Dell GX270 Fire (Well several of them.)

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subzero2785

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Mar 16, 2005
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There is a huge issue going around in my workplace in which the southbridge on the Dell GX270's would overheat and literally go up in flames in the case, burning the IDE cables or SATA cables near by. I have called Dell and they said its not widespread. This is the 9th system that has burned up. The reason why I have created this thread isn't to get tech support or flame Dell, I know this is a serious motherboard defect and I want to know if anyone else has had this issue. I finally caught a system's southbridge in the act going up in flames and have posted the grainy "Razr video" on YouTube. The only indication that the system is ready to die is when the video goes out, just like the capacitor problem years ago. The huge problem here is that the system stays on and the power button goes amber, but it doesn't shut it self off, ever. Logic would say, yeah when you see that turn it off, it wouldn't work if this happened over the weekend where no one is around. Any positive feedback would be appreciated, I just wish I'm not the only one out there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tx8AcJ-MO8Q
 
I don't know the answer to your question, but you might like to know that the video link you posted is set to private.
 
Is that the non tower version of the gx270? I'm currently running a mid-tower gx270 and my system is starting to die. My screen would go black but the power is still on. It won't boot with 2x512mb pc3200 only 1 and it doesn't matter which one. Also, sometimes it will just freeze and I would have to hold the power button down to power it off. I suspect it being my fx5200 heating up, my mobo dying, and or my psu dying. I've been getting a lot of BSOD's and windows stop error messages. This happened before I did a reformat and continued after that.

I can't wait for my new computer to finish being built. I might rip out this P4 northwood and build a secondary system.
 
AFAIK, the GX270 series have known major issues with their motherboards. If Dell says that it is not widespread, it definitely is, 10 PCs in one building is plenty enough for me. I have gotten plenty of calls about these particular model, computer would just turn on/off, have not seen or heard of one set on fire tho, but definitely issues that we know of. Whenever they call in a PC that has this kinda issues, we just guess that its a GX270, most of the time we're right. Common issues were the capacitors are leaking and some just pops up, or other things unknown on the board itself. Like you said that they had years ago, yeah, so it is still an issue. IMO Dell just needs to recall these things, unless they wanna keep sending out new mobos for these.. or.. are they just trying to empty a whole warehouse of these..
Im glad they are all now switching to a GX520s, which are quite nicer and has efficient cooling.

Ill be sure to show this vid to my coworker tho, he likes this kinda crap.
 
reswob said:
Is that the non tower version of the gx270? I'm currently running a mid-tower gx270 and my system is starting to die. My screen would go black but the power is still on. It won't boot with 2x512mb pc3200 only 1 and it doesn't matter which one. Also, sometimes it will just freeze and I would have to hold the power button down to power it off. I suspect it being my fx5200 heating up, my mobo dying, and or my psu dying. I've been getting a lot of BSOD's and windows stop error messages. This happened before I did a reformat and continued after that.

I can't wait for my new computer to finish being built. I might rip out this P4 northwood and build a secondary system.
Click to expand...

Your problem is the caps are going on your motherboard. The symptoms are the Dell will got into standby and you can't get it out without unplugging it and plugging it back in. Call them up and they'll send you a new motherboard.

We have roughly 6 to 7 thousand GX260s - GX280s, we did the hard drive recall when some of the maxtors were determined to be bad, which took quite a bit of time and they've had their fair share of capacitor problems, but we haven't had any just catch on fire. Do they all have similar serial numbers, maybe you just got a bad batch?
 
ND40oz said:
Your problem is the caps are going on your motherboard. The symptoms are the Dell will got into standby and you can't get it out without unplugging it and plugging it back in. Call them up and they'll send you a new motherboard.

We have roughly 6 to 7 thousand GX260s - GX280s, we did the hard drive recall when some of the maxtors were determined to be bad, which took quite a bit of time and they've had their fair share of capacitor problems, but we haven't had any just catch on fire. Do they all have similar serial numbers, maybe you just got a bad batch?
Click to expand...

The GX270 in question were delivered to us 2 years apart in two different labs. Since the Board of Education in my state has made an exclusive deal with Dell, I have no say to which computers should be purchased. The serial numbers of the systems in question are far apart and they are different in the type of case. I have one lab with the slimline GX270 and another with tower GX270's, both catching fire because of an overheating southbridge.

The other problem here is the fact I got these computers after the worldwide recall of those shoddy capacitors and that Dell has specifically re-capped these motherboards before production.
 
Personally, I have been anything but happy with Dell. I work for a major healthcare company that also has a contract with Dell. While we haven't seen any issues with the GX270's going up in flames (and we have about 100 units of that model in this facility), we have had the joys of the capacitor problems.

To add to the frustration, we have also had a slew of problems with the SX280 models, again with more capacitor issues :mad:

I really think that Dell needs to take thier "quality control" team out back, line them up, and shoot them. I realize that all companies have to deal with a certain amount of issues, but between the motherboard issues, laptop power supply issues, laptop battery issues, etc. I would never buy a Dell again if I had a choice.
 
subzero2785 said:
There is a huge issue going around in my workplace in which the southbridge on the Dell GX270's would overheat and literally go up in flames in the case, burning the IDE cables or SATA cables near by. I have called Dell and they said its not widespread. This is the 9th system that has burned up. The reason why I have created this thread isn't to get tech support or flame Dell, I know this is a serious motherboard defect and I want to know if anyone else has had this issue. I finally caught a system's southbridge in the act going up in flames and have posted the grainy "Razr video" on YouTube. The only indication that the system is ready to die is when the video goes out, just like the capacitor problem years ago. The huge problem here is that the system stays on and the power button goes amber, but it doesn't shut it self off, ever. Logic would say, yeah when you see that turn it off, it wouldn't work if this happened over the weekend where no one is around. Any positive feedback would be appreciated, I just wish I'm not the only one out there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tx8AcJ-MO8Q
Click to expand...


The GX270's are known for having badcaps, Dell will repair your GX270 and 280 mainboards if they have bad caps..

Not sure what they will do if the damn thing lights on fire...

Minor issue is load of steaming bullshit... they put aside over 300 million dollars to replace affected motherboards...
 
Well I have already replaced about 40 motherboards because of Dell's bad capacitor problem, in which Dell has made an exceptional job sending the parts out.

What Dell has done for me for the computers that have gone on fire was either replace the entire system with a GX620 or give me yet another motherboard. What really pisses me off is the fact that these damn motherboards that have the overheating southbridge are revisions in which they do have good capacitors capped with the letter K instead of the letter X.

What I have also noticed is the diagnostic LED panel in the back of the GX270. The letter code, while the computer is burning up, has the letter B lit in amber. This is the only error o code NOT explained in the Dell online manual. There are no beeps.

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/opgx270/en/ug/solve.htm#1235408
 
Batteries and northbridges...great. One of these days my m1710 is gonna just friggin explode in my lap.
 
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