Studio XPS 13 NVIDIA G210M PROBLEMS?

hey guys,
I recently purchased a Studio XPS 13 (a month ago), and since the beginning, I've noticed that every time I run a game on high performance (g210m + 9400mg), the game either crashes or gets stuck. At the same settings, if I run the game in normal mode (9400 mg), it usually works fine. The settings are medium-low, never high. I really can't understand why this happens. Isn't the G210M supposed to make things better? is it a problem with the drivers? I have all the latest drivers updated from the Dell site. or is this a problem with my hardware? really worried and unfortunately I don't know a whole lot about computers.
The games I've run so far are COD4, COD6 and NFS Shift. They are all ripped copies.
Any help is appreciated. Please let me know if you need to know more details.
Thanks a lot!

System specs: P8700 @ 2.53 GHz 1066FSB, 4GB RAM, Nvidia G210M + 9400MG, 320GB@7200RPM, Win 7 64bit

 

Try updating the drivers from nvidia's site. Driver version 195.xx

 

Will do that. Also, is there any way to check which version of drivers I currently have installed?
Thanks!

 

I had the same exact problem with the G 210M on the Studio XPS 13: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5720875&postcount=676


When running any game that I downloaded from the NVIDA site it would freeze/crash during the demo benchmark test. It would usually give me a message about a driver:

It would happen with Google Earth and the Windows Experience Test as well. They offered to send a tech guy to change the motherboard but I decided to return for a full refund instead.


(and I tried all of the latest drivers from both the Dell page and the NVIDIA page..... the one on the NVIDIA page not only crashed in the same way, but if lowered my Windows Experience Index score for gaming graphics AND it also started to "tear" more on programs like Google Earth... so I'm pretty sure it's a hardware issue and the newest drivers won't help)

 

@Dr.F
Well, so far I haven't faced any problems with WEI or Google Earth. it's just with games, and only when both the 9400 and the g210 are working simultaneously. It's just been over a month now, and I only have the standard warranty so I'm not even sure if I can return the laptop for a refund.

 

I would suggest getting Dell to replace the G 210M (which I think would be a refurbished mobo). Trying to get your money back or a replacement computer might be very difficult when past the 21 days.


I only had problems when using the G 210M on performance boost mode or Hybrid SLI mode (the NVIDIA G 9400M worked fine for everything).


When using the G 210M in Performance or SLI mode It would constantly freeze in the middle of the Windows Experience Index test..... for example, if I was able to complete a WEI test while in SLI or Performance mode, then when I would try to re-test it a few minutes afterward, it would usually freeze in the middle of the 2nd/3rd/4th tests and I would not be able to get 2 completed tests in a row.


All of those WEI test freezes were totally annoying at that time because I was trying to benchmark the SSD with before/after results to test how different partition alignments and then SSD optimizations would improve my score. (which would take my SSD score from 6.9 to 7.0 and even 7.1 a few times)


Other times when it would successfully complete the WEI test, the driver would drop out with this pop up message in the middle of the WEI test, sometimes 2 or 3 times in one test (same thing would happen for the game demos and google earth):

As for Google Earth it would work decently with the default settings, then when I clicked on "street view", or "weather" or anything else it would freeze and crash. Other than that, I was impressed at how much nicer Google Earth looked when using both the G 210M or G 9400M cards compared to my crappy HP laptop with a NVIDIA 7150M card.

 

@ Dr. F
I did the Windows Experience Index a couple of times after I installed the lastest drivers from nvidia.com, and the results did vary quite a bit. There were other problems too (see next post). I think I'll call Dell today/tomorrow.

Thanks for yer help.

 

@weslaw
I took yer advice and downloaded and installed the latest driver from nvidia (195.62 I think). There were significant changes, but unfortunately the problems still exist.

Before update:
1) Nvidia Control Panel: The window looked a little different with lesser options. Also under System Information, the G210 for some reason would say it only had 256MB. Also in System Information, if I was running the laptop in Normal Mode (Dell), it would only list 9400MG. Only in High Performance would it list both 9400MG + G210

2) Shifting graphics: I wouldn't be able to shift from Normal mode (or Dell) to High Performance when applications such as Chrome were open.

3) Games: I was able to play games (COD 4, COD 6, NFS Shift) on 9400 just fine (low-medium settings). When in High Performance (9400 + G210), the game would get hang.

4) Windows Experience Index: Although I don't have a snapshot, I remember my scores. Processor=6.2, RAM=5.9, Graphics=5.8, Gaming Graphics=5.9, Hard Disk=5.9. The scores were unchanged the few times I ran the test.

After update:
1)Nvidia Control Panel: Window different. New menus, options. Under SysInfo, mentions both graphics cards regardless of the battery mode. Also, the G210 now says 512MB

2) Shifting Graphics: Able to shift graphics whenever. no problems whatsoever. no window opening asking me to close Chrome etc.

3) Games: Not able to play Shift at all. When I try to open Shift, a black window opens, and then Windows automatically tries to close the program and looks for solutions. Don't know why. I tried playing Shift in Norman/Dell (9400) and High Performance (9400+G210), but no change.
COD4 and COD6 are still the same. With 9400, they're both fine. With the G210, they get stuck. Only change with the G210 is that now I see different colours, before it gets back to normal (if it does). It also gets stuck more frequently. One of the times, I also got that Windows Kernel Mode Driver message that Dr.F mentioned.

4) Windows Experience Index: This is where it really went beserk. The first time I did the test, the gaming graphics reduced by a whole point from 5.9 to 4.9 (see WEI HP). I did the test again, and the result was better. I did the test a total of five times to see if something would go wrong as it happened with Dr.Funkenstein. Nothing happened. Results changed a little bit here and there. One thing I noticed was that the "Assessing Disk Performance" took quite a bit longer than it used to. Please note that all tests except "WEI 3 Normal" were done in High Performance mode. Also, after I finished "WEI HP" and was about to start "WEI 2 HP", I closed Skype and PC Wizard 2010.

 

Other changes after/during update:
1) The first time I tried installing the update, Windows said the update failed to install correctly even though the Nvidia window said it was installed successfully.

2) After the first installation, I tried opening the Nvidia Control Panel and got this message. (see "NVIDIA Control Panel")

3) It opened later on its own, but the screen was drastically different. Had only two options.

4) Rei-installed the update. No Windows error this time. But I did get this. ( please see "Program Compatability Assistant"). I chose the "Reinstall using recommended settings" option. Screen went on and off a bunch of times. Nothing this time after the installation. Nvidia Control Panel opened fine.


That's about it. I really have no clue what's going on. Is it still a problem with the drivers? or is it hardware problems? As I mentioned earlier I have all the latest drivers installed from Dell + the new nvidia driver. Should I install the Dell provided driver for graphics again? or should I install the chipset (n730i) driver from the nvidia site? Also just so you know the games are all ripped copies. In PC Wizard 2010, under GPU Configuration and Technology SLI it says No. Maybe I'm over-reacting and just being paranoid about the whole thing. Either way, any advice and help is greatly appreciated since I don't much about computers. I apologise if my posts were long/confusing. Please let me know if you need to know more details.

Thanks!

 

is anybody there?

help!

 

I think it's a driver issue but you can never be certain. I have the 9500 option on my xps13 and I have played shift/COD4/COD-MW2 with just 9400 and with 9400+9200(aka 9500) and never had any problems. Try drivers updated on dells' website.
I would recommend getting the motherboard replaced from dell and if the problem is still there than the driver fix has not been released for the problem you are facing.

 

GeForce G210M will work on DELL Studio XPS 1340 under Ubuntu 10.04 64 bit. Follow the below steps.

Remove any NVIDIA proprietary drivers.

$ uname -r
2.6.35-22-generic ---> verify the kernel

Ctrl+Alt F1 and then login with user name and password.
$ sudo service stop gdm ----> Make sure gdm is not running using the command ps -ef

$ sudo sh ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-260.19.29.run -Nqa --ui=none --no-cc-version-check

Make sure the below files exist in those directories after the install.

$ cd /usr/lib/xorg/modules/extensions

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 19 2011-01-15 00:16 libglx.so -> libglx.so.260.19.29
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 5259592 2011-01-15 00:16 libglx.so.260.19.29

$ cd /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers

-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 6043264 2011-01-15 00:16 nvidia_drv.so

$cd /usr/lib

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 18 2011-01-15 00:16 libnvidia-cfg.so -> libnvidia-cfg.so.1
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 26 2011-01-15 00:16 libnvidia-cfg.so.1 -> libnvidia-cfg.so.260.19.29
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 132664 2011-01-15 00:16 libnvidia-cfg.so.260.19.29
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 20458880 2011-01-15 00:16 libnvidia-compiler.so.260.19.29
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 27089296 2011-01-15 00:16 libnvidia-glcore.so.260.19.29
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 5936 2011-01-15 00:16 libnvidia-tls.so.260.19.29
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 34 2011-01-15 00:16 libvdpau_nvidia.so -> vdpau/libvdpau_nvidia.so.260.19.29

studioxps:/proc/driver/nvidia/cards$ cat 0
Model: GeForce G210M
IRQ: 23
Video BIOS: 70.18.1f.00.09
Card Type: PCI-E
DMA Size: 40 bits
DMA Mask: 0xffffffffff
Bus Location: 0000:02.00.0

studioxps:/proc/driver/nvidia/cards$ cat 1
Model: GeForce 9400M G
IRQ: 23
Video BIOS: 62.79.78.00.02
Card Type: PCI
DMA Size: 40 bits
DMA Mask: 0xffffffffff
Bus Location: 0000:03.00.0

Here is the xorg.conf

$ cat xorg.conf

# nvidia-xconfig: X configuration file generated by nvidia-xconfig
# nvidia-xconfig: version 256.53 ([email protected]) Fri Aug 27 20:55:22 PDT 2010

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Layout0"
Screen 0 "Screen0" 0 0
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
Option "Xinerama" "0"
EndSection

Section "Files"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"

# generated from default
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "auto"
Option "Device" "/dev/psaux"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "no"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"

# generated from default
Identifier "Keyboard0"
Driver "kbd"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
VendorName "Unknown"
ModelName "Unknown"
HorizSync 28.0 - 33.0
VertRefresh 43.0 - 72.0
Option "DPMS"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Device0"
Driver "nvidia"
VendorName "NVIDIA Corporation"
BoardName "GeForce G210M"
BusID "PCI:3:0:0"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Device1"
Driver "nvidia"
VendorName "NVIDIA Corporation"
BoardName "GeForce 9400M G"
BusID "PCI:2:0:0"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Device0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
Option "SLI" "Auto"
Option "TwinView" "0"
Option "TwinViewXineramaInfoOrder" "DFP-0"
Option "metamodes" "DFP: 1440x900 +0+0; DFP: nvidia-auto-select +0+0"
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
EndSubSection
EndSection

 

see the problem is with the chipset cuz i have one but another gpu and what is your service tag so i can locate the exact chipset driver that wont let your computer crash see mine was A00