M17x 2 problems...

Hey, I've just spent over 6 hours trying to fix two niggling problems with my M17x, and was hoping someone could lend me a hand, I'm throwing in the towel for tonight.

I recently reformatted the whole drive and reinstalled windows. Everything works except for two things.

Firstly, my computer needs me to prod it so it boots correctly. Its currently running Windows 7.

What I mean to say is, if i simply power it on and leave it alone, it tries to boot, and then ends up at a black screen with a flashing cursor on the upper left and basically just stays there. I'm forced to manually sit through boot and hit F12 every single time and manually select the boot from HDD option, and if I do this, it works fine. I have no idea why. I've checked the bios, and HDD is set as the uppermost option to boot from. I don't even have any CDs in the drive... its driving me crazy and I have no idea how to fix it.

The second issue is that I can no longer use my GTX 280M cards. Everytime I go into the bios and enable them, after I log into Windows, I get a black screen. I might hook it up to a monitor tomorrow to see if I can figure out the problem, but for now, basically it seems like there's something wrong with my drivers. I've tried repeatedly installing and reinstalling them to absolutely no avail. Enabling SLI in the bios results in the black screen.

Hope someone can help.

Thanks in advance.

 

Do you have a raid setup? if so you need to go to bios and change it to enable raid.

 

Yep, I do, and I already set it. RAID's working fine, i just don't know why it insists on not booting from HDD unless I tell it to.

 

Try re-flashing the BIOS A03.

 

I already have A03. That was actually what started the whole fiasco that forced a reformat on me. I forgot to set the RAID the first time around, and Windows recovery somehow messed up my array... I finally got it fixed, the only leftover problem is the strange booting procedure I've been forced to put up with.

Unless you mean reflash it.

 

That's exactly what I said

 

Haha, sorry, sleep deprived I'll go try it.

 

Well, reflashing seems to have fixed the first problem=)! thanks. But problem with the SLI is still there. Whenever I enable it in the bios, the moment I log in or AlienSense detects my face, the screen blacks out. I can see the mouse cursor moving around, but nothing else. Display driver problem? I'm using the ones from the Dell website.

 

Yes, most likely it's the driver. Try installing the 195.XX or 186.82.
Use CCleaner after removing the current driver (when uninstalling from the device manager tick the "remove the driver software" option).

 

I was having a similar issue with the blackscreen and the Alienware tech installed the 195.62 driver directly from the Nvidia site. Haven't had the problem since.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/notebook_winvista_win7_x64_195.62_whql.html

 

define niggling

 

So Dell Support is pushing the 195.62 driver from NV? Interesting. They need to update the in-house driver.

 

That was on my second call to tech support. The first tech re-installed the driver from the Dell website. The second tech was obviously back and forth in conversation with someone else while on the phone with me, then finally went to the Nvidia site and installed the 195.62 driver. The first tech also told me that they were having alot of problems with the hybrid graphics and told me I must disable hybrid and integrated in the bios. The second tech had me re-enable hybrid and integrated.

 

please will someone define niggling does it mean bugging pesky what?

 

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/niggling

 

now that you point me in the direction of a dictionary i dont know why i didnt look it up my self "facepalm"

 

lol... No problem, we all have those moments.

 

The last problem has FINALLY been resolved.

I'd installed, uninstalled and reinstalled the damned nVidia drivers a good half dozen times to no avail. Finally I was reading an old thread about SLI problems that mentioned disabling the on board 9400 graphics card in the bios as well to see if that would force the computer would detect the 280Ms. i did that, and when windows started, it detected and installed drivers for the 280Ms automatically. the computer rebooted, I enabled SLI, and it worked like a charm.

What an ordeal. But all is well now. Thanks for all the help guys, hopefully if anyone faces the same issue in the future they'll know how to fix it.

Cheers.