The Nvidia Defect Forum

Hey guys,
I know there are many topics out there about the same subject, and I'm quite certain this is one of them.
But I'd like to have a bit more information about what my options are.

So here goes:

My laptop (Asus G1S-A1) is now about 3.5 years old and has the infamous 8600m GT graphics card.
Half a year ago I had an error while playing a youtube video, the screen started showing green lines and funky colours and a weird screeching noise was coming out of the insides of the laptop. I powered the laptop off and back on and the colours came back. If that wasn't bad enough, booting seemed impossible because I was sent straight to the internal system recovering program. After rebooting a bit and doing the same things over and over again, I was able to 'fix' the computer by reinstalling windows vista 32 by usage of the Asus Recovery Disk.

At this point everything started working well again, except my graphics card, it was as if I didn't have one. So I continued using this laptop for half a year without a graphics card, playing movies through VLC media player without any issues (WMP didn't seem to work). Even the oldest of games (doom/doom II/half-life) couldn't start up because apparantly my laptop didn't have OpenGL or Directx3D anymore. But at least I had no crashes.
Up until the point I realised my graphics card just wasn't installed (instead of broken), I know, I look stupid at this point, and frankly I agree.
So I installed the video drivers that came with another disk that was delivered with the laptop (full of asus bloatware and some necessary drivers).
After doing this I installed some recent video drivers I found on laptopvideo2go and amazingly my laptop worked as good as new. For about two weeks I played a few video games and videos, up until a few days ago.
While playing a youtube video, the problem started all over again, my laptop crashed just the same as it did half a year ago.

Because it's happening quite frequently now, I videotaped the sequence, you can find visual evidence of the issue here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDy5F_M_ZAU

I'm sorry for this wall of text, but in order the explain the issue, I thought the best thing i could do was start from the beginning.

Hello Tjee and welcome to our forum.

Sorry to hear that your laptop has failed.

I took a look at the video and it is definitely the Nvidia defect, no doubt about it.

I have worked on a large number of your model of laptop and they were all found to have the defect.

The fact that your laptop contains one of the more prolific of the defective GPU's also adds weight to my conclusion.

I have a few questions to see if I can help.

1) Who did you purchase the laptop from?
2) How did you pay (Cash/Debit Card/Credit Card)?
3) Are you resident in the UK?

Please let me know and I will advise further.

Best wishes

Paul
The Admin Team

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Please note that I am not legally qualified and I only offer my own personal advice. You are advised to seek professional legal advice for formal clarification of advice I give.

Hello Lapcure,

thank you for answering me asap.
Here are the answers to your questions:
1) I bought the laptop from a computer specialist who has recently quit his business.
2) I think it was payed for in cash, I'm quite sure I still have a receipt somewhere in the accounting of my dad's firm.
3) I live in Belgium

The first thing that comes to mind is, is it possible for me to trade this laptop in for a recent version of it plus a few expenses?

:edit: I just spoke with a friend of mine who just finished law school, apparantly it's no longer any use, she thinks the maximum amount of time is 3 years for requesting a refund or replacement in Belgium.
I'm going to check a lawbook of private law and see if anything is in there.

Pardon my impatience, but why did you need to know those 3 things?

You're sort of my last hope, I'm planning on buying a new desktop (or perhaps laptop, haven't decided yet), but it would be obsolete if I could exchange this one for a bargain.

Hello Tjee,

Thank you for providing the extra information.

Unfortunately as you purchased from a company which has ceased trading and because you paid in cash rather than with credit card there is no recourse for you.

Had you paid by credit card then, in the absence of the retailer, you could have pursued the card company.

Your only other option is to approach Asus and to try and get them to offer some form of resolution.

Asus would be under no obligation to help and if they did agree to offer some form of a resolution then this would be a gesture of goodwill on their part.

Pursuing Asus has got to be worth a try as that would be the only chance you would have of reaching a resolution.

I am sorry I cannot offer you more positive news.

Any questions please let me know.

Best wishes

Paul
The Admin Team

_________________
=======================================================
Calculate the minimum refund that you would be entitled to.
FAQ's
Why you should not accept a repair
Links to evidence
What is the Nvidia Defect?
Step by step help to getting a refund
Do you need an engineers report?
=======================================================

If you like what you see on this forum and would like to help then please post links to this forum in other forums or blogs. The more people we can help the better.


Please note that I am not legally qualified and I only offer my own personal advice. You are advised to seek professional legal advice for formal clarification of advice I give.

I'm sorry to hear that, I'm not certain that it was paid for in cash, however, sueing the credit card company seems a bit wrong.
After all, they have nothing to do with the purchase, I'd be amazed if it would actually have some result.

Anyway, thanks a lot for your help, I'll just buy a new laptop and move on with my life.

Would this work as a temporary solution to keep my machine running?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYzKfec7 ... re=related

Hello Tjee,

Whilst that type of repair may work, there is a chance that you could destroy the card completely.

If you fancy having a try yourself you would be much better using a hair dryer or similar.

Simply cover the card in foil to protect the other components and cut out a hole in the foil where the GPU is.

Then, with the hair dryer on high heat the GPU for between 1 and 2 minutes.

Once you have done that allow the GPU to fully cool down before reassembling the laptop. Please also ensure that you use some fresh thermal paste on the GPU and I recommend Arctic Silver if you don't already have some paste.

This would certainly work, though for how long is an unknown quantity.

At least it would get your laptop working again.

Putting the card into an oven is a little too drastic.

What do you think?

Best wishes

Paul
The Admin Team

_________________
=======================================================
Calculate the minimum refund that you would be entitled to.
FAQ's
Why you should not accept a repair
Links to evidence
What is the Nvidia Defect?
Step by step help to getting a refund
Do you need an engineers report?
=======================================================

If you like what you see on this forum and would like to help then please post links to this forum in other forums or blogs. The more people we can help the better.


Please note that I am not legally qualified and I only offer my own personal advice. You are advised to seek professional legal advice for formal clarification of advice I give.

Hello,
I bought an ASUS Gaming Series G1s at PC World on the 29th of December 2007. It worked OK until the 19th of June 2010. I started the machine up and found that it came on but was not booting and that I was getting no output from the screen.

I took it back to PC World to get it examined by their engineers on the 24th of July 2010. A few days later, I received a phone call from them telling me to come and collect it. When we got there, the engineer told us that the motherboard was broken and that they didn't provide a replacement motherboard. He gave me back the money it cost to get it examined. We said that we were'nt happy with this outcome and asked to see the manager. She said there was nothing she could do but advised us to write to Head Office of PC World and also that it would be necessary for us to take it to an independent engineer.

We took it to an independent engineer. After about a month, we got the report back stating "ASUS G1s Laptop - After close inspection of the motherboard we have found cracks in the BGA solder for the nvidia graphics chip. The cause of this is most likely down to overheating as the heatsink and fan is very dusty which would limit the cooling capacity of the machine. The cost is to repair the machine." We sent off the report to PC World Complaints Department Headoffice enclosing a letter advising them that we were considering taking our case to the Small Claims Court. To date, we have not received a reply.

Hello the4thmenace and welcome to our forum.

Sorry to hear that your laptop has failed.



It always amazes me when engineers state that because the ONLY way to visually see the cracks in the solder is through the use of an electron microscope, which are prohibitively expensive and it is unlikely that they are possession of one.

The only way to test for the defect, other than through the use of an electron microscope, is by performing a rework test.



The cause is likely to be due to overheating, but it is unlikely to be caused by dust and more by the fact that your laptop contains an Nvidia 8600 GPU, which along with the 8400 is one of more prolific of the defective GPU's.

Let's see what PC World say in their response, but to be honest because your report does not state inherent defect and because, reading between the lines, it states that the failure was due to overheating caused by the dust, then I would say it would not be a very strong piece of evidence in court.

Let's hope that PC World capitulate without you have to take matters further.

Fingers crossed fro you.

Best wishes

Paul
The Admin Team

_________________
=======================================================
Calculate the minimum refund that you would be entitled to.
FAQ's
Why you should not accept a repair
Links to evidence
What is the Nvidia Defect?
Step by step help to getting a refund
Do you need an engineers report?
=======================================================

If you like what you see on this forum and would like to help then please post links to this forum in other forums or blogs. The more people we can help the better.


Please note that I am not legally qualified and I only offer my own personal advice. You are advised to seek professional legal advice for formal clarification of advice I give.