Any updates on the XPS 16 heating/ throttling issue?

qpig=my gpu is not throttling. I'm on A10.

 

Did that for two hours today...no burns. In fact the heat wasnt even enough to make my legs sweat.

 

Year after year eh? boy do you have a surprise coming...

10 years ago the backstreet boys had the best selling album,. everyone was using windows 98 second edition, and we were still questioning the validity of the Y2K bug. If you're really going to judge a company based on its ratings from 10 years ago then it is clear that you simply have a personal grudge and not a legitimate reason to dislike the company. I tried to look back to see what ratings you were talking about that said Dell is rated the worst in customer satisfaction but I couldn't even find anything close. Instead this is what I found:

2001: Survey Says Dell is No. 1 Again in Customer Satisfaction; Dell Servers, Notebooks, Desktops Garner Honors in Enterprise-Wide IT Study.


2004 Dell and Apple led the world in Customer satisfaction

2007: Dell named No. 1 in Customer service satisfaction by TBR

2009: Dell Takes No. 1 Spot in TBR Customer Satisfaction Survey



This is the first time I've owned a Dell so do not throw me into the fanboy category, and my laptop is not perfect and yes it has problems but whereas I'll direct my complaints at the laptop...you're making outright incorrect statements like "dell has been rated the worst company blah blah" really guy? They've won 1st almost every year, so now that I've exposed you as a troll-if you've got anything thats actually useful to contribute, do it.

 

Remember how BIOS A08 had GPU throttling at 84C? Then BIOS A09 removed this limit... and A10 brought it back. Your GPU temp reporting a value of 85C is just a sign of how quickly Prime+Furmark can heat things up. Take a look at Furmark's reported fps value when you start the test compared to when your GPU temp levels off at around 84C. Use a lower Furmark resolution (so you start with 20 or more fps, so when the GPU throttling occurs the change is even more dramatic).

 

You yourself said that your GPU is getting over 80C. The chassis on the XPS is made of a metal material that conducts heat quite well. Lets just assume that the bottom of the chassis gets to at least 70C, which isn't completely unreasonable with a heat conductive material that close to something a bit over 80C.

Human skin can get a first degree burn with prolonged exposure to temperatures of around 55C(if I'm doing the math right. Not used to using Celsius since I left Japan. 130F). Even 70C is significantly over that.

It is entirely possible that even very minor differences in the internal makeup of the laptop can cause large differences in chassis temperatures, depending on fan placement, proximity of heat source to chassis, heat sink(particularly its proximity to the metal chassis), exact model of gpu/video card in the system.

You know what? I just don't care anymore. You don't want to believe me, fine. I expressed my opinion and shared me and my friend's experiences with the laptops in question, and spent the next 3-4 pages of threads trying to defend them for some reason against a Dell fanboy, which isn't conductive to the purpose of the thread. I give up and am just going to stop replying because it is just a waste of my time.

 

hello everyone. PLEASE help me with this problem.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/del...ames-dell-xps-1645-games-lag-every-5-min.html

THANK YOU VERY MUCH IN ADVANCE.

 

Mine was.....?

1647 replacement coming soon.

 

Guys, we've been doing this for months now-I think I'm pretty capable of being able to tell whether or not my gpu is throttling. on both A08 and A10 I do not experience GPU throttling even after leaving furmark+prime 95 running for about an hour. Also i said that the temperature (of the GPU) maxed out at 85...the average over the course of the hour was between 81-83. FPS does not change, clock speed does not change, its the same. I don't know what it is but I do not suffer from GPU overheating problems. I just suffer from prime+furmark induced cpu throttling.

 

So basically you're admitting that I just owned you and proved that you were just trolling. Got it.

P.S. This is my first dell laptop. You cant call me a Dell fanboy and be serious.

 

Skin starts to burn at about 55 C...just google it. If you play games on this thing while having it on your lap and you aren't uncomfortable at all then that's crazy. Under load my CPU and GPU get to 84 degrees before throttling occurs (was CPU throttling in A09), but now I get gpu throttling at 78C.

How anyone could have load temps under 75 when gaming is beyond me...unless your using an external monitor, 9-cell battery AND a cooling pad.

 

I'm telling you I get really low numbers NEVERabove 80 and usually in the 75ish range and this is only after 2 hours. Before that low 70s high 60s.

On the other hand I do have a 9 cell battery....

 

Ok if you are the only person out there with A10 who can get their GPU to 85 degrees with no throttling, can you post logfiles showing this. It would assist everyone else who does have GPU throttling with A10 - I cannot get my GPU to that temps due to it clocking down.

As a side note on Furmark+Prime throttling - you don't have to use Prime - replace that with BOINC and Furmark and you see the CPU throttling straight away.

 

Sure-how do I log gpu throttling....

 

I would just use GPU-z and make sure it's set to log and refreshing while it's in the background.

 

Whilst I think this is the best notebook I have owned in terms of style and functionality, I have had 'issues' with this notebook specifically around the fact that it runs VERY HOT (my girlfriend won't use it as it makes her legs/lap too hot) and the fans run very noisily.

I called Dell tonight after seeing another post regarding a free upgrade to a 130W power supply (my 1645 came with the 90W supply), and after mentioning the noise/heat issues the tech support guy suggested that they send a tech to replace the motherboard and the system fans! Seems like a 'big' decision to make just based on our conversation, no other troubleshooting. I guess they have done this before with these systems? I am hoping that they will be replacing with upgraded parts that are supposed to address the heat/noise issues? I am a little concerned that I am getting refurbished parts.....I don't want to end up with the thing dying on me.

Anyone else had this experience/positive results with new motherboard?

 

Globespy: The good news is that when you switch from the 90W adapter to the 130W adapter, your computer should throttle less and run smoother when fully loaded.

The bad news is that when your CPU and GPU start getting more power than what they are getting now, your overall laptop will probably run even hotter. The XPS 1645 is a powerful machine but calling it a laptop is somewhat deceiving because not many users have tough enough skin to operate it on their lap while gaming.

 

Wholeheartedly agree! It's a portable microwave oven....

 

isn't it more like a slow-cooking George Foreman grill?

Instructions: pre-heat the laptop for 30 minutes, open the lid, place the meat between the keyboard and LCD screen, close the lid. flip meat every 15 minutes until ready.

 

*Special note: Meat may be cooked to medium-well before first flip.

 

A good BBQ'ing person would know that you only flip the meat once.....cooks more evenly and you get that nice 'qwerty' grill marking....

 

problem is that it's not really a grill. it's more like a slow-cooker. though you're about the QWERTY markings!

plus, $30 BBQ's from Canadian Tire aren't the best, you need to flip every so often (it's a $30 grill!)

 

Dell is replacing my i7 820 with the i7 840. Rep. said that the x20's were causing more throttling issues

 

I just e-mailed my EPP rep about this (availability of 740qm). Did your rep say anything about when the x40qm series would become available for order?

I'm still saving up to get a sxps16, so I've got time to wait and see if the x40qm series of processors does in fact make it better (or worse!)

 

The i7-840 runs 133 MHz faster than the i7-820 and both have the same 45 watt TDP rating. I don't think the Dell rep is being 100% honest. There is no significant difference between these two CPUs other than Intel bumped the default multiplier up from 13 to 14 and bumped the maximum turbo multiplier up from 23 to 24.

 

He didn't say anything about it's availability. I said it was available internationally recently and all of a sudden he offered me to replace it. I was shocked

 

If I want to call about getting a replacement/different model who should I talk to first? I received my unit on June 17th.

 

Not that it's a 'solution' to Dell's design issues, but I bought this today and it has significantly changed my experience!
$24.99 from Costco

Cooling | AWE55US | by Targus

 

In case anyone was wondering, the Ideastorm idea that was started by basilisk CLICK HERE (about the throttling/heat issues of the SXPS 16), recently achieved an "Acknowledged" status by Dell. Not exactly sure what or if that means anything at all, but at least there's some kind of progress on that front. Please keep promoting the idea/commenting until we can promote/comment no more, as that's the best we can do from that standpoint.

 

It looks like most of the ideas get the "acknowledged" status because someone from Dell at least takes a peek at every idea. But with our topic, someone from Dell actually posted a comment, so maybe it's something that they honestly care about. The best thing, as you said, is to keep commenting at our ideastorm topic, particularly with personal detailed experiences.

 

Okai I went back to A09 but i've got SEVERE throttling. When playing TF2 with the LCD open my CPU goes to CKMOD 12.5%, even though I've set 100% CKMOD in throttlestop . (--> 1 fps)

How can it get to 12.5% ??, shouldn't throttlestop prevent this? I'm even getting 12.5% ckmod while typing this..causing my typing to stutter!!

Throttlestoplog attached

 

With your GPU temperatures in the 90C to 100C range, there isn't much ThrottleStop is going to be able to do. Dell is also using more aggressive throttling schemes with the more recent bios versions. It was a lot easier fighting against the throttling in the early days of this problem but what the bios wants is winning out over what ThrottleStop wants. I thought some bios versions are throttling when the GPU hits 84C or 85C. Not all of them do this but some versions do.

Find a way to significantly cool your GPU and you might get better results.

 

I know about the 100c GPU, however my GPU has nothing to do with the state of my CPU? Why would it go 12.5 CKMOD when my GPU hits 100c?
I also know A10 re-enabled GPU throttling at 84c. This is the reason why I went back to A09. At 100c, my GPU still runs at 675/800mhz, so it's not throttling. Just my CPU goes to 12.5 CKMOD and i get 1 fps in TF2.

I don't really know what to do to prevent my GPU from hitting 100c. I already put my XPS on a trivet with holes to allow my XPS to suck air from beneath.
Also, I'm only playing TF2 at 1600x900 on low settings for only 10 minutes and it already hits 100c.

Maybe I should call Dell and ask for a 5730

 

Now that would be a good idea. There's a good chance that the thermal paste on your laptop's GPU is less than perfect which is resulting in your high GPU temps.

What Dell is limiting the 130 watt adapters to is not sufficient to fully power the CPU and GPU in some of these laptops. The result is severe bursts of throttling that instantly kills performance and frame rates when trying to game. That's just poor design on Dell's part.

A properly designed laptop does not have to use Clock Modulation except during extreme situations like when the heatsink becomes dislodged from the CPU. Dells use of clock modulation is mostly for power consumption reasons. The easiest way to instantly reduce power consumption is to drop clock modulation from 100% to 12.5%. Plug into a Kill-a-Watt meter and it will be very easy to see the direct relationship between single digit frame rates while gaming and the Kill-a-Watt readings dropping like a rock.

A better algorithm would only drop this down to 87.5%. All you can do is wait for another bios release I guess. After 7 or 8 months of this, I have no confidence that the next bios is going to fix this laptop 100%.

 

Hm okai, that would make sense if I was running prime95 and furmark.
But i'm only running tf2 on low settings! And I have the WLED screen not the RGBLED.

In fact, like i said it went to 12.5 while I was just typing. No way that's a wattage issue.
Maybe the northbridge/mobo get's too hot?

edit: btw my gpu idles at 66c >_>

 

Your idle is quite high. It should be closer to the 50C mark. I think that either your thermal paste was applied badly or maybe (though rare) your heatsink is not properly coming in contact with your CPU/GPU chips. Do you have thermal paste kit (AS, MX, etc)? If so, do you feel comfortable enough to open your laptop up and change it, because I feel like that would help quite a bit? There are threads on here with pretty detailed directions that you could follow. (However basic Dell-imposed throttling could still be the only thing at work here.)

 

I would if it didn't void my warrenty.. I'll try calling them

 

I just called XPS premium support and they offered to pick up my XPS for repair. Probably to apply a new heatsink. Still I don't think this will improve the temps much with the current vent design.
Also I cannot miss my laptop for 2-3 weeks. So i'm not sure if it's worth it.

He also said it's not possible to change from 4670 to 5370.....

 

Okai I think my XPS is seriously broken.
I hooked up my LCD and closed the laptopscreen to play tf2 normally.
Instead, the problem still persists.

Now the weird thing:
I noticed that when pressing a key, it would go to 12.5 CKMOD

If I didn't touch the keys: 60fps. Press W: 1fps

After a while it started to hang again and then I got a BSOD.
This the first BSOD i've had on windows 7.

BSOD and throttlestoplog attached
As you can see the temps are reasonable. So it can't be the temperature.
I also ruled out my 130W adapter because the laptop screen is OFF.

Help

 

So I quit TF2 after it starts to go 12.5 CKMOD.
Now, even in desktop, my CKMOD will stay 12.5 if i press a key.
I spammed a key for a sometime and it just stays at 12.5.

After a while, it slowly starts to go back up to 100 --> 12.5, 25, 37,5, 50 etc.
So maybe it is temp related? But CPU and GPU temps are fine. HWmonitor doesn't show weird values either.

I have no idea what's going on

Any one ??

 

I'm not sure excactly what is going on there, but use throttlstop, it will solve your problems,

 

is the 1647 fixed or does it still have the heating/throttling issues ?
Please answer my question

 

If you even read my posts you'd find out that I AM using throttlestop.
I've set the CKMOD to 100% in throttlestop but it will still go to 12.5%

 

It is a tough question to answer. The most immediate and correct answer would be: no, the throttling issue is not fixed. But, that does not take into account the large number of people who don't have throttling problems. While there is a systemic problem with the XPS 16 line of laptops, the problem does not surface for all users. Two supposedly identical XPS laptops can be running the same program; one while throttle, the other will not.

Personally, my experience with my XPS1645 has been absolutely fantastic. No noticeable throttling (yes, I've tested with Prime95 and Furmark), and I can play games for days at a time.

 

So I'd like to come back to this, because now even with my GPU <90c (and good CPU temp) it still throttles to CKMOD 12.5 while TS is enabled.
Any ideas?

 

DuranXL: Try a different bios version. Older or newer.

All ThrottleStop does is it checks for clock modulation throttling and tries to reset that to 100%. If the bios is setting that to 12.5% faster than ThrottleStop can keep up then ThrottleStop is not going to be able to significantly help you out. The bios takes precedence over what ThrottleStop can accomplish and the newer bios versions are more aggressive at throttling.

Your laptop should not be doing what it's doing so you'll have to contact Dell and ask them what's up.

 

I had to laugh with the spam mail i got today from Dell:

"DISCOVER PERFECT BALANCE
Get Power & Elegance in a Studio XPS Laptop

You deserve the stunning good looks and performance of a Dell™ Studio XPS™ laptop
"

I would think "Balance" is the one word they shouldnt be allowed to use with the XPS 16's! And yes, I do Deserve the performance that I paid for. Thanks for the clarification Dell

On a side note, I've been approved for a replacement of my 1640, find out the specs next week. So will 20 days from first phonecall to email of specifications.

 

Edit: posted response in wrong thread, oops!

 

Thanks for your reply.
I already called dell but they'll see they need to pick up my laptop to see what it is which will take 2-3 weeks..
What bios do you recommend? I forgot about all the bioses. Currently using A09

 

I've heard some users went all the way back to A03 because at least ThrottleStop was more effective with the early bios versions. The laptop still throttles but for some users it's not as big of a problem as it is with some of the newer bios versions since ThrottleStop works better to defend against the throttling insanity. I haven't kept up either with what bios has what problems.

 

The problem with older bioses is that they still have the GPU limit at 84c.
A09 was the first bios that allowed me to properly play games because they removed that limit