Help needed: M17 freezes when playing games after 1 to 30min needs restart

Hi dudes and dudettes,

I purchased an M17 after i inquired in "what lappy to buy" post and i love it.
However i have a major issue with games and i would like to ask for your assistance

1. The Spec:
M17
T9400
4gb stock ram
Xfire - drivers tried 8+, 9.1, 9.2
2 HDDs x 160GB no raid
1440x900 monitor + Samsung bw226 168x1050 (conneted thru HDMI with HDMI to DVI converter)
Realteh HD v2.14, v2.17
everythin else hardware-like is standard

OS
Vista x64
Win7

2. The issue
When i start a game and play after just few minutes the Lappy totaly freezes and is irresposive and needs cold shut down/reboot
Games - WOW, Sacred 2, FarCry, Prince of P (latest one) the list goes on....

3. Observations
Mostly done on Win7 with which i fel in love and seems much more stable than Vista x64. The game as i said freezes leaving current sound on freeze to be repeated to infinity. Ones it happened when i played a video thru bsplayer

4. Possible causes
- It could be a video issue imo and/or sound issue since it seems to be better when i installed some audio drivers from guru3d v2.14
- It could be that im using 2 monitors while i run the games. It happens both windowed and full screen on 1680x1050 Samsung which is also main monitor (task bar and ie run on secondary-lappy mon)
- It could be that im using the HDMI and for audio out im using the headphone to plug my speakers. I tried with the regular analog cable the quality on the samsung with it is unbearable and swithed it back. It had these lines and the whole background was "swimming" ...

5. Tested solutions
- Obviously lots of video drivers (clean "lege artis" installs) with marginal succes installed in win7 and complete success of install in Vista. However this doesent seem to solve it.
- Various audio drivers listed above
- The best stability which SOLVED warcraft crashes on WIN7 was disabling the desktop composition
- Good stability (still freezes) was in Sacred 2 when i disabled laptop monitor and desktop composition. Still froze when i played youtube audio on the background... but after 2h+
- i run all in admin and vista compatibility

6. Help requested:
Any ideas guys, how i can track the issue or if u need more specific information to help you help me. Its an exceptional lappy and i love it, but its causing me headaches for 3 months now.


Thanks for reading this and in advance for the advices. Sorry the bad English.

Have a nice day
Nick

 

Try changing 32bit to 16bit in display settings and test it again, maybe this works for you.

I never had the problems you mention yet i played the same games on modded 9.1 drivers.

Good luck!

 

do the games freeze in vista x64?

 

maybe no help but i would

1 checked that im not blocking the air vents

2 if you gammer and know most of the other stuff id get cpu program to max out cpu on test to see id thats ok.

3 do the same for the gcards

4 if its getting hot you say i wouldnt think its the ram but you could swap them around.

when playing a game put hw monitor on after cple of mins ctrl alt del and see what temps you getting before it crashes.

like i say maybe no help to you but!!!!

 

Check the GPU temps, some M17's still have protective tape on their thermal pads, resulting it lousy cooling performance and massive overheating problems.

 

Thanks for the replies guys and sorry for not posting this, but:
- yes vista 64 is even worse than win7
- 3dMark06 runs smooth and shows regular scores (between 12-13 i cant remember exactly) for the spec
- i got CPU ang GPU non-clocked, ill stress-test GPU and CPU as suggested
- i got everest's gadget running all the time and CPU and both GPU temps dont reach more than 55 C and i have Zelman NC2000 below that baby
- i think that runnin desktop on 16bit would probly solve it, but i hate the way it looks and crippling the visuals on that mashine is not somethin i wanna do...

 

and does your fans come on ????

speed up ect

 

Kcuk its not heat he said it does not go over 55c and he has a cooler

do you put the laptop to sleep?

 

Doubt he meant 55c under full load. I think he probably meant 55c in idle. So id expect the temps under load will be a lot higher than that.
Except if the cooler actually drops the temps by 20-30c which i dont think so

 

well i kinda figured but i still dont think its heat he does run a zalaman under there.

can you please let us know if you put it to sleep and download this and post a screen shot after 30 mins of gaming

 

Id say give the temps a chance, although i doubt you will actually manage to see anything useful except if its a "tape" issue.

After that just remove all external devices, monitors, speakers etc and just try play a game with just an external mouse. If it still makes the problem then try remove one of the hdd's (the 2nd one that is) and then if you still have the issue call AW cause its probably a hardware issue with your m17

Of course you can always try a clean OS reinstall just to make sure its not a software issue before sending it back.