D900F Shutdown with new HD6970

Hello all. I installed an HD6970 into my D900F and it's shutting down after a minute or two of being on. After about 30 seconds the four lights for caps lock, scroll lock, etc begin to blink and the motherboard speaker beeps. One long beep every two seconds or so.

I'm using the latest bios from May 2010 (BIOS V 1.00.09
EC V 1.00.04). In the bios it shows the card as ATI VGA CARD. Window's picks up the card too, but I don't have enough time to install drivers before the shutdown.

Now, I don't think this is heat related. My first instinct was the heatsink isn't seated right and the card is getting toasty in seconds. Well, after the first shutdown I opened it back up and found everything to be in order. Thermal paste was a nice even coat and the GPU was still cool to the touch. After reseating the card, applying new paste, I'm still getting the shutdown.

One thing that's bothering me is that HWMonitor does not show my GPU temperature. Is this simply due to a lack of proper drivers?

Give all the above evidence this is my current theory: The BIOS version does not support the HD6970 and therefore is not reading the card's temperature. So, the BIOS are freaking out and acting like it's overheating then shutting down.

Right now I'm considering putting back in my GTX280 and trying another BIOS. Read on the D900F owners thread about a modified BIOS. Anyone have any ideas?


Edit: Got the GTX280 back in. Everything is working great. So the shutdown is most certainly from the VGA card (kinda already knew this). Looking into other BIOS. Seeing what the custom Phoenix BIOS has to offer.

Edit: Been searching the interwebs for anything and I'm finding others who have had the exact same problem: Clevo D900F disable overheat/shutdown
Like before, no solution has been found. I know my motherboard has the female AC jack so I'm starting to wonder if everyone who's had these problems has this older board. If that's the case then there might not be any fix.

Edit: Flashed BIOS using the custom ones found here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/sag...81138-d900f-sager-9280-owners-lounge-200.html
Tried the HD6970 again and still shutting down. Card is still shown as ATI VGA CARD in BIOS and is still absent from HWMonitor. Didn't see any options in the custom BIOS to disable the automatic shutdown. Doesn't seem to be any options for hardware monitoring. Really starting to think that this card just simply wont work with my machine.


Edit: Ok, the pieces are starting to come together here. The guide on MXM-Upgrade mentions a cooling issue and the use of thermocouples as a solution: Clevo D900F
Doing a google search on the chip they used prompted this image: http://i00.c.aliimg.com/img/ibank/2012/706/247/482742607_109946378.jpg
After reading the description it fits with the theory of the HD6970 not reporting its' temperature to the BIOS. What I don't understand is do you actually have to solder this to the motherboard? On MXM-Upgrade it says the circuit is as followed:

Hard drive's 5v -> Thermocouple -> Fan Red Lead.
Then,
Black Fan Lead -> Hard Drive's ground.

Once the thermocouple has it's 5 volt source it's glued to the VGA heat sink and the issue should be resolved.

Does this make sense to anyone? Do you actually have to use the hard drive's 5volt source or will just the fan's leads suffice? Also, how does the thermocouple report the temperature to the motherboard?

 

Bumping with some new information.

Asked the community at overclockers.com what they thought about the thermocouple idea. After a few helpful posts it seems that the BIOS is setting off a false overheating alert and shutting down the system.

So, now the proposed fix is to look into a modified BIOS that disables the hardware monitoring; specifically the GPU temperature. Bios-mods.com was recommended so I made a post there.

If anyone has any input or other ideas please feel free to share. Any information would be a great help. If any other leads turn up I'll update this thread.


Overclockers forum post: False Overheat Shutdown? - Overclockers Forums
Bios-mods forum post: Clevo D900F Unlock Hardware Monitoring

Edit: Been doing more research. It looks like disabling the hardware monitoring is not possible. Turns out there are two versions of the D900F. I have the older one of the two.

Given all the evidence it looks like the HD6970m is simply not supported by my laptop. My Clevo is four years old so I suppose this is finally the time to look into a new machine.