Dell xps 15 l502x crash issue

spruo

February 7, 2014 5:27:20 PM

I have an old Dell xps 15 l502x that I've been using for the last few years, for schoolwork and gaming/netflix. In the fall i decided that this laptop had run its course and I wanted to upgrade into a nice desktop. While I didn't have the capital to upgrade to a new system all at once, and the laptop was still functional, I figured I would buy the peripherals that I would need with my new setup right away, that way I could begin using them right away. This has been working fine lately, I have a nice monitor and keyboard and mouse and headset that I just plug into my laptop, and my laptop just functions as a desktop for now until I can replace it.

The problem is that the laptop will crash into a random colored screen; just a solid color, and becomes unresponsive. This has only happened while playing league of legends( I am not sure if this is league specific, since league is the only demanding thing that I do on my computer). I am pretty sure that the problem originates from the GPU because one time it went to the random color screen-- then it recovered and a notification popped up that indicated that the nvidia driver had been unresponsive, but it recovered successfully. I read of a similar issue online that people were having because their computers were overheating, and my laptop was getting hot when this happened, so I looked into it. I took the laptop partially apart to clean out the dust(lots of it, first time I had done it since I got it) and thought that it would help-- The problem kept occurring even though the laptop was not really getting hot anymore. I decided that I would format the computer, to see if anything I had installed on it was giving me trouble. I formatted the computer to factory settings, removed all of the bloatware, and updated my nvidia driver, hoping that the problem would be solved, but alas, it is not. And this is where I am now. I would really appreciate any insight that anyone has on this issue, I can't quite afford the tower that I want just yet, I would like to continue using this laptop for a few more months.

The laptop Specs:
Dell XPS 15 L502X
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-2410M CPU @ 2.30 GHz
6 GB RAM
64-bit Windows 7
GeForce GT 525M

The peripherals that i'm currently using with it(I'm not sure if all of this stuff plugged into the laptop would make a difference or not):
Razer naga
Max Nighthawk x7 keyboard
Dell S2440L monitor
Sony Pulse headset (I do not charge the headset through the laptop, just the USB wireless connection)

Thanks to anyone who made it this far into the post, would really appreciate some help if you think you know what could fix it.

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mopman411

February 7, 2014 6:05:25 PM

I read through your issue, you described it very well and what you have done to resolve it.. thank you for that, its helpful.

I am going to say that your laptop is about 2.5 years old, maybe 3. Laptops that have dedicated video cards all have the same exact issue, at some point the video card will fail. Failure of the video card almost always seems to be related to heat. The solution is to take the laptop apart entirely and to re-paste the GPU and CPU. The Dell that you have actually uses paste instead of thermal pads, that's a plus and will make re-pasting easier.

This is a video that will be helpful with the complete tear down of your laptop: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goVrdbWoOnA

Order what you need before the tear down.

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spruo

February 7, 2014 6:18:22 PM

mopman411 said:

I read through your issue, you described it very well and what you have done to resolve it.. thank you for that, its helpful.

I am going to say that your laptop is about 2.5 years old, maybe 3. Laptops that have dedicated video cards all have the same exact issue, at some point the video card will fail. Failure of the video card almost always seems to be related to heat. The solution is to take the laptop apart entirely and to re-paste the GPU and CPU. The Dell that you have actually uses paste instead of thermal pads, that's a plus and will make re-pasting easier.

This is a video that will be helpful with the complete tear down of your laptop: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goVrdbWoOnA

Order what you need before the tear down.

Thanks, I was wondering if I needed to do that. I didn't have the paste on hand the last time I took the laptop apart so I just removed the dust and that's it. Will definitely try re-pasting it to see if it helps. Thanks very much for your feedback.

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mopman411

February 7, 2014 6:59:19 PM

This becomes fun because, replace the paste once and you will most likely do it again before you replace the system. That is not a bad thing but with that said don't blow a bunch of money on paste and just one tube will last you long enough till your laptop is replaced.

This is what I use and have used for almost all my major builds: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

If you need any assistance update this or just PM me.

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lordg

July 31, 2014 8:30:12 AM

@Spruo, thank you for this post. I've experienced the exact same problem, but what is a little more scary is it's only when running on my 23 inch and whilst doing general day-to-day activities. Not even gaming. Did using the re-pasting work for you?

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wereR00b

October 31, 2014 1:59:03 PM

Posting in case anyone else stumbles upon this thread.
I had the exact same problem: Dell XPS l502x w/ GT 540M, games were locking up (mostly League of Legends for me) and playing a bizarre buzzing sound through the speakers. The solution in this video worked for me:

And in case the video gets taken down, the instructions are:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/nvidia-system-tools-6.08-d...

I've been playing for more than 24h and my pc hasn't crashed since I changed these settings. I don't know exactly what is the problem but I may guess that the default settings let the graphic processor go overclocked and this causes huge heating... and crashes.
I hope this helps to you too

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tkdojo

November 14, 2014 8:35:42 AM

wereR00b said:

Posting in case anyone else stumbles upon this thread.
I had the exact same problem: Dell XPS l502x w/ GT 540M, games were locking up (mostly League of Legends for me) and playing a bizarre buzzing sound through the speakers. The solution in this video worked for me:

And in case the video gets taken down, the instructions are:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/nvidia-system-tools-6.08-d...

I've been playing for more than 24h and my pc hasn't crashed since I changed these settings. I don't know exactly what is the problem but I may guess that the default settings let the graphic processor go overclocked and this causes huge heating... and crashes.
I hope this helps to you too

Could you please explain the reasoning for the under clocking?

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