Guest Risin Posted July 20, 2006 Report Share Posted July 20, 2006 Ok. So, my laptop has always run fine, and it wont do this all the time... but every so often ill be playing WoW or any other game, and the sound will "stutter" for a second, and my FPS will drop from 60-70 down to 2 for ~30 seconds then it will "stutter" again and go back to normal. Anyone have any idea what this could be? I have an Alienware Area-51 GeForce Go 6800 2 Gig DDR P4 3.2ghz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fabrice Roux Posted July 20, 2006 Report Share Posted July 20, 2006 Smells like overheating... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sn0wl Posted July 20, 2006 Report Share Posted July 20, 2006 We need a 'USE THE SEARCH BUTTON' smiley eh? Like Fabrice suggests it's most probably overheating. Search for the term and you will see lots of methods to deal with it like cleaning vents, putting your laptop to higher place and underclocking. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fabrice Roux Posted July 20, 2006 Report Share Posted July 20, 2006 *cough* Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Risin Posted July 21, 2006 Report Share Posted July 21, 2006 I had a feeling thats what it was, I HAVE used the search button, but every overheating problem has "computer shutting down" as a sympton. It doesnt shut down, it just lags really bad for ~30 seconds and then is perfectly ok... so, yeah. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fabrice Roux Posted July 21, 2006 Report Share Posted July 21, 2006 Don't mind our comments... I don't know the cooling design of your laptop. Either the GPU or the CPU can be the source of that kind of stuttering. The thermal throttling protection switches the CPU/GPU to a much lower frequency to prevent damages to the chip. You want to check wether it's the CPU or the GPU that overheats. In the mean time you have to clean the fans and the heatsink from dust bunnies. You also want to raise the back of your laptop in order to ease the fresh air entering. Some Alienware new firmware allows to switch the fan to full speed with a shortcut. Ask Alienware about it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zipper Posted July 21, 2006 Report Share Posted July 21, 2006 I had a feeling thats what it was, I HAVE used the search button, but every overheating problem has "computer shutting down" as a sympton. It doesnt shut down, it just lags really bad for ~30 seconds and then is perfectly ok... so, yeah. That's what my Acer 1714 was doing last year - until it finally gave up... You want to check wether it's the CPU or the GPU that overheats. In the mean time you have to clean the fans and the heatsink from dust bunnies. You also want to raise the back of your laptop in order to ease the fresh air entering. Hard throttling is probably by the GPU. I was kicking the CPU of my Acer to it's knees with Sandra math tests. It got about 78 C max and performance dropped about 40 % (P4 3.4 GHz) My Go5700 could drop from 60-100 fps to about 15 when hot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fabrice Roux Posted July 21, 2006 Report Share Posted July 21, 2006 Hard throttling is probably by the GPU. I was kicking the CPU of my Acer to it's knees with Sandra math tests. It got about 78 C max and performance dropped about 40 % (P4 3.4 GHz) My Go5700 could drop from 60-100 fps to about 15 when hot. I was trying to be exhautive in my problem source listing... for sure it's more likely a GPU cooling issue than a CPU one. But if both share the cooling FAN and if the CPU doesn't overheat... you end up with a GPU not properly cooled because of a poor fan logic. At least on beast 17" laptops... you often find 2 fans which simplify the problem. But the guy with the problem has a cool 6800 Go... not a toaster 5700 Go. I might be lucky but my 6800 Go never raise past 65°C... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Risin Posted July 21, 2006 Report Share Posted July 21, 2006 New firmware sounds interesting. I do notice my fans dont really run at full speed nearly ever. I dont mind the noise either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Area51m-7700 Posted July 26, 2006 Report Share Posted July 26, 2006 (edited) i would suggest calling up alienware and TELL THEM YOU WANT TO FLASH YOUR KEYBOARD BIOS.......like i did, no more sound stutter :) this is a post from another forum.....if you love your oh so good warranty with them, then don't do this.... My tech support call took 47 minutes total (I decided to time it to see if I could beat you!), and about 40 of those minutes was spent convincing them that I needed a BIOS update. Here's what you need to do (if you're trying to preserve your warranty that is!) 1. Download both the Keyboard Controller bios and System bios listed above and (following the pdf directions of course ) create the bootable CD's. 2. Call the alienware number and tell the tech support guys that you want to flash the bios because you hear a sound like the fans need lube (or 'like a squirrel trapped inside your case' like I said) when it is running at idle. Also, that you already opened up and blew out the CPU and Video Card area with compressed air as their FAQ says to do. 3. Suggest that you heard from somewhere (Hmm... wonder where?) that people have been having success stopping this noise with the new KBC and system bios updates and that you'd also like the nifty new feature of Fn-F2 turning your fans on high. 4. Assure them that your machine is not overheating for about 10 minutes. That's how I got them to allow the BIOS update - They're very stingy about allowing BIOS updates, but if you're persistent, you can enjy the Fn-F2 goodness! Good luck! Edited July 26, 2006 by Area51m-7700 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Moloney Posted September 11, 2006 Report Share Posted September 11, 2006 This resolved a similar problem for me with an Inspiron 9300, it's worth a shot with yours: == http://hardware.gotfrag.com/portal/story/31874/?spage=7 "By default, Dell sets all their hard drives to "power saving mode" which keeps temps down, saves on battery, and might even prolong the life of the drive. This also makes the drive much slower and for gamers it causes stuttering as every time your pagefile needs to be accessed the HDD must turn on and start spinning. For those of you that want your HDD running "full speed" the way it should be, Notebook Hardware Control allows you to adjust the power management of your HDD, letting you run your HDD the way it should be, full blast and stutter-free in games." Notebook Hardware Control can be downloaded from here: http://www.pbus-167.com/nhc/nhc.htm In the Hard Disk tab, setting Advanced Power Management to Max. Performance appears to have cured stuttering problems, woo-hoo. P. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Timothy Crowell Posted September 22, 2006 Report Share Posted September 22, 2006 Ok. So, my laptop has always run fine, and it wont do this all the time... but every so often ill be playing WoW or any other game, and the sound will "stutter" for a second, and my FPS will drop from 60-70 down to 2 for ~30 seconds then it will "stutter" again and go back to normal. Anyone have any idea what this could be?I have an Alienware Area-51 GeForce Go 6800 2 Gig DDR P4 3.2ghz I have the exact same issue with the exact same product pls let me k=now what you find out timgcrowell@gmail.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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