**OFFICIAL** Dell XPS M1730 Owner's Lounge, *Part 4*

Installed a X7900 last night. First time disassembling a laptop and applying thermal paste. I didn't have a lot of time to stress test it and the only prime 95 I found only ran for one minute (unless I was blind to any options to change it). I had it running at 3.4 from the BIOS and was only able to undervolt it to 1.475 which still seems high compared to what I found in one of the older M1730 threads. Temps w/o undervolt got up into the mid 80s running the 1 min prime/3dmark06. At 1.475 it was low 70s after running 1 min prime/3dmark06/Guild Wars 2 for 10 minutes. I know I need to run a longer cpu stress test which I'll do later tonight.

My biggest concern is if I put too much thermal paste on. If I did I would see higher temps though, wouldn't I? That wouldn't have an affect on the undervolting, right? I know each chip is different but I was getting BSOD undervolting to 1.425 I believe while there were others with the X7900 getting as low as 1.3##. I guess it doesn't matter if after the longer stress test my temps stay in the low 70s, it's not like I ever run it off battery (which is dying anyway).

Also, I was unable to remove the heat sink from the 8800M GTX. I removed the 8 screws underneath the fans but the heatsink and board felt sealed together. Are things just glued down like the fans were to the heat sink which I had to pry off? I don't have temp problems with the video cards after the A11 BIOS update but I wanted to put AS5 on there so I can look into overclocking the cards.

 

I can only speak on dissambling the 9800M GTX which I presume are similar to the 8800. The first thing to do is to remove the two fans. From memory there are three screws on each fan. You may have to prise the fans off with a small straight edge screwdriver. Under the fans you will see several (about four on each video from memory) large headed silver screws. They are a torque screwdriver head. If you don't have a torque screwdriver a small straight edge one which fits will do. Undo these screws and gently prise the heatsink off. You will also have to remove a strip of tape between the two video cards. Save this for reinstallation. Once the heatsinks have been removed you will see the ample amounts of hardened conductive paste Dell used.
Clean off all the old paste. You will also see that there is a video chtp between the two main Nvida chips. I will have a heat conductive compound similar to blu-tac. You can obtain new heat conductive compound from an electronics store. If you can't obtain a small sheet of copper from a hobby shop. I cut out two pieces of copper which were about the same thickness as the original compound. I used arctic silver heat conductive paste to join the two small pieces of copper together. I cut the copper with a small hacksaw rather than sissors or tin snips as they tend to curl the edges of the copper. Using a mini hacksaw may be fiddly but it will give you perfectly flat piece of copper.
If you don't feel up to cutting out a piece of copper, there is a seller on eBay in China selling small copper squares for the M1730 video cards.

The copious amounts of old dried up heat conductive paste can be removed with a bit of patience with the help of a toothbrush and very small amounts of methelated spirits.

Once it is all clean you can reassemble the card. DO NOT USE AS MUCH ARCTIC SILVER AS DELL USED IN MANUFACTURE. Remember it is electrically conductive and you don't want to short out your circuit.

Be careful to make sure you have packed the video chips with enough copper to ensure that all three chips are in contact with the heatsink. From memory I had to use two pieces of copper on the centre chip.

I reinstalled the video card and turned the computer on. It worked ok for about ten minutes and then continued to have blank screens as it was doing previously. I purchased a brand new 9800M gtx video card on eBay for $290US. Everything has worked ok since.

 

Thanks for tips above; I'll write a proper reply when I've more tiime.

Just a very quick post to put up the difference a good cleaning of the fans make.
The clean took about an hour and involved complete take down.. all the way to the fans exposed completely!!!

For some of the old heads; I posted up pic's up of the last time I did it (two years ago I think!) and there was a layer 1-2mm of dust like a carpet. This time there wasn't a layer.

But do check out the improvements!!!




EDIT: First pic obviously pre-cleaning and second post. The test was FurMark Multi-GPU, running for 10min's. Everything else was the same.

Thanks. I had done a strip down once before. But your guide is very detailed.

I was more asking specifically what brand of screw drivers that anyone might recommend. In the end I picked up some stuff locally - Rolson Screwdrivers. The seem good enough.

On a side note I don't know if anyone else has found this but the screws that encase the motherboard are strangely extremely hard to remove! I had stripped this same laptop done before and would not have over tightened the screws. So I think the heat might be responsible.

A word of warning for anyone who hasn't opened up the M1730/other laptop - don't strip the screw heads! I can only imagine what kind of a pain in the **** that would be!

 

You are correct about the screws. If your screwdriver jumps in the thread be sure to try another one. I purchased a complete set of screws for the M1730 on eBay. There is a guy in England selling 156 screws for under $15 with free international postage. I got some when he had some at a reduced price. I changed every screw on the laptop except the screen. My laptop, which I purchased about three months ago secondhand had been worked on by a Dell technician, who obviously used a power screwdriver. God I hate those things as they strip screw heads and threads.

 

Do you have the name of that person? I was thinking of taking my iPhone - apart I need very very small philips heads for that though!

 

Here is a link to the guy selling the screws suitable for the M1730 laptop.
156 LAPTOP SCREWS DELL M1730 M1710 M90 HP DV9000 DV6000 FREE WORLDWIDE SHIPPING | eBay

For the IPhone try eBay.
Brand New iPhone 4 Full Screw Screws Set Replacement Repair Part | eBay

 

Sorry my apologises. I actually completely mis-read your post. I thought you had said screwDRIVERS - and hence I was amazed at such a low cost for 156 screwdrivers!

 

Logitech LCD has suddenly stopped working.The light of LCD is working but there is no text in it.What may be the cause? I Tried reinstalling drivers but still the same...

 

Does it show the XPS logo or is it completely blank?
Uninstall the old driver and reinstall the 32 bit ones from the Dell XPS M1730 driver site.
Logitech Gamepad 15 have updated drivers.

If all this fails you can source a replacement gamepad for about $20 on eBay. Installation is fairly simple, all you have to do is remove the keyboard

 

Hello to everyone!
Could anyone help me figuring out what is the problem with my laptop?
Yesterday I woke up and found out that my laptop was not turning on. The screen stays black.
I've searched for a solution and found a few possible versions: mainboard failed, GPU failed and something with LED cable. But there is no certain answer.
Here is the video I've made showing what Fn+Power does. Dell suggests, accordingly to this webpage , mainboard needs to be replaced. But I'd like to be sure I'm doing a right thing replacing the motherboard.



Thanks!

 

Heya

I am trying to get my musician friend's 1730 working again. The notorious failing video. Seems to boot, but there is no video on the internal OR external display. All info suggests that the graphics card has died. Completely rebuilt and redid all cooling with IC Diamond, but still the same problem on reboot.

SO where does one go for a new graphics card? I have found a bunch on Ebay, but I can't even locate the original spec on this beast. Dell support shows a really long list of every component, but I don't see a specific gpu... It seems as though Dell basically abandoned this notebook, so I'm assuming there's no point in trying to get a new card through them? I have heard stories of $500 replacements for 5 year old tech! Come on, Dell. You should have a pile of these cards just waiting for all these owners with failing notebooks.

Any experiences to share?

Thanks

BTW did anyone ever take class action over any of these bad Dell products?

 

I think you are being a bit ambitious thinking Dell may honour the warranty. New video cards can be purchased on eBay. I bought a 9800M GTX SLI for $299US on eBay about six weeks ago. It was brand new. It appears that Dell may have sold off all their spare GPU's for the M1730 to parts suppliers. There appear to be a good supply of 9800M GTX's on eBay at reasonable prices. Why not go for an upgrade to a 9800 from a 8700 or 8800 GPU card. There is still plenty of life left in the M1730's if you can keep them cool to avoid GPU damage.

I run A11 bios with an X9000 CPU and a 9800M GTX GPU and I hardly notice the fans running. I did notice, however, that when I overclocked the CPU from 2.8ghz to 3.4ghz that the fan noise increased significantly. I then put the clock speed back to 2.8ghz.

Chances are is that it is the GPU. New 9800M GTX video cards can be purchased on eBay (US site - will ship internationally) for $299US. Depending on how much you want to spend, I would try replacing the GPU first and if that fails to fix it then the motherboard. Secondhand motherboards for the M1730 can also be sourced on eBay at reasonable prices.

I upgraded the hard drive in my M1730 to a Liteon SSD S100 - 256 yesterday. It had a 160gb Seagate 7200 in it previously. the extre space will come in handy but the big advantage is the fast boot to Windows 7 64 Bit Ultimate. I took the opportunity to do a fresh install of Windoze. The drive only cost me $169AU which is not a bad price for a 256gb SSD hard drive. The price in US dollars equates to about $175US although they should be able to be sourced a bit cheaper because of the larger US market. My next upgrade will be a hybrid 750gb 7,200 Seagate drive as my second drive for about the same price.
As RAM is so cheap at the moment, I was thinking about increasing the RAM from 4gb to 8gb.

 

You could use ThrottleStop to get the CPU at 3.6-3.8 Ghz, that would make a big difference

 

Thanks for your response.
I have figured this problem out. Searched about this issue all over the Internet and came to conclusion it is a GPU failure. So I tried the "oven trick"... Cleaned GPU from all the plastic stuff it had on both sides of GPU board (it took some time to get rid of the glue that stuck on the base from all that plastic covering) and put it in the preheated (200C) oven for 10 minutes. It worked perfectly!
It's working fine, an average idling temperature is 50-51. I've updated BIOS to A11 and now it's quite audible when the fans kick in on high speeds, hopefully it will help keeping the GPU health.

 

I'm glad to see the oven trick worked for you. I had a 9800M GTX card fail, however I just purchased a new one. I did pull it apart and put new arctic silver heat conductive compound on the chips. I might try the oven trick on it - I can't do any more damage to it.
If it fixes it then I have a spare GPU.

I did try overclocking it to 3.4ghz. The CPU ran a fair bit hotter so I turned it back to 2.8ghz again.

 

Thanks, My LCD is completely blank.A few days ago when I was gaming, LCD suddenly started to work.It remain fine for the next 2-3 start ups.But after that, stopped working again and now it is blank.Strange issue! I tried reinstalling drivers but to no avail.

 

I have Intel turbo memory 4GB and 2 of Samsung SSD 830 256GB. I have 2 option to set up:

First, Intel turbo memory 4GB and 2 of SSD non raid.
Second, 2 SSD on Raid 0 without intel turbo memory.

I'd like to know which option setup above is better? Thanks in advance.

__________________________
XPS M1730
X7900
2x2GB DDR2-800
8800M GTX SLI
PhysX
BD Burner

 

Need help!
I think I killed my Nvidia 9800m gt sli. I was running fine at 900/1500/900 using nibitor and Nvflash for over a year. then I tried to squeeze a little more out of the GPU and upped by increment of 10mhz to 930mhz. I then had a crash while trying to lower it back down to 900mhz. I bricked my 9800m gt sli. I can hear windows start but black screen. I tried a dos cd with Nvflash 5.1 for dos on it and a back-up 1.rom and 2.rom bios. All I get is 3 beeps. Tried the following commands.
Nvflash -i0 -4 -5 -6 1.rom
Nvflash -i1 -4 -5 -6 2.rom

I tried the to load the dell bios from Nero boot disk.
If anyone know a way I can flash this bios please let me know. I know I made a risky choice. please don’t criticize. I have done this for a while and got caught with my pants down
Glenn

 

Hi Glenn, maybe contacting "svl7"here or on Tech Inferno would be an advisable thing for you to do. Good luck on your getting your bad flash fixed!

 

Logitech LCD fixed
By the way, any one tried Dirt Showdown on m1730?

 

From yesterday I'm in the ranks of the GPU damaged . A nice adventure with The Beast, but a short one - because since november 2010 I played mostly on Alien M11x R1 .
I wanted to save The Beast to more demanding games . Failed to .
I will try to contact with Dell Poland - nVidia Settlement - I wonder what I will hear .

 

If you'll really benefit from the Intel Turbo memory, then I'd go for that as I highly doubt that we'd notice a real world application gain from an SSD Raid 0 configuration. SSDs are already fast even if it isn't configured in Raid 0, so if the turbo memory will show a significant gain for the memory, I'd personally go for this. Just my 2 cents.

Hi guys! I'm currently going through this thread as I might be able to get a M1730 for a good price and want to learn more about this nice machine. :thumbsup:

 

M1730 overclock x9000 cpu and problems overclocking 9800m GTX gpu HELP!!!!!!!



Hi i hope someone could help me.

I have an m1730 with an x9000 processor, iv overclocked it in the bios to 3.0ghz but not any more than that as the fans sound like jet engines. Iv got got throttlestop but need to know what i need to do on it to overclock the processor to 3.4ghz or 3.6ghz. I want to do it this way because of the fans.

Next i am trying to overclock my gpu, its a 9800m gtx and i am using msi afterburner to do it, i can overclock the card to 560 core 1400 shader and 850 memory but if i go any more than that the gpu's crash under a bit of strain. I have seen that people can overclock the card to 620 core 1550 shader and 1000 memory but i cant get anywhere near it. When i had my 9800m GT card i ran it at 600/1500/1000 with no problems. The card is refurbished so could it be a bad card maybe?

Any idea's anyone?

 

Hello everyone there was dell xps m1730 that was advertised on a website by an elderly man on behalf of his son, he isn't very computer literate so I had to tell him to upload me the DirectX system information file, which he did according to my instructions. Funny thing is the 8800gtxs are probably not installed or busted. Below is the link to the DirectX file and tell me if I should go for it or not. Thanks

Text Upload - Free Content Hosting

 

Hi All,
someone has tested M1730 with Windows 8? I have a M1730 with 8700m gt sli. Now with nvidia drivers 258.96 in windows 7 64bit to avoid black screen and freeze issue with youtube etc...

Thanks!!!

 

A nice surprise . Replacing the GPU . How do I check the manufacturing date of the GPU without opening the laptop ? GPU-Z shows correctly ?

 

I believe GPU-Z shows the release date of that particular card.

 

I need advice from this group. In July I sent my laptop back to Dell for repair. The computer was totally dead (motherboard.) It came back and worked for two weeks and crashed (hard drive died.) They replaced hard drive. In doing so, they broke the little post that ejects the remote control. I waited for part. Dell asked me to depot the laptop, which I did. They told me that they don't have that part because laptop is END OF LIFE and for me to get repair and they would reimburse me. So I took laptop to Best Buy. They told me it was $85 non-refundable but that their repair house would just call Dell anyways for part. So I still have the laptop, that Dell broke.

I have condensed my description and not told the hours of phone calls, "disconnects", non-returned phone calls and hassle with Dell. This whole ordeal is under a BBB complaint also. They held the laptop for 6 weeks without repair and told me they couldn't repair it. This has been a serious hassle.

 

Hey there. I know this is an older post but I've got a bit of information that may have been lost over time(former M1730 owner; even though I own a stronger notebook now I miss the old Beast). If you have one of the Extreme CPUs(X7900 or X9000) and overclock it past 3.0GhZ, the fans will automatically ramp up to maximum speed whenever the machine is running to deal with the added speed. This does create increased noise, but it was bleieved in the past that running the fans on maximum like this greatly reduced the risk of a GPU failure(the GPU fans would run at maximum as well). I had my X9000/9800M SLI M1730 for about two years with those settings and never had any fan failures. I had the CPU and GPUs repasted with AS5 and was very picky about keeping the fans cleaned out.

Hope this information helps.

It sounds like the most feasible scenario is that the hard drive has been wiped and the OS reinstalled without any drivers. The display resolution is at 800x600 and the driver listed is the standard VGA drivers Windows uses to get an image on the screen.

If you can get a serial number or something where you can check out the particular build specs on that 1730, it might be okay, just in need of some drivers.

 

Just a quick questions - is anyone running IL-2 Cliffs of Dover on their M1730? I've tried it but does get past 15-20fps on native resolution and lowest video settings.

 

Greetings from the Philippines.

I bought TWO Dell XPS m1730 with the help of a friend, one in seemingly-good condition, and the other is bricked. I got them both for nearly $210 (approx. 8,990 PHP here), with my friend sponsoring some of the dough.

In case you're wondering why I bought those, let's say it's a hobby for me to try to make things work where others have already given up in. Plus I needed a laptop that I can use for work and play. I learned that the m1730 was a particularly problematic model-- but one of the most powerful too.

The first laptop, I nicknamed Dante as it was red, could not SLI and was nigh unstable when one video module was enabled. I had to disable it via device manager to get a workable system, having a single video module.

The time came that I had to upgrade to Windows 8, and its hardware was proving to be frustrating.

In comes the 2nd m1730, Vergil. It had broken keyboard, a bricked video and had no battery and adapter. Plus a dented side.

I attempted to upgrade the firmware of the m1730 (Dante) 8800 gtx in a bid to make it more stable--- which I ended up bricking. Now it shows black.

I used this m1730 for work, and having it out of action is not an option.

I baked Vergil's m1730 videocard, also a 8800 gtx, and lo and behold, it works! Slapped it into Dante, and I'm back in business.

Somehow, in the back of my mind, I wanted to believe I didn't senselessly and irrepairably bricked a video module for nothing. In fact I've been putting aside money to purchase a better refurbished video module.

I was able to use Dante without incident -- until today, which is due for another baking. Luckily I have spare thermal compounds, but the hassle...

Right now, I'm thinking if I can unbrick the videocard which was previously in the Dante m1730 by blind-flashing it. I read somewhere here that some guy experienced it too, but I'm at a loss how to do it. For one, the bios is set to boot at hard disk, not at a USB device.

The current videocard in Dante m1730 is due for baking-- its showing garbage ascii characters, and we all know how to deal with it temporarily. (And I forgot to refresh the thermal compound in the SLI bridge in the first baking-- silly me. That will not be repeated after the baking.)

In here, where the units, which was previously from Australia, is no longer covered by warranty, I want to do everything I know I can before conceding to buying reconditioned parts. I don't have the luxury of money for that, although come push to shove, I will find a way for it.

I'm also interested in flashing the 8800 gtx sli into a 220m, so steps for that would be appreciated too. This m1730 has been an eye-catcher for me, and I intend to keep it that way even though it is a core2duo/extreme.

 

3Dmark vantage xps m1730 GPU or CPU problem please HELP!

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Hi all, i have just changed the processor and gpu in my m1730 laptop. I am having problems with it in 3Dmark vantage and crashing in games.

I have changed the gpu from 2x 9800 gt cards to 2x 9800 gtx cards and the cpu from a core 2 duo T9500 to a core 2 duo extreme X9000.

When i run 3D mark vantage i have problems with the water shooting up in the air on the 1st test and graphics being very slow on the second test. I done this with no overclock on cpu or gpu. I have exchanged the gpu for another and still same problem.

When i had the last gpu and cpu i never had this problem and i overclocked the gpu as well and it was fine.

Iv been thinking this may be a voltage problem. If so could someone please confirm and help me fix this. Thanks.

 

If you have a spare motherboard, use it.

Also update from the oven, my m1730 is once again usable... although it is running a little hot, but not too uncomfortably hot for concern. It runs games quite faster now.

 

Skyrim makes my GPU really hot.Even when running the game with stock clocked single card on low@1280x800, temp goes up to 85C.Any suggestion how I can fix this issue.I don't want to blow my GPU.Can I underclock my GPU to make it cool? It'll not cause any problem?

 

I read somewhere that the information about GPU are contained on the motherboard - in this case GPU-Z will not show properly . Am I right?

 

Iv been having lag and crashing problems since changing my gpu and cpu.

I have just changed the cpu back to my old T9500 cpu and the laptop works fine with the with new 9800m gtx card even when its overclocked so what could be the problem when im using the x9000?

 

Hello,

Upgrading to Windows 8 will not help your youtube. I have an old Inspiron 8200 and it plays youtube fine.
Windows 8 does run fine on M1730 though, but I think that you will have to do some troubleshooting to find your problem.

 

Which drivers would work for win 7 32 bit?

this Drivers | GeForce or this
Drivers and Downloads | Dell [United States]

regards

 

Get more ram and make sure your hard disk has no bad sectors, and if your videocard needs baking, bake it.
After that, the 8 experience is what I would call smooth as silk.

And yes. 64 bit.

 

Metalman, I just ordered Windows 8 and going to instal. Did you install on a your system with a raid and if so what raid drivers did you use? Did you find any issues at all?

 

I do not use raid, but other then that Win8 installed and works great.
Just go to nvidia to get your video driver for Win8.

 

My problem with youtube etc is a bug related to Nvidia 8700M in windows 7 64 bit... only with drivers 258.96 everything is ok.
However I noticed reading some benchmark that Windows 8 still be little slower than windows 8 in games, etc.Maybe related to nvidia drivers not really optimized yet for Windows8..

thanks

 

Looking for advice about selling my M1730 in UK; in short, do I offer it as I bought it with 2.2GHz processor and 8700M GT Sli video, or as updated with X9000 processor and 9800M GTX sli video? With either option, I would want to sell the 'spare' processor and video card separately. I know the up-spec machine will sell for more, but will it achieve the same as if I sell the basic mahine and then sell the X9000 and 9800M GTX separately? I paid good money for the upgrades, so perhaps selling them alone will be a better option. These days though, gamers are looking for better machines than the 'basic' spec, aren't they?
I realise it's all about 'what the market will bear' but I thought I'd put the question here for comments. I'm selling the machine having had a great 5 years use of it, any issues have been covered well by the in-home Dell warranty which just expired and can't be renewed with Dell. It has all-new case parts, screws, palmrest, etc. as I had these parts to hand for a while. Win 7 Ultimate with original disks, 2 x 200Gb drives in non-raid mode, all original user documentation, remote control, 2 x original DELL power supplies, original packaging etc. I'm travelling more now and while I've had great use out of the unit and Dell's excellent service, it's time for a smaller / lighter machine to suit my needs.

Cheers, Andy

 

If the 258.96 driver works in win7 then stay with them, you don’t have to use the latest driver. The video card in the M1730 are old, so you just need to find the driver that work best a stay with it.

 

I'm looking for stable drivers sli GTX9800m . Latest nVidia driver gives me flickering and errors in SLI mode . I do not know what can be wrong . The same problems like on 8800gtx . I thought that with the new graphics I will not have old problems - is it possible that the old Ageia processor causes these problems? Can someone help me please ?

 

Hello,
296.10 from nvidia are the drivers that work best for me, anything newer gives me problems.

 

Thanks, I just thought that I am the one and only with these problems.
And maybe someone knows where can I find a manual to remove Ageia procesor from the system ? I can't see it here Documentation

 

The Ageia processor is to the right of the video card. I think it has three screws, lift the card up and out of the motherboard. You can screw the screws back in so that you will know where they are in the future.

 

@Consi Pit have you looked in This DCSE XPS1730 Manual >>> HERE <<< sure has it

 

Iv been having the same problems lately with my 9800m gtx in sli mode, never mind when I try overclocking. I'll roll my drivers back to them. Thanks.