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Alienware m11x R1 freezing issue
Recently, my Alienware m11x R1 that is exactly one year old has been experiencing an issue where it has been completely freezing up. Randomly, no matter what I was currently doing on the computer, or even if I was not doing anything and the computer was idling, the screen would freeze and hold whatever image it was currently displaying, and the computer would become otherwise unresponsive. No cursor movement, no response to keystrokes or ctrl-alt-del, and the HDD activity light would not flash, indicating that there was no current activity at all. The only way to get it out of this state was through a hard reboot by holding down the power button.
Originally, upon my first call to tech support, this was diagnosed as a video driver issue, and several methods were tried. First, the nVidia 263.08, A02 drivers (download package R297688) from the m11x drivers page on
support.dell.com.
The next day, the issue repeated. I contacted support again, and that is when this service request was created. The diagnostic steps attempted were as follows:
Uninstall the 263.08 driver and install the latest stock driver from the nVidia website. This did not work because of the switchable graphics platform of the m11x. It was determined after trying several different driver packages that there was no way to make the standard nVidia driver work with the switchable graphics of this system.
Ran the hardware diagnosis tests from the BIOS. The system passed all tests.
Install the nVidia beta driver 197.12, P03 (download package R264266) from the m11x drivers page on
support.dell.com. Again, this solution worked for about a day before the freezing issue occurred again.
Now, I have determined that this issue happens the most (but not exclusively when) I have a download running through the Steam program. This leads me to believe it might be an issue with accessing the hard drive, somehow. As mentioned before, the freezing still happens even when Steam is not running, however, it happens more often when Steam is open and there is an active download. I don't know if that helps diagnose the problem or not.
If anyone has any insight as to the cause of this issue, it would be greatly appreciated. I'm getting a callback from support on Monday, and I'm just trying to collect information to make the troubleshooting process easier.
dsweb329
1 Message
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April 9th, 2013 09:00
Same here.... my MX 11 randomly freezes. Ran all the utilities mentioned in various posts and all result in a passing grade.
therealzeldar
11 Posts
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August 12th, 2013 11:00
I just saw your reply. I'll try your steps to see if anything shakes out. Sounds like others did not see anything wrong when they ran the diags, but are still having the problem. Has anything else been determined with regard to this problem? My machine is still regularly freezing up, same problem. Once it froze in the middle of a Skype video call and the machine was outputting a very strange continuous modulated sound that was the other caller's voice at the moment the system froze. As usual, I had to hold down the power button and reboot cold to use the system again. No events in the log.
Anyway, I will give your troubleshooting steps a try. Are you still out there watching this thread if I do this?
Khmerfresh
1 Message
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May 11th, 2014 18:00
Hi there, still any problems with the computer i can help you and anybody else on this post. Step 1 enter the bios using the button F2 on the boot screen. Step 2 on the second tab go on to it and disable the wifi card. Step 3 save and reboot the laptop voila I hope this help and if you need internet use Ethernet or probably buy a cheap USB wifi reader :) hoped this helped!