Dell Inspiron 7520 (Intel/AMD) LA-8241P Freezing Issue

[FShahid]

Hi I have Dell 7520 which has i7-3632QM as well as AMD 7730M Discrete Switchable GPU.

This is BACO Switchable meaning the AMD GPU can only "render" and cannot work as alone as it depends on iGPU for output.

Attached is the datasheet for LA-8241P which shares common with Inspiron 5520 and Vostro 3560. Link to Schematics: https://cdn.badcaps-static.com/pdfs/...a856347d78.pdf

The laptop has worked flawlessly for last 9 years, with CPU temps never exceeding 90*C and GPU barely reaching 80*C on gaming/full load.

Since AMD dropped support for 7700 series GPU so I was using modded drivers for last few months with no issues.

How it all started is one day last week I was using it for some work for 2 hours, then afterwards I plugged in charger for some gaming and launched the GTA V game. As it entered into the game it froze after a minute or so but could hear sounds. The system was responsive, I could try Alt+Tab and Start logo but it wont return to desktop so I did Ctrl+Alt+Del and sure enough it showed the screen from where I logged off and was able to log in again. However after logging in the movement of the cursor starts lagging for 2-3 seconds until it froze, and the system freezes (clock time not updating).

I force power off and powered it on and when I login, after a minute of been logged in whether I do something or not it just freezes, and the behavior of freezing is if I am moving the mouse, just before it freezes the cursor movement lags for 2-3 seconds (as if fps is dropping) until it freeze. The Idle CPU temp. is around 53*C

The first step I did was to clean uninstall AMD drivers by booting into Safe Mode, then went back to Normal Mode and turn off WiFi so it does not autoupdate, so I was able to use the system again as normal but I noticed an issue; I could see some garbage in Windows tiles icons that you have in Windows 10 Start Menu, but otherwise system worked normal. As soon as I tried installing modded AMD driver it freezes, so again went back to Safe Mode to clean uninstall AMD drivers and booted back to Normal Mode.
Now I tried OEM driver it worked but when I launch a game that tries using GPU the game shows garbage instead of actual game, but system did not crash. So I restarted and when I again tried to launch the game the mouse cursor stalls as before and freezes.
Uninstalled the AMD drivers again in Safe Mode then went back to Normal Mode, I tested NFS Most Wanted (old one) and sure enough it was using iGPU as I can see performance drop, however after few minutes the situation seems worsened, it froze again and after restart it is freezing while it is logging in even without AMD drivers ie. on iGPU, it freezes when it is logging in "Welcome" screen the circle animation starts lagging in 2-3 seconds until it freezes.

Tried running the Dell UEFI Diagnostics (ePSA) and after first test it reported "Memory Errors Resolved" and then it asks to do through testing which I performed and I noticed it took much longer (more than 6 hours) than I remember tried doing test long time ago. I thought ok the issue must be with RAM, after test completed without errors I rebooted into Windows but it is showing same behavior ie. freezing at Welcome screen or sometimes getting into desktop but freezes after few seconds with same mouse lagged 2-3 seconds until it freezes.

Laptop has two 8GB modules (16GB total) so removed back cover, tested RAM one by one, first tested each slot and then each module, but same freezing issue.

Now to summarize, the system freezes when system boots into Normal Windows whether it is AMD or iGPU.

Since the situation has worsen just within couple of hours suddenly, and max. temps of GPU was 67*C in Dell Diagnostics (I did regular servicing of laptop fan once every 2 years) I don't think it could be AMD GPU failing due to overheat.

I think it could be decoupling capacitors failing which maybe near CPU & GPU

However I require your community expertise on this matter which I why I'm here. Please guide what to look for troubleshooting on this motherboard.

[mcplslg123]

Re: Dell Inspiron 7520 (Intel/AMD) LA-8241P Freezing Issue

Failing AMD GPU in my opinion. have seen GPU failure on many Dell 5520. You can convert it to UMA to bypass GPU issues but games may not support on Intel iGPU.

[FShahid]

Re: Dell Inspiron 7520 (Intel/AMD) LA-8241P Freezing Issue

Failing AMD GPU in my opinion. have seen GPU failure on many Dell 5520. You can convert it to UMA to bypass GPU issues but games may not support on Intel iGPU.

Thank you for response. I have seen that process but I want to keep it at last resort. Any other options?

I want to add that today when I powered on at Welcome screen it circle was spinning constantly but the system was already locked as tested with caps lock led not responding to press, and after few minutes the spinning circle froze, so forcefully powered off and on and went to Safe mode I noticed that AMD drivers were installed by itself, possibly during my last use it autoinstalled hence it started freezing again.

I then went ahead and tested with a spare working 4GB RAM module, the issue was same so that rules out.

Uninstalled the AMD drivers, restated into Normal mode with original two 8GB modules of total 16GB, disabled networking so that it doesn't start installing drivers again, disabled the AMD graphics from device manager, connected to network, downloaded and ran Prime95 of total 20 minutes which kept CPU all cores maxed at 2.88GHz and 15.9GB full RAM use, the laptop stayed stable and responding to caps lock, etc. I then also played a YouTube video at 720p60fps and that worked ok too...

Welp, looks like AMD GPU went bad as you mentioned or the capacitors for it has gone bad so I will disassemble the laptop in the weekend to have a look at it and report any findings.

I don't get it though, how suddenly the GPU failed before I even started get into gaming for a minute or so, it should not have so quickly overheated to the point that it failed. Also notice how as soon as system mouse cursor lags to freeze at almost same time the system locks up (not responding to caps lock led) without showing any Blue Screen errors, and then today there was opposite behavior ie. spinning circle kept spinning at Welcome screen while the system was already locked up (not responding to caps lock led).

[mcplslg123]

Re: Dell Inspiron 7520 (Intel/AMD) LA-8241P Freezing Issue

This model is perhaps almost 9-10 years old,so gpu failure is not un-expected. You can confirm its GPU by applying good quality bga flux around the gpu chip and then gently heating for a couple of seconds. Remove the corner glue,if any,before applying heat. Dont heat the die on chip and temperature should'nt be very high.

[piernov]

Re: Dell Inspiron 7520 (Intel/AMD) LA-8241P Freezing Issue

The point is to heat the die and not melt the balls, also useless to waste flux and make a mess on the board…

[mcplslg123]

Re: Dell Inspiron 7520 (Intel/AMD) LA-8241P Freezing Issue

The point is to heat the die and not melt the balls, also useless to waste flux and make a mess on the board…

I know but to be on safer side asked to heat around the gpu. Its meant for test purpose only.

[reformatt]

Re: Dell Inspiron 7520 (Intel/AMD) LA-8241P Freezing Issue

The GPU's from this era fail because of bad connections from the die to the BGA pads underneath. It's only a temporary fix unfortunately.

[FShahid]

Re: Dell Inspiron 7520 (Intel/AMD) LA-8241P Freezing Issue

Thanks for all your replies, I have managed to fix it

To be honest I did a very long post for the fix on this thread but I can't seem to find it today, maybe I forgot to post the reply?

Anyways I performed the method exactly as described in this YouTube video by Nik Telio: /watch?v=FU84qGSdE-s
(I suspect my post got deleted due to sharing link so I will share just the video code)

First I removed metal bracket and protection stickers beneath the GPU die and around it, then put masking tape around the die covering SMD components as much as I could, then placed temperature probe with help of some thermal paste on top of the die to have better reading, removed the corner glues securing the GPU as mentioned by mcplslg123 but with little help of hot air to cleanly remove it. Applied AMTECH RMA-223 no-clean flux around the die.

After everything is prepped I started heating the GPU by rotating hot air gun from distance slowly until it reached 180*C (the flux seeped into the chip without making a mess thankfully) then I bought the hot air gun closer, rotating it so it immediately reached at 230-232*C and stayed there for 4 seconds. Then I removed the heat and let it cool to room temperature.

Once it is done, I cleaned the flux residue, applied thermal paste and assembled it back. Powered it on and noticed that it POSTed slightly quicker than what it was before, also the unusual delay that was appearing for backlight off/on between Windows load and login screen was sufficiently reduced, meaning the reflow was a sucess. Then I installed the GPU drivers back (there was no freezing this time) and restarted. To my surprise this time it booted properly with the GPU, so to be sure I ran few games and checked the GPU usage it was good (the temps for a short run test went 58*C for GPU and 65*C for the i7 CPU) and the fps was what I would expect when GPU is been used so that confirms the GPU is functional.

I love this machine, i7-3632QM (2.2GHz upto 3.2GHz), AMD 7730M 2GB GPU, 16GB DDR3 1600 (upgraded from 8GB), 126GB mSATA SSD (added) + 1.5TB HDD (added) + 1TB. I bought it at the end of 2012 as brand new, used to encode x264 and then x265 videos from till 2015 (with a rock-stable 2.8GHz TurboBoost on all cores without throttling), then I used to play GTA V and Overwatch and other games until recently in 2022 when it gave up (so that's total 9-ish years). I think it served me more than what I expected

The battery started wearing out severely from 2018 onwards so when the battery backup went to just couple of minutes in 2021 I got the li-ion cells replaced (circuit & housing is same). Battery backup is back to what it used to be as new. So in terms of charging control this model was perfectly tuned to allow battery life last this long.

Again, thank you everyone for helping