 780M worked with minimal problems...

 

We're glad it was something simple. Enjoy your Alienware!