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Possible memory problem
The other day I was playing Guild Wars when it crashed. The system rebooted but stalled just after the bar filled on the boot screen, with a cursor in the upper left hand corner of the screen.
The diagnostic lights 3&4 were lit indicating a memory problem.
I rebooted 4 times before the system would boot to Windows - 3 of the times the system would stall in the same place and each time the 3&4 lights lit.
I ran memtest86+ afterward and it indicated a failing address (it only started reporting this after 5 iterations - the first 4 times were fine, then during the 5th and 7th iteration it reported an error - failing address of 000001000dc).
I called Dell Tech support and the individual I spoke to was skeptical of it being a memory error and stated that normally, when it's a memory error, the 1&2 lights are amber at the same time the 3&4 lights are green (doesn't appear to be what the manual states however). He seemed to think it was a USB issue as the flashing cursor in the upper left corner is typically a symptom of that.
I informed him I had already disabled the USB boot option in the BIOS, put all my devices on a powered USB hub, and hadn't experienced this specific problem since doing so. I highly doubt that this is the issue as the system had been booting fine up until this point.
Anyway, he tells me to run the Dell Diagnostic tool instead of Memtest86+. Guess what? The Dell Tool finds no errors at all. In addition, the PC seems to booting more reliably again which leads me to believe it was a heat issue (games stress a system like nothing else!) causing the memory to behave erratically. Anybody have any other thoughts?
btw, I do plan on taking out a stick of memory and trying to troubleshoot that way... that'll just have to wait until the weekend though.
Message Edited by Maverikva on 01-04-2006 12:03 PM
absolutrudy21
3 Posts
275
0
Posted January 5th, 2006 16:00
I have the same problem with my XPS 600. I have a memory stick and sometimes my Ipod connected into the front ports. I'll try booting it up without having anything in there. Thanks for the help.I had the USB boot problem before but had since diagnosed and resolved that. I'm quite confident that this is a different issue based upon, primarily, the fact that the PC had been booting fine for several weeks before this happened, and even continues to boot fine. It was only this one day where I experienced these specific problems - again, leading me to believe it was an overheating issue. And heat will cause marginal components to fail explaining why even Memtest86+ indicated a memory problem.
When I had the USB boot problem, the PC would begin to boot but the bar on the boot screen would get about 3/4 through and the #4 light would stay lit. It was at that time I disable the USB boot option as suggested; it didn't work. I then moved all my USB devices to a USB hub and that solved the problem. Additionally, I don't use the front USB ports so that's definitely not at issue.
mrpres1776
6 Posts
275
0
Posted January 4th, 2006 20:00
I've had my XPS 600 for a few weeks and experienced a similar issue when trying to reboot. After reading some of the message boards here, I learned of the USB boot issue. I, too, went into the bios and disabled the 'boot from USB' option, but still experienced the stall-out during re-boot. The Dell XPS manual seems to suggest a memory issue based on the eluminated diagnostic lights (which I see you suspect as well).
After repeated tests, however, I have found the only way I can get a successful reboot is when I have absolutely nothing plugged in the USB ports on the front of the machine (the back ones seem fine as I can leave multiple items plugged in there). I routinely plug in a Logitech gamepad controller, and an Apple iPod. When leaving both, or just one of these items plugged in the front USBs, my re-boot fails. It's a nuisance, but I have found my only work-around (until I hear of a fix) is to unplug all items from my front USB ports to get a clean reboot.
If anyone has any theories or fixes, please share.
Thanks so much!
Message Edited by mrpres1776 on 01-04-2006 05:35 PM