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

Maybe check power management settings and give the windows one another go?
Even using my engineers portal Samsung didn't really give a **** as it wasn't a big enough issue (and they didn't have a 100 series chipset laptop to test it on)

 

[email protected]

Try that email, it is the one I use when I can't be arsed to talk to the foreign call centre.

 

Nice, thanks for the email, I'll send them something.

 

Thanks for this helpful post. I'm not an expert on PCs but I know how they work and have built a gaming PC a few years ago from scratch so I know that turn key solutions don't really exist. I don't mind doing some small matinence here or there software wise but if I have to scour the net every day to correct something, I would get upset fairly quickly as I currently don't have time to really do that unfortunately. I may take a chance on this machine though as the pros out way the cons for me.

 

I was basically in the same boat you are; none of these fixes are difficult. But I don't think there is a fix yet for the flickering 4k screen; I can't speak to that as I have the FHD.

Overall, I am happy to have jumped on board. Good luck!

 

Thank you sir!

 

We have two of them and the only issue we have had is the spacebar which will frequenlty not space when pushed. Other than that, the machines are wonderfully light, very powerful even stock as we have them, and our FHD screens are great. Though the spacebar issue is very annoying, reading here about the nightmares with Dell and our own previous experience with both our L501 and L502X XPS 15's has us reluctant to return them for repair until our warranty is nearly finished.

 

Could I ask what thermal pads people chose (brand and thickness) when they replaced the original ones, and were you happy with them?

 

Do some research here to find different brands and sizes used. It seemed to me that a lot of people had one (or two) vram thermal pads that were not contacting the heatsink.

I purchased a bunch of Fujipoly 17W/mk in 0.5mm, 1.0mm and 1.5mm thicknesses from frozencpu.com. I think they were the highest rated pads. They are a dense, putty-like material. Downside is that they are very dense and not too compressible. I read here that a few guys had issues with the denser putty pads pushing the heatsink up away from the GPU so are thinking softer foamy pads similar to those included standard (vs dense putty type) might be better.

I did not have a density problem and tried two configs with virtually identical stress test thermal results (I think 2x 0.5mm + 2x 1.0mm. Then tried configs of 2x1.0mm and 2x 1.5 mm). My chips measured about 14mmx15mm.

You can do your own research but I understand all thermal pads are very poor thermal conductors, some are just worse than others; so the key is getting the thinnest possible pads you can get away with. Everyone's heatsink varies a bit so you will need to test to make sure there is good contact at all 4 VRAMs (perhaps via consistent square indentations showing on the pads after fitment).

Also, you need to repaste the CPU & GPU at the same time as you replace the thermal pads (every time!). So actual thermal improvement from the pads is difficult to isolate. That said, since the thermal pad gap(s) are a common defect, it is essentially a thermal bottleneck which after correction, should improve extreme "real world" performance significantly.

FYI thermal improvements on my FHD (i5 6300HQ) estimated averages in a variety of stress tests were approximately as follows and are detailed in another post. These are consistent with the results of other 9550 posts here at NBR:

repaste / repad -5*C
undervolt with ThrottleStop (-170mv) -11*C
Total exceeded -16*C

 

Thanks for your reply. I plan on getting 0.5mm ,1.0mm, 1.5mm pads and 30g of mx-4 just to cover myself. Roasting is not a problem, done it many times in desktops and laptops but I have no experience with thermal pads at all. Would you saw 30mm x 30mm would be large enough? Also I am in the UK and the only pads I can find are thermal grizzly at over lockers or pads that say they are for water blocks and I'm not sure if that would still be OK.

I did read this thread and saw people mentioning what they used but as the replies are a little spread out my post was more for consolidation purposes and feedback on people's choices.

 

Hi all,

I've got 2 XPS 15s with 4k touch screens and their screens are VERY different. One is super bright white and the other looks yellow compared to it. I tried calibrating the yellower one manually through Windows calibration to see if it could achieve the same bright white but couldn't, leading me to believe these are just different LCDs.

So which LCD is better? Just wanted to get a quick opinion - which screen is more "accurate"? Ignore the desktop monitor in the background lol

http://i897.photobucket.com/albums/ac179/DAhn626/IMG_7230.jpg

 

Yesterday I noticed two problems that I overlooked for some time already. Opening the Sound panel takes between 25 and 40 seconds. Opening Printers&Devices is quick, but then takes forever to scan the devices to be shown. Somtimes they show up after 3 minutes, sometimes never.

I fear I screwed my system by installing or updating a driver (web points to Realtek, Bluetooth, inactive Shadow copies etc), that will force me to reinstall everything to find out in a step by step approach what causes this delay.

Before I do that - does anyone else have such long opening times?

 

1. Cutting 15mm x 15mm squares would work for each of my 4 VRAMS.

2. I think the overclockers UK are selling the Thermal Grizzly Minus Pad 8. I have seen a lot of people using them throughout the internet for VRAMs and other stuff. R#ph and AMD_i7 here at NBR use those pads in a 9550 and can give you a view on their softness; drop them a message. According to the spec sheet below they seem to be "fluffy" but not 100% clear:

http://www.thermal-grizzly.com/en/products/13-minus-pad-8-en

3. Read some postings around here on the pad install. There are some good photos in the dedicated thread.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...rature-observations-undervolt-repaste.785963/

Best practices seem to make sure VRAM and heatpipe are clean; use clean latex gloves when handling, etc.

4. The mx-4 gets good ratings for low pressure situations in a variety of tests including:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/thermal-paste-performance-benchmark,3616-19.html

 

Thank you, I really appreciate your help.

 

Still you posted in the wrong thread.

 

Oops, sorry, will move to the other for further questions on this.

 

Due to video memory not having any real issue with heat the stock pads are fine, if anything the higher w/mk rated pads may allow more heat into them from the heatsink on this design. As a laptop engineer I soon came to realise for the average user that hasn't fitted waterblocks to a lot of video cards as part of there hobby that using a higher rated w/mk has the problem I found and pressing quoted, the GPU no longer makes any contact with the heatsink and only a thick layer of paste will badly transfer the heat instead!

So, this isn't an overclocked video card and the higher rated w/mk thermal pads are basically designed for water cooling applications on video cards with calculated clearances on a machined blocks of copper. AFAIK no water block supplier will provide anything over about 7 w/mk to allow compression.

The underlying problem is the heatsink design leaves one ram chip partially covered and with little contact on part of it, it's my opinion that anyone asking should take the heatsink off and look for compression marks and take it from there as every heatsink is probably different!

if anything shimming the offending chip with a bit of 0.5mm is probably enough.

 

FYI the putty type fujipoly 17W/mk foam is still fairly compressible; eyeballing I would guess 20% with very light pressure; like you would expect modeling clay. The fluffy stock pads seem to be 80% compressible with the same pressure.

The charts in this document give some idea about density and thermal conductivity of various pads

http://www.fujipoly.com/usa/assets/files/Fujipoly 2015 Sarcon Catalog for web.pdf#page=8

 

Yesterday I noticed two problems that I overlooked for some time already. Opening the Sound panel takes between 25 and 40 seconds. Opening Printers&Devices is quick, but then takes forever to scan the devices to be shown. Somtimes they show up after 3 minutes, sometimes never.

I fear I screwed my system by installing or updating a driver (web points to Realtek, Bluetooth, inactive Shadow copies etc), that will force me to reinstall everything to find out in a step by step approach what causes this delay.

Before I do that - does anyone else have such long opening times?

 

Didn't think I'd need to come back here anytime soon, but a random problem has just arised.

When I put my computer to sleep WITHOUT AC power, it always restarts when I try to wake it.
When I put my computer to sleep WITH AC power, it wakes just fine.

I just did a system restore and kept my files, problem still persists. Changed power plan, still no fix.

Running BIOS 1.02.00, all drivers are updates as far as I can tell

 

Replied to the other post in the other topic!

Best to stick to one thread about a problem

 

For me the latest BIOS has been pulled on the support page?

 

Same for me.

Latest BIOS available for is 1.2.10 both on my "personal" drivers page and the historic drivers page below:

http://downloads.dell.com/published/pages/xps-15-9550-laptop.html

 

The latest was never on the historic when I looked a few days back, but hey maybe the divvots working on the BIOS reaslise they really farked things up AGAIN!

My eldest is back at school so I hope to find time to phone Dell and unleash hell on them again about the BIOS problems when my nippers having a nap and I finally get an hour spare!

 

Now Dell Premiercolor isn't working anymore... someone else who uses it?

 

Broken for a while, right click still works so you have limited options.

 

Hello all !
Having received the computer Monday, I was planning to say that the computer was awesome and without defects, and that all the issues listed had been solved (at least on my unit), but it is not the case.
I now have three issues of different severities (from big to small) :
- the keyboard has a semi-dead key : the "l". Sometimes it registers the press immediately, sometimes it takes a half-dozen attempts to register. I think I'll ask for a keyboard replacement, but this may take time (it is a Belgian French keyboard, not very frequent, probably the reason why the "3-5 business day shipping" became a 2 weeks-long shipping for me), so if there's an easy way to correct, I would be happy ;

- there's a little coil whine (I only started to notice it yesterday), only noticeable in a silent room, fans off, both on battery and on mains, every time I scroll, hover a link in my browser, the taskbar or anything that may cause, upon activation, a change in the displayed image (hovering a text with an edit-cursor doesn't cause whining). I may live with it, surely if a replacement unit could also have the same whine (as it appears to have been the case for a time and for a lot of Skylake HQ laptops - don't know if it is solved now) ;

- kind-of display driver glitches (sometimes the top half (more or less) of the screen goes black, hovering the zone with the cursor forces Windows to refresh the zone and it comes back to normal). I don't know how to call this for a Google search.

Help or advices for these two last problems (or a solution for the first - that would be nice ) are welcomed and are already appreciated.
Are these enough reasons to ask Dell for a complete replacement ? Or just the keyboard ?
(For information I live in the French-speaking part of Belgium - sorry for my approximate English.)

 

Due to a keyboard replacement being a total strip down I would ask for new as the engineers are 3rd party company with little training. The screen issue is a new one on me.

 

That screen issue looks problematic. If I were in your shoes I would do a bit of research here to to find what look to be the best BIOS and Intel HD drivers (they may differ for FHD and 4k screens). If the drivers don't help try alternative measures before the exchange-return-warranty period expire

 

After some digging in my web browsing history I found someone that has a similar-caused problem, but not exactly the same :
https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/3spvho/list_of_known_issues_with_the_xps_15_9550/ the last post, of Aki_Ing, those with Firefox.
However, my problem is (currenty) only some portion of the top half of the FHD screen that goes black, probably Windows that fails something (as usual). When the problem reappears I wi[insert the f*d key two times] try to capture it. I'll look for the drivers tomorrow.

 

I managed to capture the bug (red areas were added after the capture for privacy):

or http://imgur.com/a/6nwPY if the picture doesn't work.
There was some black in the upper left corner, but I move my cursor there before I realized I should capture it.
Currently, it only has happened in Opera (where I spend most of my time); maybe it's related, maybe not.

 

I'm having a problem where my CPU is being throttled to 0.78 GHz (on AC and on Battery). I found a solution which requires to remove the battery for a couple of seconds. Is there any other way?

I'm on BIOS 1.1.15 (most stable for me).

 

My battery will stop charging at 60%. Windows 10 reports - plugged in , but not charging. I am on 1.20 bios

 

Well, this is unusual for the 1.2.0 Bios. I guess you upgraded first to 1.2.13, the version which introduced the battery charging and afterwards downgraded to 1.2.0.

Upgrade to the latest available Bios 1.2.14 A13. Check the DELL Support Page for your Device.

 

Hi again, I have a FHD 9550. I just did a fresh install by following Gonz0's post. Everything is fine except for a mouse issue. Any usb connected mouse is severely lagging and stuttering. I tried many fixes, some said its caused by realtek audio driver, so i installed the microsoft one. Disabling the usb selective suspend, turning on & off scrolling inactive windows. remove nvidia experience. nothing worked. Any ideas?

 

Try left USB port

 

Hold shift when you reboot and go into safe mode, see how it works in safe mode, google windows 10 safe mode if you get stuck

(If pressings suggestion doesn't help.)

 

I tried all ports, not working. : (

 

Anyone using the latest BIOS, have you checked if speedshift has been enabled in this release?

 

I am using latest bios,can you confirm that issue with brightness "flickering" is still there? For me it is and I am wondering if I should call dell.

 

Please call Dell, it is a BIOS issue and they will tell you to install 1.1.15 BIOS to fix this, you need to point out this is far from a fix as you are losing important feature updates, security fixes and NVMe updates. The more that do this the more they will be pushed to fix it.

 

SpeedShift is a OS related thing and currently only supported by windows 10 build 10586 or better.
Using HWinfo, shows that SST is disabled on my Device running Bios 1.2.14. In Bios I only see that SpeedStep is enabled. Dont know if this is related.

 

Considering we should all be running win10 ver 14393.187 as of today it is supported but Dell didn't enable the option in the BIOS so I had hoped they had sneaked it in with the latest updates.

Speedsteps the old way of doing it

http://www.anandtech.com/show/9751/examining-intel-skylake-speed-shift-more-responsive-processors

 

New 1830 driver out
Fixes:
- Fixed video shuts off when lcd lid closed and you try to manage wifi issue
Seems it was made several months ago. Dells taken a long time to bring this out 0_o

 

Please help
DPS 15 9550 i5
doing f12 diagnostic and screen get distorted
https://postimg.org/image/8okzb9ajp/
Happens while testing memory

Did a Dell online diagnostic. 1st time screen turn blank in the process., did it again 2nd time i get BOSD.

Screen also turn blank while playing game like overwatch on low settings.

All driver / bios are up to date

Inter extreme tuning benchmarking
Screen also turn blank if I have Intel 530 driver install .
With Nvdia driver only it can pass the test .

 

Do a search for a recent post as someone had a distorted screen and reseating the two ram cards solved that issue strangely. The 9550 RAM clips are not very robust.

Completely uninstall Intel XTU - it causes some problems with the 9550 as I and several others here have found.

Wait for advice for some of the pros here for best tips...

 

looks like the motherboards shot if you get a BSOD as well. But as above, try resetting the ram and video cable.

Sent from my SM-G920F

 

Same post time again!!!

 

I'm stalking you.

Sent from my SM-G920F

 

I replace the ram with G skill 32gb like few days ago. After reseting the ram I pass the F12 diagnostics once how ever it shows one of more problem were found , did the diagnostic again and I get the same distorted screen . How do I see the log ?
Pop in the old original 8gb ram pass multiple test no problem.
Run a online diagnostic 1st time browser crash 2nd time Pc freezes 3rd time testing I get blank screen( power button to restart)
Did another test and pass, below are the log

CPU
Level 2 cache test: internal error
Math register test: module failed to start
Hard drive
linear rest test : abnormal exit
Video card
transformation and lighting stress test:
Cannot run


Another question. Any idea what chip is that ? No thermal pad on it or anything it runs a bit hot

https://postimg.org/image/m44n4spu1/1b3a4ca8/