Well basically last night (and the past couple of days) my laptop has randomly been shutting off when using the GPU heavily, Folding or L4D. So last night when I was trying to get into a game with some friends I just kept crashing and couldn't play. So I thought, must be overheating or my defect (m8600GT) GPU. So I got CPUID Hardware Monitor and had a look at the temps, 80-90 degree idle temps, going all the way to 120 degrees before switching off. As my laptop is out of warranty I decided to open it up and see what I could do. After about 5 minutes I was in, And lo and behold the nuts used to hold the heatsink down on the GPU were hanging freely off the bolts, the glue had failed and there was very little contact to the chip. Fixed it by putting the nuts on the other side of the board where they wouldn't pull through and applied some AS5. Now idling at 65ish, still too high. So after determining that I have the old Aluminium heatsink rang Dell to see if I could get the new all copper heatsink and explained my problem and how I fixed it (He was clueless) I asked if I could get a new heatsink and he said they don't have them and that he would arrange a new motherboard to be sent out to see if that will fix the problem. So now I get a new motherboard, which should extend the life of my laptop. now when the tech comes to install it I will ask him if I can get a better cooler. Hopefully the tech will leave my current motherboard behind and I can try to use it in a HTPC.
The tech guy only carries his cell, screw driver, and some tools, I think some screws as well, and of course, your part that he received from Dell. The technician is not a Dell one but a contracted firm from your region, trained to know how to open the inside of your laptop. They don't carry thermal pads/paste or extra parts. All broken parts MUST be returned to Dell else you will charged for them. If you are out of warranty, and you purchased the motherboard, this might be different. If you are out of warranty and and the fix is for free, then it's probably Dell doing a recall on broken Nvidia GPU's such as yours. But because your GPU is soldered in to keep your laptop thin, it's a new motherboard entirely. If you are UNDER warranty and you have a buisness line laptop with next buisness day on site service, than if the fix fail, then it's a new laptop (unless it's something silly), and I don't know what Dells does if the laptop is not in production.. I guess they just repair is continuously until everything works. During the time Dell build you the new system, you get to keep your system, until you receive the new one. If the hard drive is not the faulty part, you switch them to avoid a system re-install. How do I know? Because I had personal experience, and read a lot of stories on that. I must rate Dell service and technician as excellent.
Dell tech support (phone/internet) is clueless. And it sounds like you have an XPS M1530 - which is a laptop notorious for behaving like a hotplate. I imagine it is selling like (hot) cakes in Siberia, where it would serve a dual purpose. In today's world of notebooks, it is a piece of junk. I fixed my overheating the same way you did - reapply thermal paste, tighten all the screws, and prop it up so that it gets a little more air into that bottom-intake.
Actually I must disagree, about tech support. Well maybe you are correct for Dell Home, but Dell buisness (which you don't need to be a buisness to order from them) are quiet knowledgeable, and all from your region. In my case, they speak perfect French and English... so I imagine the call center is either in Ontario or Quebec.
Im sorry, but as an owner of a few Dells and user of the business line, I have to say the business line is ok, when you dont get some dolt. Home and Office on the other hand is Habib, and we ALL know what thats like... Ive got a M1530 and its not that bad actually... most of the time it only heats when playing something intensive like Crysis, but then again mines got a 9XXXM GT chip and not a 8XXX chip, so thats probably why... as for the technician, hes only gonna have a thing of screw drivers, and the other "required tools" to do the job. So he will not have any thing you will need... And they are defenitly contracted out. Last guy who worked on my Inspiron e1505 was a German guy, so if that says anything... Oh, and PS - If you can get some moron on the home line, you can get a replacement sent out, no charge. We did that with my e1505 because it was being retarded... I just reformatted the drive, disabled some stuff and applied some new AS5, worked fine, but got a new laptop out of it... So not sure you feel abut that, but if you tell them its overheating badly and crashing left and right and it got hacked (only works when talking to Home, not Business) then normally they have a manager talk to you, you say same thing to them, and then Voila! Hopefully this will help. Oh, BTW, your heatsink on the lappy, is it a metal pipe connected to the CPU/GPU and mosfets, then connected to the exaust fan? If so, theres not much you can do with that, except get the cooper-ish model, but from what im assuming, its not much different. If you have a bigger block, you could find some slimline cooler or rip an older one and DIY it...
The Home line is very iffy sometimes. I usually talk to them using their Dell Chat services, and that works out fine. When I had to get the motherboard replaced in my XPS 210 (My fault, ended up telling them I was cleaning it and it stopped working after that) I still had access to the XPS support team, which was mostly American support, and all was nice there. But with my Studio laptop, the particular model I have is known for having a short in the wire that goes to the volume/eject/etc buttons. I looked it up online, saw it was pretty common, and then contacted Dell Support since they had been known to replace the whole media key section. The first time they told me I needed to reinstall my drivers/etc/bs, and got off the line with me. I then tried support again, told them that I knew they had replaced others laptops parts, and then the said they would send out a replacement. Both times it was the same technician. Very courteous and relaxed, would call me up to check where my house is and if I was home. Both times he only had the necessary screws, parts, and oddly a few sticks of ram(probably the other job he had that day) Overall, I'm satisfied with the mediocrity of Dell's support.
The heatsink is the aluminium version and the heatpipe covers teh GPU, CPU and Northbridge. I wanted the copper version to lower temps. I fixed it so the heatpipe is contacting the GPU again, I just wanted lower temps. But the guy just though I had an overheating problem, kind of ignored the fact that I said I fixed it several times. I can always ask the tech if he can leave the motherboard behind (I know it's unlikely) but it's a perfectly working board.
I had a Dell Precision workstation like six years ago, and their 'gold' tech support was the best. I think they replaced every part like five times over during the three years of support, and a couple of the technicians ended up knowing me pretty well. The only Dell lappy I've had exposure to is my friend's Mini 9, which seems much more solid than my Eee PC 4G.
Maybe you should have asked for a heatsink replacement. Oh well ,a new motherboard, probably the most expensive part of your laptop, you can't complain. If it doesn't help, just tell them that and it's new heatsink. BTW, any damage, including scratch done by the technician is covered by Dell (well in Canada it's like this)
Yeah I said I wanted a new one, that's the whole reason I rang them up. I didn't expect a new mobo or anything, I was expecting to have to pay for the new sink too.
That sucks about Canada, I asked the technician over the phone if I dropped my computer while moving it during his instructions, would it be replaced, and he said yes. Those Dell guys were what got me into computers, not that I recall..
its like that in USA too, but you have to prove it to Dell first. A tech replaced my gfx card and monitor in my lappy and wound up putting some nice gashes in my (when it was brand new) brand new laptop. I called dell and told them they they were responsible for it and they said that they werent, but never did anything about it. Talked to 6 people in a day and only 1 said sorry, the others just were "thank you for calling dell." next computer will not be a dell
No. My experience was "Oh we are really sorry!", can you please carefully look your machine and identify other scratches done by the technician so that I can place an order on these parts. (for me it was the screen lid only). Once the tech came and replaced the part, the next day I have Dell Costumer Service calling me and ensuring that I am satisfied with the service this time around, and I received a coupon of 50$ off on anything from Dell.ca, with free shipping. My next lappy is from Dell . Also, to mention that if you order by phone you can seriously negotiate on the system price a 2000+$ system for ~1600$, free shipping + 75$ off coupon with free shipping on anything on Dell.ca, just by asking! Also, it's hard to beat when you buy a laptop with MINIMUM 3 year warranty with 3 year next buisness day on site, where every other laptops are like 1 year at best minimum.
Nothing bad, just I asked for a new heatsink but they sent out a motherbaord instead. The tech came today had a look, rang up dell and ordered a heatsink. When I rang, the guy said they didn't have heatsinks. The replacing the motherboard is because the m1530 has an m8600GT soldered to it. That is one of the defective chips so I get an extended warrenty to 3 years for the GPU.
Try that with Acer or somthing similar and see how far you get Dell support is superb really, could have just told you to stick it?
True, not taking a jab at Dell, their service has always been great. Just I found it a bit amusing that they would jump straight to sending me a new mobo when I told them I had fixed the problem and just wanted better temperatures.
I open laptops as a part of my living, I can strip any thing pretty, and have done so. The last interesting unit I saw was a high end Hp entertainment laptop, a really beautyfull unit. I am sure there a few tech people here, but if you open a laptop you will see a number of long copper pipes which afix to the top of the CPU and a in one bracket type plastic peice with an exit fan, this normally is on the side of the laptop, its were the hot air comes out and warms your arm or hand. Well it was totally stuffed with dust, like your looking inside of a hoover bag, so of course the dust was required to be removed. I had a think about that and that in dangered a sub 2/3 year old premium laptop, I believe laptops all have 3 year but some times there 1 year? So whats the consideration to think about, some darn air filters would be nice on these +1k laptops. Most consumer products are designed to fail. Im sure this is true in other aspects of consumer electronics, a little knowledge and a screw driver could most likely extend products lives, but its knowing what your doing.
The tech just came round with a new Heatsink, Load temps are now the same as my idle temps with the old heatsink, I am happy.
