Problems? See this thread at archive.org.
Hello. . . first, thanks for reading. Second, if I've posted in the wrong forum, please accept my apology. . .
I have had my Inspiron e1705 (with the Nvidia Geforce 7900go) for just over a year (just out of warranty, this is important later) and it has worked well for me until recently. About 2 weeks ago the video would inexplicably scramble into a mess of blue and white lines anywhere from 1-10 minutes after a boot up. It would take longer to manifest if I was just web surfing or sitting idle. . . but would happen faster if I was playing a video game.
If I disable the video card (and use the on board), I can use the system for a time (about 20 minutes) before the system slows down to a crawl. Often, the video problem is prefaced by a loud whirring sound by the fans. I also connecteed to an external monitor and the problem happend here as well (though it took longer to manifest when set up like this).
My guess, after doing research, is that this is an overheating issue and that the video card should be replaced. Thankfully, I purchased this laptop with an Amex card and my warranty was extended. . .so, I sent my laptop off to the Amex repair folks with all the information I've provided above.
The initial reports from the repair company was that they were able to replicate the problem and that they were going to "update the drivers" to fix this. I explained again the symptoms, and suggested that this might not be a video drivers issue (I had found no information in my research prior to sending the pc out for repair about drivers. . . If i had, I would've done this myself). Then, two more days later I was called to get permission to "wipe my hard drive, because the cloned drive was failing". . .I had no idea why they would need to do this, but since my data was backed up I said OK.
A couple days later, they say that they can't replicate the problem and will be shipping the laptop back to me.
So, my question is. . .what do I do if/when (leaning to when) my laptop comes back and still has the same video problem? Is it possible this is/was a drivers issue? I have serious doubts and want to try and plan ahead what I have to do to get this repaired.
If anyone has any experience with this issue, or with dealing with Amex warranty repairs on Dells, I'd be appreciative to hear what you have to say.
Again, thanks for reading!
Inspiron e1705 Video Problem
Discussion in 'Dell' started by j0n55, Apr 21, 2008.
