P-7811FX: Narrowing down the problem

Alright. So I made this thread in hopes that I can find the solution to my problem, because as much searching as I have done I have not found one quite yet.

Now, the problem is multifold. First, I started out with having overheating issues with my laptop where it would overheat on games that were not fairly intensive. It would get up to 95C and shut off. I made sure that I had proper ventilation underneath my laptop, however I have not quite yet checked for proper application of thermal paste and so forth.

This is because I utilized the RivaTuner fix to set it so that it would be forced at Performance 3D. This helped cool my laptop immensely, and it would sit at 65C or less at all times. The problem is that I want to get the most out of my laptop and improve the my overall performance. Attempting to bump up my clocks up to the detected limit ends up causing display driver crashes. If I push the shader to around ~1300 it starts to crash and recover rapidly.

Meanwhile, if I disable the force constant performance level, I can push my shader and CPU clock to the manufacturers limit, but pushing the memory clock above ~600 causes display driver crashes as well. My temperature levels shoot up very fast although I do notice a fairly big difference in overall game performance.

As a side note, I have had two other issues with the laptop too. First the motherboard ended up being faulty on me and I had to send it back for repairs, and second I ended up burning through a power brick. This was before I undervolted and knew concretely about the overheating issues however.

So. Am I doing something horribly wrong here? Like I said, I'm trying to get the most bang for my buck out of this laptop here.

 

Simple thing to do is clean out the internals. I found that a moderate amount of dust in the system dramatically increases thermals. You would be surprised.

 

Besides this, you way want to follow the teardown guide here on how to disassemble your laptop. Take it down to the motherboard, clean it out, re-apply heatsink paste, and check the heatsink for the video chip. On mine, one of the screw posts had actually come off of the motherboard so it wasn't seating correctly on the GPU. I highly doubt that you have that problem, but it doesn't hurt to check it.

 

Gonna resurrect this thread as I have finally taken apart most of my laptop.

I was not however able to reach the motherboard and GPU to apply some ICD7. After removing the screws that kept the monitor in place I still couldn't get it to come off. I followed the guide to a tee, but it seemed like the two screw areas were glued down. I did not want to apply too much force as I was afraid of breaking the monitor. Did anyone else have this problem or is it just me?

Anywho this came as a result of HWMonitor showing some incredibly unusual temps for my MOBO. Apparently it was idling at 60c and reaching 98c while playing Alien Swarm. Afterwards now it idles at 34-35C. I did manage to apply some ICD7 to the CPU heatsink however, as well as clean up a huge ball of dust that was obstructing the fans.

edit: To further clarify here, I recently turned off the Rivaturner set constant 3d level to test my GPUs heat. This is important because after five minutes of playing Alien Swarm HWMonitor reported my GPU at being 103 degrees Celsius. I stopped at that point because it was continuing to get hotter and I did not want to risk any possible damage. My fan was blasting out incredibly hot air and touching the left side of my laptop was also very hot, almost burning my hands. I was getting much better performance out of my game however.

Also, even when my computer isn't overheating, I get occasional "Display driver has stopped responding and successfully recovered". This occured while playing DFO, with my GPU temps sitting at around 60c.

I'm starting to wish I got a desktop instead of this laptop. I shouldn't have to underclock the card to get any sort of stability when I bought this for mid to high end gaming.

 

If I recall correctly, for the monitor, there are 2 screws on the bottom side of the laptop AND 2 screws on the top side once you take the media bar off. It should just lift out (lift towards the sky lol).

As well, that wall of dust will be clogging the GPU heatsink and fan. I have just recently followed the guide cleaning out the dust and applying new TIM. I have seen more stable temps from the GPU, however I used a no-name brand heatsink compound. I am currently ordering ICD7.

You shouldn't have to turn down any settings. You really need to get to that GPU.

I got a similar error when playing the SC2 Beta. Try getting to the GPU and applying the TIM to the memory chips and the GPU itself. Just to note: when taking my laptop apart I documented all the screws carefully. And I had a bit of trouble with the keyboard ribbon. Just remember that the motherboard clip acts like a hinge and follow the guide in these forums

Good luck.

 

Make sure you get all the screws before you try to remove the lcd panel. I know its a pain, but if you take your time and work methodically, it really isn't all that bad. The 7811fx is actually one of the easier laptops I've disassembled. Just be glad you don't have an Averatec.
Also check to make sure the cables are disconnected, like the lcd cable which can snag on the laptop's base when you are trying to pull out the lcd.

 

After managing to successfully take apart my laptop fully this game (it was an error on my fault. I missed earlier instruction to remove the bottom chassis LCD screws) and applied thermal paste, so far the results are looking good.

Played Alien Swarm at 1900x1200 for about 10 minutes at full detail, no FPS drops and my computer stayed at a stable and cool 66-67 degrees Celsius. Did what Bodin said and documented all the screws, which made it easier to reassemble and applied TIM to all four memory chips and the GPU.

I've been struggling with this issue for months now and it looks like it might finally be gone.

 

It's me again. A good month later.

And the crashes still happen. My laptop still ends up way overheating on a lot of games, causing it to black screen and crash. So, am I officially screwed here? I'm guessing that my GPU is dying and/or not soldered down all that well as Pttyboy in the other thread said.

This really infuriates me.

 

Does it still only crash in the 4th 3D Extra or w/e performance profile?