Fresh install freezes on battery

[shamrin]

The customer asked me to roll this machine (Dell Studo XPS 1635) back to it's native Windows 7 OS from Windows 8. The customer complained that, among other problems, the computer would freeze when watching a video if it was running on battery. Alas, after installing Windows 7, it has the same problem. I seem to be able to run it OK on battery until I play a YouTube video then after less than 30 seconds all input and output freezes and the sound eventually and painfully grinds to a halt. The screen stays lit as if it's still on but Task Manager, browser, everything appears to be halted. It's not a heat problem.

I've tried using power management to tell the machine to act the same on battery and when it's plugged-in but that doesn't solve anything.

I just wanted to see if anyone thought this could be anything other than a bad motherboard or video chip, or if anyone could think of a possible workaround.

 

[glennd]

Try some other high load activity or a stress test tool that does lots of video activity. Might be a bad battery.

 

[NYJimbo]

Should we assume you did a whole "battery" of hardware diags ?

Anyway, system cooling policy comes to mind as when on battery most laptops will throttle down CPU before raising the fan if set to passive.

 

[shamrin]

Should we assume you did a whole "battery" of hardware diags ?

Anyway, system cooling policy comes to mind as when on battery most laptops will throttle down CPU before raising the fan if set to passive.

I'm "powering" through some detailed tests on the CPU and motherboard components now. The other peripherals check out OK.

I was wondering if it was heat-related at first too but Speedfan doesn't show the temps on anything to be very interesting. I went ahead and reseated the heatsink and fan, it made it run cooler but still fails on battery. Have you ever heard of a bad battery doing something like this?

 

[fixitplanet]

If it works normal without the battery then it sounds like the battery is bad and needs to be replaced. Have you tried replacing the battery yet? To be sure replace with an original and not 3rd party.

 

[shamrin]

Alas, it was not the battery. That was worth trying I suppose because it's a fairly cheap and easy fix but it was always a long shot. Still within a few seconds of pulling the plug all the I/O goes bad, sound gets freaky, no mouse (even the cursor disappears), no keyboard no updates to the screen. And once the failure starts, you can't fix it by plugging it back in, it just convulses and dies.

 

[Bootman 650]

Have you ran Memtest?

 

[Rayspcsolutions]

Have you examined the battery connector on the mother board for bad solder connection? Just a thought

 

[fixitplanet]

Alas, it was not the battery. That was worth trying I suppose because it's a fairly cheap and easy fix but it was always a long shot. Still within a few seconds of pulling the plug all the I/O goes bad, sound gets freaky, no mouse (even the cursor disappears), no keyboard no updates to the screen. And once the failure starts, you can't fix it by plugging it back in, it just convulses and dies.

Uhgg ... that's no good....did you get it solved? How about chipset and other drivers.... any luck?

 

[shamrin]

I'm convinced this is a problem on the motherboard. I've still got the machine but I don't think the customer wants to spring for a motherboard repair so I don't think we'll get a full resolution on this one.