7811 defective

Well, I did it. I finally got it to lock up w/o a mouse. Power settings put to high, dell touchpad drivers, etc.

While playing WAR, I began to transfer 10 gb of data from an external HDD to my 16 GB thumb drive (formated to ntfs). It took a little bit longer but it locked up after about 7.4 GB transfered over (about 20-25 min vs the 10-15 it takes on my mouse).

So what does this mean? Is this a power issue, meaning I get a 180W brick or should i send it packing in hopes the next refurb works as intended?

 

Depends on your budget or if you know someone with a charger you can use. You can buy a charger to rule that out, find someone close to you with one, or send it back and never know if it could have been fixed by a charger..

Troubleshooting is tedious, trust me I know.

 

The problem is the AC circuitry is split between the Brick and the laptop. A desktop power supply breaks the AC to the different Rails requied by the system. Notebooks require a brick to do the conversion to DC and then the laptop must break the primary line voltage to the required rail voltages.

Like a Desktop PSU the rails are aportioned from the primary available amps to the lowered voltages for the rails at then a set available amperage per rail. The advantage of a 180w is then 50% more availablbe base amperage. Theoretically you then can have up to 50% more power per rail, if the notebook circuitry will alow it.

This can make a huge difference when the power at a rail is strained. just one strained rail can start to cause huge problems with the other rails. Since it has been shown our laptops under high stress gaming pulls 105w or better it is a safe bet the rails are highly strained on just a 120w brick. That and the fact these bricks just get HOT under that load shows they are well over stressed is just a recipe for dissaster.

And just a note, poorly supplied rails can EASILY over stress a component causing excess heat as well............

 

scotchirishprince,

Have you tried to run video card stability test program? My 7811 used to freeze/crash while running the video stress test with&without using any USB device. The freezing problem totally went away after I had gateway replaced the motherboard. Now I Have no problem using the external usb hdds, keyboard, mouse or charging my phone while running 3d intensive programs.

f10167

 

F10167 - I haven't tried a video card stress test per se, but as I've said before: I can't play games all day long when I don't have a usb mouse plugged in. Plug in that mouse and I'm locked up within a few minutes. Bizarrely, I can play games with a mouse on the battery alone until it runs out of juice (power settings turned up to high).So the fact that it runs fine in games until I place a mouse just leads me to believe its not a GPU issue.

Global - The fact that it could be a power brick issue kills me and I really want to test that out. However, I can't find the Targus 180W in any store. So my only option will be to 1day it from amazon and test it out on monday. That should still give me time to send the laptop back.

Tan - Very nicely said. The brick does run very hot, and it does seem that the slightest extra fluctuating pull from a usb device (mouse, HDD, usb drive) pushes the system over to lock up when its already highly stressed.

I think I will risk it and get a Targus 180W from Amazon, try it monday night and then, if it still doesn't help, return the laptop for a new refurb.

Are there any Brick and Mortar stores that carry a 180W universal power supply? I'd prefer to get this sorted out this weekend but i've had no luck so far ( all I can find are 90W and 120W)

 

I use the Targuss 180w and can atest to it. While it may not solve the problems it definately elimates power concerns. This is especially true down the line when changing the CPU or adding accessories. Even used I would not sell it back at original cost, if someone wants to give me more than it is worth I'm not a fool as I can always get another.........

A temporary fix may be to get vsynch on. This will lower GPU strain somewhat and may get you up and running.

 

Tan - Amazon has Saturday shipping, so I will find out tomorrow if it solves my issue. If not I'll probably keep the 180w for the next one.

Keeping with the power issue theory, what settings would you recommend I turn down, turn off, or enable under the nvidia and/or power settings to try and restrict the gpu power consumption? Might be something to fool with while I wait for the new brick.

If I tune it down on AC w/ mouse and don't have any lock ups then I think we have have proven the issue. However, I have run the various games at less than 1920x1200 and still hit the same lock ups with a mouse.

Either that, or it s a mobo issue and its off to the refurb place come monday

 

it is hard to just tone down the gpu unless you under clock it. This is the same effect as off battery to some extent. Again setting the vsynch on will force the gpu at points to wait thereby drawing less power and creating less heat. You could also try the setting to render less frames in advance.

You will like the 180w, runs much cooler and you can be assured of no power issues. Also if you use it as a portable you can leave the 180w at home and the 120w as the packable brick. Again I don't know if it will solve the problems but anyone planning to seriously game with these should consider the 180w a must have!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just overstressing with the heat the stock brick runs at is just asking for trouble. if it goes and you can't brick and mortar a replacement you could be without a computer for a while. Get a good 180w and this may never be an issue...........

Edit; You could also get an RMA then play with it for a day or two before sending it off................

 

Actually, I got an RMA # for this laptop about 2 weeks ago. But every time I'm about to send it off, someone makes another suggestion that I haven't tried yet.

 

Very interested to see if it's a problem w/ the brick. Mine has been freezing too in games and running very hot.

 

Sorry thought you were not at that step already. I guess we just keep pulling you deeper down the rabbit hole......

 

Running hot as in the brick or computer? The 180 handles the load much better than the stock brick so that should be cooler. It may even cool the laptop slightly better by supplying the components with clean power and plenty of reserve power for the fans............

 

Got the Adapter. going to let it charge up the battery before I try playing a game on it. Lets hope this works. If not then its getting boxed up.

 

This is an issue with the brick, it works fine but the tip does not go in 100%. So this is normal.............

Edit let us know how it all works out for you...............

 

Thanks Tan, I didn't see that the battery light came on because of the angle I was at. I'll let you know

 

Well, I plugged it in, let the battery fully charge up, and started to play WAR with a mouse and...

It locked up in 4 min 39 seconds, which is by far the fastest lock up in WAR I have ever experienced. =c

I was very much hoping this 180W brick would be the cure all, as the lack of enough power seemed to be a strong possibility, but I had a feeling in my gut that it wouldn't.

What's really bizarre is that, before I upgraded to Ultimate, WAR would play fine 70% of the time but every other game locked up. But I have since tried the vista 64 home premium that it came with again, XP 32, and Ultimate 64 w/o luck. Just a side note.

So I guess the moral of the story is this: if you get a laptop, new or refurb, and its locking up during games, don't bother trying to figure out what's wrong with it, just take it back and demand a new one!

I will have spent over $200 now in addition to the $750 trying to this to work ($101 for AC brick, $7 for next day shipping, $60 for the Zalman Notebook cooler, and probably $20-30 to now ship the notebook back 2nd day to make sure it gets there in time). For that total ($950) I could have build a pretty nice gaming desktop.

Sadly, because I waited for so long, I'll only have a shot at one replacement (90 days are up march 19th or 20th), so lets hope it works. If not then i guess the next refurb will be ebay fodder.

 

Sorry to hear, I was hoping this would do it. Probably the fastest lockup as maybe the power you have the harder it runs. Well you have the brick for the next one, again I think you will enjoy it overall.

most who get lockups don't have your issue. While your lesson was a hard one it may show other with a USB issue to punt right up front. Again not to go through your pains, so we may have to all thank you for that.

Another moral to the story could be to get a 180w to have these systems run as hard as they can, too early to say that for sure though............

 

Yah, thats it one angle to take from it. If there is more power available perhaps it pushed even harder, exposing the same weakness (whatever that is). Hopefully if anyone else ever experiences this, they won't spend so much time on it like me. I also hope the refurb company doesn't resell this one before fixing it.

I appreciate everyone's help in this matter, and I will let you know when I have my replacement and how it runs.

 

Hmm thanks for the info, I should look seriously into getting mine RMA'd as well (serial no. starts w/ 2887)

 

Sent it back. They will be mailing my replacement in a day or so. I'll let you know when I receive it (probably tuesday?).

 

Well, got me replacement. That was fast. Its a P2887, which bothers me slightly, since I've seen negative things on this forum about that S/N designation. Its also much more abused than the previous one. The ram/HDD guard was knocked off two of its three secure points when I fished it from the box. Screen also much looser that previous one, but at least I don't spy any burned pixels like before
...
Booting it up...started at 6:23pm....its now 6:33pm, still on the "Please wait while windows continues settings up your Computer" screen. Never took this long to boot up on my previous one. Wonder if the HDD took a licking during shipment.
...
Finally Up, can see the mouse cursor...keys seem to stick a bit on the left side...finally booting into vista....I'll install some things and give her a go...let you know what happens a bit later.

 

Installing some programs, then it should be ready for testing.

Despite the wretched initial star up time, it seems to boot up and down as quick as my other p-7811

Also noticed an obvious contusion about the size of a tennis-ball around the right side of where the dvd control buttons are.

If i can play the games i want w/o issue then all these things will be forgiven, of course, but whoever owned this 7811fx before me treated it like a son...

 

So far so good. Been playing WAR about 90 min now with usb mouse and not having a single issue.

I do see these weird bar things that sometimes flash on the screen as it was exited the game and then also when i restarted it. Hope thats nothing. I'll upgrade the drivers and see if they go away.

 

Good to hear, enjoy..........

 

It could only be drivers if it ONLY happened when inside windows. If you get "bar things" on the screen during BIOS and before windows loads it has nothing to do with the drivers used.

If it turns out to be a problem (Hopefully not, knocked on wood for you) you can record your display while exiting the game and show us exactly what you're talking about (Taking a pic of what you're seeing I assume is too hard if its simply "flashing" on/off the screen).

I hope you enjoy your new laptop

Cheers!

 

So the computer seems to be running really well. But....

I've notice what best can be described as "static" that shoots across certain regions of the screen (always the upper portion and usually on the right hand side). It doesn't do it during game play per say, but any in game movie that loads and some loading screens it is very obvious and very distracting.

Would a driver update resolve this or is it more than likely a defect with the GFX card?

I'm out of my 90 day warranty with the refurb people, unless they issued a new one for this replacement, so I'm hoping its just software. I'll update the gfx drivers and see what happens I suppose.

 

Is it only when playing in-game movies and stuff like that, or does it happen while the computer is booting?

 

Tanware.What is producing those statistics in your Avatar? Is that display from a software product?

 

It is a gadget running from HWMonitor running in the background..........

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=364221&highlight=gadget

 

So far its only been during games. As I said before, it also seems to only occur during loading screens, intro movies, and in-game movies. I updated the drivers last night but was too tired to play. I'll see what happens this weekend and let you know.

 

Updated the drivers to the Beta ones Nvidia has on their site (179.49?). Still have the weird static in the top portion of the screen. Only happens in games. Have yet to see the static during boot ups.

I'll try a few more games. Maybe this one just has an issue.