Dell XPS 15 (9550) list of hardware and software problems

Agreed, it's ******** they just stuck more pads inside and gave it back still broken.

 

I would say it is now locking up since it was returned so they have broken it even more, when they try and start a remote session you can tell then it wont get to windows, locks up even in the BIOS or diagnostics. Play hell that it is fubar to get a new one.

 

Yeah, I got it as soon as they did. But nothing beats seeing the result of someone's experience taking something apart.

 

Yeah I'm at the point where they're going to replace this for sure. I figure I'll demand one of 2 options - a full refund (may be tricky since I bought it from someone else) or brand new with 1 tb SSD upgrade. Is on site warranty worth it? These guys were pretty worthless all the way through this process...not sure if I want that...

 

I have next business day, it gets things done quicker plus you get to watch them work on it so they have to be careful.
Good luck with the 1tb upgrade, I think I fluked it getting that and 32gb of ram.

 

Well, I got the short end of the stick. Since I bought the laptop second hand, after about 40 minutes of arguing, they said the only thing they could do is give me a refurbished and TRY to get me an upgrade. It's a bunch of BS, but I think they think I'm just trying to squeeze out a new machine using the warranty.

I've sent them video after video and picture after picture of overheating and hanging.

Is there anything I can do to strongarm them into getting a new machine? I tried threatening with a lawsuit and the cheeky bastard said, "Ok, fine. Go ahead." As of now, I've agreed to get a refurbished since this is taking too damn long.

 

If you bought a 2nd hand then even I don't see why they would replace it with new. This is why I won't spend this much money on something unless it is new!

See what the next one brings, you may get a straight forward new return!

 

Yeah I understand why they'd be hesitant but the previous owner had the same issues apparently (I didn't know this) and dell basically replaced all the innards (minus cpu, gfx, etc) but the real kicker is, this thing is only 3 months old.

 

Have you asked for this to be passed to the resolutions team?

 

Yeah I spoke to the resolution team. It's only took a full day for them to call me :-/

 

May as well take the refurb, You are not going to get any further at the moment.

 

yeah, i figured. One upside of all of this (I guess) is the previous owner of this machine was Indian and seemed to really love curry...i've been wiping it down non stop but can't get that smell out. At least with the refurbished, i won't have to deal with the smell anymore!

 

Yeah you can't exactly put it in a bag of bicarb overnight. Made me LOL though.

 

Could you recommend me the pads you spoke of? Is this the appropriate replacement?
http://www.amazon.com/Thermal-Pad-U...d=1463712447&sr=8-23&keywords=thermal+pad+gpu

Also, someone who knows laptops better than I - would this be a good idea to put on top of the CPU/GPU chip in the 9550? (of course with thermal grease between the chip and shim pads and then again between the pads and the heatsink?

http://www.amazon.com/Vktech®-Heatsink-Copper-Thermal-15mmx15mm/dp/B00E5SMY0W

 

FFS NO!
They are for perfect heatsinks not the POS installed in this.

 

Just wondering if it is a normal situation that my laptop has a bios startup time for over 12 seconds. That was really weird because my old XPS 14 only has less than 3 seconds. I have already replaced the PM951 SSD with Samsung 950 Pro SSD.

 

Afraid it is normal and related to the DDR4 based chipsets.

 

Pity

 

Yep, I tend to close the lid and leave it in standby during the day to get round it.

 

Hi guys. I got new Dell XPS 13 9350 with SSD THNSN5512GPU7 from Toshiba. But there are NO drivers available anywhere. How can I install Windows 7 with AHCI mod on it???

Or how should I install Win 7 on it at all? Will be the ssd slower with RAID mod?


Thanks

 

1, this is a 9550 thread
2, you will find a windows 7 install thread in this forum fr the 9550 so go there.

 

Had similar problems and more. All of them got fixed when installing the lastest Bios 1.2 and 6 drivers dated end of April (see Dell download page for a big pitch about it)

Unfortunately Dell Update automatically replaced 2 of these 6 drivers a week later, and I'm back to having the same problems !! Great Software management at Dell !!! Support advised me to disable Dell Update when I contacted them !!!

]System restore to what I had before the WD15 fix, reinstall the 6 drivers, and disable Dell Update. Just a couple of wasted hours, on top of all those I already wasted since I got my WD15.

 

Anybody knows something else for dual monitor output/GBe/USB-C?

Dell TB15 seems to have other major problems.
No Displaylink solutions.

Thanks Pappl

 

Help! I've had the laptop a couple months now and am very happy with it, but all of a sudden I started getting the no sleep / no shutdown bug. I need the laptop for a residency program starting soon and can't have it awake all the time.

I am already running ahci mode in BIOS and tried booting in safe mode. Problem still exists. If I sleep, it powers back on after a few seconds or less, same thing with shutting down.

I know others had this issue early on, no idea why mine cropped up now! I have A05 BIOS, should I give the A06 a go and see if it fixes it? Also, what should I do if this crops up again at an inconvenient time?

Edit 1:

I have tried following suggestions in this thread:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/dell-xps-15-9550-huge-sleep-problem.791550/

Nothing works. Safe mode, uninstalling that one security update (didn't matter since that was installed over a month ago.

I used powercfg -requests and it was all 'none'
I tried powerenergy and see results below. One error in the report, ADSM disabled? No idea what that is but it sounds like it could be relevant. I have not made any hardware changes in months.

http://imgur.com/a/DTFCl

http://imgur.com/ETXXCho

 

What do you get with "powercfg -requests" ?

Sent from my SM-G920F using Tapatalk

 

Everything was "NONE".

I installed the new bios 1.2 (upgraded from 1.19) and problem went away. Sleep works, haven't tried restart.

I reran the tests and results are below. Same as when I was having the issue. None on the powercfg -requests. Same one error on the powercfg -energy report - something to do with ADSM. Does anybody know what that's about? I can't have the laptop not want to go to sleep at a random time!

http://imgur.com/a/p8dmj


I'm curious to see why it wouldn't stay sleeping or shut down...I figured the bios update would reset everything but I doubt I can reinstall the same bios on top of itself if the problem occurs again.

 

So it does sleep but wakes up again?
Do a "powercfg -lastwake"

Sent from my SM-G920F using Tapatalk

 

Negative. Everything is working as designed after that last post. I reread it and I wasn't very clear.

Only the results of the energy state and powercfg requests were the same as before. Still had that error in the energy report... But sleep is working fine no issues.

 

Not sure if this was already mentioned but some xps come with gray font not sure if the font supposed to be white or gray on the new models.... anybody have xps from this year?



Also newer design is lighter by about 40grams if I remember correctly do to keyboard not using copper plate underneath it.

 

My newest from about 3 months ago is gray and the older one from late last years white.

HTH.

 

Hi folks posting this as I found a solution to very slow WiFi (and LAN) download speeds... long story short had the original DELL 1830 card in, Bluetooth non-existent so DELL put new Intel 8260AC card into to fix Bluetooth....but that's not the fix/reason for this post...

WiFi and LAN speeds 50-80 Mbps on a 200 fibre line.. horrible... tried uninstalling/re-installing you name it.... then I happened to check the Realtek USB GbE Family controller (the one that pops up with the thunderbolt external dongle for Ethernet/USB/SD card ready device).. updated driver by choosing which version (not auto), and saw that it had 3 drivers available and had installed wrong version... chose 10.6.1211.2015 and suddenly bingo, speeds 100% and everything is snappier, everything... think driver had been corrupt or something... HTH

 

Hi everyone,

Can't believe I've read all 99 pages, as well as all of GoNz0's excellent clean install guide, and a lot else besides.

What brought me here was the confusion of trying to do a clean install on my new 9550, only for the install process to not recognize any drives (I've an SSD only).

I'm hoping you don't mind if ask two quick clarifying questions.

Firstly, I know i order for the clean install to recognise my SSD I need to load the drivers when it reaches that point of asking, and that I need to have them on the (or a different) USB. I'm not sure which drivers, tho. I believe it's the '14 series', but I've gone to this page and there are quite a lot. I'm hoping you can point me at the right one? I'm guessing, based on GoNz0's older post here, that I should be getting " >64bit Intel RST(e) AHCI/RAID Drivers v14.8.9.1053 WHQL< "? And not the one with the software set? [EDIT: or is it the >64bit Intel RST(e) AHCI/RAID Drivers v14.10.0.1016 WHQL< ? ]

Second question, as I don't run RAID I want to switch to ACHI (also thinking of dual boot with Ubuntu or possibly a second Windows instance). However, I'm a little worried about switching to ACHI from RAID as a) I know people were having problems earlier, as well as someone's statement "Dell ships them with RAID BIOS for a reason". Am I being overly cautious?

FYI, my specs:

i7-6700HQ CPU @ 2.60GHz
16GB RAM
512GB SSD Toshiba THNSN5512GPU7 (controller type NVMe, controller interface PCIe)

Many thanks!

 

If you don't run raid and instead are using ACHI then you won't need any SSD drivers. The toshiba drive works best with the built in windows 10 NVMe driver. That takes care of both of your questions. I don't have any issues in ACHI mode on mine.

 

it's these, and my older post is up to date as of last week http://www.smartredirect.de/redir/clickGate.php?u=CHoN7d6s&m=1&p=3r6MDbeCf4&t=6QdegMhg&st=&s=&splash=2&url=https://mega.nz/#!wMk3RAID!w54ywW6g-XLeuJcJeAVnK6epNzXy6S2ya_14LIyoe6M&r=http://www.win-raid.com/t2f23-Intel-RST-RSTe-Drivers-newest-v-WHQL-v-WHQL.html

Not sure but I think you may need them in AHCI mode as it contains both drivers for the chipset.

 

Thanks guys

I'll let you know how I go!

 

Hi,
The OP mentions " Hardware Issues: CPU throttling", what exactly is meant by this?
I'm running into extremely bad TDP (or Power Limit) throttling since a couple of weeks. After about 7 Minutes of load on the GPU+CPU (like a game or benchmark), the CPU will drop down to 0.8GHz and 2-4W Core TDP.
It will stay there for various amounts of time, sometimes go back up to 1.6GHz just to drop back down a minute later.
Here is typical progression recorded in XTU: http://imgur.com/g3DsK5C (i disabled BD_PROCHOT in that picture just to make sure it's not related to it)

Is this the CPU throttle issue from the list? Does anyone know what to do here?
This didn't always happen on this machine. Once it starts throttling to 0.8GHz it get unusable (can't even move the mouse properly).

BIOS 1.2.0
6700HQ, 4k model
Also, I'm on AC power.

I tried some suggestions from my /r/Dell post https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/4miryz/xps_9550_6700hq_anyone_else_experiencing_extreme/ , but nothing helped yet...
Any tips would be appreciated

 

NormenKD - interesting post on Power Limit Throttling. I have Power Limit Throttling during RealBench Stress Test (not Prime95) on my i5; after about 5 minutes when temps hit ~78*C then (ONLY) Power Limit Throttling kicks in and CPU performance drops as low as 1Ghz.

Regardless, it looks more like a temperature trigger in my case. But in your case, I see temperatures are ~55*C so that looks different.

**This guy sardinesrules has throttling issues with new 1.2 BIOS. Some tips for his i5 throttling by disabling "Turbo Boost Short Power Max" although that does not seem to improve things on my i5:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/tdp-throttling-xps-15-9550.792135/

**This guy MansOlson on Reddit is having Power Limit Throttling and claims it is as of a recent BIOS update but I don't see any info on his system:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/4kfaks/xps_9550_power_limit_throttling/

 

The BIOS update thing seems interesting, as i didn't experience this behavior two or three months ago.
In that timespan i did multiple updates of drivers, firmwares, BIOS etc. so i can't easily tell if one of those made a difference.
I already tried to downgrade to BIOS 1.15.0 (the one with the throttle fix) but it didn't help.

I don't know anymore... i understand that it can't run at 3GHz for extended periods of time, but 0.8GHz and ~3W Core TDP? That can't be right.

 

Hey guys, Dell screwed things up so they sent me a brand new laptop with upgraded SSD (it's toshiba instead of samsung!). Very stable albeit running in raid mode. 2 quick questions

1. Does raid mode make a difference? I ran crystaldisk and i got better speeds than I did with my samsung 950 pro. Should I make it AHCI?
2. I undervolted my CPU and it's night and day. It runs at 78 at max. But my GPU still gets to 91-93. Is there a way to undervolt the GPU as well?

 

If it works in raid leave it in raid, the toshibas all run the same speed unlike samsung, 2400/1500 r/w
Personally I prefer to use the NVMe driver.

 

1. I know you asked about replacing thermal pads on the vram? Did you do that?

2. Are you using XTU for your undervolt? Several people reported strange thermals behavior with XTU. Deleting XTU and trying ThrottleStop gave me much better results.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...ndervolt-repaste.785963/page-35#post-10272754

3. Maybe you could try MSI afterburner or NVIDIA Inspector might work for GPU adjustments.

4. Worst case scenario you could buy a bunch of these tiny fans (lol):

http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...ing-lots-of-photos.608856/page-5#post-9077971

http://www.conrad.com/ce/en/product...-lmin-W-x-H-x-D-10-x-10-x-2-mm-SEPA-MF_10A03A

 

duplicate.

 

Repaste the gpu/cpu. No way should you get gpu temps like that. Also check if the ram pads are all touching.

 

I have successfully brought my cpu to 76-78 and gpu to 83 using Eason's method of putting more thermal pads on top of the heatsink. I don't have enough, so I orderered more. Once I do, I'll post a "guide" of sorts to bring temps very low. I think I can get it even lower.

As for the XTU/throttlestop, XTU has successfully brought my cpu temps very very low, but I'm not very technical so I have no idea what the guy is talking about when he talks about certain throttling happening lol. I'll go ahead and give throttlestop a go, but XTU has been great 99% of the time, even after reboots. If throttle doesn't work just as well, I'll return to XTU.

The MSI afterburner and nvidia inspector routes don't work. Or if it does, I'm not skilled enough to understand how it works.

 

Aaaand i spoke too soon lol. XTU is doing some shady things - all of a sudden it lost all of its undervolting. Upon reboot, the undervolting has returned to default settings. Odd

 

Eason has a good point about temps being too high - consider repasting if you can't get numbers down. I found this general temperature guide helpful - guiding for mid-70s

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-1800828/intel-temperature-guide.html

The ThrottleStop designer has a few posts here mentioning some XTU bugs and fact that it is inefficient with resources.

Concretely with my 9550, the problem I saw with XTU (as detailed in the thread I referenced above) was "Power Limit Throttling" when doing CPU intenstive stress testing (with RealBench Stress Test). You can see "Power Limit Throttling" easily in XTU at the bottom graphs by clicking the little wrench at the top right of the graph and selecting "Power Limit Throttling." There are a couple of other throttling options (and lots of temp sensors, power indicators) you can select there also. Then run your game or said Stress Test and try to see if the drop in CPU speed is related to "Power Limit Throttling", "Temps Throttling" etc. Eg. when your CPU speed drops, does "Power Limit Throttle" rise from 0% to say 100%?

On my 9550, looking at the wattage consumed and temps during the stress test, the "Power Limit Throttling" should not have been activated so I thought something was wrong.

I meant to send you this primer on GPU software:
http://www.ultrabookreview.com/10167-laptop-undervolting-overcloking/

A few people have tried using the thermal pads between the heatsink and bottom case and I think they all removed them in the end. Regardless, it is tempting to put a tiny pad between the GPU & bottom...

GoNz0
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...ndervolt-repaste.785963/page-29#post-10252062

Custom90GT
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...ndervolt-repaste.785963/page-30#post-10262419

SuperDaveMaine
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...ndervolt-repaste.785963/page-29#post-10252227

 

It isn't necessary to put the pad between the sink and the case on the XPS 15. It is on the 13 with the IRIS Imo.

 

So I've successfully undervolted my CPU to about -169.9mv with Throttlestop plugged in and -180mv on battery, but had a slight issue the other day where my clocks would stay at 100% even though I had Speedstep on. Only fix was to do the opposite of what throttlestop suggests. TS suggests that you go to advanced power options and set min + max processor to 100% so TS can control it, but if you do that, TS won't ever let the CPU clocks go under 100% (or whatever you set 100% to be). I had to delete all TS files, then and in advanced power options on windows, set min to 5% and max to 100% and then reinstalled TS. Now all is well (for now).

In terms of temps, my max cpu has been 78C and GPU is 82C. Right now I'm using Gelid GC-extreme paste, fujipoly .5mm thermal pad on the 3 vram's making good contact, and put 3 pieces of the same .5mm stacked on the one that isn't making good contact.

Very pleased with my setup as of now, but going to see in a couple days if I can make it better. Ordered the Coollaboratory Ultra and some masking tape so I can cover all the chips around the CPU and GPU die so nothing gets on anything. Will report back with temps!

 

Well, after months of pretending that my 9550 waking from sleep randomly wasn't an issue I messaged Dell last month about it and they pretended to know nothing about the issue.

Today it woke from sleep, drained the battery to 19% by the time I got home and now won't shut down (reboots itself a few seconds after the power light goes blank) and has stopped charging.

**sigh**

 

Since about a week ago, my screen periodically goes black for a couple seconds before correcting itself. Event manager reports that the i915 (intel graphics) driver has crashed and recovered. Any known solution?