Chosen Solution
Hello everyone, My pc has run into some trouble here and I think it’s toast but before I just to that conclusion I’d like some opinions from you guys. I honestly don’t know a ton about computers. I uploaded some pictures of what seems to need the green screen of death This dell XPS8500 is from approximately 2012. Things I’ve tried with no luck; booting into safe mode Restoring windows repair utility booting from usb letting the green screen sit over night Most of the menus are in the magnified state which makes it almost impossible to do anything I was able to navigate a few of them comparing them with pics from google search. Thanks for any help, Matt
Are you using an Intel onboard (IGP) or dGPU (GPGPU) machine? The majority of high spec systems come with the Radeon 7570, which is a low-profile GPU converted to work with a different bracket; these things are prone to overheating and failure due to poor cooling and being easily overworked due to said cooling and limited performance. I’ve beaten on mine with GTA V, but I know I’m tempting fate every time and I accept the risk of killing mine. There are other cards that don’t do this, but they were all optional CTO upgrades. The difference between the consumer 7570 vs. business 7570 is the secondary port; the consumer card in the XPS uses HDMI and DVI. The OptiPlex edition of this GPU uses full size DP and HDMI, not DVI. Either way, it’s the same cheap card and putting DP on it is literally putting lipstick on a pig. For onboard video, it’s usually bad RAM. The problem with this specific 7570 is they’re so low-end, they run extremely hot under a hard load, which the coolers cannot take – and the cards fail with zero warning as you found out. This in turn kills the fan bearings as they get beaten up due to the poor cooling, which in turn kills the cards after a few years of hard use. It’s very common to see ex Radeon 7570 (as well as other hot running “low profile” cards) computers with the evidence (an open PCIe slot where a card used to be) left behind because people just pull these things when they die after a few years rather than replace them with the same failure prone part. Even if the previous owner puts a cover in (most do not) if I looked up the Dell S/T I could tell right away if it died and was removed. The only cards in this form factor that aren’t death machines are DOA waste like the GT420. Personally, if I got a Dell with a GPU like this I wouldn’t remove it if it worked; but if it did fail with early warnings (not the fan; if it’s rattling that means it’s probably on deaths door but has time), I’d put a full-size open market card in there and then scrap the dead card – or if it’s older, use the IGP. If you’re lucky it’s just a bad driver and booting on the Intel onboard without the GPU installed (Dell has a POST block with a GPU installed) to uninstall the drivers for this card and then reinstall the AMD reference driver or use the Windows WHQL driver to get it started and then install the AMD driver. We don’t know what card you have explicitly, so you will need to find out and locate the correct driver. Just don’t be surprised if it fails again permanently. If you don’t want to chance it, these are your choices: Buy a modern midrange GPU and replace it (requires driver change)Remove the card and switch to onboard video (requires driver change)Required driver If it didn’t ship with a GPU, the RAM is bad. Get a set of DDR3L 1600MHz - at least 16GB of it especially if you plan to keep the computer in the long run. If not, remove the bad module as long as it’s reasonable - think 4-8GB of RAM after finding the dead module. If you have this card and the driver is no help, this is the exact 7570 known to fail.
So what your getting there is most likely from a bad graphics card. If you have one not dedicated. Then you can usually replace it very cheap and very easy. Dell does have built in diagnostics if you hit f12 when you boot the computer. I am almost positive that’s a bad gpu. As far as the booting issue goes that could just be a windows reload if anything. I can further guide you if you need any questions
