Problems after upgrading to i7-840qm

I am the owner of an m15x. Original configuration with an i5-540m and gtx-260m.

I recently bought an i7-840qm processor and 8Gb of memory and installed both.

After upgrading the CPU, windows 7 x64 started crashing at login, I got a few BSODs ("A clock interrupt was not received on a secondary processor within the allocated time interval") but mostly just freezes at the "welcome" sign after logging in. With a high power profile I did get one crash while booting windows before getting to the login prompt.

This error sounds like the CPU, but I found that without the Nvidia driver running this does not happen. I tried to reinstall windows 7 and I tried an older Nvidia driver as well as the current and the latest beta drivers. All results in the same problem, but safe mode or running on the microsoft VGA driver works just fine.

Linux (Ubuntu 11.04 x64) also starts up just fine, but the Nvidia driver seems to be locked to performance level 1 (0 lowest, 4 highest). I can play games under Linux but adaptive or maximum performance mode never goes beyond 1, but I don't get crashes or glitches.

Also the CPU seems to be able to take a lot of abuse, I tried rendering a scene in Blender under Linux and it performed admirably, kept going at 100% on all cores for an hour without anything going wrong. Cores were sitting at around 75-80C temperature while this was going on, they idle at just under 50C.

All in all the hardware seems stable enough, except for the odd Nvidia driver issue.

I tried resetting the bios and I tried turning off everything that I could in the bios (sound, network, etc.) to see if it was power related, same issue. I haven't ruled out power yet, but it seems unlikely. In any event I've ordered the 240watt power supply to see if it will make any difference.

I wonder if reseating the graphics card would help.

I could really use some pointers on what to look for in troubleshooting this.

Possibly more information in my thread on the Dell forum: Re: CPU + memory upgrade for Alienware m15x - Alienware Forum - Alienware Club - Dell Community

 

i had the same problem and the same bsod error when i first got my m15x from dell. so i shipped it back to dell and they replace the ram, which i thought was weird because it passed the mem tests. But i had a 5850m, so im not sure about the nvidia drivers.
have you tried swapping your ram back?

 

Well that's strange. I don't know if there is any such thing as a graphics card that works "half". I'd imagine that a piece of hardware as complex as that, would be all or nothing.

I'd also try to swap back to the old RAM just to make sure. Try the old CPU as well. If you reach the conclusion that it must be the GPU that is dead, and you're out of warranty, you can order something like a GTX 560M (or one of the more powerful AMD GPUs). The 560M cost around 250 USD on ebay.

 

Hi, I did try to swap the RAM back with the same results.

I agree its hard to believe the gfx card is half dead, but it does seem a lot of people with Nvidia GPUs (notebook and desktop alike) have had this problem and it was the card. I am going to try windows XP and see if I get a similar problem with that.

Swapping back the CPU is a last resort for me, but one I've considered. I want to try reseating my gfx card first and apply some better thermal paste.

The thing I don't understand is the gfx card acting weird in both windows and Linux, while the CPU happily keeps trucking on both no matter what I throw after it. With the RAM possibility out of the way it seems more likely to be GPU than CPU to me.

Also in the past my gfx card has been slightly unstable, often crashing in games and especially when playing flash videos.

Will the laptop be able to run both the i7-840qm and a gtx-560m on its power circuit? Because in that case I'll do that.

I do have a PSU rated for more watts coming (the m17x r3 one, which is supposed to fit the m15x), but I understand that the internal power supply is also limiting how much it can draw, at best the new psu would just run cooler and better be able to keep up with demand.

 

it should be fine the 560m uses the same power as a 5870m which is about 50-75w.
im running an xm cpu that uses more power than yours and also the 6990m which runs 75-100w, and while playing BF3 it consumes about 145-152w total, also if i do an overclocked bench run of say 3dm 11, it consumes over 180w, so with your setup you should be fine (well under 150w mark)

 

How do you feed it 180w on the 150w power supply? Or are the last 30w simply lost in heat from the power brick?

I'm trying to figure out how I can measure the reliability of single components in any reasonable way other than what I've been doing.

I really appreciate everybody's help on this.

 

sorry forgot to mention that im currently on a 240w psu, but i was able to pull over 150w on the old psu which i still have around here somewhere but it gets extremely hot and the 240w is at worst warm
and other more legendary benchers around here have proven that the 150w psu can provide over the 150w mark

 

According to Intel's spec sheet, the 740QM and 840QM use the same amount of power. I'm running 560M together with a 740QM, and it's no problem.

There is a thread on this forum dedicated to the installation procedure (there is a few things you need to be aware of - like the driver inf mod and the x bracket that needs to be reused from the old card)

 

Just got my new power supply, which I hope will fit the laptop, but at this point I don't expect it to help.

Fersknen: If the 560M requires modifications to the driver, will this card work in Linux with the nvidia drivers for that OS? I spend most of my time in Linux and I need graphics performance there as well since I do a fair amount of 3D modelling. I only use windows for games.

 

I have no idea how Linux' kernel mod thing is put together. The driver mod is simply that you need to add Eurocoms GTX560m cards hardware id to the inf file, so windows will accept the driver as being valid for the card.

I have no idea what-so-ever if that is needed on Linux.

 

Power supply fits, sadly it didn't change anything as others had pointed out. Next is reseating the gfx card, then putting the old CPU back in if that doesn't work.

If it still acts the same after the old CPU is in place I'm assuming its the gfx card.

 

Odd that it broke down when you changed the CPU and RAM

 

The store (laptop-monkey, they have been very helpful and responsive) I got the CPU from said they have seen it before with that revision of the m15x and they had a customer with the exact same laptop and same problem fix it with a new vbios.

Any idea where I can obtain a new vbios and how to put it on?

Information about my card from the Linux driver:
Graphics Processor: GeForce GTX 260M
CUDA Cores: 112
VBIOS Version: 62.92.96.00.0a
Memory: 1024 MB
Memory Interface: 256-bit
Bus Type: PCI Express x16 Gen1
Bus ID: PCI:2:0:0
PCI Device ID: 0x0618
PCI Vendor ID: 0x10de
IRQ: 16
PCI-E Max Link Speed: 2500
X Screens: Screen 0
Display Devices: LGD (DFP-0)


I figured I might also try reflashing the system bios.

 

I just noticed it says "PCI Express x16 Gen1", shouldn't this be a Gen2 card?

Anyone got an idea of how to get my hands on a compatible vbios? I've been searching for one, but can't find it.

 

I don't think Dell has ever released a revised vbios for the 260m card. I have no idea if it should be Gen1 or 2. Odds are that it's unrelated to your problem.

 

Yeah, I'm pretty stumped at this point No idea if its the graphics card, cpu, etc. I just gotta build up the courage to pick the machine apart. Its ironic, I work with server hardware all day, so I know the more you much around inside the more likely you are to damage it even more, which is why I'm trying to avoid it, but I have to bite the bullet and do it.

After taking the power and battery out and holding the power button for a couple of minutes I managed to boot up and log into windows once with the nvidia driver running.

I installed furmark and got about 10-11 fps no idea if thats good or not. I didn't get the machine to break, but I noticed that the pcie went from 16x1 to 8x2. Again, no clue if thats good or bad. The driver kept showing the wrong mhz, while gpuz clearly showed the numbers I expected from maximum performance.

I also backed up the vbios and did an md5sum against the only one I could find from that card and it checked out.

Next reboot it was back to behaving badly again.

 

Are you on A09 bios? http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m15x/549258-m15x-bios-a09-discussion-thread.html This tells you how to do it.

 

Well, going from 16 -> 8 only means that the bandwidth consumed by the card is going up and down. That's normal during operations. Only really when some app is loading textures into the cards memory, would I expect it to ever remotely max the bandwidth of PCI-E x16

11 FPS in Furmark for the 260M card seems normal.

Hmm... well if you handn't reinstalled windows I'd be screaming software issue, since the behavior can be changed by rebooting.

I'm assuming that you also had the problem when you switched back to your old CPU?

As for options - you can always try to get a new graphics card for it. But of course that won't help if it isn't actually the GPU that's damaged. I also question why your GPU would be damaged in the first place, since I'm assuming that you didn't touch it during the CPU upgrade?

 

Already on A09 bios.

I never got around to trying my old cpu again. Been really busy, was planning on taking my gtx out this weekend so I could reseat it and give it some better thermal paste but didn't get around to that either.

Thing is its hard for me to believe its the CPU because it seems rock solid, I can't get it to crash any other place than windows 7 login. The one time I did get to log in it ran just fine, no crashes or anything.

The one constant thing that seems odd is the gtx, reporting wrong speeds in both operating systems. Might try upgrading it if nothing changes after I try the things I need the time to try.

 

That might be the case, but it's still the only factor that changed in your system when your GPU become uncooperative. You really should, for the sake of elimination, try it again with the old CPU.

Also, if you haven't already, you should try it with the old RAM as well.

 

Yeah I know, its only logic right? I already tried the old ram, no difference.

 

Alright, tried taking out my GTX, blowing dust out of the port, etc., no result, still the same crash when logging into Windows 7.

Replaced my CPU with the old one, everything works well again. I can boot between Linux and Windows, no crashes, Linux can detect the correct GPU values and set maximum power level (verified with UNiGiNE Tropics benchmark, now 797 vs. 365 before.)

Furmark gives me same results as the one time I managed to log into windows, namely ~11fps, but GPU reports correct speed. I let it run for 10 minutes and it got up to 75C.

I don't know if the CPU is defective or something just isn't playing well together. I would be curious to hear from people with an i7-840qm and a gtx-260m in an m15x.

I really want a faster CPU for rendering, but at the same time I don't want to give up games for it.

 

Well, the laptop has been sold with the 840QM CPU back when Dell still carried it. I'd guess that the CPU is defective.

 

It wasn't an option when I bought it, but maybe it was added later.

I will take a chance and ask the seller to send me a replacement part.

Thanks for all your help.

 

Let us know how this works out for you, thinking of going to the 840.

 

Re install the A09 Bios.
I got a 920 xm from laptop monkey yesterday morning,machine behaved badly all day with GTX 460 barely making it by clock speed of 200MHz.
Ran fine first time on reboot this problem occured,Clean windows install made no difference,re installed GPU Drivers and no difference.
Re installed A09 BIOS Bang all good.

 

Windows does not like when you add or remove cores.
Exist an option inside msconfig for limit the number of cores but usually the best option is to reinstall from scratch.

 

Man, thats the only thing I didn't try Too late, the CPU is on its way back for a replacement, hope it gets there or they will make another couple hundred on me, I have nothing but praise for their customer support.

 

New CPU, same problem.

Reinstalling A09 did not work to resolve it. Only thing I can think of now is new GFX card. Oh well.

Thanks to laptop monkey for being so patient with me.

 

It seems to me that the only problem here is that i7-840qm has no graphic card while old CPU has. I assume vBIOS of your GPU is made for working in Nvidia optimus mode. I believe this is the reason. You need to find a BIOS of Alienware 15x model with your GPU AND quad core CPU (720, 740, 820, 840 and XM models).

Also I suggest you to skip using 1-st gen ES/QS I7 CPUs. Many of them have lower memory bandwidth. which is 1066. Normal quad core 1st gen CPUs have 1333Mhz bandwidth. But if you can approve this I would be happy. You can use CPU-z o AIDA64.

BTW how much did you pay for this ES CPU? several hundreds???? OMG!

 

Then flashing his GFX vBIOS should fix the problem...

also he should uninstall Intel HD graphic driver if that's the case

 

I paid ~$200, which isn't bad compared to a boxed cpu.

The memory bandwidth is 1333mhz, which seems right, memory is also much faster than my old CPU measured by "mbw" under Linux.

I've looked for a vbios, but cannot find one, only one I found so far is same revision and has the same md5sum as the one I backed up from my gfx card.

My thoughts were that maybe the pcie bandwidth is nerfed in this ES/QS cpu.

Currently I'm abstaining from games and just running Linux, which works fine for me for the things I do there. Obviously I'd still like a fix if one exist.

 

Since I'm already in the hole with this machine I might as well throw away some more money, so ordered the green GTX-560M from upgradeyourlaptop.

If it has the same issues as my current one I will know there is an issue with either the CPU or motherboard and I will probably at that point just put the old CPU back in and be happy with better graphics performance, as well as use the GPU to do my raytracing instead.

My current 260M has been kind of flaky anyway, and I am starting to get screen artifacts and stuff like that, still thinking its the likely culprit, but I'm sure I will eventually update this thread with the result, maybe my experiences can benefit someone else.

 

Exactly the same problem, graphics won't go to highest performance level. With the i5-540M in it works fine (tested in Linux so far, testing Windows soon).

I guess this concludes my experiment with ES/QS processors.

Update: i7-540M+GTX-560M works fine in Win7 64bit. Furmark ended up around 86C after 15 minutes.

My only reservation with the GTX-560M is the lack of heat-spreaders for the memory chips on the back, but short of getting some and using thermal glue to put them on I don't see what to do.

At least the new graphics card renders twice as fast as the 840QM, which was my main use for that CPU, I guess I'll just use the graphics card for that.

Now I just need to find a new home for that CPU and my old graphics card. Where is the for sale section of this forum?

 

unfortunately it is forbidden to sell on the forum anything QS or Es. Only OEM items.

However I wont tell anyone if you will notify buyers about this in PM. Maybe you will be lucky. But I doubt because Marketplace is stricktly monitored.

 

Yeah, I figured so was actually only joking

 

I still believe that problem is not in CPU being QS. So you can with a pure heart sell it on eBay. But as I told before 200$ for it is a lot so it will take a lot of time to sell.

 

Monsterdog the i7 840qm is a downgrade compared to the i5 540m. Theres like a 20-30% improvement only if tasks uses all 8 threads of the 840qm for 50% more power consumption but overall the i5 540m is more then enough.

I have no idea why people downgrade from 32nm high clocked dual to an old fashioned 45nm cpu with no gpu.

Put it this way its like you having a core 2 duo desktop e8400 and then buying an old q6600 as an upgrade. I would not even replace an i5 540m for an i7 920xm for usability as it will heat up, take lots of power consumption have no switchable graphics.

 

You are wrong. 840qm beats 540m even in single threaded apps. check specs of both. Besides OEM 840qm uses 1333 memory bus while your i5 uses only 1066mhz. See why I am right?

 

The die may be 45nm and has a lower clock frequency, but I use it for 3D rendering and it gave me a solid 25% speed increase with the two extra cores.

For now the i5 is back in the machine, I have a used (but tested) OEM i7-740qm on its way to test with. It has the same TDP as the 840qm, so I'll see if its a problem for my motherboard to supply the extra power or if its the ES being crippled in some way.

 

Well, with an oem 740qm it has the same problem, gtx won't go to highest performance level. At this point I don't know what to do, guessing there is something wrong with the power circuits or something else on the motherboard.

Guess I'll have to figure out how to repair that or just give up and get a new computer. Probably not a super expensive laptop next time.

 

AS I TOLD! It is not ES/QS problem. CPU is fine.
I still believe that it is either vBIOS OR BIOS.

 

Same problem with two different graphics cards, the second one not a Dell part, and a reflash of the motherboard bios?

I'm leaning more towards faulty power circuit myself, but I'd love to have a solution for this.

Just to sum up, I tried:

* new power supply
* new battery
* new graphics card (gtx-560m)
* different i7-840qm es/qs cpu
* oem i7-740qm cpu
* reflash of system bios after 840qm was installed
* bios resets every time I had it apart, as well as holding the power button for 30 seconds each time with no battery in
* reinstalling windows
* official drivers
* current drivers
* beta drivers
* making sure I cleared stealth mode state

I used an anti-static wrist strap and anti-static mat, silver based thermal compound, new thermal pads on all the right parts, temperatures are quite reasonable on all parts.

So far the graphics card only works at full speed in Linux with the i5-540m and at all in Windows with the same CPU.

Update: briefly had the same problem with the i5, half speed graphics in Linux. I unplugged the AC power, plugged it back in and I was good.