[SOLVED] Alienware 17r4 Crashing

[gamerguy319]

Hello,
After many years I find myself at wits end trying to fix this computer. So I come back to you all.

As stated I have an Alienware 17r4. It has a 7700hq, and a gtx 1070. It originally shipped with a 128GB m.2 SATA SSD, a 1TB HDD, and 16GB of RAM. In the time that I owned the machine I repasted it with kryonaut, replaced the HDD with a 1TB SATA SSD(Samsung 850 Evo), replaced the 128GB M.2 SATA drive with 2 1TB M.2 PCI-e SSDs(Samsung 870 Evo Plus), and replaced the RAM with a 32GB kit(2666MHz CAS 18). The system has run with these upgrades for months without issue.

Over the past couple of weeks the machine started to crash randomly, especially when woken from sleep or starting up. The windows on the screen will stop responding (the mouse never freezes), then after a minute or two the machine will usually blue screen then restart. On occasion this will repeat a number of times before it resumes normal behavior(I think the record is three times). Looking in the system event logs tells me nothing other than the machine shutdown unexpectedly, and it failed to create a dump file (I have read this is a result of not having a page file)(volmgr 161, Kernel-Power 41 sometimes occurs).

Here are the steps I have taken to troubleshoot in no particular order

1. I ran memtest86 for a full 4 passes. There were no errors; I also ran the windows memory diagnostic with the same result.
2. I viewed the smart status of the three hard drives. There was nothing of note(crystal disk info & samsung magician)
3. for the 870 Evos I used the samsung magician software to run both a full diagnostic test and an extended S.M.A.R.T. diagnostic test. There was nothing of note for either drive.
4. I reinstalled windows10(this has been done a number of times). Typically the system will be fine for a day or so before it resumes crashing. I tried doing this on each SSD. The 850Evo never failed.

the 870Evo's seem to be the ones with issues. however getting it to crash consistently is a major issue so I have not been able to narrow it to either of the drives.

1. For each drive I installed around 400GB of games to each. The internet was fast enough that the CPU was pegged at 100%. I was never able to induce a crash with this.
2. I have also run programs such as intel burn test, crystal disk mark, and a number of games in an attempt to cause a crash. This was futile.

I am beginning to think that the machine has a failing motherboard. This laptop has been used heavily for the past 4 years or so.

Do you all have any ideas on things that I can try to fix this issue?

 

[white.a.drew]

Hello,
After many years I find myself at wits end trying to fix this computer. So I come back to you all.

As stated I have an Alienware 17r4. It has a 7700hq, and a gtx 1070. It originally shipped with a 128GB m.2 SATA SSD, a 1TB HDD, and 16GB of RAM. In the time that I owned the machine I repasted it with kryonaut, replaced the HDD with a 1TB SATA SSD(Samsung 850 Evo), replaced the 128GB M.2 SATA drive with 2 1TB M.2 PCI-e SSDs(Samsung 870 Evo Plus), and replaced the RAM with a 32GB kit(2666MHz CAS 18). The system has run with these upgrades for months without issue.

Over the past couple of weeks the machine started to crash randomly, especially when woken from sleep or starting up. The windows on the screen will stop responding (the mouse never freezes), then after a minute or two the machine will usually blue screen then restart. On occasion this will repeat a number of times before it resumes normal behavior(I think the record is three times). Looking in the system event logs tells me nothing other than the machine shutdown unexpectedly, and it failed to create a dump file (I have read this is a result of not having a page file)(volmgr 161, Kernel-Power 41 sometimes occurs).

Here are the steps I have taken to troubleshoot in no particular order

1. I ran memtest86 for a full 4 passes. There were no errors; I also ran the windows memory diagnostic with the same result.
2. I viewed the smart status of the three hard drives. There was nothing of note(crystal disk info & samsung magician)
3. for the 870 Evos I used the samsung magician software to run both a full diagnostic test and an extended S.M.A.R.T. diagnostic test. There was nothing of note for either drive.
4. I reinstalled windows10(this has been done a number of times). Typically the system will be fine for a day or so before it resumes crashing. I tried doing this on each SSD. The 850Evo never failed.

the 870Evo's seem to be the ones with issues. however getting it to crash consistently is a major issue so I have not been able to narrow it to either of the drives.

1. For each drive I installed around 400GB of games to each. The internet was fast enough that the CPU was pegged at 100%. I was never able to induce a crash with this.
2. I have also run programs such as intel burn test, crystal disk mark, and a number of games in an attempt to cause a crash. This was futile.

I am beginning to think that the machine has a failing motherboard. This laptop has been used heavily for the past 4 years or so.

Do you all have any ideas on things that I can try to fix this issue?

Is the bios up to date?
When replacing the cpu did you clear your bios for a new cpuid to be prepared?
Sorry rethermaled didnt upgrade.... Did you make sue the cooler was seated snuggly secure and proper.?

 

[white.a.drew]

Hello,
After many years I find myself at wits end trying to fix this computer. So I come back to you all.

As stated I have an Alienware 17r4. It has a 7700hq, and a gtx 1070. It originally shipped with a 128GB m.2 SATA SSD, a 1TB HDD, and 16GB of RAM. In the time that I owned the machine I repasted it with kryonaut, replaced the HDD with a 1TB SATA SSD(Samsung 850 Evo), replaced the 128GB M.2 SATA drive with 2 1TB M.2 PCI-e SSDs(Samsung 870 Evo Plus), and replaced the RAM with a 32GB kit(2666MHz CAS 18). The system has run with these upgrades for months without issue.

Over the past couple of weeks the machine started to crash randomly, especially when woken from sleep or starting up. The windows on the screen will stop responding (the mouse never freezes), then after a minute or two the machine will usually blue screen then restart. On occasion this will repeat a number of times before it resumes normal behavior(I think the record is three times). Looking in the system event logs tells me nothing other than the machine shutdown unexpectedly, and it failed to create a dump file (I have read this is a result of not having a page file)(volmgr 161, Kernel-Power 41 sometimes occurs).

Here are the steps I have taken to troubleshoot in no particular order

1. I ran memtest86 for a full 4 passes. There were no errors; I also ran the windows memory diagnostic with the same result.
2. I viewed the smart status of the three hard drives. There was nothing of note(crystal disk info & samsung magician)
3. for the 870 Evos I used the samsung magician software to run both a full diagnostic test and an extended S.M.A.R.T. diagnostic test. There was nothing of note for either drive.
4. I reinstalled windows10(this has been done a number of times). Typically the system will be fine for a day or so before it resumes crashing. I tried doing this on each SSD. The 850Evo never failed.

the 870Evo's seem to be the ones with issues. however getting it to crash consistently is a major issue so I have not been able to narrow it to either of the drives.

1. For each drive I installed around 400GB of games to each. The internet was fast enough that the CPU was pegged at 100%. I was never able to induce a crash with this.
2. I have also run programs such as intel burn test, crystal disk mark, and a number of games in an attempt to cause a crash. This was futile.

I am beginning to think that the machine has a failing motherboard. This laptop has been used heavily for the past 4 years or so.

Do you all have any ideas on things that I can try to fix this issue?

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/product-support/product/alienware-17-laptop/drivers

 

[gamerguy319]

Is the bios up to date?
When replacing the cpu did you clear your bios for a new cpuid to be prepared?
Sorry rethermaled didnt upgrade.... Did you make sue the cooler was seated snuggly secure and proper.?

The temps on the CPU are lower than what the machine was doing OEM. I do not think that that is the issue. Also the machine crashes regardless of the load placed upon it.

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/product-support/product/alienware-17-laptop/drivers

Also I am running the most current BIOS. I forgot to add that in to the stuff I have tried. Regarding drivers, I took extreme care on one installation to only allow dell drivers. The machine was unplugged from the internet. the drivers were downloaded on another machine to a flash drive when was then installed on the machine.

Of course, none of this fixed the issue.

 

[white.a.drew]

Hello,
After many years I find myself at wits end trying to fix this computer. So I come back to you all.

As stated I have an Alienware 17r4. It has a 7700hq, and a gtx 1070. It originally shipped with a 128GB m.2 SATA SSD, a 1TB HDD, and 16GB of RAM. In the time that I owned the machine I repasted it with kryonaut, replaced the HDD with a 1TB SATA SSD(Samsung 850 Evo), replaced the 128GB M.2 SATA drive with 2 1TB M.2 PCI-e SSDs(Samsung 870 Evo Plus), and replaced the RAM with a 32GB kit(2666MHz CAS 18). The system has run with these upgrades for months without issue.

Over the past couple of weeks the machine started to crash randomly, especially when woken from sleep or starting up. The windows on the screen will stop responding (the mouse never freezes), then after a minute or two the machine will usually blue screen then restart. On occasion this will repeat a number of times before it resumes normal behavior(I think the record is three times). Looking in the system event logs tells me nothing other than the machine shutdown unexpectedly, and it failed to create a dump file (I have read this is a result of not having a page file)(volmgr 161, Kernel-Power 41 sometimes occurs).

Here are the steps I have taken to troubleshoot in no particular order

1. I ran memtest86 for a full 4 passes. There were no errors; I also ran the windows memory diagnostic with the same result.
2. I viewed the smart status of the three hard drives. There was nothing of note(crystal disk info & samsung magician)
3. for the 870 Evos I used the samsung magician software to run both a full diagnostic test and an extended S.M.A.R.T. diagnostic test. There was nothing of note for either drive.
4. I reinstalled windows10(this has been done a number of times). Typically the system will be fine for a day or so before it resumes crashing. I tried doing this on each SSD. The 850Evo never failed.

the 870Evo's seem to be the ones with issues. however getting it to crash consistently is a major issue so I have not been able to narrow it to either of the drives.

1. For each drive I installed around 400GB of games to each. The internet was fast enough that the CPU was pegged at 100%. I was never able to induce a crash with this.
2. I have also run programs such as intel burn test, crystal disk mark, and a number of games in an attempt to cause a crash. This was futile.

I am beginning to think that the machine has a failing motherboard. This laptop has been used heavily for the past 4 years or so.

Do you all have any ideas on things that I can try to fix this issue?

Take it to a repair shop power maybe dying

 

[white.a.drew]

Take it to a repair shop power maybe dying

If your psu is sending power spikes to hardware it can cause and imbalance in the system resulting in crashes....
One way to test is occt

The temps on the CPU are lower than what the machine was doing OEM. I do not think that that is the issue. Also the machine crashes regardless of the load placed upon it.

Also I am running the most current BIOS. I forgot to add that in to the stuff I have tried. Regarding drivers, I took extreme care on one installation to only allow dell drivers. The machine was unplugged from the internet. the drivers were downloaded on another machine to a flash drive when was then installed on the machine.

Of course, none of this fixed the issue.

 

[white.a.drew]

The temps on the CPU are lower than what the machine was doing OEM. I do not think that that is the issue. Also the machine crashes regardless of the load placed upon it.

Also I am running the most current BIOS. I forgot to add that in to the stuff I have tried. Regarding drivers, I took extreme care on one installation to only allow dell drivers. The machine was unplugged from the internet. the drivers were downloaded on another machine to a flash drive when was then installed on the machine.

Of course, none of this fixed the issue.

Any results from occt?

 

[gamerguy319]

It ran Fine. I have since removed all but one hard drive. I am going to run it for a few days to see what happens. Then I will start switching drives around again to see what happens.

 

[white.a.drew]

It ran Fine. I have since removed all but one hard drive. I am going to run it for a few days to see what happens. Then I will start switching drives around again to see what happens.

Are you using one or two sticks of ram if two is dual channel enabled in the bios for proper dual channel support if not that can cause crashing to.