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7700 Power Adapter Problem ;(

post #1 of 14
9/8/05 at 11:36pm
Thread Starter 
Hey guys and gals.

It's been a long time since I last posted (January / Feburary 2005).

The reason for this post is that my lovely Alienware Area-51M 7700 I recieved back in January is now sitting on my desk doing nothing.

I have reason to believe the culprit is the AC Power Adapter. For starters, the 2 of the 4 pins that are used to hook the power adapter to the back of the laptop are all black and burnt-out looking (I will take pictures when I get home, at a friends house right now).

Second, I notice that when I plug the AC Plug into the wall and then plug the other end of the AC plug into the AC Power Adapter the green light on the adapter lights up fine. But when I plug the adapter into the back of the laptop, the green light on the adpter begins to flicker and the adpter makes a weird buzzing noise. So I believe it has something to do with the 2 burnt-out looking pins on the adapter when connecting it to the laptop.

The computer ran off the battery fine, until it ran out juice of course. . So that causes me to believe that the computer is fine and there are no issues with the battery.

I have searched the forums and found that 2 users have had my similar problem but no real solution was ever listed.

Now I know what your saying "You have a warranty right? Just send it in!". Yes I have the 1-year warranty but one of the main reasons I don't want to send it in is have to wait 2 weeks through God knows when to get my 7700 back. I know what your saying again "Wow, what an impatient bastard." but the issue mainly seems to be with the AC Power Adapter which has gone bad.

So I'm planning to order one tommorrow through Alienware's Shop and recieving it by Wednesday. Hell, if I'm wrong I can always send it back for a refund, right? (I think there is like a 14-day refund policy or something)

Well, if anyone has any ideas let me know.

I would love to save $90. (XBOX 360 comming out soon! lol)

When I get home, which should be like within a hour of this post, I will take pics of the faulty pins on the AC adapter.

Thanks for taking the time to read through all my crap.
-zer0
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post #2 of 14
9/9/05 at 2:26am
Thread Starter 

Tired to take pictures...

Well I tried to take pics of the faulty pins on the power adapter but it coming out blurry on my sony cybershot 5 megapixel cam. Well my g/f was messing around with it last, she most likey changed some of the settings on the camera.

Well it's 1 AM here and I gotta be to work at 9 in the morning. I'll see if I can snap the pictures at work tommorrow.

Later,
-zer0
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post #3 of 14
9/16/05 at 11:23am
Thread Starter 
Well, if anybody has been following this thread (ribbit, ribbit - lol). I just got the replacement power adapter yesterday and ta-da ...... it doesn't work, lol.

So I guess I have no choice now but to send it in.

lol, now I have 2 power adapters (one for work, one for home - guess it works out)

So if you have a similar problem as mine, do your self a favor and just send it in... (if your still under warranty)

Good thing I was able to back up everything before the rest of the juice in the battery went out.

Later dudes, and lets hope I get it back before X-mas, lol
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post #4 of 14
9/16/05 at 11:56am
Sorry bout your problem...prolly the internal power circuit it fried...
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post #5 of 14
9/16/05 at 1:18pm
yeah thats sounds about right....its sad....
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post #6 of 14
9/16/05 at 1:19pm
that sucks. sorry to hear that. although it sucks to be without your laptop for a while until they fix it, it's good to let your baby go back to the mothership. there may be something a bit more serious inside.... i'd suggest sending back the first power supply also.

good luck!
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post #7 of 14
9/16/05 at 10:24pm
Wow zero, you laugh out loud way too often! You must be a comedian's best friend. Lol!
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post #8 of 14
10/4/05 at 3:06am
I am having the same problem, I got a new adapter from them, it worked for a couple of hours and looky looky, no worky.

I order my lappy, hell I can't remember, but it was one of the second few out.

I think i am going to have to send the lappy back, I don't wanna, I don't!

Good luck with yours.
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post #9 of 14
10/4/05 at 6:49am
Sounds like the EXACT same problem myself and shaffers17 had.

They shipped the replacement power adaptor, but the problem continued.

I've had my system back now for about a week and it's running fine.

Apparently they replaced the graphics card (6800 ultra), but they didn't provided any more information other than that.

So at the moment we don't know what causes this problem, but we do know that a replacement power supply doesn't fix the issue.
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post #10 of 14
10/11/05 at 1:41pm
Thread Starter 

It's Back!!!

As of October 11, 2005 12:05 EST, my 7700 has returned from the mothership! Everything works great. The motherboard and CPU heatsink were replaced. I have a laptop cooler that I run under my laptop now (Antec Lapcool or something like that) and just installed get thermal and will have that running just in case any heat problems arrise.

I would like to thank AlienRichard and everyone else in the forum that assisted me in the problem.

Woohoo! Got my laptop back in time for Quake 4 and F.E.A.R.! lol

Gonna run 3DMark to see if my scores got any better, lol

Later dudes.

A now HAPPY 7700 owner,
zer0-



P.S. - I'll post some pics in a little bit. (that is if I can find my digital camera)
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post #11 of 14
10/28/05 at 6:29am
Ouch, that isn't very reassuring. I'm currently waiting for a new power supply that should be on the way, though it likely isn't.

See, at the end of September I contacted AW and told them that the AC adapter for my 7700 was not working, (The light wouldn't come on at all). Since I didn't have a credit card with an available balance at the time, I opted to have them send me a lable to return the part, only, they never sent me the lable. 2 weeks later I contacted them again to ask about the lable, and they finally sent it to me via e-mail. I shipped the part the next day. Wendsday I called tech support, and spent an hour on the phone while some outsourced CS rep insisted that I had never sent them the part. Just as I was about to demand that I be transfered to a superviser, suddenly they had recieved the part, and the rep was going to e-mail parts and have them ship me the replacement. Now of course, nearly a month since the part fried, I'm going to have to contact them again since I never recieved an e-mail confirming the part was being shipped and ask for an update.

I personally feel like a sucker for ever buying an alienware in the first place. I know for a fact that I'd have gotten better customer service from Dell, and spent less on the machine. Guess I'll see if AW is going to insinuate I'm a liar again in the morning when I see if they decided to ship me my replacement part.
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post #12 of 14
10/28/05 at 12:54pm
i plan on calling in and getting a new power supply. glad to hear things are going better for everyone
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post #13 of 14
10/28/05 at 9:25pm
Well, I contacted CS again today, and they said my part is scheduled to ship, but do to the recent huricane nothing has shipped yet. I was also told I would recieve an e-mail when the part ships. Now I just wait and see how long it takes to get that e-mail. Maybe I'll get to use my computer again befor christmas.
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post #14 of 14
11/5/05 at 3:24am
my units lights wouldnt shut off even unplugged....THAN tonight smoke came out of the back....what the???
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