Solved! Sudden Hard Shut-downs on Dell laptop

[manoynmonic]

Ok guys, at my wits end here.

My laptop will regularly die - as in turn off/power-off while in use. Here's what I've tried so far:

Thought it was heat - cpu and gpu seemed to be running a bit hot. I recently warrantied the Dell motherboard, and thought maybe that the guy who put it in didn't put the heat-sink crud on there. I pulled it apart, reapplied, made sure the fan vents were clear while I was in there. Things began running much cooler. But the problem persisted. Then I got that Dell utility that lets me manually control the fans, and cranked them up to full-speed all the time. Things were running very very cool, high 30's low 40's C. The problem persisted. I thought perhaps its a bad PSU (I know it's a lappy and it should be ok, but anything's possible), so I tried running on just battery power. Still getting random shut downs. I ran the Dell BIOS diagnostic, it says everything is fine. It started while running Vista, so I switched over to Linux, same problem.

I say it's random shut downs, but there are a few ways I can guarantee it will shut down: watch youtube clips, make a skype video call, or let the kids play video games on it. I want to say maybe the onboard video card is bad, but that is why the mainboard was just replaced (as in just a month or so ago).

System specs: Dell Latitude D830, 2.2 GHz Core 2 Duo, 4 Gigs of ddr2 PC5400 RAM, Nvidia Quadro NVS 140M 512 MB.

 

[bert539]

Ok guys, at my wits end here.

My laptop will regularly die - as in turn off/power-off while in use. Here's what I've tried so far:

Thought it was heat - cpu and gpu seemed to be running a bit hot. I recently warrantied the Dell motherboard, and thought maybe that the guy who put it in didn't put the heat-sink crud on there. I pulled it apart, reapplied, made sure the fan vents were clear while I was in there. Things began running much cooler. But the problem persisted. Then I got that Dell utility that lets me manually control the fans, and cranked them up to full-speed all the time. Things were running very very cool, high 30's low 40's C. The problem persisted. I thought perhaps its a bad PSU (I know it's a lappy and it should be ok, but anything's possible), so I tried running on just battery power. Still getting random shut downs. I ran the Dell BIOS diagnostic, it says everything is fine. It started while running Vista, so I switched over to Linux, same problem.

I say it's random shut downs, but there are a few ways I can guarantee it will shut down: watch youtube clips, make a skype video call, or let the kids play video games on it. I want to say maybe the onboard video card is bad, but that is why the mainboard was just replaced (as in just a month or so ago).

System specs: Dell Latitude D830, 2.2 GHz Core 2 Duo, 4 Gigs of ddr2 PC5400 RAM, Nvidia Quadro NVS 140M 512 MB.

Experience the same problem with my D830. Dell blamed 3rd party software and you got to battle . Bought new Asus netbook and work much better than Dell .So bottom line don't support Dell

 

[manoynmonic]

It was the video card. I talked Dell into sending a guy out and (again) replacing the mobo. Problem solved. It was out of warranty, but those mobo's have a recall out on them, so Dell swaps them out for everyone. They kinda cheesed me and put a mobo in that had a smaller video card than the old one (the old had 512, the replacement is only 256mb), but everything works now.

 

[AntiZig]

ahh nvm, glad you've solved it

 

[ssybesma]

It was the video card. I talked Dell into sending a guy out and (again) replacing the mobo. Problem solved. It was out of warranty, but those mobo's have a recall out on them, so Dell swaps them out for everyone. They kinda cheesed me and put a mobo in that had a smaller video card than the old one (the old had 512, the replacement is only 256mb), but everything works now.

Help!

I have the same exact problem. Sudden traumatic shutdown, not a BSOD, not a reboot.

Happens when certain games are played that seem to put stress on the video card. First noticed when I had it on a docking station and thought that was the issue, but now it's happening without it being on a docking station.

My mobo is 6 months out of warranty as well.

How did you get yours replaced? What number did you call and how can I get more info on this recall (I looked on Dell's site but saw no reference).

Anything you can provide would be GREATLY appreciated and I would like to make it up to you in some way if possible.