Korean Job Discussion Forums

woods · Joined: 19 Nov 2008 Location: Seoul 2009-2011 / (Ireland)

Having a very common problem for the Dell xps1330 apparently.
The NVIDIA graphics card is malfunctioning and i get these strange white vertical lines on my screen when i try booting up.
The odd time it does work, it is only briefly and it eventually freezes.
Its not a software issue, its faulty hardware.

This is a major problem with my type of NVIDIA graphics card apparently (8400). It is supposedly a fairly easy issue to fix....requires the graphics card to be re-soldered to the motherboard or something.

As my computer is out of warranty....does anyone know a reliable and reasonably priced Dell repair service in Seoul???
Directions and any info. would be great.

I spent a lot of money on this laptop several years ago and it is my lifeline to home here.
Any help is much appreciated. Thanks

buildbyflying · Posted: Tue Mar 30, 2010 6:34 pm Post subject:

The problem as I'm sure you know is all over. HP did a huge recall, but that didn't get most of them (mine included). There was even a lawsuit against Nvidia.
Mine sat on the shelf until recently. The cost of replacing the gpu is the cost a new laptop (and it's said the replacement gpu is likely to crash and burn as well). My fix? Just get an external monitor. ANd if you're on vista grab the gpu monitor desktop widget.
The 100k you'll spend on an lcd is still 3x less than the cost of repair.
If you really need the laptop screen: plug in to an external long enough to change the video driver in the control panel. Switch to the generic ms driver and lower your screen resolution.