Laptop help needed

[Neroon]

My son has been experiencing a particularly vexing problem with his HP laptop. We're at the end of our rope with it, short of a complete scorched Earth approach, so I promised him I'd ask in here to see if anyone had some ideas. I am waaaaaay out of my league on this problem.


To begin with, the specs:
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Make and Model:
Hewlett-Packard dv9000z

Processor:
AMD Turion 64 X2, 2.20 GHz

Video:
NVIDIA GeForce Go 7600

RAM:
2 GB

Hard Drives:
160 GB primary, 80 GB secondary

Operating Systems:
Windows Vista Ultimate (primary drive),
Windows XP Pro SP2 (secondary drive),
Xubuntu Linux 7.04 (secondary drive)
Optical Drive: DVD+-RW


The original problem, stated in his own words
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Whenever I start my laptop up, there are these strange vertical lines running through the HP logo screen. They also appear on the Windows boot screen and in the BIOS, but not on my OS select screen (I also have XP and Linux set up on a second hard drive). Whenever I try to boot into Vista afterwards, one of two things happens:

a) If my video drivers (for an NVIDIA GeForce Go 7600, if it helps) are either uninstalled or disabled, it seems to boot just fine. It's only using a basic video driver, but it's fine. The same thing happens with Safe Mode.

b) If I have *any* video drivers installed (and enabled, of course) at all, even if they're an older version, Windows crashes with a "PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA" error before it gets to the welcome screen.

The weirdest part is, I thought I had it fixed at one point. I updated the BIOS sometime last night, and after that (I don't remember whether or not I did anything else), the lines seemed to be gone and Vista booted just fine, drivers and all. However, there was one point when the screen went all wacky on me, and since I couldn't make heads or tails of what was going on, I powered off. When I turned the system back on, the lines and error were back.

I've tried a couple of different things; reseating the RAM, System Restore, restoring a backup I made last night when the system was working...either none of those worked or I did something wrong. Based on
my work earlier, I think that the video drivers have something to do with it.

What I did to supposedly solve the problem was uninstall an update (KB941229 - it had something to do with Windows Media Center). When it reverted, I was just using the computer like I normally do. The screen got all distorted and the system locked up, so I had to shut it down with the power button.

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[Noname Given]

A question:
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Are you using the base NVidia go drivers that came with the HP laptop; or did you get drivers directly from the NVidia website?

Laptop chip support architechture is sometimes very specialized, so you should always check the HP site first for driver updates. IF the HP site said you could get drivers directly from NVidia, you're fine.

So, with that out of the way; if it's not a software driver issue, it's one of two things:

1) A thermal issue with the GPU (and you wouldn't have an issue with the default VGA-compatable driver as it makes no use of the extra - and more heat generating intensive - circutry on the chip.

2) You have a just plain defective GPU (or card - it could be either way - some HP laptop models have teh GPU soddered directly on to the MB, while others have a video card slot that can allow various laptop 'go' type video cards.

If the PC is new or still under warranty; I'd take it to an HP authorized service center and let them take a look at it. If it's out of warranty, and has a video card slot - you could try getting a 'new' card of the same type, and see if it fixes it (and if not, just take the card back to where you purchased it for a refund).

Good luck.

 

[motichu]

The drivers that I'm using are the latest version available from HP's website (though I've tried an older version as well). As far as I can tell, the drivers from NVidia's site won't work because of the specialized architecture you mentioned.

I'm not sure whether it's a software or hardware problem. I'd originally been thinking that it's a software problem since I've "fixed" it a couple of times by fiddling with software. However, since backups and System Restore failed to help, that makes me think it could be a hardware problem.

Sadly, I also don't know if the video is on the motherboard or if it's a separate card - I'll have to try looking into that. (EDIT: looks like it's on the motherboard. Darn.)

Fortunately, the laptop appears to still be under warranty (we bought it this past June). If worst comes to worst, I should be able to get it repaired.

 

[farmkid]

I had a similar problem with my laptop this past summer. Mine is 4 years old and has an ATI GPU, so there's no similarity there, but the symptoms were similar. The problem I had was that it would not boot with any drivers installed, but it would boot with the generic VGA drivers. It would get part way through loading the drivers, pause for a long time when loading some video driver file, then crash with a blue screen error. No driver change made any difference. I even removed Windows and put on Linux and the results were the same. I finally concluded that there was some flaw or damage to some circuit that was used in the advanced feature set enabled by the drivers.

To determine for sure whether it is a hardware problem, you could try loading Linux and see if the problem remains. However, you should check your warranty before you do so. There was a story in the news a couple of months ago about a guy who brought his laptop in to have the screen latch repaired, but was refused warranty service because he had replaced the Windows OS that had come on the computer with Linux. The warranty specifically forbid changing the OS.

 

[The Doctor]

The fact that the graphical corruption happens during the boot process and not just in Windows points a finger pretty squarely at a hardware problem. Could be something as simple as a stuck fan on the GPU or something defective on the card (or motherboard, if the GPU is integrated).

I'd do a backup and wipe of all personal data and send the machine to be repaired. Be sure to remove the extra OS partitions as support centers tend to be sticky about such things and may arbitrarily decide not to support your configuration.

 

[motichu]

Just tried booting Linux again (I'd tried earlier with no success), and the graphical environment wouldn't start.

I guess it's a good thing that I bought that external drive. I'll need the laptop for about a week more (still have some papers and such to finish), so I'll take care of getting it repaired later. Oh well, I'll manage.

 

[James Bond]

I had this problem with my Dell desktop a couple of years ago. It was something wrong with my video card. I'd suggest taking it to a service center or installing a new card yourself. All the best!

 

[Alpha_Geek]

If you're seeing those stripes in the BIOS screen, no amount of windows drivers is gonna help since the BIOS is firmware built into the hardware, and it's up and running before the CPU gets even a tiny sniff of Windows.

Most notebooks these days use Unified Memory Archetecture (UMA) which is the bane of PC purists. UMA takes part of the system RAM and uses it for the graphics card. Pure Evil, I tell ya.

The first thing I'd try is going into the BIOS and reset the default values. If that fails...


It's also possible that it's a problem with the LCD display. If the notebook has a monitor port, then connect a monitor and go through the boot process and see if the problem shows up there also. If it looks ok, it's gonna have to go off for repair.


If that's not is, and if you have another RAM card that you can slip into the notebook, try that and see what happens.


If that fails, it may be that some other problem on the motherboard. The notebook may need a trip to HP for service. Something like this should be under warranty if the time limit hasn't expired.

Hope it's just the BIOS settings!

AG