Is there a way to downgrade my M1330 bios?

Use update utility, it will flash back to the older bios, you have to go to options an check the box to allow downgrading first though. make sure to either reset the CMOS manually.

I am not happy with this situation, but don't think you should be unhappy with Dell. I am glad to have a new BIOS that may or may not help, but should they do nothing? Certainly it is too soon to issue some kind of massive recall.

Sounds like you are doing the sinister thing in trying to kill your laptop intentionally. Why don't you just throw it down the stairs or something? Maybe buy theft insurance and break into your own house or burn your house down and put in a claim on your fire insurance?

I am very interested in how Dell handles the situation once it is known and more failures come up. I hope they/nVidia offer assistance for those of us who may have failures through no fault of their own.

Sorry if that was a bit harsh. We both are feeling this in our own ways.

I also note that your criticism is with nVidia and not Dell. My apologies there, but Dell is the one you will call for replacement/repair and it will be their problem should your system go down.

I actually really like my laptop. There is a bowing out on the lcd bezel that is annoying and could collect junk in the bottom and of course I would have prefered 1G LAN since I move around a lot of big files. Other than that, I am really happy.

For me this is frustrating because when I use my laptop, I want to enjoy it. I want to enjoy games and now that is difficult since I am thinking there are a finite number of cycles I can go through. Each time I game, that number goes down. So while gaming, I am turning down options/settings to keep the temperature down and also not gaming as much as I probably would have if the problem wasn't there.

FWIW, 24 hour crysis sessions probably won't kill it. It sounds like cycling the system is what does. Load crysis, get to max temp, shutdown your laptop and let it cool down. Rinse & repeat. ATI tool also seems good for raising temps and if you *really* wanted to kill your laptop, you could (temporarily) stick a paper clip or whatever in the fan to keep it from starting up or turn it off by other means. I don't advocate that as an honest customer plus Dell could probably figure that out. Stick to cycling crysis/atitool and shutting down might be best (but take longer). Keep in mind you might never ruin your gpu (if what nVidia says is true in that only some are affected).

I am going to be an honest customer and use it as I normally would. If it fails, I will call Dell. If my situation doesn't warrant replacement/repair, I will buy a new laptop. I just hope I can forget about it more and enjoy gaming.

Temps: (i8kfangui with sensor swapped and 10C correction to match nVidia setting)
Idle: 65-70C (it is hot in Tokyo now)
Gaming (moderate games or settings): mid 90s
Intensive games: low 100's with 105C max

Some good news for HP users. Sounds like they are 'enhancing' warranties for some laptops including some with 7xxx series cards.

http://www.betanews.com/article/HP_a...PUs/1217358666

I *assume* Dell would offer something similar for us. I don't know, but I think the HP design wasn't the best, so they probably feel the need to do more for their customers. Still this is encouraging to me.

I doubt we will see a full blown recall since lots of people won't be affected. Either they don't use their computers enough or simply don't game on them.

Wow...those are high temps

They are a bit hotter than my 1210 would get. I think that baby maxed out at around 98C or so. Temps can vary a lot depending on the airflow and what game you are actually running.

My max temps have been gaming with an external monitor 1920x1200 and settings on highest possible. That seems to hit me the hardest, but I sure like my 24" screen for gaming

No way I can really play games at those settings, just some quick testing.