Failed 6990m on Malibal Lotus

The other day the 6990m on my P150HM went from working fine to complete failure in about 5 minutes flat. I was playing the witcher (the first one, so not that stressful of a game for my build), with no overclocking and the laptop resting on a cooling pad when the entire screen went gray. I ended up having to hard shut down. Upon reboot the initial BIOS splashscreen was discolored, and it booted to black. I did all the safe mode driver fix stuff, even a full wipe/reinstall of windows, still nothing. My machine is just over a year old (so also just outside of warranty).
So I contacted Malibal, hoping that they could help me out. I realize I'm out of warranty, but a complete GPU failure on a $1600 build after barely more than 1 year?? The response I got was pretty much that they know this line of AMD cards are poor quality, and that they try to warn people away from AMD when they buy (their words, not mine AMD lovers), and that I would have to buy a replacement at full cost. I personally find this ridiculous. There is nothing on their site to even remotely suggest any lack of faith in AMD cards, and if they don't trust them why are they selling them? I am pretty upset about the entire situation. I realize I'm outside warranty, but with a laptop of this price level I don't think it's out of line to request a replacement for this big of a component failure after just over a year, especially if they apparently know the cards they were selling me weren't great quality (and as far as the 6990m goes, there appears to be quite a trend of cards failing just outside of warranty). What do you guys think?

 

sad bro, had the same experience with my first 7970m, well half the price of nvidia and similar performance would get you to this point a lot did you verify from bios that the card is recognized on POST? (or you cannot get to the bios even after reinstalling everything?) it is not beeping says that the card may not be dead btw (I never did it but a blind flash could solve your problem)

but look on the bright side, get a 680m now and max the games, you paid 1600 dollars for not only 6990m but the cooling solution & mobo that supports mxm3.0. So get out there, buy a new gpu, and rock your games, all the way down to the max style

 

I can't get to anything since the clean install (I think since it never did a successful first boot it never fully finished installing). No beeping whatsoever, but then again it never really crashes, just sits there with a black screen. What do you mean by blind flash?

Yeah, I wish. I will probably end up having to go for a 660m, 675m if I get real lucky and my parents decide to help out. I could probably afford the 7970m but from what I see I think I'll be going Nvidia.

 

I did manage to get into BIOS (was pressing wrong function key), and it lists the 6990m as VGA adapter. Not sure if that changes anything, just thought I'd toss it out there

 

you flash the vbios of graphics card, a blind flash (again noting I never did this) is flashing without the screen feedback, there are numerous threads in this forum how to do it, take a look into one of them. Again, you not getting the beeps says that the card maybe alive, but something might be wrong with its programming? (my card beeped (didn't pass the POST) and it was dead, yours maybe alive) you can message slv7 about the blindflash, as far as I know he revived many (many) gpus from dead (he even has a thread of reviving a 6970m right?), kinda like the priest of graphics cards around just sit tight, we will get some pro feedback soon on this thread

EDIT: oh you got to the bios and it sees the 6990m? great news! it is probably alive

 

Luckily my 6990 is still going strong.

I recommend the GPU baking trick as it seems to work with these cards.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/har...-kind-guide-how-bake-your-gpu-fun-profit.html
http://forum.notebookreview.com/zep...znote-6224w-but-works-all-brands-modells.html
The Oven Trick (repairing your broken video card with an oven) | Overclockers

Good luck
200C for 7min seems like a good value.

 

I've been thinking about trying the baking thing, but if this blind flash might work I should probably try that first.
One other thing to think about with it being a software/BIOS issue, the initial splash screen (very first thing you see, not sure exactly what its called) shows really bad blue lines/doesn't display right (although the BIOS screen itself looked completely normal). Does this still fit with the blind-flash-might-fix-it theory?
Thanks for all the replies

 

If it's showing really bad blue lines then the baking shall do the trick. I highly doubt a flash will fix anything.

 

Alright I'll give that a try tomorrow. Aside from new thermal paste is there anything else I'll need?

 

Whoa...this is the first time I am hearing anything about Malibal 'warning' anyone against pruchasing the 6990m. I can attest they never said a word against the card when I was making the purchase!!

My 6990m also died some days ago after just 18 months. Luckily, I had purchased a 2 yr parts warranty so Malibal will replace mine free of cost.

 

I know,that's exactly what my reaction was!
Lucky...

 

why not join the Green Team and forget about these AMD video card/driver problems

 

As if Nvidia hasn't had any utterly massive gpu failings in the past that resulted in several class action lawsuits filed against them..........funny how people forget about the 8XXXX and 9XXXX series

 

people, dont let this get out of control it really seems that the 6990m gpus have one or more unstable batches that fail after approximately one year of operation. does not mean that all amd cards are bad and all nvidia cards are better. dont overgeneralize based on one single gpu model

 

So it looks like I might have an extended warranty via some visa perk since I bought it on visa? Not sure yet. If I do have that I'll hopefully pick up a 675m off malibal (that would work fine in my comp, right?), if not I was wondering if this card...
Laptop Video Cards :: nVidia GTX 670MX 3.0GB Mobile Video Card - R&J Technology, Clevo Barebone Notebook kits, Laptop and desktop system builder
...Would work in my model? It says P150em instead of P150HM, but does anyone know if it would work anyway?

 

675m will work with modified drivers. as for mx models, no one has ever really tried them in hm machines. not sure, but iirc mythlogic said those wouldnt work tho. another alternative would be the 7970m, shouldnt be much more expensive than the 675m, if at all...

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

Awesome, I really hope this visa thing goes through.
The 670mx is $290, and the 7970m is closer to $500, so it'd be nice if the 670mx would work (college student now, need to penny pinch a little bit more)

 

sorry i mistyped: i was trying to say that mythlogic reported them as NOT working in HM laptops...

corrected that in my earlier post.

in any way, u should better check before buying!

 

Dang, alright. Thanks for the follow up

 

675M will give better performance but be hotter.

You could maybe find one these days at a good price.

 

Heat isn't that big of a concern unless it would be a huge jump from the 6990m (I don't mess with over clocking and I always use a cooling pad during gaming), but unless the warranty works out it might be out of my price range ($570 is the best deal I could find outside of a used eBay one, which would make me nervous)

 

Heat should be relatively the same between them, not a huge difference.

 

So it looks like the visa extended warranty won't work...
I would really like to keep it closer to $300 than $500 if I can, does anyone have suggestions? Any second opinions on whether the 670mx would work (not that I don't trust you, just that it would be so nice if it could)

 

Seconded: MX cards do not work.

 

MX cards require a bios update that isn't (That I know of) available on the Hms. Only reason I know this is because My NP9170 won't work with them since I haven't updated the bios yet (I know, I know, lazy as hell). I am assuming it has something to do with the Windows 8 UEFI boot.

Swing for the 7970m if you can, the Hm's don't have the switchable graphics problems that the Ems do. 7970ms in Hms tend to do very well. As far as I understand it (And anyone can stand in and correct my information if I am wrong) If you had the 6990m in yours then it will support the 7970m.

 

Thanks for the second, gotta double check just in case.
If I can afford it I'll do the 7970. Just a thought, how much of a performance drop would the 670m (not MX) be compared to the 6990?

 

No problem at all. When comparing benchmark numbers like 3D mark the 6990M still beats the 670M by ~20%. I'd skip that option and go strait to the 7970M which can be had around $400-450 right now.

 

Sounds like I'll just have to suck it up and buy it. Any advice on sellers? I found this one...
Laptop Video Cards :: ATI HD 7970M 2GB Mobile Video Card - R&J Technology, Clevo Barebone Notebook kits, Laptop and desktop system builder
But does anyone know how that company is as far as quality/warranty? Are there any other options available that people would like to suggest?

 

You could try giving Malibal a call and seeing if they'd be willing to sell it to you. You could also contact Sager or Eurocom directly and see what they'd be able to provide it to you for. RJ Tech is a solid place though and if you're fine with the cost should treat you fine.

 

ill second what derek said, i for one got my 7970m from RJ and i can only recommend them (aside from the lil fact, that they forgot to preflash my gpu with the modded HM vbios, so i had to do it myself but then again, a nice guide came out of it that has already helped tons of other users here )

as far as eurocom goes, u can always go ahead and check their ebay shop upgradeyourlaptop, theyve got some pretty decent prices there for laptop gpus. aside from the alread mentioned sellers id also consider mythlogic, their service is supposed to be pretty nice and as far as ive seen theyre always willing to sell u any laptop part u could possibly need

 

I'll check those out. Does mythlogic have an online shop or should I just email them?

Also, would this card work in my model? Doesn't specifically say but the port specs seem to match other cards listed for p150hm upgrades.

http://item.mobileweb.ebay.com/viewitem?itemId=130717954698&index=10&nav=SEARCH&nid=75717976126

 

Hmm that's funny my 6990M died too a week ago, but luckily there is a standard 2 year warranty on it

 

Who did you buy from to have 2 years standard?

 

all shops that sell electronics in the EU are required by law to give out a 2 year standard warranty on everything

yep, u can either email myth or send them a pm right here on nbr.

the 675m works in hm laptops and is identical to the 580M, so u can basically just choose the one that is cheaper also be aware that the 580m will work out of the box, whereas the 675m will work but will need modded drivers in order to be properly installed (software-wise).

cheers

 

Dang, that's a nice perk!
Great, right now its down to 7970m for $480 or 675m for $445. Pretty much same price, so any opinions? Part of me shies away from amd, but thats mainly superstition at the moment.

 

based on personal experience (check my sig) i can only recommend the 7970m on hm machines. for those extra 35 bucks ull pretty much get like 50% extra performance

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

Wow, did not realize there would be that big of a performance gap. On the notebookcheck gpu chart (the one comparing game fps) they were within a few frames of each other, and the 675 showed higher on a couple? Not doubting you at all, just curious.

Also, thanks a ton to everyone here! You guys have been a big help

 

You'll need to take the notebookcheck benchmarks with a grain of salt. They are a good baseline to go off of, but often don't rerun their benchmarks with new driver releases, different models of the GPUs (Different Vram amounts and data bus widths) and as a result the scores can vary. The 7970m is going to be more powerful than the 675mx,

 

the 675mx is a different thing tho, that would only be about 20-30% behind the 7970M

 

Didn't think about the up at factors. I guess that's why its a good idea to check with the community here!

I actually have a friend on bestbuy geek squad, so I'm going to let him take a look, make sure its definitely a total hardware failure (clean, reseat everything, check for any BIOS errors,whatever else he can think to try), so wish me luck on that!

If that doesn't work then 7970m it is!

 

Also, if anyone could connect me to mythlogic on these forums so I could ask about prices/buying a GPU that'd be sweet!

 

u could just send them a pm, theyre represented by the user "mythlogic" here either that or hit them up via email on their website

 

Right, probably should have been able to figure that one out...
Thanks!

 

So I got in touch with mythlogic and they have the 7970m for $445 (over $100 cheaper than what malmalibal quoted me....). Anyway, that sounds like a sweet deal, except they said the HDMI won't work in my p150hm if I go with the 7970m? Is that a hardware thing, or a vBIOS thing? Is there a workaround that would get HDMI working?

 

yup, thats been an issue for quite a while now. strangely, there ARE one or two users who are able to use hdmi out on their hm laptops with a 7970m installed,but we couldnt determine the exact reason. so far its only clear that its definitely a software issue,since one is able to see an image on the external display up to the point that the amd drive is installed or loaded at windows startup.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

Interesting, so a software fix is possible in the future then.

 

Well the only issue being it's not really something the companies are focusing on... Clevo wont be able to do anything since it's a weird driver issue.

 

yep, so any software fix would have to come from the community itself. its really weird, since both the same vbios and the same drivers as that user who got it to work didnt make any difference on other laptops of the same model.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2

 

Well possibly the order or which HDMI sound driver they updated from.... Very odd.

 

Classic, the community pulls off what the company was too lazy to pursue I've got faith in , fellow NBR-ers!