M570RU sudden power off while gaming on battery

Well the title explains it a bit already:

While gaming on battery power (so not connected to outlet power) and on high performance in Vista 64-bit, my notebook shuts down without any warning/beep or anything of the kind.

I did not have the time to test this behaviour thoroughly (I have exams now) but it seems like the battery cannot provide enough power to the system and the whole thing just shuts down.

To give an example:
- battery on 50%
- high performance (Vista 64-bit)
- play Timeshift
After just a minute or two in the game the notebook suddenly powered off.

After shut down it is impossible to turn it back on, but it is no overheating, because when I connect the notebook to the wall outlet it powers on instantly. And now comes the really strange part: the battery is still around 50% charged!!

To make some things clear: This is my second M570RU and the first one I had, had the exact same problem. It has happened to me three times now and those were the only three times I was gaming (at least attempting to) on battery power.

Maybe more of you M570RU owners out there can try the above. If it happens on more (and perhaps even all) systems there is a serious flaw somewhere.

For those interested: I use the 169.09 Vista x64 drivers.

NOTE: I searched the forum for a similar thread but I couldn't find one, if this has already been sorted out please excuse me

 

thats sounds strange.... never experienced something like that before.

Is the battery healthy... can you give it a full charge cycle (from full to near empty, and vice versa)?

If its a the unlikelihood of a faulty battery, then that could explain your problem... but its too rare to even be possible.

It could be a couple of things:
- low-level settings (such as on battery power, the system holds back the full performance of a notebook to conserve battery)
- OS (64-bit, 32-bit)
- the particular game itself

 

The last two times it happened on 3dMark06 and on Bioshock. The battery seems to work perfectly. I'm on battery power now from fully charged to 30% now after about 1 hour on the "balanced" setting in Vista. From your three points that leaves:

- Vista x64 has a problem
- The power settings have a problem with battery power (and this also boils down to Vista probably)

Correct me if I'm wrong

It's also good to note that the last time the notebook lasted around 1-2 minutes in game, the first time it was almost 3 minutes in 3dMark06 and for Bioshock it was again 2 minutes. So there seems to be a "time constant" for my notebook of appr. 2 minutes high performance gaming on battery power.

So what (else) can it be? It would really be nice if more people could try it on their M570RU.

 

Just thought I'd ring in, I own a M570U and I have experienced the same problem while playing Portal. I tried it on both batteries which I know were both fully charged. I have the same high performance settings and am running Vista 64-bit. Not sure what Vista drivers I am running though.

 

Then its probably a max performance setting in Vista thats causing it.

I would just leave it at balanced or "on demand" battery settings.

 

imo it sounds like the battery can not supply enough juice to thing like the cpu or gpu while under that kind of stress i have not seen this yet but i have not done any hardcore gaming though.. these 570's seem to have a number of issues popping up of late as gophn said try turning some things down in vista.. and maybe the display brightness.. etc

 

Question?? How long have you had the system? I had a laptop in the past that I had for 4-5 months and it had a similar issue. I ended up taking off the bottom cover and cleaning the fans and the vents out and did not have the problem again. Just a thought.

 

if i am right he just got it recently

 

okay mine just did this twice to me during 3dmark????????? i saw your post and have never ran this one through 3dmark, i did the first one and that one made it through fine many times.... now im mad.... wtf is up with these things...im dissapointed in these....imo should have got the other system i was looking at..this was with performance settings and the stock drivers i have not upgraded them yet..but mine did turn back on while on battery... now i have it plugged in and it went right through 3dmark06...????? ill charge the battery to full and try it again that way kinda defeats the whole purpose of a notebook imo

 

Yes you are right, I just got this second one (1,5 - 2 weeks ago). The first one I got a month ago.

So you seem to have the same problem also.. Let's just hope it's a problem with Vista and not with the notebook itself.

 

yeah i know.. i hope its not the notebook.. ill be mighty ticked off..

 

Same thing just happened to me, 75% Battery Left... about 4 min into WoW

 

this seems like more of a issue than anyone will end up wanting to admit.. i wonder what sager will be doing about this mess..there are more people posting with this same issue now... there has to be something more than its just because of vista....trying out bioshock does the same to me but battery was around 50% or so.. still should not be low enough to cause a shut down..

 

I have a M570U aka Sager 5760 and I have always had this issue but only on intense games that max out the GPU. This happened on Vista and XP.. and most of the time only on the games Oblivion, and Farcry but does happen rarely on other games. I noticed that it happened when the game dropped down below 30FPS and the GPU struggling in a intense scene or very pretty one and happens more often right before the system Reads more scene data of the HARD DISK.. It has never happened Plugged in. I personally think the battery just can't support (MAX GPU, HDD Reads, MAX CPU Load all at the same time, and don't forget when MAX Fans kick in if not already running.) it as it mainly happens when I'm also at below 75% power.. This also tends to happen mainly when I'm at MAX Performance and sometimes when at Balanced (Power Settings), but Powersaving no because the game is running like crap because of lack of GPU power(Vista will start to denie GPU power below Max Performance) (plug into wall while in power saving and the framerate jump to normal)..

Just wanted to let you know my own personal experience with this issue and my own personal testing of what I have found..

 

Even though you set back to DMA, it does not work that way.

Here is my old post about it:

Sounds like your IDE channels might have dropped to PIO mode, instead of DMA. (This is a "feature" in WinXP.)

Go into device manager and look at the Primary and Secondary IDE channels. Under the advanced tab, see what mode you're in. If it says PIO you'll need to uninstall the drives and let Windows find them again (resetting it to DMA if available won't do it).

If WinXP has trouble reading a disc more than a couple times it permanently lowers the mode to PIO. Uninstalling and reinstalling the drives is the only way to get a fresh start. Once the drives have been re-detected, you may have to go back and manually set the "DMA if available" option.

ALSO:
Try to run a CHKDSK on your system.
-Go to START > RUN > type: CMD
-type CHKDSK C: /R
-hit yes, and Restart (the CHKDSK will run)

Hope this helps,

-Gophn

________________________

Another note, I recommend this amazing freeware for all-purpose DVD ripping:
- RipIt4Me
(it will need you to have DVDShrink and DVD Decrypter installed already, which are both freeware)

 

So Exatrive, since you have the same problem on another sager/clevo system it seems to me more like an even bigger issue. I suppose most people have their notebook on outlet power all the time, because I haven't read about this issue before. If it is the battery that's causing the problem it would be nice if clevo came up with a fix for it.

 

agreed with all these issues showing up i am regretting my purchase..

 

Well I never intended to play games for extended periods of time away from a wall as the batter life is a joke when you have a gaming laptop to start off with.. The battery as it stands is barely able to make it through a DVD movie (if lucky), let alone a gaming session that may last maybe 45 to 60 min depending on the game. the only thing I rely on the battery for is Power Outage situations when I'm away from my UPC 30min backup.

I personally think that gaming laptops should drop the battery all together to expand that space for something every better.. or at least make the space optional for something else. Of course this is all just my opinion on the whole mis perception that gaming notebooks are suppose to be 100% reliable on battery only source under max load, when the current power draws in desktop equivalent GPU's need help from a external power supply molex. I personally can't see batteries alone in general being capable of suppling a very clean power to very picky hardware when it comes to clean power.

I'm sorry this is a gross over explanation of when I was just trying to get across.. To put it in simple terms, think about how much desktop performance you have sitting in front of you in the form of a laptop. Then think about what kind of Power supply you need in your desktop to power that kind of performance. I would expect a battery to explode under that kind of load.. oh wait, thats already been a issue with certain laptop companies.

 

I completely agree with you Exatrive. I did not plan on gaming on battery power when I bought this notebook. And I'm very happy with it

However, not everyone is happy with this and one may demand that a notebook can perform every single task not only on AC power, but also on battery! That has been and still is one of the key concepts of a notebook.

It would be nice if clevo tried it out for themselves and perhaps came up with a fix, or even make it public that while gaming on battery your notebook can suddenly power off. But that's MY opinion and I guess a big company like clevo will not quickly admit to what I am beginning to think is a design error (be it battery/hardware or software/bios related).

 

check the pins on the battery and notebook. one of mine was bent a good amount. i fixed it and have run the system hard now for about 2 hours on and off battery and have had no issues. i cant say this will fix your issues but it could it seems to have fixed mine. i dont think the battery was making good contact. now i have a few other issues to work on. my intel card is now working right... i need to get my lid replaced from the bend in it and my new keyboard they sent me is missing some keystrokes. ill be calling for another tomm i guess. so yeah ill change my opinion for the moment. hopefully they take care of the lid and keyboard for me.

 

I will try that a.s.a.p. if I have the time. Good one zfactor and I hope this helps!

 

UPDATE: From the last post on I got 2 new M570RU's and they both have the sudden power off problem while gaming on battery power. I can't see any connector(s) that is (are) bent, preventing good contact between the battery and the notebook. So the problem is still not resolved...

 

So it works fine with power plugged in?

Definitely strange.

I can only think to try the using another OS, and repeat the same thing to see if the result is the same.

 

have you tried the patch:
http://sierra.com/en/home/support/sierra_support.html

 

Yes it works fine with AC power plugged in. Maybe I can try another OS, but I don't have an external HDD for it and to be honest, I don't even have another OS at hand.. But can you explain how it can be OS related?

 

sounds like a software issue in the sense that it crashes near the same exact time for the same game.

maybe try another game first then... before doing the OS thing.

 

Ok here we go:

3dmark06 -> power off
bioshock -> power off
COD4 -> power off
timeshift -> power off
NFS pro street -> played once, but as I recall; power off

So basically a lot of (if not all...) "demanding" games..

It's also not always on the exact same time, it happens in 3dmark06 for instance somewhere during the first test (proxicon), though it will last for a minimum of 1 minute..

 

ok... now I would try a stable OS like XP 32-bit.

you can borrow someone's Retail/OEM* XP CD (hopefully it has Service Pack 2, if not download it)... then install it on your system.

*make sure its not a OEM Recovery CD (with an image on the CD that overwrites the HDD's info and slaps on a pre-set factory image), but a real Windows XP install CD.

This is not illegal, since your are not going to activate it... and are using it for diagnostics.

- do a clean XP install
- do all drivers and such
- make sure to update to latest DirectX version (Nov 2007)

try those games again on battery.

 

I'll see what I can do with the OS. Are there any other possible causes?

 

I'm definitely not an electrician, and I donno if this has been covered before...

But these laptops are power hungry. It is somewhat possible that when it is being taxed 100% by the applications, it flat out cannot draw enough power quickly enough from the battery (i.e. batteries can only discharge so fast). It could be the battery just doesn't provide enough voltage (amperage?) to fully power every fan at high, the GPU, drives, etc all going at once, which is what happens in those high end games and benchmarks.

Since some other people are having the same issues with demanding apps, it could be the problem. *shrug*

 

def sounds like a power problem imo.. mine has not done this to me in forever then last night bam.. shutdown. sager has released a new cpu heatsink on the newer machines i wonder if it is just getting to hot i know when my heatsink was not seated right it would do the same thing all the time.

it has to be something where its not getting enough voltage or something to one of the components and shutting down. wish i could have helped prior, i know my system has been fine and then i was shocked it shut down and i have been playing games etc on it for a while.. im very annoyed..

 

Maybe one of the guys from xoticpc or any other reseller can test if it happens on more systems? Maybe they know an answer..?

 

LTLFTP:

I dont think this is a fault in the design, but more of the limitations that had to be considered to have a bit of give and take. Take for instance the Anandtech write up on the WidowPC "Clevo M570RU Rebadge" Sting 517D2 ( http://www.anandtech.com/mobile/showdoc.aspx?i=3196&p=1)

If you are too lazy to read it, the pertinent bit is here:
For battery life testing, we did take the time to perform our standard three in-house tests. The first consists of surfing the internet until the batter runs down. We set Internet Explorer to load three web pages (including AnandTech.com) pause for 60 seconds, exit and then reload those pages. The second test simply plays a DVD until the battery runs dead. For the third test, we loop the four gaming tests in 3DMark06. In all cases, we set the power profile to "Balanced" and leave the display brightness at maximum. If you're willing to turn down the brightness level, you should be able to increase battery life by another 10 to 15 minutes.

and

The 8800M GTX ends up using slightly less power than the last-gen Go 7950 GTX, but neither one is even remotely battery friendly. SLI platforms obviously suffer even more, making them unfit for anything but short-term battery use. They work great as a system that you can take to your friend's house to play games, but at under 90 minutes of battery life even with the 8700M GT we're definitely not talking about something that can take the place of a Nintendo DS on road trips.

One other interesting item to note is that on the higher-end GPUs (G0 7950 GTX and 8800M), maximum performance is throttled in battery mode - presumably to prevent overloading the battery. Performance in 3DMark06 for example is roughly half as fast in battery mode. Even if you're not worried about playing games on battery, the mere presence of a discrete GPU has a significant impact on batter life.


I would suspect the drain on the battery during gaming is too much for the battery to handle and the sensors shut the system down to prevent damage to the battery. It is mentioned to play games on balanced mode and I suspect they had to run the gaming benchmarks on battery balanced mode....

I would suppose if the battery were of a larger cell design, this could have been avoided, but at some point you have to weigh the benefit for a part time gaming platform like the M570RU is. For long gaming jaunts I intend to have power available and consider balanced mode to be adequate for on the road gaming.

I say intend because my new M570RU should arrive on my doorstep this coming Monday. I guess I can test mine when I get it, but I dont anticipate a difference in this is not likely an issue of broken M570RU's but a lack of ability on behalf of the configured batteries they use...