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M90 video problem?

post #1 of 12
3/10/09 at 1:58am
Thread Starter 
I have an M90 and it was good for the first two years and about 7 months ago it started to heat even when I wasn't playing games. A lot of times it would shut off by itself. I now realize that it might be the dust bunnies that needed cleaning. Thank you dell for pointing that out(sarcasm).... Now my lappy will only show the windows sign on bootup and go black after that. Is my motherboard out also or just my graphics card? I'm hoping that I can put in a 7900gs after seeing the prices for a fx2500m. I had a fx2500m before but I don't do much gaming lately. Will these go down in price ever? The reason I want to keep this laptop is because I love the screen of the m90. Probably the best screen on any laptop ever. Should I just give up? If I clean the dust bunnies regulary, will it last me another couple of years?
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post #2 of 12
3/10/09 at 1:13pm
Have you cleaned out the fans yet? as in open up the laptop and remove the dust bunnies..and this needs to be done on a regular basis.

Does the laptop stay on and no video, or is it shutting down completely?

The BIOS for the FX1500 and 7900GS are interchangable from what I recall. So you should be able to drop it in no problem. and you could even flash he FX1500 BIOS on it. to confirm I would check with a member here zzpulp.
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post #3 of 12
3/10/09 at 9:23pm
Since the card works in the BIOS, I wouldn't call it dead. Can the laptop boot into safe mode?

Oh and no, those cards are not gonna get cheaper.
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post #4 of 12
3/12/09 at 3:49am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by zzpulp View Post
Since the card works in the BIOS, I wouldn't call it dead. Can the laptop boot into safe mode?

Oh and no, those cards are not gonna get cheaper.
Haven't tried yet but will this week. I haven't touched i in about half a year. Thanks for the advice. I'm glad that's it's not completely dead
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post #5 of 12
3/16/09 at 6:42am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by dave-p View Post
Have you cleaned out the fans yet? as in open up the laptop and remove the dust bunnies..and this needs to be done on a regular basis.

Does the laptop stay on and no video, or is it shutting down completely?

The BIOS for the FX1500 and 7900GS are interchangable from what I recall. So you should be able to drop it in no problem. and you could even flash he FX1500 BIOS on it. to confirm I would check with a member here zzpulp.
Now it's working again. weird. It didn't work about the last 10 times I tried. I thought it was dead. It had artifacts all over when it booted it up. I'm not sure how I fixed it. I just pressed F8 then got it to boot into safe mode and restarted and the artifacts were there when it started and it disappeared. i just played cs source and everything ran fine.

But I have a question even when I'm not gaming and having cleaned out the dust bunnies, the temp on my gpu is 60C. Why is it so high. It was always this high. Mind you i just took the heat sink off of the gpu and put it back on w/out any use of thermal paste yet(i have to go grab some) but even without me taking the heat sink off, it was never under 60c
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post #6 of 12
3/16/09 at 6:45am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by dave-p View Post
Have you cleaned out the fans yet? as in open up the laptop and remove the dust bunnies..and this needs to be done on a regular basis.

Does the laptop stay on and no video, or is it shutting down completely?

The BIOS for the FX1500 and 7900GS are interchangable from what I recall. So you should be able to drop it in no problem. and you could even flash he FX1500 BIOS on it. to confirm I would check with a member here zzpulp.
how long is regular. I really didn't have any dust bunnies. A little bit of bunnies on the heat sink but alot of dust on the fans.

What's the significance of electical tape on heat sink?

wait a minute the last light is blinking orange and green on the upper right of my laptop, whats going on with that?
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post #7 of 12
3/16/09 at 4:28pm
Once a month is pretty much the max you need to do it. As long as you're good at not stripping screws, every 1-2 months should be fine.

Your GPU temperature is high because the Dell bios keeps the fans off unless they need to be on. This results in high idle temperatures but low noise. If you want lower idle temperatures you can let i8kfangui control your fans.
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post #8 of 12
4/19/09 at 9:58am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by codek View Post
I have an M90 and it was good for the first two years and about 7 months ago it started to heat even when I wasn't playing games. A lot of times it would shut off by itself. I now realize that it might be the dust bunnies that needed cleaning. Thank you dell for pointing that out(sarcasm).... Now my lappy will only show the windows sign on bootup and go black after that. Is my motherboard out also or just my graphics card? I'm hoping that I can put in a 7900gs after seeing the prices for a fx2500m. I had a fx2500m before but I don't do much gaming lately. Will these go down in price ever? The reason I want to keep this laptop is because I love the screen of the m90. Probably the best screen on any laptop ever. Should I just give up? If I clean the dust bunnies regulary, will it last me another couple of years?
It's doing the same thing again. Starts goes to bios then windows screen then weird artifacts goes black and it's one but screen is all black,

It does boot in safe mode but i can't get it to boot up in normal mode again. Any ideas. I think the last time the gpu overheated and it shut itself off
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post #9 of 12
4/19/09 at 5:25pm
Are you positive the fans are working correctly ?

You may want to apply new thermal compund to the GPU
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post #10 of 12
4/20/09 at 2:02am
Its sounding like its another messed up nvidia card
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post #11 of 12
4/21/09 at 3:20am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by dave-p View Post
Are you positive the fans are working correctly ?

You may want to apply new thermal compund to the GPU
yes it was working the as5 got the temps down a couple of degrees (i even did the stocking filters on the vents)then one day it went out again. I tried to restart it and restore the comp(pretty sure that wouldn't work) but weird artifacts and chinese looking characters everywhere. I think what might have caused it is that I didn't use ikfangui (sp?) and I had it on for more than 1 day straight.
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post #12 of 12
4/21/09 at 1:10pm
wel it sounds like your GPU is crapping out when it reaching a threshold temp.

Normally the card should work fine as long as the max temps stay under 90 C, and 90 is what I would consider high, I believe the card specs maybe a little higher.

If you seeing artifacts below 90C that it is safe to say the card is faulty.

if IKFANGU can keep the temps low enough to use, than you maybe able to stretch the life out a little longer.
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