Faulty GPU?

Hi all
New member here

Got a Clevo P150EM that is giving me nightmares.
Windows boots to a black screen. After a few of those failed boots, Windows boots in "Automatic Repair" and lets me boot in safe mode which works fine for ~10mins before the laptop freezes and gives black screen (with a really weird sound). I managed to delete AMD drivers and catalyst and removed the GPU form "Device manager" all together. After that, windows boots normally but only lasts to ~10mins and gives a black screen just like safe mode.

Linux (Ubuntu 14.04) is no different. Boots to a CLI and displays:
"*ERROR* UVD not responding, trying to reset the VCPU!!!"
"*ERROR* radeon: failed initializing UVD"

then boots to desktop and freezes just seconds after that.

Live USB of Ubuntu 14.04 gives the same results

I'm suspecting a faulty GPU
What do you guys think?

specs:
Clevo P150EM (reseller: Schenker Technologies)
i7-3630QM
AMD Radeon 7970M
8GB RAM

Thanks in advance

 

It sounds like a GPU problem.

Try hitting F6 and choosing nomodeset when the live CD boot screen comes up and see if it works after that. The open-source video drivers generally will fall back to VESA if you use nomodeset rather than trying to accelerate the graphics... If nomodeset works, you should install Ubuntu then get the propriety fglrx from AMD and try that. If that messes up, your GPU is dying.

 

If installing the GPU drivers causes the machine to hardlock it's the GPU that needs replacing.

 

I've successfully booted to live usb with "nomodeset" option turned on. No issues so far, the GPU even shows up when I type "lspci" in the terminal. Does this mean that the GPU is still alive?

 

What to do next?
Is there a way I can be 100% sure that it's a faulty GPU?

 

Install Ubuntu and then install the proprietary drivers from AMD. It will likely exhibit the same behavior and you'll have definite confirmation that your GPU is dead.

Unfortunately the story is all too common on the forums about AMD cards failing.

 

Quite a few for the Nvidia 5xx series too

 

Sounds like dead 7970M to me...

 

Not a faulty GPU. Don't think that. This computer is rock solid but it has an issue. It is the driver software for the 7970m.

So here is the "deal" with this notebook. The drivers suck. Period. The only drivers I have ever been able to get working are the original drivers that came with the PC. In Jan 2013, I tried upgrading to Catalyst 13 and it failed miserably. BSOD, Catalyst saying no hardware installed on the system, no ability to connect external displays, nothing. I emailed AMD and had a back and forth for about two weeks trying everything to get the upgrade working. Nothing worked. Absolutely nothing. Complete uninstall/reinstall, clean Win7 Ult, just install new drivers, even tried a step up install where I went from my version to the next version until I reached latest (well, that was the idea, after the first update...fail).

I am here now because AMD just released a new version of Catalyst and I was hoping someone had finally figured out how to get the drivers updated successfully. As for your issue, try and find some original drivers/copy of catalyst that came with the PC. That will probably fix your issue.

Good luck.

 

AMD/Intel combo?

I've had a number of hard crashes since the new Intel and AMD drivers hit.
The AMD 15.7 update works fine as along as it's paired with an older Intel driver (using 4061 myself)

This is very important. It's what I used as a base to resolve my crash issues and find the right drivers.

 

You guys crash as soon as the desktop loads or the driver is installed?

 

Anddo24,

Thank you...using those intel drivers, I was finally able to update all graphics drivers. Took me three years so I appreciate it greatly.

Wish you all the best (seriously )