Need Help with M17 System

Hey, guys! I recently bought a M17 from Alienware Europe. It was dual HD3870, Q9100, and 4G DDR3. The system was designed to be the best, yet I encountered a critical problem while playing large 3D games. And the problem was so weird that even after several international calls and countless emails with alienware, neither the company nor I could determine what was going on. Now alienware wants me to send the computer back to their facility in Ireland, but here is my situation: I live in China, and the warranty does not include shipping fee from Asia, which is costly indeed; and our custom is very picky toward electronic products not on their "3C Standard" list, and it will cost me much trouble to get the computer into China again ( as it already has in the first place). Therefore, before I pack it up and send back to Ireland ( the last thing I wanna do), I hope you guys can help me determine what is going on with this marvelous yet tricky machine...

OK, let me describe the situation:

It happens every time (actually, not exactly every time, I will explain later) I play large 3D games on the computer (so far I have tried Crysis Warhead, Grand Theft Auto IV, Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts and Men of War), that the first 3-5 minutes the computer performs smoothly, and then the graphic and audio starts to lag simultaneously, as time passes, the lagging becomes even worse. For most cases, the game continues while the lagging grows to some unbearable extent, as today, I try to run Men of War with this unbearable lagging for almost 2 hours, and nothing becomes better or worse, just graphic and audio lagging at the same pace. Yet for some very rare occasions, the system will restart itself. And I have once experienced the lagging when I was using Word while listening to music.

After contacting alienware, the technical support wanted me to do SP2004 and 3Dmark06 tests on the computer and sent back to them the results. I got two very low 3Dmark06 scores out of ten tests, both 9000+, and the other were O.K. (around 12000), temperature fine.

However, I found out a way to avoid the lagging after the tests.

Games perform smoothly right after a 3Dmark06 test with every sub-test to repeat 3 times. No matter how long I played, 1 hour, 2 hours or 3 hours, the performance would be O.K., not so O.K. as it should be with such powerful hardware, but at least the lagging disappeared temporarily.

However, if I do not launch a game right after a 3Dmark06 test, say, surf the Internet or just leave it idle for about 10 minutes, the lagging problem comes again.

The same problem happens when I watch videos at full screen mode. That means, if I want to run a game or watch a movie, the 3DMark06 tests should be applied first.

In addition, it is definitely not software problem. Because I have respawned the computer to factory status and only installed games on it for many times, and the problems still.

It is so weird, isn't it? Does anybody here know what is going on with my M17? Please tell me, thank you very much.

The attachment is my test result with SP2004 and 3DMark06.

 

Sounds like a heat issue

 

I am sure it is not a heating problem.
It is still cold in Shanghai, and the computer is operating in a room temperature of about 22 centi degree. I have extra USB cooling pad under it. And the GPU temperature has never passed 82 centi degree, and CPU 75 centi degree.

 

BIOS? chipset? update both to be sure.

 

Ok ... Sorry try updateing every driver you can then see if it works

 

BIOS is up to date. And AW has never released chipset upgrade.

 

Thank you, they are all up to date.

 

Wow I'm perplexed .... It makes no sense .... You say it work fine after 3dmark but not before.... So the gpu isn't bad ur temps r down ... Faulty mobo?

 

What is mobo?

 

Kampfen,

Sorry to hear about this issue, have you ran the system with one video card only? Did it start from day one and if so, would you be able to install the operating system using the recovery disk instead and not the respawn? This way everything is installed from scratch. Please let us know.

Thank you.

 

Motherboard .... Not sure though some one else may be able to help more

 

The situation was already there when I received the computer.

Actually, one of your tech support agents has told me to disable one video card. Nothing changed...

I think I will first take your advice to install the system from the recovery disk.

Thank you.

 

Thank you, man.

 

imo sounds like gpu driver issues. what gpu driver are you using?

 

The problem exists in both ATI and AW original drivers...
I have tried every possible combination of drivers.

 

imo then i would start fresh with a fresh install and go from there. make a few more posts then shoot me a pm. ive been through similar before with someone

 

Thank you... I will do it tomorrow... It's 2:30 A.M. here. gotta sleep.

Thank you, guys!

 

i would NOT do a respawn. i would start with a simple vista or windows 7 install and ill send you links for the most current base drivers for the system. they are all up to date as of yesterday. this resolved his issues then any other alienware software you may want you can get from the web site like the keyboard color stuff (though you dont really need it the colors can be changed without all the extra junk imo) i like a clean system

 

I will do it tomorrow morning. Can you mail me all the driver address?
It seems I cannot use the PM feature in the this forum at the moment.
I appreciate your help, thx.

Plz mail to:
[email protected]

 

sure as soon as i get to my office ill send them over to you. im not a alienware rep or anything but i do know the system very well (former ocz reseller) and ill help as much as i can

 

Thank you!

 

Hey kampfen,

I first tought of heating aswell untill i checked your attachement. Both your CPU and GPU are at "good" temperature levels.

I did notice you get a low total score with 3dmark...well not low..but 12k is not an amount that i would "accept" for that system and money. This might mean that they they "forgot" to properly clean the system when testing it. Try a new install if that doesn't work then i'm affraid that shipping it out to them is your only option.

By the way, just an idea...since shipping it out and actually getting it into China is a problem, is it possible maybe to check with AW if you can ship it to a depot from Dell in china and they check it there? They are afterall..the same company more or less....just an idea.

Good luck..hope you get it sorted!

 

It is not soo simple (takes some time^^) but it's worth! I noticed a difference between "Respawn" and self made reinstall fro Vista

Greetings
Julian

 

I have a feeling it is a RAM issue. Try running a memory test and post back with the results.

Duane

EDIT: If you have any spare RAM sticks available (eg. from another laptop lying around), try plugging those into your M17 and see if the problem persists.

 

Thank you, pal. I am testing the memory with MemTest v3.4 right now. It is probably the only way I can do to test the memory, since none of the memory sticks from my four Thinkpads fit into the slot in M17.

 

sounds like some sort of undervoltaging or downclocking. what's your power option at?

 

High Performance

 

How did the test go on the ram?

 

OK, here is the result that I have done today:
First, I ran the MemTest on each memory for about 30 minutes, with the other one taken away from the slot, until 100% of the memory had been examined. And there were no error report for both memory.

Second, I re-installed Windows Vista by the recovery disc, which was obviously a clean OEM Windows installation DVD. after that, I installed other necessary drivers from the support CD, and then Grand Theft Auto IV.

The problem was still, yet not quite a same problem.
The graphic and audio still lagged after 5 minutes gaming, and became unbearable in 5-10 minutes, but when it reached a climax, everything suddenly went normal, and the game were performaning smoothly at a level I had never seen... This had never happened before the re-installation.

This machine is truly miraculous, I have to say... I am gonna restart again. Do you have any idea what is going on?

 

now did you update all the drivers after the install ? not just the ones fromt he support cd.

did you by chance put it to sleep? before playing? because vista has a issue where if you put it to sleep it will lag for 10 mins or so.

 

Well, at least we know it's not the RAM. You said you tried disabling one of the GPU's; did you physically remove one of the GPU's or just disable it by software? Try physically removing the slave GPU and see what happens.

Also try running a HDD test (like HDTach) and look for any anomalies. I know the HDD is least likely to be causing the problems, but we can at least try to isolate the HDD as the culprit. Good luck.

Duane

 

Actually, I did have thought about removing the slave GPU. Yet AW has not published an official guide on how to remove the GPU, and either can I find one on the web. What's more, one of the technical support agent told me that once the GPU was removed by myself, the warranty voided.

Do you happen to notice any of the guides on the web? Please tell me, because I am not acquainted with notebook hardware. When I opened the maintenance panel, they seemed so complicated to me...

 

Yes, I did upgrade everything. Actually, AW has not released many upgrades for M17. And I did not do anything that could put it into sleep.

 

if you do remove the gpu with out talking to AW CS then it will void your warrenty. If you talk to them on the phone and they walk you through it then it will not be voided. But they will proably tell you to send it in before that

 

That way, it seems that the only option left is sending it back to AW. International calls from Shanghai to Ireland will cost me a fortune ( and I already have spent a fortune on it), every time I called in, the conversation sounded just like a checklist. I have to say, they are kind, but not helpful.

Thank you, guys...

 

did you test the hdd with hdtune? try that.

also you should reflash the bios imo. i would give you my bios but its for ocz and will void your warranty.

imo it sounds weird. still think it may be heat or voltage related...the newest bios has changes for voltage but not sure you want to go that way.. lmk if you do

does it do this plugged in as well as on battery?

 

OK, then I will do the HDtune test. I probably donnot need a BIOS upgrade now, because three weeks ago, an AW agent has already instructed me to flash it with the newest version.

The situation happens only when plugged in, because on battery, it is always lagging...

 

what bios version do you have

 

M17 BIOS B10 from AW website.

And I have done a benchmark test with HDTune. It is in the attachment. Error test still in progress.

 

reguarding the laggin on battary the is a option in CCC that changes to max performance while on battery that is proably why you lag on battary

 

OK, let me try it after the HDTune error test. By the way, do you see any abnormality in the benchmark test result that I attached?

The computer seemed to show some lagging after the test.

 

open the bottom and unplug the crossfire cable from the slave card and run the system and see if it still lags. lmk after that. that is the silver colored cable from one gpu to the other

 

OK. Let me try.

 

reboot after removing the cable also

 

basically we want to see what it does with only one card this is what ocz had me do to test it without having to make the customer remove the actual card itself.

 

Nothing changed after I removed the Crossfire Cable, still lagging.

 

naturally after removing the cable you turned down the settings on your games. Running on one gpu will cause it to lag very badly.(just covering gorund btw what did you bench with? try 3dmark o6 on one card) that will rule out the master card

 

Actually, after removing the cable, holding the settings unchanged, the performance was still smooth at first, and then started to lag after a while. Just as I have described in the first post, as if nothing changed. I tested the computer with Grand Theft Auto IV.

OK, I will try a 3DMark then.

 

Right. Sorry, I forgot that removing the GPU voids the warranty. In that case don't do it.

I see you tried unplugging the crossfire connector as zfactor suggested to no avail. I'm officially stumped right now. Hopefully the other forum members with OCZ's or M17's can help you more. Good luck.

Duane

 

Thank you any way, you guys are so kind. I have decided to send the machine back to Ireland. Hope AW could solve this problem.

Back on my T60 again