Laptop Video Card Memory Error

[razorbubble]

System Info:
Dell Inspiron E1705
Intel Core2Duo 2.0 GHz
2 gigs of RAM
GeForce GO 7900 GS
Windows Vista Ultimate

Some problems:
1. Recently I've been getting the blue screen of death more and more often, especially when my computer is just idling or when playing a game. And I believe that my graphics card seems to be the problem.

2. Using RivaTuner, I am able to check upon the temperature of the CPU core. For some reason, the fans on my computer don't turn on until the temperature of the core hits, 70C sometimes even higher, highest I've seen it go was 79C. So is there anyway to set the fan speed at a certain rate to prevent that from happening, cause I think that I my system is crashing with the blue screen due to overheating.

3. Early today, I ran some hardware diagnostics, and the video card apparently failed the video memory test. The problem that occurred is that when calling for a specific memory location, like FFFFFFFF, the card responded with FFFFFBFF, just a rough estimate, and I tested a few more times, and each came up with a different address problem. Total hardware failure?

edit: Also, it is possible for the driver of the card to be affecting its hardware? such as the fans and memory?

 

[KSoD]

1. Can you get the Stop Error code that looks liek this:

0X000000ZZ where ZZ is a Alpha Numeric combination. There is also a line in all caps below it that will help as well.

2. Try SpeedFan or CoreTemp

3. Do you have the latest nvidia driver?

4. Yes it is possible for a driver to cause this.

 

[razorbubble]

Not sure if it's a Vista thing. But when I get the blue screen, it just says, that there is a Hardware malfunction, please uninstall latest hardware....no stop error code, just 3 lines of text.

edit:
Also, since my computer is a laptop, I have to get the drivers the company and not from NVIDIA. But I was recieving errors when I installed the latest one, and upon resetting the driver to the original factory driver, everything seems to be fine.

 

[KSoD]

Okay sorry i forget that the M series drivers are not available at nvidia's site. that is my bad.

It seems that this new series of drivers are playing bad on many laptops. I would not update the drivers until after you see some feedback on how they work. Since it seems that the latest ones killed your system.

 

[razorbubble]

Well, thx for the input, apparently I left it over night and no problems with overheating, weird blue screens, and that sort. Apparently the factory installed driver seems to be working perfectly fine.

 

[razorbubble]

Okay, apparently problem not fixed. And I'm not even sure anymore what is the exact problem. Sometimes it would just restart when I'm browsing the web, even when the computer just enter windows and starts loading the startup programs, but mostly when gaming.

This is the message I get:

Hardware malfunction
Call you hardware vendor for support
NMI: Parity check /Memory parity error

Is it possible that possible overheating destroyed the memory? Or Vista updates? I even attempted to downgrade to Windows XP again and it does not allow me due to some hardware problem. Would updating the Bios improve things? Any ideas? Also about fan speeds, I tried RivaTuner and SpeedFan, they do not have the option for me to change my fan speeds, so does that mean that I cannot have control over my fanspeeds?

edit: Also, I googled the memory parity error, and I found a really old and lengthy post from 2 years back thats still be posted on, and seems to me that Dell is the problem.
NMI: Parity Check/ Memory Parity Error -- System crash - Notebook Forums and Laptop Discussion

edit2: Also, from reading from various tech forums, seems to a large number of people with the same problem, especially with the Dell Inspiron E1705/9400.