New M7700 (D900T) owner looking for help. Technical issues.

Hi K-tron

I have WD Scorpio Black, wich is Sata II, but my D900t mobo is 5.3, and supports it with no problem. I'm typing from it now
Now my specs are:
Mobo 5.3 (intel), with a broken IC, so it still doesn't recognise the optical drives. Not even USB ones.
P4 3.6---Vista says it's the weekest part
4 Gig Ram
7950 GTX with this driver:
http://downloads.guru3d.com/downloadget.php?id=2126&file=4&evp=8ff0a01f749e231a25d1b32228568af0
Thanks to this driver GTAIV runs like a charm.

Last week I had 3 laptops, 2 defective.
Now 3 out of 3 working Even my old Toshiba came back to life.

Wish you luck with yours K-tron.

 

megszalott,
The numbering scheme for the D900T intel board is probably similar to the D900K.
I know starting with version 5.1 on the AMD platform supports the SATA 300 drives.
That may also be true on the D900T boards, since your SATA 300 drive is working on a 5.3 board.
I posted the info again in the Clevo section, hopefully someone will find it helpful, it took quite some time to figure it out.

Thats good to hear your boards are working well.
I managed to get my fourth replacement board to work properly, so I guess I will be using that for a few days. Hopefully it lasts

K-TRON

 

Hi,

I have a SAGER 9860 (Clevo D900T) laptop,
which has a V6 mainboard but the SATA controller is broken
Will it be possible to use the DVD drives interface to connect an harddrive?

The laptop did just work awsome, with 7950GTX card in it, I have had much fun with it, and it had become quite useless now the SATA controller is broken.

I have connected the HDD(placed externaly) via USB-SATA controler, which works fine for Ubuntu, but windows doesn't work well with the USB-SATA controller :S

Is the TV card onboard, or an add-on card (if add-on, then I could replace it with an mini-pci sata controller ?)
Not much experience with laptop building, I could use some advice.

Lambik

 

Hello

I don't think you can put a HDD thru the optical drive controller, or the mini-pci interface.

But I think this is your problem:

"The only one I know for sure, is if your computer freezes and you get an, "Operating System Not Found," message after rebooting. The issue is in the raid controller. There is a known issue with the connectors to the HDDs coming loose because of too much heat from the GPU I believe. It is a simple soldering fix, but most people may fear they lost all their data, when in fact, it's not th HDDs just the controller."

I found it here:

http://www.notebookforums.com/showthread.php?t=162082

Hope this helps.

 

Oh. and welcome to nbr.

 

Hi

Thank you for this quick reply much appreciated.

It might indeed be the problem, as the connector is locate next to the 7950 hotheaded module.
Next question for me will be, How do I open the case, I did 'unscrew' the screws on the bottom plate, but still unable to open it up.
Especialy near the CPU it's seems still to be tightened.


What things do I need to take out ?
Sofar I have taken out :
- HDD
- Battery
- Optical drives
- cooler at RAM bay.

Do I have to take out the Graphics module and the CPU cooling block as well ?

thank you for being patience with me,

Lambik

 

Do you want to dissamble the laptop?
This might help you a lot:
Courtesy of Gophn
http://tinyurl.com/csxh56

 

Ohhh
Amazing! You had the service manual and now you shared it to everyone.
I have expended many time searching for it without success, many thanks.
Now I can repair my old motherboard v5.2B
Anyone know where I could buy the SMD resistors R100 (2512) and the power diode SM1040D1

Best regards.

 

I too have been searching for it for a long time. I got this link from our clevo expert (Gophn), but I don't know if it is moral to share it (since it is not my upload). Anyways, thank him for this.
The manual made my laptop recovery a lot easyer, and I know it will help a lot of other people too.
Good luck

 

If the place i sent mine to have the motherboard replaced (bad call, should have done it myself) had sent my old board back like i asked i'd have spares
s.

The resistors shouldn't be too hard to find, the diode i don't know. Digikey maybe?


EDIT:
THANK YOU for the full service manual!
I've been trying to find it without any luck.

 

That resistor looks fine, meaning you should be able to solder it back on without any problems.
If you want, you can buy a new one.
Mouser electronics and Digikey are good places to look. If you are a student, use mouser, and call to place an order. They will give you a discount, if its for a school project

Your board has a lot of rust or something on it, did you spill something on your laptop?
You may want to try cleaning that junk off with some q-tips, and rubbing alcohol.

K-TRON

 

The resistor to the left of the one that fell off looks like it got a little warm and started bubbling, doesn't look good to me

 

Thank you for the service manual,
very useful

Tomorrow I will try to 'unpack' the laptop
and check if I will be able to soldering the connector.

This forum is awsome

Lambik

PS. I noticed the link was not available for a few minutes,
maybe a faster link : http://www.lambik.com/files/D900T_ESM.zip
[if not allowed plz let me know]

 

Too bad, that the thread title cannot be modified to: "D900T owners looking for help. Technical issues."
It seems that this thread is turning out as helpful to others, as it was for me

 

I did re-soldering the S-ATA connector, and the harddisk access is restored ,
BUT . . it doesn't boot , no message, nothing, just a blinking cursor.

When I run a Ubuntu Live DVD, I can access the harddisks without a problem,
browsing folders, opening files, and the system stays up

Does anyone have any hints ?
Should I try the 're-soldering' again ?
should I try to find CF-card boot, or USB boot OS, which does start windows or Linux on the harddisk ?

Thanks for all the help , I am already happy that the harddisks work again .

Lambik

 

woohoo, it boots
I first did install windows with quickformat, which didn't work,
but after that I removed all partitions, did a 'slow' normal format,
and that worked

Now installing all the drivers, hopefully all things will still work

Lambik

 

Hi

New problems here
So I bought a new V6.3 motherboard, and it still doesn't recognise the optical drives. So I figure that this little f*cker couses all my problems. GRR.
CD DVD Drive Connector: http://cgi.ebay.com/Alienware-D9T-D900T-CD-DVD-Drive-Connector-71-D90TN-D05_W0QQitemZ370161742550QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item370161742550&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=72%3A1205|66%3A2|65%3A12|39%3A1|240%3A1318|301%3A1|293%3A1|294%3A50

Thats that.
I installed the new motherboard, and the system started. Then it told me that my Vista is fake. (Thank you Bill). So I started to reinstall my Vista from a flash drive, like I did before, couse still no working DVD rom in my AW. At 5% it froze. Tried again, but it didn't recognise the hard drive anymore. Tried all the Raid/ATA drivers, but nothing. The previous mobo (v5.3) had no problems. So I figured that the Promise Fast Track BIOS is too old. 1.00.00.33. Downloaded the new one 00.37, but I can't flash it with my Flash drive, couse I get this message: "Please put the utility and BIOS file to a floppy diskette!"
I don't have/ will not have/ will not ever trust a friggin neanderthal technology like a floppy drive! I think I will give this laptop to a f*ckin' nigerian scammer, and move on with my life. My school projects are on the second partition of that Hard Drive, and I'm really pissed. Most of all I am angry with the stupid manufacturers, who won't move on, and make a usable BIOS flash utility! Stay with the USB floppy drive guys couse that's the future!

 

I have a USB floppy drive for just this reason, it was cheap and it's come in handy more then once.

 

you can use a USB flash/thumb drive.

thats what I do.

Or I use nLite (for XP) or vLite (for Vista) to slipstream the SATA drivers into a new CD.... then you would not need to insert any floppies or anything.

 

I'm using a USB flesh drive for everything Even for installing Vista.
I know vLite, and I like it a lot.

I now realized that the Promise BIOS was not the problem. Sometimes my new mobo doesn't recognise the HD. I checked the solderings in the known problem aerea, but it seems to be OK. Now I can start it up with the old Windows in safe mode. I'll keep on trying to install a new Vista.

Now I have two working motherboards v5.3 and v6.2 . So I'm going to buy another AW with a defective mobo, and give it to my father for a better media experience

I have other plans too. I want to exchange one of my mobos with some intel fan, together with the 3.6 P4 processor, couse that's the weekest point. Since I invested a lot in this laptop (7950GTX, WUXGA-recently), maybe it would perform better with a dual core AMD. Since I don't have any AMD experince, I would like to know, how good, or bad are they? I saw some tests, where the AMD melted within seconds, without the heat sink, and the intel went on. I won't be using it without the heat sink though So someone should help me out: Is there an AMD that will fit in a D900K, and perform like a Core 2 Duo?

 

So you want to convert your D900T to a D900K?
Its a good move on the performance end.
However their are things you should know.

Clevo states that Opteron series processors will not work. They do work, however this is a problem. I have a Opteron 185, and when using Pc3200 the system freezes continuously. My memory died, so when that happened I tried installing Pc2100. It booted and runs fine. I have had no stability issues.
I dont know anyone else with an Opteron and a D900K, so I cant confirm this works all the time.
However you can make a change.
Dont buy the Opteron processor.
Stick with something which works.
The 3800+, 4200+, 4600+, 4800+, and FX-60 will all work in your system. Just please make sure that you buy the socket 939 ones.

The heat myths are a lie. The amd chips generate more than 2x the power as the intel ones and run much cooler. I have heard many more melting D900T stories than D900K ones.

Honestly you can make the switch, but the boards cost a good $500 new.
You also need more expensive DDR memory, and the D900K has a max of 2Gb memory support.
Other than that, if you have the graphics card, all you need is new memory cards (Pc2100, Pc2700, Pc3200 will work) a new motherboard, and a socket 939 processor.
Everything else is the same.

After dealing with my system I dont want to put another penny into it. I think it may be better for you to just get rid of your system and get a newer one which is less problematic than the D900T/D900K's

K-TRON

 

Thanks K-TRON

After reading your comment, I decided that I'll stick with the D900T. For now. But I'm starting to make eyecontact with the M17X-s appearing on ebay. I'm buying everything from ebay, couse the closest AW support centre is in Germany.
This D900T is like my first car, a Mazda RX-4. It worked once in a month but then it worked grait. And it made a good hobby mechanic out of me

 

No luck here, after installing the drivers the laptop frooze again,
and wouldn't even boot after that.

I don't trust the quality well enough to buy a new mainboard, as that has already been done a year and half back too.
Broken that soon, that gives me the feeling the next board will be broken
in about the same time too.

So if any of you is interested in spare parts . . plz let me know willing to sell my stuff here.

Lambik

PS. Thanks for the help anyway, much appreciated

 

Get a 6xx series intel chip of the 3.8 flavor, the 6's outperform the 5's, and run cooler too.