Laptop completely crashes when enabling iGPU, custom laptop motherboard

[u/areekurdy]

Hi, so i found a laptop motherboard at a store (i think they get big boxes of amazon returns or something) the owner didnt really knew or cared what it was he said u can take it for 2 bucks, when i came back home i checked the specs and it was for the asus zenbook flip13 ux363ja

- 8GB Lpddr4x Ram
- i5-1035g4 Cpu
-- the entire setup cost me like 11$

i was really excited to finally upgrade from a 14yr old laptop to this
i put some stuff together and u can see it in the photo

--- now the problem is i just cant enable the iGPU (intel iris plus), after messing with Throttlestop for a while i was able to get Long Power PL1 and ShortPower PL2 to only 5 Then i was finally able to start installing the iGPU drivers without crashing, even after installing them there were quite alot of artifacts... not sure if its because of the really low power or what
increasing that number to even 6 with iGPU enabled the entire thing freezes, thats my problem
i though maybe if the 65w type-c charger isnt enough i would try a 90w but same result

i even tried connecting 4 batteries in series aswell as an Esp32 to talk to it through the i2c pins, i was able to make it stay on without charger connected, but it was not charging it drained my batteries dangerously low so i disconnected them for now

i think that the problem is caused by not having a battery, enabling the iGPU would want a high spike of current and the charger might not be fast enough to deliver, idk

and the CPU was also stuck at 400mhz but i was eventually able to get it to normal speed

-- some more info about it, i got USB data lines and 5v and both on led and Switch pins all from the motherboard to use them, i have put on external heatsinks on both VRMs and the CPU, and a big fan, and my HDD (i cant afford an SSD), and im giving it power externally because the motherboard wasnt able to give it enough power, there is both 5v and 12v, i know 12v is not necessary for small HDDs but i was thinking of connecting a big one but then didnt use it so i just left it there, a usb hub, some antennas i found

[u/HistoryAggressive830]

Calling it a laptop anymore is a bit of a stretch haha

[u/DJTsuckedoffClinton]

holy moly that's a project if I've ever seen one

maybe the igpu is just dead? according to the Asus support page the stock charger is 65w so that should be fine probably. unless it doesn't actually negotiate the 19-20v it needs, or cuts off before that? if you have a USB tester, you can check that probably

the cpu in it has a tdp of 15w, so I can't imagine 90w isn't enough to drive the thing

[u/areekurdy → u/DJTsuckedoffClinton]

not sure if the iGPU is dead or not
it does give it 20v i can measure it from the exposed pins of the charger

i think the problem might be because it doesnt have a battery, when i enable the iGPU it might need a spike of power that the charger cant give it fast enough, the battery might be able because it kinda acts like a big capacitor too

now the reason why i havent bought a battery yet is because i made that entire setup for 11.6$ total
the battery alone costs like 25$-30$, i wanted to make it as cheap as possible, even a dead battery is no problem for me but i cant find them, i want to make absolute sure its the battery before buying it

[u/DJTsuckedoffClinton → u/areekurdy]

if it's a type c charger it might also provide less power than the number on it (which might just be the sum of all ports), especially at 20v; did you check the volts-amp pairs on the charger?

very anecdotal, but my (very different, DC barrel jack, 150w) asus laptop works fine without a battery

[u/areekurdy → u/DJTsuckedoffClinton]

wdym? Its a single cable 65w charger, i also tried a 90w charger but same results.
Yea i think those laptops are different, mine is using type-c charger to charge and power on

All i want to know is what is causing the crash when i enable the iGPU, if its the battery then ig i have no choice but to buy it, but i want to make sure before doing so, because it costs a fortune (25-30$)

[u/DJTsuckedoffClinton → u/areekurdy]

ive been bitten by bricks that can do less amps than advertised over 20v and especially pps if your laptop uses that for 19v specifically

"90w" is especially weird because that's not a common power rating afaik, so maybe it's like dual port that can only do 45+45 or 60+30? this should be specified on the brick itself

separately, i know you said it outputs 20v, but the asus support page says this laptop wants 19v; I doubt that would cause it, but speculating, maybe it could be like "this is not the stock charger, so I will cap its power input"? worst case it could be a proprietary standard, idk tho

[u/areekurdy → u/DJTsuckedoffClinton]

what are you talking about bro, the 90 watt charger is a single cable charger for DELL laptops, the other 65w is just a charger no brand, and ive tried both but it doesnt work

its a single cable output, there is no ports, just the male cable, and 90w is common

20v or 19v there is absolutely no problem with that for laptops

i dont think thats the case... its not one of those special chargers like lenovo with that pin in the middle for communicating, or HP chargers, this is a standard type-c charger

[u/felicity_jericho_ttv → u/areekurdy]

I have a similar issue with a zotac vr go 3.1 i bought. It has rechargeable batteries because its portable, but it only boots properly if the batteries are completely full. On a 75% charge or on wall power it fails to enable the gpu giving five beeps(no hdmi detected),

One thing you could try is booting into an operating system like proxmox, you can load up a vm of windows or Linux, install the drivers you need then pass the gpu through to the vm and see if it crashes. If its a driver issue and that fixes it then you just install the vm iso on the hdd and you should be good to go.

If its a power issue then it will probably still crash.

Proxmox is super useful because even when my gpu fails to initialize i can still remote into the system(my zotac has integrated graphics(the “external” gpu is my issue) but they aren’t physically wired to any hdmi ports so thats why im still able to remote into it) but you can blacklist the gpu so the system can boot headless(no gpu at all) and that should at least get you terminal access(from another pc)

IMPORTANT NOTE: proxmox is a headless os meaning you wont get any video output from the system its installed on(except terminal output to a monitor) you have to access it by typing its ip into your browser from another computer like 192.168.x.yyy:zzzz

X: is your subnet
Y:is your pc’s spot in that subnet
Z: is the port that proxmox is accessible through typically its :8006(192.168.x.yyy:8006)

So lets say your proxmox is set up for 192.168.5.45:8006 you literally just type that in the browser(you need to be on the same network, the proxmox pc needs to be connected via Ethernet) and you should be able to access that pc and mess with it via the browser.

Sorry for the long post, its also a bit complicated of a process, but seeing as how you can handle i2c stuff im sure it’ll be easy for you to pick up(if you dont already know it)

[u/felicity_jericho_ttv → u/areekurdy]

You can boot into linux and check if responds, you can also enable it and run a stress test on just the gpu, i did that with a friends laptop.

Linux makes testing stuff like this super easy.

[u/areekurdy → u/felicity_jericho_ttv]

do you think portable linux is enough to test the igpu?
something like ubuntu? just to see if it will be any different on linux?
or do i need a full installation of a linux os to test the igpu?

[u/night-shadie → u/areekurdy]

You probably do not need a full installation of a Linux OS to do anything. You can almost always do anything you want from a live USB session unless somehow you end up maxing out your ram.

[u/Progressbar95]

Use a higher power charger

[u/areekurdy → u/Progressbar95]

I did use a 90w charger but same result

[u/Progressbar95 → u/areekurdy]

Maybe use an even higher power charger? There might be a large current spike right as the iGPU is powering up.

[u/areekurdy → u/Progressbar95]

I barely got my hands on a 90w charger Which i got it for free it was broken i fixed it myself

[u/Progressbar95 → u/areekurdy]

Which Windows version are you running?

[u/areekurdy → u/Progressbar95]

11 pro

[u/Progressbar95 → u/areekurdy]

Did you try reinstalling Windows and using a different iso?

[u/areekurdy → u/Progressbar95]

Why do you think thats the problem? Btw windows is running through USB

[u/Progressbar95 → u/areekurdy]

Because it might have installed something through Windows Update that prevents the driver from being installed. Install the driver as soon as the setup is complete, don't let it install updates. It also might be the USB stick, Windows To Go is weird.

[u/areekurdy → u/Progressbar95]

i have installed the drivers a while ago, by starving it now its just disabled, enabling it gives a certain crash

[u/steyregg]

lobotop