Help with Alienware 18 laptop:
I'm having an issue that I really can't get to the bottom of, I don't know whether to blame my OS, GPU, SLI bridge or anything else really.
The problem was I first noticed black bars and flickering top bar (with the minimize and close functions) flickering on top of the window application in Microsoft word. Typing was a pain, the cursor was erratic and text flickered, but ONLY in word and powerpoint and such. AlienFX also suffers with the black bar phenomenon in the window (but not outside). Next I struggle with stuttering and frame rates in BF3. Single GPU gives higher framerates (60fps more or less) with stuttering while SLI gives low framerates and stuttering. In Word 2013 I noticed no black bars with SLI disabled (not sure if this is always true). I've tried many different drivers for my GPU with no fixes.I also dual booted Windows 10 insider preview ( to see if it was the OS) with mixed results: The BF3's stuttering stayed but in SLI the framerate was mostly normal (high 90 to 140ish), however I did notice stuttering during the Witcher 3 even at low settings that I don't have when on Windows 7. This maybe due to the fact that their is no driver support as of yet for the witcher 3 on windows 10. Skyrim runs normally as far as I can tell on both operating systems. Also, an increasing amount of GPU artifacts at boot screens have appeared since the dual boot setup. However, they aren't ever there while in Windows. Occasionally, the computer also crashes in boot (rarely just turns off). Windows 7 has also drastically slowed down despite numerous failed and succeeded system restores and hard disk checks. The CPU usage during these slow downs (mostly on startup and application opening) is usually low. My CPU passed an XTU stress test, and all temps across the board are normal. I have no idea what to make of these observations, consistency seems to have been thrown out the window. Symptoms first started showing up in a weekend, starting with the battlefield framerates, now everything seems to have been going downhill. Windows was recently updated, but the system restore should have removed these updates and solved the problem, I restored to the farthest date that wouldn't fail in the system restore. Could it be some kind of plugin??? Malwarebytes showed no viruses.
Seems a little overwhelming, related or not, these are my best observations.
System Specs are:
780m SLI
4700mq
16gb RAM
750gb HD with 120 intel SSD (Windows 7 on the HD, WIndows 10 on the SSD.)
I'm having an issue that I really can't get to the bottom of, I don't know whether to blame my OS, GPU, SLI bridge or anything else really.
The problem was I first noticed black bars and flickering top bar (with the minimize and close functions) flickering on top of the window application in Microsoft word. Typing was a pain, the cursor was erratic and text flickered, but ONLY in word and powerpoint and such. AlienFX also suffers with the black bar phenomenon in the window (but not outside). Next I struggle with stuttering and frame rates in BF3. Single GPU gives higher framerates (60fps more or less) with stuttering while SLI gives low framerates and stuttering. In Word 2013 I noticed no black bars with SLI disabled (not sure if this is always true). I've tried many different drivers for my GPU with no fixes.I also dual booted Windows 10 insider preview ( to see if it was the OS) with mixed results: The BF3's stuttering stayed but in SLI the framerate was mostly normal (high 90 to 140ish), however I did notice stuttering during the Witcher 3 even at low settings that I don't have when on Windows 7. This maybe due to the fact that their is no driver support as of yet for the witcher 3 on windows 10. Skyrim runs normally as far as I can tell on both operating systems. Also, an increasing amount of GPU artifacts at boot screens have appeared since the dual boot setup. However, they aren't ever there while in Windows. Occasionally, the computer also crashes in boot (rarely just turns off). Windows 7 has also drastically slowed down despite numerous failed and succeeded system restores and hard disk checks. The CPU usage during these slow downs (mostly on startup and application opening) is usually low. My CPU passed an XTU stress test, and all temps across the board are normal. I have no idea what to make of these observations, consistency seems to have been thrown out the window. Symptoms first started showing up in a weekend, starting with the battlefield framerates, now everything seems to have been going downhill. Windows was recently updated, but the system restore should have removed these updates and solved the problem, I restored to the farthest date that wouldn't fail in the system restore. Could it be some kind of plugin??? Malwarebytes showed no viruses.
Seems a little overwhelming, related or not, these are my best observations.
System Specs are:
780m SLI
4700mq
16gb RAM
750gb HD with 120 intel SSD (Windows 7 on the HD, WIndows 10 on the SSD.)
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