Hello guys
I just recently experienced a problem with my laptop screen.
A week back, the screen hanged up while playing borderlands 2 which I had been playing since its release for about an hour almost every day.
It just hanged up and the screen went mish-mash with various colorful patterns. The laptop was not even overheated which is usually the case while playing power demanding games.
I restarted the laptop then I got four pairs of RGB parallel lines (vertical only on the start up screen) and after the windows 7 logo I got hard disk error (my speculation) with a blue screen (not sure what is written behind the colorful mashes).
I tried using safe mode with networking and still got those vertical lines but I can see the alphabets between the spaces otherwise everything works fine. I checked the catalyst driver for AMD and it says that drivers are missing. I tried connecting it to external monitor screen and still got those lines suggesting that the graphic chip went Capput. Though, I tried leaving my laptop on in the safe mode since I was using Download accelerator to download some demos.
However, over the weekend, it just turned normal and all the lines disappeared; though still in the safe mode. I restarted again and the windows worked normally but the laptop was extremely hot, nearly easy to burn skin. After few hours, the lines reappeared and I had to leave it on for a while and it turned back normal after about 6 hours.
I have not found anything like that on the forums. It is working fine for a time being. Does anyone know what it is due to and any way to prevent it.
My laptop specs are as under:
DELL XPS 1670: i7 1.8 GHZ; 8 GB ram; 320 HDD 7200 rpm; Ati HD 4670.

Precautions I would take would be to have it with a laptop cooler for the heat problem and see if you can run a diagnostic program. This is very confusing, I also would have thought something to do with the GPU but it doesn't seem all that viable. Maybe even try updating the GPU software? That may help for the 'Screen hanging' problem.

Apart from that, I personally don't know :/

If you get the video issue on both internal/external displays, Normal and SafeMode, and after updating the video drivers, I would say it's the video card.

There is one more test you can run since it is a Dell. Press Fn+power to get the Dell Diagnostics (think what Blakhole means).

Heat issue, do you hear fans kicking on? If not sure, you can remove the base cover to get a visual on the fan. There also may be packed dust between the heasink and exhaust port that just compressed air won't clear it out.

Here's a service manual to help you take it apart if you didn't find it already
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/sxl1645/en/sm/index.htm

If the fan is working, try removing the battery and just having it plugged in. Sometimes batteries cause overheating. If that's not it, the power circuit on the board may be having problems.

From everything so far, sounds like you'll need to replace the motherboard.

Trister wrote:

If you get the video issue on both internal/external displays, Normal and SafeMode, and after updating the video drivers, I would say it's the video card.

There is one more test you can run since it is a Dell. Press Fn+power to get the Dell Diagnostics (think what Blakhole means).

Heat issue, do you hear fans kicking on? If not sure, you can remove the base cover to get a visual on the fan. There also may be packed dust between the heasink and exhaust port that just compressed air won't clear it out.

Here's a service manual to help you take it apart if you didn't find it already
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/sxl1645/en/sm/index.htm

If the fan is working, try removing the battery and just having it plugged in. Sometimes batteries cause overheating. If that's not it, the power circuit on the board may be having problems.

From everything so far, sounds like you'll need to replace the motherboard.

Thanks blackhole and Trister for your solutions.
I just bought the base with a fan for the laptop.
Yes trister, I tried opening the bottom frame and it had a heap of dust on the fan. I just tried my best to get it cleared out with a micro blower (LOL) smaller I could find. Just checking about the power button; is it the one where u turn on and off the laptop. Yes, I had problems earlier on both external and internal displays and even in the safe mode. Now it is working fine for the time being and will run diagnostics or send it for a service by the time I get the desktop. The technician at my Uni IT is amazed to see laptop screen recovered. thank you guysand thanks for the leaflet.

mckrack wrote:

is it the one where u turn on and off the laptop

Yes.

Just make sure to check in between the fan and the grill. We had Dells of similar design and there would always be around a 1/8 inch (.32cm) layer of dust in between there. And while you're at it, make sure the CPU heatsink is cleaned.

It is odd how the issue seems to be intermittent. Could mean something is on its way out.

Hello Trister

I might have kinda sorted the problem.
I have noticed that the lines keep reappearing when I have battery attached and trying to play BF games be it 1942 or BF3. Now the screen total bright and the laptop crashes. Fortunately, it does not crash while playing MW3 the four delta one mod, no matter how long I leave it running. Works fine with movies or other academic application though. If I try to run diagnostics at the boot screen seems to settle it back to normal.
I tried re-installing the graphic driver but with unsuccessful attempts as keep getting the message inf file missing but it does indicate which one and quit the process right at the very end. I have also noticed no driver available for base core driver in the device manager.
Any suggestions.