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I'd really appreciate any help anyone can give me.
My situation is the following: I got a new Dell XPS 15 9550 two weeks ago. It was running fine until last night when the screen suddenly went black. I was just using Facebook. The computer was still on but not responding. It would not respond to pressing the power button. So i held the power button for 5 secs, restarted it and kept using it and it would happen again. Eventually, after trying different solutions, I went for reinstalling Windows 10.
While Windows 10 was reinstalling it happened again. The screen suddenly went black and stayed like that forever. I had to turn it off again. Now i have no OS and the computer's stuck in a boot loop. Luckily I had a Ubuntu Linux bootable USB laying around. So i plugged it in and tried to install Ubuntu
But the computer also freezes randomly when trying to install Ubuntu. Sometimes it doesn't even last 10 seconds before freezing, sometimes it lasts a minute. The only difference is that with Ubuntu the screen freezes on the last frame, while with Windows the screen freezes black.
So i ran MemTest86, no memory problems. I ran Dell Diagnostics (the extended test) from the Diagnostics partition. Went to sleep. Came back 4 hours later and Diagnostics said all hardware passed, no errors. The weird thing is that after 4 hours it was still responding, just waiting for me to click OK. No freezing. So I restarted the laptop, tried to install Ubuntu, and again, freezes after a few seconds.
So I really don't know what the problem might be. If it freezes under different OSs, it must be a hardware issue? But memtest86 and dell diagnostics both said hardware is OK. Not only that, but while running diagnostics it didn't freeze for hours.
I would REALLY appreciate any help anyone can give me. Thank you very much.
Memetest and Dell's diagnostics probably don't stress the video adapter, so that may be your cause, but hard to say. Did you also perform disk/file-system tests yet? How long did you actually run memetest86 for? If it was any less than 72 hours (continuously) then you didn't test your RAM thoroughly enough to claim it's OK (IMO/IME). Try a different, known-good stick of RAM. – Ƭᴇcʜιᴇ007 – 2016-01-06T19:21:51.780
Thanks for your answer. I will try running memtest again. Do you know how i can test my hard drive/video adapter? Thank you. – Leo – 2016-01-06T19:37:36.460
Do you have the latest BIOS loaded? I would check to see if a newer version is out there, or maybe reset your bios settings to default (unless you've made changes you need) – LSxCPU – 2016-01-06T19:52:33.220
What you describe is a hardware issue. I suggest you contact the OEM and get it replaced under warranty. – Ramhound – 2016-01-06T20:04:49.660
I have another small problem and it's that i live in South America. If i have no other option I will send it to the US so it can be replaced, but that is quite a hassle. If the problem is the hard drive or memory it's a lot easier to just buy a new one here. I will look into the BIOS – Leo – 2016-01-06T20:23:53.547
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Dell has a 30 day refund policy, sent it back for a full refund, don't screw around..https://www.dell.com/learn/us/en/19/solutions/us-return-policy
– Moab – 2016-01-07T01:10:44.270Update: i removed the hard drive and booted ubuntu from a usb stick and it still freezes after some random seconds maybe a minute. The thing is, i can run memtest or dell diagnostics for hours without a problem and the moment i try to run an os it will freeze. Any ideas will be greatly appreciated. (PS: moab, my gfs going to the us in 2 weeks and im sending the laptop with her in case i cant fix it but i wont be getting it back till july in that case) – Leo – 2016-01-07T21:26:28.180