fz11m freezes randomly

[cptbill]

Hi guys,

I have a FZ11M.
Problem is that it freezes when i leave it idle. That might happen sometimes after 10 hours, sometimes after 20 hours and sometimes after 3-4 hours. It happens randomly.
FZ11M stays idle (no processing, cpu is almost 0%) and the screensaver gets activated. So most of the times i find the laptop frozen (displaying the last image of the screensaver)and i can only shutdown the laptop with the power button(pushing it until FZ11M turns off)

Any clues what might be wrong?

[cptbill]

Anyway i opened a new case from the e-support webpage and waiting for an answer.

[frunns]

Oh damn, I'm not the only one. This happened to me during christmas, got my laptop back from repair (faulty key on the keyboard) and all of a sudden BSODed on me, saying something about memory parity (as previously mentioned). After that it just started freezing up, repeating half a second of sound (of what was playing at that moment). And it's occuring in both Vista and Ubuntu. At first I thought it had something to do with playing DVDs, as it actually were in the beginning, but just today it froze up a few times when using a torrent-program in ubuntu... And I don't really dare send it back to the repair center either, they'll just end up not finding any fault or just blaming it on me...

[cptbill]

Hmmm...weird things with FZ11M.
Anyway at the moment i have opened a case, they replied to me to and told me to test the laptop using safe mode.

[frunns]

yeah, they told me to use recover and reset my comp, but I think it wouldn't matter as the problem should be hardware-related, as it occur in multiple OSs...

[cptbill]

I am VERY dissappointed with the vaio support.
I am doing whatever they tell me on the case(number 2829858 if anyone cares) i opened on e-support.
The worst part is that they keep asking me the same questions like :is there an external hardware connected?
I have opened the case from 4th of January, i have an unusable laptop and cant believe that e-support keeps asking me the same things.

Something new i noticed is that on the "problem reports and solutions" of vista i can see many many "video hardware error" something that never happened before.

Here is an image: http://users.forthnet.gr/ath/cptbill/fz11m.jpg

I think its probably a vga hardware problem. So on earth do i have to do to have a workable laptop?? How should i convince them to pick up my laptop to repair it??

[frunns]

well... the e-support really ain't that good. the phone-support however is quite nice, and the actual repair time as well. the problem as I see it is, can you replicate the error? I sure can't on mine at least... however now it might be gone, haven't occured in a long time.

[dragsan]

Hi
I got exactly the samo problem with FZ 11 E
It was very annoying so I sold it 3 weeks after purchasing it and now I got a AR61M

[cptbill]

well... the e-support really ain't that good. the phone-support however is quite nice, and the actual repair time as well. the problem as I see it is, can you replicate the error? I sure can't on mine at least... however now it might be gone, haven't occured in a long time.

I has been a month since i opened the case on e-support.
Yeah i noticed that their e-support is bad since they tell me to do the same things over and over. In order to reproduce the problem, they have to switch it on and leave it idle doing nothing. It will freeze after some hours.

dragsan was it exactly the same problem? What i have noticed on my problem is that the laptop freezes when the processing usage is low (for example 1-2%). Which means that a screensaver might have been activated (or energy saving mode) and the laptop freezes after some hours. While working on the laptop, it never has frozen.

At the moment i found out a solution to my problem: running a task that keeps the cpu busy. For example folding@home which is set up to run at about 6-7% cpu usage.
I know that this is not a permanent solution but i am desperate. I paid €1200 for a laptop that i have rarely used and now i am trying to convince Sony support to pick up the laptop for repair.

[dragsan]

Yes, mostly it happened by low cpu usage
But sometimes however it happened as I was watching a movie or surfing on the internet

[Thalamus.]

Hi cptbill,

hopefully Sony Vaio Support should be in contact soon..