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    W500 graphics problem

    Discussion in 'Lenovo' started by gillcleeren, Jul 4, 2009.

  1. gillcleeren

    gillcleeren Notebook Enthusiast

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    Hi,

    I have a recent ThinkPad W500 (bought it about 4 weeks ago). I have Windows 7 RC1 running on it and since then, I'm having something weird happening:
    I first had the ATI card enabled. However, I got a lot of crashes from the display driver, where a small message in my task bar would appear, saying: "ati display driver stopped responding and has recovered". I thought this to be the driver, so I manually changed the BIOS so that only the onboard display card would be used. Note: the W500 has the switchable graphics option included.

    I changed it about a week ago, and have had no more crashes since then. However, I was just switching between windows (using ALT-TAB) and it happened again, so with the Intel Integrated Graphics. Again, a message appeared saying that the display driver (no mention of which one actually) stopped responding but had recovered.

    Exact symptoms: screen freezes for about 5 seconds, goes black for about 3 seconds and then everything works fine again. The message appears at this time. Nothing is logged in the Windows logs however.

    Is somthing wrong with my machine or are other people experiencing this as well with Windows 7 currently?
    If you also have a W500 (perhaps other systems have this as well...), did you find any solution for this. I bought this laptop to give presentations with, so I can't afford a graphics driver crashing during a talk.

    Thanks in advance for your help!
     
    gillcleeren, Jul 4, 2009
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  2. w500?

    w500? Notebook Consultant

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    I'm running the RC on a W500 with no real issues to speak of. What driver are you using?
     
    w500?, Jul 4, 2009
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  3. gillcleeren

    gillcleeren Notebook Enthusiast

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    In both cases, I have been using the one installed by Windows.

    For the ATI card, it didn't find it initially, but when running Update Driver in the Device Manager, it installed one itself (I don't have the version number now since I disabled this one in the BIOS).

    The integrated graphics first also had the one installed by Windows (it said Prerelease in the Device Manager). Now, I have installed 15.15.0.64.1808 (8.15.10.1808: Mobile Intel® 4 Series Express Chipset Family) from the Intel website ( http://downloadcenter.intel.com/fil...+RC1,+64-bit*&lang=eng&strOSs=203&submit=Go!).

    Which card are you using? And which drivers did you install?

    32 or 64 bit?
     
    gillcleeren, Jul 4, 2009
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  4. w500?

    w500? Notebook Consultant

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    w500?, Jul 4, 2009
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