My m1530's defective GPU failed after 1.5 years.

hello everyone, so...as the topic goes, my m1530 died suddenly from the usual defective GPU symptoms yesterday, after using it for exactly 18 months, and this is coming from a IT-literate person who takes care of his laptop very well. i bought this laptop early last year so the official 1 year warranty has ended, but i was lucky to be able to have my laptop replaced today because of nvidia's 1 year additional warranty.

so although some might think i should be satisfied to have my laptop repaired outside the warranty period taking to account that many others out there are also having the same problem but are being denied of the nvidia defective GPU enhanced warranty in their country, i am still worried for my laptop because

1. the technician who came to fix my laptop today apparently said the new motherboard which he replaced is still the same revision as the old one, so that leaves me to think that the defective GPU problem is still existant despite the replacement.

2. im a student using this laptop for my school work and i simply cannot afford this to break down on me unexpectly again in future. moreover, i have spent a huge sum of money ($2000+) on this laptop, thus i expected it to be of good quality, reliability and durable and never saw a need for a warranty longer than 1 year.

3. the gpu temperatures seem to hotter now after the replacement, ranging 60-70C. previously was 55-65C.

so i'm left with a choice to continue using this laptop with dreaded fear everyday again or to sell it away on ebay for cash to buy another one (this is my first and last dell) which is more suited for work/school. it's really a pity because i love this laptop to death and seeing it go to someone else is the last thing i ever want to happen.

 

As far as I know, there is no reliable, permanent fix for this Nvidia GPU problem. You can copper mod and stuff, but that's not going change the fact that the solder balls on the GPU are bad.

I'd definitely advise selling it while it's working and buying a new machine, preferably something with integrated graphics if you don't make use of the discrete GPU.

You could also sell off the Nvidia board and buy an Intel board; I'm pretty sure that'd be compatible with no other modifications.

 

Uhh, wait, you invested a huge amount of money on a laptop and then decided to skimp on the warranty? Realize that laptop components fail eventually, and being IT-savvy doesn't help you halt entropy. Typical points of failure include optical drives, hard drives, the keyboard (keys) and the screen (LCD, inverter, or lamp). Given how expensive laptop components are, it is usually much cheaper to get an extended warranty if you plan on using the machine more than two years.

Also, I find it a bit stupid to assume that the GPU will fail from my own experiences. I've been a heavy user of my XPS 1530 since I bought it (first generation). It has been chugging along quite well, and I figure, if it fails, Dell will fix it, and I'll have some more years before it fails again, giving me somewhere around four to six years of usage. This is quite a long time for any laptop, so it seems like I've gotten my money's worth out of it.

 

try selling it on craigslist... they dont charge for posting ads and i have sold many electronic items there very quickly.. within days or first week!

then buy a laptop with good reviews make sure to do a lot of research

 

I would complain to dell about the situation if you truly paid that much money

 

i figured it wouldn't help much anyway, since the warranty has already ended and i highly doubt it is possible to get a refund or replacement of another model. also, i find it utterly ridiculous that they tried to sell me a 1 year extended warranty for $360USD, or maybe it's just me who find it way overpriced.

 

that's what i did before buying this laptop. this laptop was very rated highly almost everywhere, so i thought it wouldn't be a problem and proceeded to buy it. after purchase i was extremely satisfied with every single aspect of this laptop, but when news of the defective GPU surfaced a few months later, i thought that buying this laptop was my worst investment ever. initially one might think that this GPU issue is blown out of proportion, but to be hit by it makes u think otherwise.

 

i understand where u are coming from, but at the time of purchase, this laptop was priced significantly higher than any other brand/model of laptop with a similar performance, so i guess it was only right for me to think that this laptop uses higher grade, better quality and reliable components that ensures better lifespan, stability and low failure rates of the laptop. maybe it's wrong for me to assume that IT hardware works that way and maybe it's because i'm one of the many unlucky victims of the GPU failure, but nothing is going to change the fact that my impression of dell/nvidia isn't very good now.

 

right, i wasn't very smart at that time for choosing a laptop with a gaming graphics card when i'm using it mainly for work. now, at least i know that gaming and work don't go very well together.

 

hey, was just wondering if dell have an item list which dictates that any purchase of the 1530 after a certain date may be more susceptible to gpu failure or is it pretty much every 1530?
i purchased mine back in feb 08, so far so good,

ive attached a picture of my idle temps, is this similar to urs brendon before it packed in?

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afaik there's simply no way to tell if ur unit is going to fail from the GPU defect, so it pretty much means every m1530 is more or less susceptible to the failure. it was mentioned in the past that the new motherboards manufactured after some time in august 08 (or 09 i'm not sure) has fixed the problem, but there's no truth or evidence to it.

as for the temps mine is attached below. for some weird reason the temps today are a lot cooler compared to yesterday when the new motherboard was installed. my temps were very similar to urs yesterday but today it cooled down a bit.

 

ahh ok, thanks brendon looks like ill be living everyday in fear now lol.
im afraid to look at the temps while i play a few games :s
ive researched into notebook coolers and have seen mixed reviews. and since these coolers are abit pricey bearing in mind i am a student i was wondering if the money spent on a cooler can be used to purchase are more superior laptop fan, anyone know if theres a better fan that will be able to fit and replace the factory fan?

 

Mines about a year - year and a half old now and idles around those temps.

When im hammering it in games it usually ranges 85-88 (l4d2)

 

oh oh. I'm in that time group now. Good thing I bought the 3 year warranty.

 

I love my m1530. I admit I bought it partly because the Red edition just looked great. It has been a great machine.

Just recently it had a little trouble with the case so Dell immediately sent someone out to replace a case piece. When he opened it up he showed me something I didn't realize. The case fan blows out through a finned heat exchanger that cools the cpu and another part. It is very easy for it to get plugged. He showed me the overheating from this configuration and told me to blow the heat sink out through the back vent holes once a month.

When he put it back together it wouldn't boot. So Dell sent him back to replace the motherboard, cpu and fan. There was still some trouble from other components later so now they are replacing my m1530 with a XPS 1640 complete with faster bus, faster processor, the full HD rgb backlit screen and Windows 7 64 bit on top of that.

I will miss my m1530 but I can only thank Dell for great service. Yeah, I spent some money on a longer service contract but boy am I getting my money's worth.

 

While I wish my laptops would last as long as my desktops, truth is, most laptops loaded with powerful components and used heavily will have premature component failure due to excessive heat.
My m1530 is coming up on 2 years now and still kicking. However, the heat has gotten worse. I typically get warranties for the amount of time I plan on keeping my portables, especially when I spend top dollar and I depend on my system working day to day.

Going forward, the best you can do is try to be mindful of keeping your system clean of dust build up and use a cooler when you will be using it under load or for long periods. I love my m1530 too...it's one good looking lappy.

 

Brendon I never asked but did you end up selling your M1530? Or you still holding onto it? I seriously can't my head around selling it. I've been thinking 'I'm gonna stick with it till it dies'. But like you said in my thread, that might cost me a lot of money. One of the dilemmas with selling it is also not knowing down the track whether it's still working or not. Not knowing that after and if I sell it alone would probably drive me nuts. If I knew it died 6 months after I sold it, I'd probably be relieved, but not knowing? Ahh..

Btw, during that 1.5 years did you play games much? Did you monitor the temperatures and were they really getting higher before the GPU died? Or were they normal and the GPU just died randomly without warning?

 

i've sold it couple of days ago for about 650USD and i'm intending to get the asus ul30a as a replacement. i thought it was a good decision on my part because i could get a brand new laptop with another 2-year warranty with that money, and also the fact that the m1530 is out of warranty and costs about 350USD to extend its warranty for another year in my country. although the m1530 smokes the new ul30a in terms of performance, the ul30a's design, portability and battery life really makes up for it. in fact i think it even looks sleeker than the m1530.

i use the m1530 mainly for school work/surfing net/watching videos and rarely played any games, even if i did played games i doubt the total hours spent gaming on it would even exceed 12 hours. however i do remember once when playing l4d my temperatures would shoot up to 95C, and i was quite worried at that time so i called up dell support and all the guy could say was "it was normal" and refused to do anything about it because he said my problem does not justify for a motherboard replacement. this happened about a year ago though, but it didn't really bother me and i continued using it as per normal after that. then about 3 weeks ago i was surfing the internet and it just went boom all of a sudden.

from what i understand most of the m1530 did not die from overwhelming temperatures. it was the thermal cycles (hot-cold-hot) of the GPU which caused them to fail prematurely. i'm more inclined to believe that all m1530 suffers from this problem because of nvidia/dell's refusal to release any information about this. so to say they might be trying to keep the problem low profile and get away with it by letting all the m1530 die outside warranty and not alerting uninformed m1530 users of this problem. in fact i've seen a couple of uninformed m1330/m1530 users in other forums PAYING to get their out-of-warranty unit replaced because of this specific problem. in addition, when my unit died and i called up dell support, all they said was my unit was out of warranty and did not acknowledge this problem and the enhanced warranty until i told them of all the related symptoms i was experiencing. thus i can see how they are really trying to run away from this.

with regard to your dilemma, i think it's more of an individual preference on whether to keep or sell it. for my situation, i would have to sell it because it'd be extremely inconvenient for me to have the laptop fail unexpectedly since i'm using it for school work. moreover, due to the unpredictable nature of the GPU failure, there is less reason to think that "if i treat this laptop good and well like a baby, it will last me for a long time".

 

I wonder if keeping the laptop fan on very low rpm permanently would of got more life out of these defective GPUs.

Stop the constant heat cycling and it may of lasted longer. What do you guys think?

 

It wouldn't be worth it, you would just crash it all the time lol.

If my m1530 has problems after the motherboard change I'm getting in two days, I'll be pushing very hard for a sxps 16. I've used one of those before and they stay cooler with a Core 2 Duo, not sure about other cpu's though. I've looked closely and the back vent is more open to allow more airflow. Also Dell has moved away from Nvidia for the sxps 16, I used to prefer Nvidia but the failures and re-branding of cards have turned me away. I still like Dell though.

 

Damn what happens after 2 years (1year warranty with 1 year GPU extensed) ?
I knew I should have waited for for ASUS...

There is no support in Slovakia, at least none I know of. If anyone can help me, please contact me. thanks