Np5796 random black screen

I've looked through the forums and I found certain solutions to my problem but the situation I'm in is confusing. My 9800mgt does black screen, and randomly has a full screen (green boxs) of artifacts ONLY in certain places. I currently go to college doing digital animation and whenever I bring my sager into the lab room with around 18 computers I get a black screen if I'm doing something that takes up memory and cpu at random times using the programs.

For example, I can use Photoshop cs4 fine, but if I maximize it, the screen will quickly flash with artifacts then go black, system crash, reboots fine. If I'm like halfway through rendering in 3dsmax2010 it'll black screen. This happens all the time in the lab.

What confuses me is that if I have my laptop in my dorm hooked up to a 24" external monitor it won't black screen BUT i'll recieve a screen full of artifacts. Although when I'm in my dorm it barely does it, maybe once or twice a week?

I was thinking it could be an overheating problem, so I stripped the whole lappy, dusted it and reapplied thermal grease; problem still occurs. I tried downloading the latest drivers; problem still occurs. I also have tried reinstalling all the programs and vista. The only thing I haven't done is updated bios drivers (could anyone link me to bios download page for my laptop?)

I have a feeling my 9800mGT is starting to go because I read through the forum and seen that they have problems but is there anything I could do to slow the process down or possibly fix it? Since I'm in college I can't really ship out my laptop soon or anything that requires me not having it for a while since I have mad work to do. Could people give me suggestions even if they're probably not right? I could use any help because I have deadlines to meet. (I'm not going to bake my videocard if anyone thinks that will help)

 

Any ideas?
I just tested today that it is infact more hot in the lab than my dorm with a temperature reader program on my laptop. Although it does not glitch out in my dorm (while maximizing photoshop).

 

Re-apply thermal compound (Arctic Silver 5) to heatsink/cpu and GPU

 

Are you using maximum speed on your fans? I forget how to toggle that on the NP579x series though.

Maybe you might need to bake your GPU...

 

Hate to say it, but your GPU is probably going bad. 2 weeks after recieving my 5793, I stared experiencing the same issues as you, artifacts. Sent it in and sure enough a bad GPU. Running a 1gb 9800gts now on a zalman2000 cooler and temps never go above 60, under heavy load. Doesn't mean my card will last forever but hopefully delay its demise !

 

Well I'm about to be SOL soon... With my specs, would buying a 280m GTX on ebay for $510 be a deal? Or is the 300m series coming out soon?