8790 Artifacting - Page 13

I would imagine it just depends on the degree. If you catch it early and clean the unit out and figure out how to keep it cool (do believe there were some ATiTool settings that Iconel and G-Omaha figured out in another thread), you can ward off damage.

We need to make a sticky for the artifacting info and how to circumvent it. G posted some links above that should help.

Nice of Sager to stay on the ball and inform us on how to keep these machines running

In such sadness, i must report: removiing the screws was only a temporary solution. You were all right *weeps. I guess i'll have to RMA it.

Wow.

Count me in the club, but a much more exclusive one!

My 8790 straightup CROAKED yesterday after having been in service since June of 2004. That puts me slightly out of my 1 year warranty. Jesus. a $4000 paperweight.

The machine powers on, but nothing comes on the LCD, and it beeps every couple of seconds and does nothing until i turn it off.

Yep, that'd be the Video card.

The few times I did play 3D games on this machine, I experienced the artifacting problem IMMEDIATELY. "Huh.", I figured. "That blows. I paid a lot of money for this machine. It's a good thing I don't use this thing to play games" -- And I didn't. I'm a musician, and it was used for Audio Processing, so, I didn't pay too much mind to the crappy video card.

Well then, now I know the truth! I've just sent a very pissed off e-mail to sager, but I'm not expecting much. What I do expect is to be told that it's going to cost more to repair this thing then what i'd be able to sell it for after the repair, so, hurrah. Ebay "Laptop for parts" listing, here I come.

Never purchasing a sager again.

Were there any symptoms prior to the "croak"? Is it possible something happened to your screen? If so, try hooking up to a regular monitor to see if you get an image. If it works, you're the proud new owner of a new desktop computer with a 3ghz HT processor. Don't give up yet. If you get any hint of hope, go back a few pages in the thread and try some of the solutions presented and be sure to download ATI tool. You can get it from my signature (it's the animated icon of the hammer banging on my 8790).

I'm in a similar situation. I mostly use my 8790 for its processing power and ability to be somewhat mobile. Good luck.

nope

the particular beeping that i'm getting means "dead video card"

i figured out that i needed to downclock the video card months ago in order to even get a stable image in 2D mode (!) ... that only works for so long, i guess.

"David Liu" contacted me this morning:

ehg. and what wonderful engrish...

another one

This is in response to my "This is clearly a defect" argument.

No honor or fessing up at sager.

[quote=deepshock]In such sadness, i must report: removiing the screws was only a temporary solution. You were all right *weeps. I guess i'll have to RMA it.[/QUOTE

Same here, I've cleaned it the best I can and left the Screws a little loose, Down Clocked the Video Card all to no avail. There still is some Artifacting but I can live with it until after the Holidays.

I'll call Sager then and see what they want to do about it since it's still under Warranty.

After cleaning and adding Arctic Silver I still had to reduce the clocks three times before mine stopped artifacting. It's been stable at 297/163 for about two weeks.

I'd like to pose a question to all the out-of-warranty artifact sufferers. It has been discussed that the solution is to send to Sager for full motherboard and video replacement and the cost is around $800. Aside from the MB and Video card, there is nothing wrong with our computers. Why not have them upgrade to a motherboard containing the new NVIDIA PCI-E video??? Has anyone checked into this? It's like buying a new engine for an old car instead of buying a whole new car.

I'd like to hear others thoughts on this. Thanks.

They discontinued this model, so I don't believe there are any mboards that would fit this chassis. So they basically have us in a tight spot. Ante up for a new motherboard for a poorly engineered (IMO) machine or buy a new machine.

So what if we were to send in our paperweights and they put our perfectly good $900 screens (quote from David Lui) and $300 processors in a new model? I will be asking them just that. Here's what I'm going to ask for. Let's just see what they have to say...

I wanted to make sure you understand my concept, so I created kind of a "Sample" Web Page" to give you a better idea of what I'm talking about. By the way...It was made on a Gateway. It's the only thing I own that I can actually see the screen as I type. I still turn the old Sager on every once in a while to hear the purr of the fans.

Let me know you thoughts.

That's fantastic. If only they were set up that way

My only nitpick is that I already have BT, so I need a "Already got it, don't need it again" option

Ask, and you shall receive. I have to keep mine the default though. So what do you think. Do we have a chance at this type of "exchange"??? I really was being serious to some point. I looked at all the views and it seems the only setback is "will they do it".

I only have one other option at the moment. I spotted a Toshiba A105-S101 Satellite notebook at Best Buy today. It's on sale for $597 without rebates. It appears that I could possibly use my 1 gb of RAM, my Slot-Load DVD Burner, and my 100 gb hard drive in it. It comes with a 40 gb, 256mb RAM, and CDRW. If it could work, I could use it until I get my Tax refund and am able to purchase a "real" notebook (dual-core, 7800). Although, from what I've heard, the dual-cores runs HOTTTTT. So, I'd really like to see how they fair in a notebook with a known track record of poor cooling.

I talked to a lawyer I know today and I told him about my troubles and my support group here. He said two words... "Class Action". He's not that kind of lawyer though....

On another note, I decided to mess around with the driver's some more and I:

1. Uninstalled ATItools
2. Rebooted
3. Uninstalled ATI Drivers
4. Ran Driver Cleaner
5. Rebooted
6. Cancelled Found New Hardware

And, now I have a viewable screen. Yes, it takes days to scroll through a web page and it hurts my eyes, but I can see everything and I can use it for what I do most (Word, Excel Documents).

What happens is when you reboot and cancel Found New Hardware is your notebook will use default VGA drivers called VGASAVE. The only thing is I wish you could change the refresh rate so it wouldn't hurt your eyes so much after prolonged use.

Give it a try. It can't hurt. Just make sure you totally clean your ATI Drivers after install or it will reload them automatically.

Happy Uninstalling!!!

There's got to be someplace to get a barebones unit from. Not sure if PCT/Sager/Hypersonic or any of the others would be willing to sell you one (if they even have any anymore). Would think they exist, tho'.

I did realize you were serious. And it's not a bad idea. Just don't know if it'd fly. One way to find out, tho'- Ask.

As for the lawyerly stuff, considering the lack of help I've been getting lately, it's been on the far edge of Things to Consider for me. There was a link to a place that dealt w/ that linked in another thread (might've been this one, but don't think so). I'll have to look it up. Got it bookmarked, but now gotta figure out which computer it's bookmarked on

Glad to see that you got yourself back up and running, if only temporarily.

Edit: Found it. http://www.computerlemonlaw.com/rights.html Along with another link that looks interesting (I'm just getting off lunchbreak, so no chance to read it and see if it's good or not): http://www.techfirm.com/PCLemonLaw.htm

I submitted a form with the computer lemon law site which is not winning me over with its professional design but we will see. I am going to talk to student legal services about getting a refund, that is if I do not flunk out of school with my 8790 being serviced again under the extended warranty. If someone could start a list of people that have had this problem that might help for any legal actions.

I've been running with no ATI drivers installed now for 5 days and everything still seems to be working fine. I am able to once again use my notebook for everything except games. I am stuck with 1024 X 768 resolution, but that is better than an artifacting 1680 X 1050 any day. For those of you who are out-of-warranty, and absolutely have to have your computer working for every day tasks such as Word, Excel, Photoshop, and Email, I suggest you try what I have done. Uninstall ATI driver, clean all ATI-related items off your notebook, use Driver Cleaner, and anything else it takes to make sure everthing ATI is gone. What this will do is force Windows to use the default VGAsave driver.

I've only had one issue. On startup, Windows still finds some sort of driver information related to ATI and asks for "Disc 1" because it can't find a file. I push cancel and it's fine until the next startup. If I could get rid of that too, I would be perfectly happy. If anyone knows how to have Windows quit trying to install the video driver on startup, please post. Thanks.

Here's a list I collected from ONLY the two artifacting threads here on NotebookForums.com. So far 68 people have spoken up about this problem here. This is only one place to speak your mind. Take into account that there are probably 500 or so more people who have the same problem and just haven't made it known here on the forums and you've got one of the worst problems without a recall I've ever seen. Food for thought.

USERNAMEFIRST ARTIFACTING POST
1ximfinity 12/12/2004 06:29 PM
2Vicviper 12/12/2004 09:29 PM
3aegdaien 12/12/2004 11:52 PM
4Freejack 12/15/2004 06:13 PM
5Tread 12/19/2004 04:03 AM
6motrin 12/21/2004 07:39 AM
7CRJPilot 12/22/2004 04:32 PM
8coolesnce 12/23/2004 06:51 PM
9Strife 12/26/2004 01:58 PM
10SEMC 12/26/2004 03:14 PM
11skooma_diver 12/26/2004 04:26 PM
12FriedToast 12/26/2004 05:54 PM
13BuRnCyCLE 12/27/2004 04:43 PM
14ratmyr 12/28/2004 01:34 PM
15Psicho 12/28/2004 09:17 AM
16blade 12/28/2004 11:37 PM
17oumercury 12/28/2004 12:11 PM
18Babbabresaur 1/23/2005 01:56 PM
19khu 1/23/2005 10:32 AM
20Freyguys 1/23/2005 10:39 PM
21Anifes 1/23/2005 12:53 PM
22tclaborn 1/27/2005 02:32 PM
23taliswolf 1/31/2005 07:59 PM
248GuaWong 2/12/2005 12:07 AM
25jetino 2/15/2005 10:29 PM
26odie99 2/21/2005 12:44 AM
27Mephista 3/4/2005 08:21 PM
28chewygoal 3/7/2005 08:12 PM
29ifrit 3/11/2005 02:20 PM
30JacobHenry 3/11/2005 12:29 PM
31mattszeto 3/13/2005 01:18 AM
32de_labarre 3/13/2005 12:46 PM
33Sardo Numsei 3/15/2005 06:08 PM
34gevo 3/23/2005 05:40 AM
35SagerGuy24 3/28/2005 09:42 AM
36Borgath 4/12/2005 05:25 AM
37oumercury 4/12/2005 08:29 PM
38gsferrari 4/12/2005 10:48 AM
39dkuscher 4/13/2005 08:29 PM
40CowboyNeil 4/27/2005 05:45 PM
41shlacking 4/28/2005 09:11 PM
42justinpfarrell 4/29/2005 02:47 AM
43Euclid 5/2/2005 10:02 PM
44smithmal 5/3/2005 05:11 PM
45achiral 5/5/2005 04:49 AM
46deb1385 5/24/2005 05:39 AM
47garrett 5/27/2005 09:56 PM
48Kokeeno 6/13/2005 01:42 AM
49obake 7/2/2005 11:16 PM
50mnikkel 7/4/2005 03:09 AM
51cr_still 7/5/2005 12:52 AM
52lewarkmd 7/6/2005 02:00 PM
53Sedorox 7/6/2005 11:01 AM
54Sushifiend3000 7/7/2005 04:10 PM
55Michelle 7/11/2005 03:41 AM
56Sedorox 7/18/2005 06:52 PM
57>(SLuG> 10/27/2005 03:50 PM
58Jim O'Rourke 10/27/2005 06:54 PM
59G-Omaha 10/28/2005 09:10 PM
60boriskillu 11/2/2005 09:29 PM
61Bob W 11/5/2005 02:19 PM
62Cairngorm 12/15/2005 05:48 PM
63MilkMan 12/17/2005 11:47 AM
64Shadoejack 12/17/2005 12:28 AM
65deepshock 12/22/2005 01:45 AM
66PoorBoy 12/22/2005 07:32 AM
67vladtepes 12/25/2005 09:42 PM
68nintariman 12/29/2005 05:49 PM

I really apreciate what you're trying to do here mnikkel. We shouldn't just take the loss and move on, something has to be done about these faulty +$2000 systems that we bought.

-Vicviper101

Odd.. you mention that I had a problem; however, did not reflect that the problem has since been fixed. The minimizes the list to 67 and by extrapulation reduces the 500 to less than 480??