Windows 7: Laptop acting strange. Few things happening.

Ok so I've had this laptop since October. Occasionally when I'm on Skype with my cam I get this weird white noise type thing. My whole screen turns into like white noise, like how tv's are on the wrong channel. It's not the regular black and white dots, but there's color to it and it's lines. So basically color noise. It has happened a few times and I have to hold the button down and restart it. Recently though, my laptop has been turning itself off. No BSOD or anything, but just shutting off on it's own. It has happened twice. Once when I was on cam and got the color noise, and now another time while I was just watching a video. I have no idea what's going on. Any advice or help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Try updating your graphics driver.

Open your Event Viewer (type: Event Viewer at the Start search) and look to see if there are any Critical events listed around the time those problems occurred. Then Check the Errors.

See if anything corresponds to the time and symptom.

Also: are you on battery or power supply when this happens? Or does it not matter which?

I've done that already.

It happens on either. It doesn't matter. Which logs am I supposed to be viewing?

These:


Critical and Errors. Click the + sign to expand each.
Double click on the individual error to see details.

This is all it says.

No one knows what could be the problem?

Not based on what is known now. Need more clues.

The graphics problem could be pre-symptomatic of a larger problem. Or it could be a stand-alone problem.
The shutting off problem could be a power problem, an overheating problem, or it could be a symptom of the graphics problem.
The graphics problem could be software and/or driver related, or it could be hardware related. As could the power problem.

A bad battery or power supply has been known to cause your kind of power symptom. You want to try running the computer for a while on battery only, on power supply only (remove the battery from the laptop and run it without one) to test to see if this could be the cause. You said you did this test and it was non conclusive. So we are assuming these components are good.

Overheating has been known to cause both your graphics problem and your power problem. In a laptop this is normally due to:

• A fan has stopped working
• Dust has built up inside the laptop, blocking air flow.
• A Component is overclocked, overworked, or defective and is running hot.

It would be much easier if I had your laptop on my bench. But right now all I see is SevenForums! The more information you can give the more help I can be.

And very often, in the process of slowing down and explaining their problem carefully a lot of folks figure out what is going on themselves.

But for now I suggest exploring the overheating issue. Here are some video tips:
How To Clean Dust From Your Laptop - YouTube
How to Clean a Laptop Fan - YouTube

Lets see if cleaning does it.

What would help is for you to fill in the System Specs for the Laptop.

I realize that then later you may want to go back and change them to reflect your custom built desktop, but the time-being we need the system specs for the laptop.

Here is how. I prefer using Speccy, but the call is yours.

Update your SevenForums System Specs
User CP (located on the top menu bar) |
Your Profile | Edit System Spec (left-hand column)

To gather info, use Speccy (my favorite) or SIW or System Info

Add the word laptop or desktop or netbook to the
“system manufacturer” block, for example,
Toshiba Satellite L305D notebook.

Provide full windows version info, for example:
MS Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 64-bit

Use the “Other Info” block for Optical Reader,
Mouse, touchpad, wifi adapter, speakers, monitor, etc

Scroll down and click on SAVE CHANGES.
============================================

I had this same symptom amongst others with a customers HP Pavilion Dv5 - 111Oem and the fault turned out to be bad sectors on the hard drive

run the laptops hard drive check on boot and see if it shows any problems ?