G750JX - Long RMA Wait Times

[wango911]

Basically, I have this bad dilemma with ASUS and their poor RMA system since the beginning of May. So, here's a bit of background leading to today.

Back in early May, my laptop was experiencing BSOD's under Windows 10 (version 1511). It would happen at random times, and Windows would not display the BSOD at all (might be a Windows bug for that), only freeze and sometimes make horrible noise.

At first I assumed it was a video driver issue, so I went ahead and uninstalled my Nvidia driver using Display Driver Uninstaller. Reinstalled the driver again, and the issue still remained. I decided to reinstall Windows, same issue. Then I decided to downgrade to Windows 7, same issue. I realized it was a hardware related issue. I didn't really diagnose the issue, so I decided to use my lovely 1 year warranty to have my laptop looked at and repaired.

Here's where the RMA nightmare really begins.

I submit the first RMA to ASUS, when the ticket was created, I packed up the laptop, and sent it on its way. Took about a week for the laptop to be repaired and sent back, which was nice. When it came back around May 23rd, I reviewed the piece of paper that had the repair details on it. Motherboard was replaced and some cosmetic component that I didn't really care about.

Excited I was I got myself a repaired laptop, I got back to work and started using it. Upon 2 hours of use, BSOD. And after a few restarts from blue screening, realized the issue got worse.

I was pissed. I immediately called ASUS again to open another RMA ticket. I requested if I can receive a replacement laptop since they basically already replaced the motherboard, and it would be pointless to keep repairing it. Of course, the tech support agent made no guarantee, so I took that chance. This is where the fun REALLY begins.

I'm usually really good checking up on things to see how they are going, but while the laptop was in the repair facility in Silicon Valley, the RMA status on the look up website never was updated, NOT ONCE. So, I had no choice and spend at least 15-30 minutes of my time to call to check the status, each time I felt like it. Of course, whenever I connect to any tech support agent, they read the same thing I read. Totally helpful.

2 1/2 weeks later, I was getting impatient since I had no idea what was going on with my laptop. I called ASUS again demanding I get a written update on what's going on with my laptop. About 72 hours later, I get an email with a written update. Basically, they were in the process of replacing my laptop. OK, cool. However, they did not give any ETA in when they will receive it, nor when I will receive it.

Fast forward 1 week, now mid-June, I called back with a status, since they never updated my RMA ticket. Same scripted language, "You will be receiving your replacement". I demanded to talk to a tier-2 agent. Once I connect to the tier-2 guy, he sounded like he hated life. I demanded my RMA to escalated and expedited, in which he did... I hope.

I decided to stop calling support since every time I do, I will get nothing out of it. Now it's July 6th (as of this writing), and still have no laptop, and dying to play Overwatch, but I'm on a i5 Macbook Pro typing this out.

Any suggestions that I should do? I have read online of other ASUS RMA nightmare stories, but never thought it would happen to me.

[wango911]

I just received my replacement unit that was long waiting for, now after around several hours of use, playing music via soundcloud and surfing the internet using Google Chrome, Windows crashes yet again.

WTH?! I don't understand what is causing this. I'm not running Malwarebytes anymore, but instead I'm running ESET Smart Security, and I just clean installed to Windows 10. I'm completely lost at this point. Same bugcheck codes to in the Event Viewer, 0x7e. Leaves no dump file.

Here's what I'm running right now:
Windows 10 Home, ESET Smart Security, Asus drivers, Discord, Steam, Battle.Net, Google Chrome.

[kidfromhell]

wango911 wrote:
I just received my replacement unit that was long waiting for, now after around several hours of use, playing music via soundcloud and surfing the internet using Google Chrome, Windows crashes yet again.

WTH?! I don't understand what is causing this. I'm not running Malwarebytes anymore, but instead I'm running ESET Smart Security, and I just clean installed to Windows 10. I'm completely lost at this point. Same bugcheck codes to in the Event Viewer, 0x7e. Leaves no dump file.

Here's what I'm running right now:
Windows 10 Home, ESET Smart Security, Asus drivers, Discord, Steam, Battle.Net, Google Chrome.

Don't worry, we'll take it from here. Right at this point I'm pretty positive that either drivers or a program is causing this. How about you clean-uninstall ESET (get an uninstallation tool from ESET if they have) and check? If you're worried about protection, install Malwarebytes for the meantime. *IMPORTANT* Then open MB, go to settings, navigate to Detection and Protection and DISABLE 'Malicious Website Protection'. Just have the 'Malware Protection' enabled. Test the PC and let me know.

Install MB ONLY if you're concerned about leaving your PC unprotected while testing, or else just test your PC with NO security suites installed.

FINALLY, try to update all the drivers. Don't rely on ASUS site alone as they go non-updated for a very long time, get to know the right component your PC and scour the web to find updated drivers (eg. Realtek)

In the meantime, we have to find out why the MEMORY.DMP isn't getting saved when crash occurs.

[wango911]

kidfromhell wrote:
Don't worry, we'll take it from here. Right at this point I'm pretty positive that either drivers or a program is causing this. How about you clean-uninstall ESET (get an uninstallation tool from ESET if they have) and check? If you're worried about protection, install Malwarebytes for the meantime. *IMPORTANT* Then open MB, go to settings, navigate to Detection and Protection and DISABLE 'Malicious Website Protection'. Just have the 'Malware Protection' enabled. Test the PC and let me know.

Install MB ONLY if you're concerned about leaving your PC unprotected while testing, or else just test your PC with NO security suites installed.

FINALLY, try to update all the drivers. Don't rely on ASUS site alone as they go non-updated for a very long time, get to know the right component your PC and scour the web to find updated drivers (eg. Realtek)

In the meantime, we have to find out why the MEMORY.DMP isn't getting saved when crash occurs.

I will try that for sure, protection I'm not worried about since I always know where to look online. I did do some troubleshooting last night. I ran driver verifier and it BSOD on a Wacom driver, which I don't even have a pen tablet and uninstalled it. Re-ran it and it did not crash on startup. On my previous laptop, at times I could catch the crashing and complete memory.dmp and it would point to the Broadcom driver (bcmwl63a.sys). Maybe a overall mass of defective wireless cards?

[kidfromhell]

wango911 wrote:
I will try that for sure, protection I'm not worried about since I always know where to look online. I did do some troubleshooting last night. I ran driver verifier and it BSOD on a Wacom driver, which I don't even have a pen tablet and uninstalled it. Re-ran it and it did not crash on startup. On my previous laptop, at times I could catch the crashing and complete memory.dmp and it would point to the Broadcom driver (bcmwl63a.sys). Maybe a overall mass of defective wireless cards?

Nope, it couldn't be that. Let me explain. In my 750JX situation, the wireless driver was doing the same, but a program was messing with the driver in the first place (Malwarebytes, in this case). So there could be always a situation where an 'internet-consuming' program or a driver mess with the wireless card and in turn causing the wireless card to fail.

That's why when you run a dump, you'd see the driver which failed at the beginning but in the end you'd also see what program or service caused the driver/hardware to fail.

But, also make sure that your WiFi drivers are up-to date as well.

[wango911]

kidfromhell wrote:
Nope, it couldn't be that. Let me explain. In my 750JX situation, the wireless driver was doing the same, but a program was messing with the driver in the first place (Malwarebytes, in this case). So there could be always a situation where an 'internet-consuming' program or a driver mess with the wireless card and in turn causing the wireless card to fail.

That's why when you run a dump, you'd see the driver which failed at the beginning but in the end you'd also see what program or service caused the driver/hardware to fail.

But, also make sure that your WiFi drivers are up-to date as well.

I've got my wifi driver updated to 7.35.317.3 which is from Feb. 2016, latest I could get it updated to. On a side note, I was curious to see what "bcmwl63a.sys" popped on Google just to see, and I noticed a whole lot of issues while torrenting (more with uTorrent) with said driver. I torrent quite frequently, so I uninstalled uTorrent for now. As for any internet related apps I run frequently, I run Discord voip 24/7 since I'm an admin of a server. As of now, I'm not running anti-malware software, just to see how my computer runs. Also I never turn off my computer unless I travel or need to restart for updates.

[kidfromhell]

wango911 wrote:
I've got my wifi driver updated to 7.35.317.3 which is from Feb. 2016, latest I could get it updated to. On a side note, I was curious to see what "bcmwl63a.sys" popped on Google just to see, and I noticed a whole lot of issues while torrenting (more with uTorrent) with said driver. I torrent quite frequently, so I uninstalled uTorrent for now. As for any internet related apps I run frequently, I run Discord voip 24/7 since I'm an admin of a server. As of now, I'm not running anti-malware software, just to see how my computer runs. Also I never turn off my computer unless I travel or need to restart for updates.

Can you let me know the model of your wifi card? Let me check if the one you have is the updated one. Also is Windows up-to-date? There could also be a situation where the programs you use might be too old for Windows 10 and still works, or sometimes they may not have been updated for a long time. So, also check all apps are running in their current versions.

Windows 10 is also notorious for updating drivers on its own, so you might wanna check if the driver version is getting restored to something else after you manually update. Did you run Memtest? That is a good one to check if your memory is at fault. And for turning off your PC, I'd recommend that you turn it off at least once a day (when you sleep). When windows runs, a lot of crashes and errors occur which may/may not be fatal, and those files reside in memory. So if you never shut it down, those files stay in memory even further and may cause errors and crashes. So I'd recommend restarting your PC first, then shut it down. Because when fast start is enabled in windows, you may never get a complete shutdown. Only restart cleans up the whole memory.

[wango911]

kidfromhell wrote:
Can you let me know the model of your wifi card? Let me check if the one you have is the updated one. Also is Windows up-to-date? There could also be a situation where the programs you use might be too old for Windows 10 and still works, or sometimes they may not have been updated for a long time. So, also check all apps are running in their current versions.

Windows 10 is also notorious for updating drivers on its own, so you might wanna check if the driver version is getting restored to something else after you manually update. Did you run Memtest? That is a good one to check if your memory is at fault. And for turning off your PC, I'd recommend that you turn it off at least once a day (when you sleep). When windows runs, a lot of crashes and errors occur which may/may not be fatal, and those files reside in memory. So if you never shut it down, those files stay in memory even further and may cause errors and crashes. So I'd recommend restarting your PC first, then shut it down. Because when fast start is enabled in windows, you may never get a complete shutdown. Only restart cleans up the whole memory.

It's Broadcom BCM4352 802.11ac. Speaking of Windows 10 overwriting drivers, I disabled that under "Device Installation Settings" under System Properties. For now the WiFi driver date stamp and version has not changed since I've updated that. I have not run Memtest, but I have Hiren's BootCD version 10 (old version, but best version IMO) and ran PC Doctor, memory came out clean, no issues, but it does not test continuously. I also have a copy of PC Check v8 from work and ran that as well, and memory checked out clean, but it's not continuous like PC Doctor. I guess it won't hurt to run Memtest just to be on the safe side. As for fast start, I have that disabled since I have an SSD from factory and I think it's really not needed. Windows 10 is also up to date.

[wango911]

Have not had any crashes for 3-4 days, but I think I figured it out. uTorrent and bcmwl63a.sys hate each other, will throw Windows under the bus with an exception stop code. After some digging and finding patterns and similarities from even non-Asus computers, I think it was version specific for both of the software. I uninstalled it right when I saw a plethora of the same issue showing up online for other users.

I already dumped the Broadcom WiFi card in favor for an Intel 7260 card. No issues as of yet, will report back and see how things go.

[Apoapsis]

I take it this doesn't happen in Safe Mode?

[ROG_HARDCORE]

My friend Waited 5.3 Month for his G752VY to be returned. Speechless, Hot audio IC, audio crackling, and some minors stability not fixed yet even after a long wait.

Good luck.