I've had a Dell G15 with an RTX 3050 for about three years. It worked well during the first year, but over the past two years I've experienced game crashes, freezes, desktop dropouts, and graphical artifacts. Windows Event Viewer reports an nvlddmkm Event ID 153 error. I've tried clean Windows installations, driver rollbacks, both Game Ready and Studio drivers, DDU, BIOS updates, switching between hybrid and dedicated-GPU modes, maximum-performance settings, and several other software fixes. The laptop isn't overclocked and doesn't appear to overheat. I even tried replacing the nvlddmkm.sys file, without success. The charger cable and the laptop's power jack both feel very loose, and the battery also drains extremely quickly. Could an unstable charger connection or failing motherboard power jack be interrupting power to the GPU and causing these crashes?
4 Answers
The very fast battery drain is another warning sign. A drop of about 1% every ten seconds is not normal unless the battery is severely degraded or the reading is inaccurate. Check the battery health with Windows battery-report or a hardware diagnostic tool, and test the laptop with a known-good compatible charger. If the battery, adapter, and jack all check out, the GPU or motherboard may be failing.
A loose charging plug or DC-in jack is a serious lead, especially on a gaming laptop. If moving the connector changes charging behavior, causes the battery icon to switch, or makes the system crash under load, the jack, cable, adapter, or motherboard power circuitry may be faulty. Avoid continuing to stress it until it’s inspected, since intermittent power can cause instability or additional damage.
The connector is noticeably loose, and I suspect the power delivery is dropping or fluctuating when the GPU is under load. I’m considering having the power jack and adapter checked or replaced.
The error can sometimes disappear after installing the newest NVIDIA driver, so updating is worth trying. However, if you’ve already tested multiple current drivers with DDU and the problem continues, the driver probably isn’t the only cause.
I tested both Game Ready and Studio drivers after using DDU, but the crashes and Event Viewer errors remained.
Since stress testing the NVIDIA GPU produces many errors despite updated BIOS, clean drivers, reasonable temperatures, and no overclock, this may be a hardware or power-delivery fault rather than a Windows issue. Have a repair technician inspect the DC jack, charger output, battery health, motherboard power circuitry, and GPU. Don’t modify or replace system driver files manually; that can create new problems without repairing the underlying fault.
The crashes also happen while gaming on AC power, often after 20–25 minutes, so I’d test the adapter and charging jack before assuming it’s only a software problem.