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15 R3, sudden crash, no logs or BSOD, motherboard failed
I bought an Alienware laptop 15 R3 and by all indication the motherboard has failed. Of course its out of warranty. Really? Motherboard dies and what we have left is the privilege of having owned a Alienware laptop at a high cost! I'd be more understanding if it were the hard drive or something else but motherboard failure means there's a serious quality issue here. I've exclusively bought many Dell machines over the years - desktops and laptops and they've all had a good long lives. I still have a laptop on window 10 that's 12 years old. It would be normal for hard drives, wifi cards, fans, eventually going. But never a motherboard failure. I would probably be ok with it if I were the only one. Go online and you can see scores of people have the same issue. The stupid part is I just bought a G5, I am seriously thinking of canceling the order. Next time I purchase for business, the fact that the durability of Dell machines is seriously flawed will weigh heavily. Two words Dell: Quality Control. Defective motherboards won't earn you repeat customers.
mattyb3
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September 8th, 2020 16:00
That really stinks.
But, like any electronic component, motherboards can fail. It is the most complicated component in a laptop with thousands of smaller components soldered to it so the chances of something going wrong is higher than a hard drive or wifi card which are relatively simple in comparison. As the CPU and GPU are soldered on the 15 R3, you have an even higher chance of a board failure.
What exactly has happened to it? Is it completely dead with no sign of life?
crimsom
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September 9th, 2020 11:00
Hi @darpaj there must be a glimmer of life, somewhere on your system. Is there no hope of recovery in safe mode?
darpaj
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September 9th, 2020 12:00
The laptop will boot and run the OS, but then randomly shutdown. At this point motherboard is the only real thing left. Most likely cracked solder on CPU, GPU, or power. I realize that over time everything will fail. However, right now I have a Dell Latitude from early 90s running on windows 3.1 with external cd player... not a single problem. I have two Dell inspirons 8 years old, running windows 10....work flawlessly. We have always been a Dell home.....what more can I say.
darpaj
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September 9th, 2020 12:00
@crimsom Yes to both questions.
crimsom
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September 9th, 2020 12:00
Hi @darpaj if I have understood you correctly, your Windows 10 freezes randomly but is OK after a reboot?
When you say system logs, this is the event reporting in Administrative Tools, Component Services and/or Computer Management?
crimsom
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September 9th, 2020 12:00
Hi @darpaj that is very frustrating and we can see that you have worked hard to fix this problem. Have looked through your list and there was no mention of increasing Virtual Memory. Virtual Memory is supposed to act as a saviour when the physical memory (RAM) is exceeded, typically when running resource-intensive programs. To compensate Virtual Memory combines the RAM with Temporary Storage on your Storage Disk. Users have reported that their freezing issue was fixed by increasing the Virtual Memory to 8 GB.
darpaj
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September 9th, 2020 12:00
It just freezes..... systems logs just stop and resume when I reboot. I have replaced the hdd, reseated the ram, removed the wifi card, new thermal paste on heat sink, inspected all cables for tears or kinks, done full dell diagnostics on all hardware. Reinstalled Windows 10 and when that didn't work then installed Ubuntu OS thinking it might be a windows driver or compatibility issue. Still froze no log entries, same issue.
crimsom
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September 9th, 2020 13:00
Hi @darpaj To increase Virtual Memory, Hold the Windows Key and Press R. Type sysdm.cpl and Click OK. Select run as administrator, then click Advanced -> Performance Settings -> Advanced -> Virtual Memory, Change. Uncheck Automatically Manage paging file size for all drives, and choose Custom Size. Set Initial Size to 1000 and Maximum Size to 8192. Then Click OK and Restart the PC.
darpaj
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September 9th, 2020 13:00
@crimsom Ok. I will give it a try and let you know.
Alienware Area-51 ALX 2006
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September 9th, 2020 14:00
If that didnt work then id recommend disconnecting the physical battery and then running off ac power only to verify if its a battery issue.
And Wooow...
you still have that inspiron?
what are you using, P/S2 Ports and PC Card slots?
crimsom
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September 9th, 2020 19:00
Hi @darpaj as an example, this image is what our system says for our C: drive, which is a SSD.
darpaj
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September 10th, 2020 06:00
@crimsom Tried the increase in virtual memory. It did not work. However, it got me to think that maybe one of the RAM cards was bad. So I removed one of them and left one in place and tested and it crashed. Then I replaced it with second RAM card and it crashed. I then removed it and placed it in the empty slot, 24 hours later no crash. So it seems that one RAM slot is bad. I'll let you know if there is any change.
crimsom
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September 10th, 2020 09:00
Hi @darpaj thanks for the update that it seems to be a memory issue. Cleaning and/or reseating the RAM card could solve your issue. Then Windows 10 can check the RAM integrity for you.
It is very rare for the RAM slot to be unusable.
crimsom
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September 10th, 2020 09:00
Hi @darpaj when cleaning RAM card, use lint free dry cloth. Do not use water or solvents.
Alienware Area-51 ALX 2006
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September 10th, 2020 11:00
If the ram slot failed then you can only use one stick and that’s not really ideal unless you don’t care about ram so you buy a single 16gb stick but if you do it’s a motherboard replacement.