x17 R1, randomly shutting down, black screen, not gaming

Question

Hello humans. I have had my Alienware X17 for 2 weeks now. I am not a gamer, so I know I'm not over working my laptop. I bought this laptop because I love the look. I purchased this laptop at BestBuy. First day having the laptop the screen turned black.  I turned it on and after entering my pin it gave me a black screen. The keyboard was on with its colors and the cruiser was there but nothing else. I shut it down and it displayed the 'drag down to power off' while the rest of screen was still black. It did turn off. I turned it on, and it got as far as entering my pin then the black screen displayed again. No matter what I did it was still in a black screen for 3 days. I then thought of maybe entering CTRL ALT DELETE and refreshing it would maybe work so I tried it, and nothing happened. I gave up and turned it off. I would say 10 min past, and I turned it on to record what was going on to show Geek Squad at BestBuy and it was still in a black screen then out of nowhere it worked. I took it to BestBuy, and they ran all the test they could and did all the updates required and they didn't find anything wrong with it. That was a bummer! They told me to try it out again so that is what I'm doing. It happened again and again! I'm not gaming when the screen turns black or displays duplicates of my screen. I'm on the internet browsing and paying bills. When it happens, I just shut it down and turn it back on. Fans are normal and laptop is not hot when it gives me a black screen. What can this be?

DELL-Cares · Answer

We tried reaching you on a private message asking for the Service Tag number to ascertain the warranty but did not receive a response. Please feel free to reply to the private message whenever you are available.

crimsom · Answer

Hi @Kiminny13 welcome to this free user to user Alienware laptop discussion forum. This is not Dell Support.

It seems that POST is working, and there are no hardware diagnostic light codes. The problem seems to start when trying to enter the operating system. Guess operating system is a version of Windows. Are all the PIN characters being entered by the keyboard? It is possible that the keyboard has a fault and that some keys are not fully functional.

At Alienware splash screen, please press and hold down F12 key to enter boot menu, use up and down keys to find Diagnostics and press enter. Allow Dell's ePSA Diagnostics to run and share if it says there is a hardware fault. Thank you.

[This user does not work for Dell and volunteers their free time. Please remember to say thank you by clicking on Kudos as this user's only reward.]

Kiminny13 · Answer

Hello, Sorry! I wasn't sure if it was a legit message or a scam so i left it alone. ill do that no in a private message.

Kiminny13 · Answer

Thank you for your response. I don't think its the keyboard. I'm not using any accessories. the second time it happened I was not typing or on the start screen. I was reading my phone bill at ATT website. It displayed duplicates of my screen then turned to black. I will do what you asked and let you know what happened.

DELL-Jesse L · Answer

Kiminny13, Following up to see if the issue was resolved by Geek Squad?  Let us know.

Kiminny13 · Answer

Sadly no. They didn't detect anything wrong with my laptop. Good thing I caught the issue on camera. So I will be going in tomorrow with the evidence.

DELL-Jesse L · Answer

Kiminny13, Please let us know the results from GeekSquad.

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