Dell XPS 9570 Reviews

To be fair, the CPU is an often overlooked part of GPU performance. Even a 1050Ti has some performance impact from CPU choice. A 4C/4T chip that can turbo to 3GHz will probably produce different results from a 6C/12T chip that can turbo to 4GHz.

 

I got the 9570. I looked past the throttling results I read about and everyone's poor experiences with Dell. I also looked past the mushy keyboard, the lack of a lower brightness setting for dark room environments, and the lack of dedicated Page Down/Up, Home, and End keys.

The XPS simply would freeze up or flat out power off. That's right, sudden no power, no graceful shutdown.

This was 3 minutes into Cities Skylines, a really basic sim game that requires a Core 2 Duo and a GTX 260 or ATI Radeon HD 5670. I had done all updates, fresh installs (multiple times), lowered detail settings - all to no avail. I came to the conclusion that it wasn't going to get better and was not worth trying to send it in to Dell depot warranty. If issues persisted after than and all the shipping time, likely I would fall out of or be really close to the 30 day returns deadline. So back it goes.

Sadly, I'm not sure what to get now.

 

Bummer, you're not the only one that I've heard about having the system power off when gaming. Crazy it would happen with just Skylines. I'm not sure what would cause it, but you shouldn't have to troubleshoot a new laptop. I keep thinking about purchasing a 9570 to test it out, but I go back and forth on it.

 

I'd stay away for now. I've read some posts from people still having problems with the 9560, as recent as this month. I see that you have the 9575. Are you having issues with it?

 

The 9575 is pretty good right out of the gate compared to the 9550s and 9560s that I had. I don't really have any issues with it, I would just like more ram since I can max out the 8gb fairly easily. I can't justify spending $1799 before coupons on a laptop just to get 16gb of ram though, that's crazy. I have a thread that shows some benchmarks and thermals if you're interested. I'm really torn on if I should send it back or not. I probably will and then wait to see what kind of deals I can dig up when they come out to the outlet.

 

Send it back if 8GB is already an issue for your applications. You will be stuck with a brick that will be difficult to sell in a year.

 

Lol you're right. I just feel bad sending back a working laptop, normally I just sell them but I don't want to take a hit right away. I do have a 15% off dell coupon and ebates is at 10% right now which makes the 9570 ~$1150...

 

I am not completely sure if this system freeze is related to a thermal issue. I could see a major frame drop happening, but a system freeze? Maybe it's a driver issue.

@custom90gt Pull the trigger. You, @pressing and I, will figure out how to make the 9570 work properly

 

I would install a fresh ISO and delete every partition on the SSD. Start from a legit fresh OS. You're definitely running into tempthrottling and hitting the software limit for shutdown.

This is not my only concern with this chassis at all, but at least the removal of DELL's bloat will allow you to diagnose what's going on much easier. It that fails send it back.

There is a reason why I didn't cover this unit. The chassis and its cooling solutions is biting off way more than it can chew last generation. This time there's some seriously badass parts inside and it just can't keep up unless you're good with limited performance from high-end components.

I'm not trying to sound like a Debbie Downer as this is my dream chassis. But dear Dell, let me design its internals and these will sell like hotcakes.

 

@B0B Dell temperature management seems pretty aggressive in trying to keep everything below 80c under sustained load. It should throttle like hell but not crash!

 

I’m definitely not saying that’s what’s causing the crashing. But there’s a lot of bloat on these things so a fresh ISO, deleting all what’s probably five partitions of the main drive starting fresh is what I would do for starters at this point.

 

I did the complete fresh install but still had problems. Other problems included sporadic bad coil whine (more like snap crackle and pop), headphone jack had high pitched white noise static, even when mic was muted. That was tested with regular ear buds to my expensive (by my definition) neutral Audio Technica headphones I use for guitar practice.
Maybe had a bad unit. Already shipped it back today for a return. Sad thing is I'm not sure there is another comparable product in this range.

 

No problems from my 9570 i9. Everthing works perfectly. I would give it another chance.

 

Everything*

 

Sure. But there seems to be an epidemic, also some users of older XPS 15 models report crashing under load instead of downthrottling recently. Maybe a "feature" of a recent BIOS or such.

 

@DOS_6.22 were you using the "Dell Optimized power plan" or the "extreme performance" plan?

 

I used the Microsoft "better performance" power plan and also tried the Dell optimized. If there was just normal overheating and was non-defective, it would have done one of two things: 1. throttle down CPU and GPU while maxing out fans, 2. if that couldn't cool it down, gracefully shutdown the computer. The instant power-off was a red flag for an electrical problem with the device. Could be a short that occurs at a certain temp, poor solder work, defective component within the VRM or other electrical components.
I would like to give them another chance, I just didn't want to roll the dice and have it come back with a new problem - leaving me with little time to do a product return, with defects are not normally subject to restocking fees.

I've had experience with a laptop repair depot where the notebook went in for a minor defect repair and then came back with a broken trackpad and the chassis no longer being flush. Customer service had been a hassle with this. Eventually I went up to their corporate customer relations to remedy the situation, after reporting them to the BBB.

It's something I don't want to have to go through again if I can avoid it.

 

You shouldn't have to have a brand new laptop fixed anyway. I would return it and reorder before I sent it to tech support. I just placed an order for a 9570 so I'll let you know if I experience similar issues.

 

Hi. Is the Sharp SHP1453 panel still in use in XPS 9570? For six months I bought five xps / precision 5520 and each had a dyed panel - on the right in pink, on the left in green:

 

Guessing that your didnt really intend to post that question in the review section?

Sent from my SM-N950F using Tapatalk

 

Another review from Ultrabookreview.com

https://www.ultrabookreview.com/20435-xps-15-9570-review-live/

 

Updated a lot of stuff today. Let me know if there's anything you want covered that isn't. There are some cool new BIOS functions that I'd like to cover actually

 

Don't read that article, it's terrible...

lol, I'm just kidding. Eason is a good dude and really complete. I'll have to check out the updates as I read it early yesterday.

Hey Eason, I'm curious if you can run 3dmark 2011 on the stock system? I haven't gotten it to complete once stock but if I undervolt I can. It's actually starting to piss me off.

 

Ah, I didn't realise that was you, nice one Eason and glad you are also on here. Good in depth review. I should take more notice of peoples signatures!

I'm a little concerned about the cooling/throttling issues you guys seem to be getting on the 9570, but it is early days and hoping they'll be getting fixed as Dell get feedback from users.

 

I will try that tomorrow and let you know. I don't normally run 2011 and and perhaps dell doesn't either.

 

In the review, you are refering to an Intel 9265, which AFAIK does not exist. I guess the best replacement for the Killer NIC is the 9260.

 

I'm suprised we don't have the Killer 1550 instead of the 1535, its actually an almost identical card to the Intel 9260, just rebadged.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/1217...-networks-launches-the-killer-wirelessac-1550

 

Dell likely has a ton of leftover Killer 1535 cards. It's strange how the Dell G5/G7 series has the superior, newer cards with Bluetooth 5.0. The 2 in 1 has the 1435 soldered onboard. This laptop has it upgradeable, which is great. Did not have issues with the 1535 when I had the 9560, and I don't use Bluetooth much at all, so I don't think I'll swap the card when I receive my 9570.

 

Yes, and as se know, Dell has been using the Intel NICs for other laptops like the Precision ”copy” of the XPS15

 

I can't complete the benchmark with an undervolt - it crashes

 

That's odd, I can run it without any issue with the undervolt, but I've tried a few times stock and it won't run it.
3DMark 11 Performance - 9240
3DMark 11 Extreme - 3343

 

Another good updated review, from The Tech Chap.

i9 and 4k processing and no mention of any thermal throttling under normal use.



He had problems with the Killer Wireless card as many have already mentioned.

 

The fact that his rendering times were only 16% faster leads me to believe he was throttling. None of these reviewers seem to actually watch what their cpu is doing when they are encoding... I should have added that in my review but I'm currently doing iunlock's mod on it so I'm a little late to the party there.

 

Yeah, I have a 7700k mITX desktop running on a cheap junk H110 board, and an i7-2600k running on an ASUS ROG board. The 7700k is faster just about any encoding, rendering, etc task than the older Sandy Bridge chip, but it wasn't until 2 months ago when I changed the CPU fan to a larger one with more range that I noticed something odd. The fan was running fine under load, but suddenly, it would dip to an audibly lower speed, then resume normal operation. It would do this at ~1.5 second intervals. I went and ran OCCT with its built in monitoring tools, and found out the frequency was taking a dip at those intervals. I eventually diagnosed it to VRM throttling and nothing I did would resolve it (short of underclocking and undervolting the CPU, but that kills the slim performance margin over the older i7).

I never even knew VRM throttling was a thing. How could a mobo designer make a mobo that couldn't handle stock loads? I thought all mobos were becoming the same, especially in the mITX size class (where there is less freedom to implement things). It sure seemed that way since the wilder LGA775 days. Boy was I wrong. I now know to watch closely at all factors, and coming back to NBR at the same time, the XPS15 threads (along with many high-specced thin-and-lights) really resonated with my experience.

 

No offense, some people are just not skilled enough and these reviews are almost useless.

 

I do not like the Tech Chap's content. I have subbed/unsubbed to him a few times and always end up disappointed.

 

Review complete: https://www.ultrabookreview.com/20435-xps-15-9570-review-live/

4/5

THE GOOD

• Despite (somewhat) stale design, still one of the best-looking 15-inch laptops
• i7-8750H CPU performs admirably in such a thin chassis
• Decent gaming performance
• Competitively priced
• Well-rounded feature set
• Dell's on-site service is second to none in the PC world

THE BAD

• Battery comes with 9.9% wear, so true capacity is 87WHr
• Battery life is not quite as good as previous generations
• Webcam still on bottom bezel and no Windows Hello compatibility
• No FHD-touch screen option
• Unstable and buggy out of the box; required clean Windows installation
• Still only one m.2 slot and slow SSD write speeds
• Additional USB Type-C port would be nice

 

Dave Lee (aka Dave2D) did a review of 2018 premium 15" laptops. XPS 9570 ranked near top . . .

 

Totally this. I've not seen a single, objective review so far of the XPS 15 9570 on Youtube. They're all by morons, who bought the i9 and "want to love it" mostly because of paid 3k USD for it. If I pay so much money for something, I won't see the negative things. Some of these reviews are just horrible and unbelievable. They even are like "sure it, throttles, but hey, it's enough power for me" ... seriously? "Sure, it runs hot, but hey, dont they all?" ... "Sure, it does this and that bad, but, hey, I can live with that. It' the best laptop!!111". .... ... And then all those "reviews" are just, of them talking while the laptop is idling next to them with some hipster coffee cup. The Dave Lee "review" is bad too, no real live caps (fan noise ect pp).

That ultrabookreview test is also stupid. He says in his own test, that the laptop had lots of bluescreen issues, the TB3 has bad performance because of it using some 3rd party chip (or what?) compared to the XPS 13 for example, and he didnt put that in the BAD list. Coil whine also isnt fixed it seemed. Standard SD slot is a BAD thing btw and not a GOOD one, you cant put a permanent SD card into it without sticking out and use as a DATA disk. No word of the horrible bad killer card in his bad list. Back bleed of the HD panel. And so on. And thats a 4 out of 5? No way...

 

I also agree the UBR is a bit odd, and I agree with most parts of your SD vs microSD view, but I think you quoted the author of that review (or I have a much looser grasp on who's who than I think).

 

There is only so much I can do if the laptop is unstable out of the box, but I'm able to fix it with a clean reinstall. I mentioned it in the article and put it under "bad", but how much would you deduct from a score for that? (tbh I don't believe in scores, but readership demands it).

You misunderstood about the TB3 port. The performance is fine over it and working as it should -- but ALL -H/HQ series chipsets have the same issue in my testing. ULV laptops with TB3 seem to have smoother frame timing/better graphics performance. I can't hear coil whine, so no way I can comment or measure it. Standard SD is something lots of people ask for, especially creators/multimedia users, and this is a "creator's" laptop. Backlight bleeding is again something I can't take points off for when it is a standard struggle for any IPS laptop. About the killer card, I did write:

"The XPS 15 ships with a Killer 1535 802.11ac Bluetooth 4.2 combination network card, which is a 2×2 card with a maximum throughput of 867Mbps. I experienced minor issues with my card not being detected on occasion when waking from standby. When I contacted Killer about this, they informed me that it is an issue with the Dell BIOS and should get fixed in the XPS 15 as it was just fixed in the XPS 13. While the card should work fine for the majority now, swapping the Killer card out for an Intel 9260 module is cheap and easy — plus you’ll get Bluetooth 5.0."

Thanks for reading and sharing your thoughts.

edit: I should add that during the review process, especially the first few days, I wanted to give it a 2/5 or something to "teach Dell a lesson". But after it's stable and working -- not with any tweaks but with just Dell's own updates -- I can't just say "well it works really well at everything right now, but it didn't out of the box in the one unit I got so 2/5". I would like to do that sometimes, but ultimately I'm trying to help people decide whether the XPS 15 9570 is a good laptop or not. Unfortunately, it still is.

 

(I know it's an older posting, but thing has irritated me as well).

I also think that the 2 additional cores from the CPU (hexcore vs quadcore) are responsible for that huge jump in the score. This is confirmed on the review on ultrabookreview.com which lists following data:

The Firestrike "Graphics Score" is:
- 6400 points with a 1050 gtx
- 7584 points with a 1050Ti gtx

In assuming that the "Graphics Score" mainly tests the GPU capabilities (compared to the "Standard Score" which tests both CPU & GPU), the difference is as expected only 18% larger with the 1050Ti. This makes sense, because the hardware specs of the 1050Ti is also only 20% better than the 1050 (768 shader cores vs 640 shader cores).

 

different 3dmark scores scale differently, though in theory they aren't supposed to. The differences tend to be wider with more taxing benchmarks (time spy) and more narrow in the more basic ones (cloudgate) in my experience.

 

Hmmm... indeed, I looked over it again on the notebookcheck various benchmarks and the big difference on TimeSpy is there as well between 1050 and 1050 Ti - regardless of the CPU. The "Ti" does indeed seem to scale better with the more taxing TimeSpy benchmark.

 

This is a very interesting observation. I recently trialed the 9575 with my Aorus Gaming Box and was really surprised by the sometimes poorer performance (or more erratic/unstable FPS) over my Macbook Pro 13. There was no clear winner though. It wasn't a huge leap in performance, but in some titles, the performance was smoother on the 9575, which I attribute to the 16GB vs 8GB ram. The FPS plots in many benchmarks was far more erratic though (like in Assassin's Creed Origins) - this is where the FPS on the MBP was simply more consistent. I believe the MBP still uses a northbridge chip though, so it can't entirely be explained by that.

I returned the 9575 because significant PL throttling crept in and kept crushing the GPU frequency, that and TB3 compatibility seemed buggy on a couple fronts. I'm hoping the 9570 is a more stable eGPU partner, but your commentary troubles me. Is there another 15" notebook you'd recommend over the 9570 to pair with an eGPU? It seems like the smaller 13" designs use the ULV chips, whereas all the 15" designs go with 45 watt parts.

 

hehehe. I think you guys are a bit harsh.​

 

The most recent BIOS and TB3 driver updates for the 9570 seemed to make eGPU performance a bit better (13000 graphics score). If you're playing CPU bound titles like open-world games or sims, I think the 9570 will be okay, especially with something like a 1080 or better. The only 15" ULV laptops I know of are the LG gram (terrible cooling/performance) and the Lenovo P52S. If you want a 14", you could also do Dell latitude, ThinkPad T, or X1 Carbon.

eh, criticism is warranted. I did get accused of being too nit-picking by Andrei when I gave him my original list of negatives. Or maybe I'm being too soft in my advanced age, even with that criticism.
I am pretty observant and also tend to be unlucky with computers, so nearly every laptop I've had came with major issues out of the box -- including the Lenovo X1 Carbon, which is one of the best laptops money can buy. It's very hard to determine what sort of score to give a laptop like that that comes with terrible screen after terrible screen, has an ACPI power management issue that drains your battery (but not other people's), and a piece of **** worthless fingerprint reader.

 

Wow, thanks for the update - this helps me out a lot. Do you have any games so you can update your XPS15 review with real world game performance? I'm trying to see where the 1050TI falls in comparison to other laptops hosting the 1050TI - did you say if it is a "max-q" 1050TI? There seems to be confusion there.

 

Yup it's a max-q TI. I have Doom and Prey currently installed, but I don't think there is any benchmark built-in. Those are the most demanding games I've got in my account.

 

"SD is something lots of people ask for, especially creators/multimedia users, and this is a "creator's" laptop.Backlight bleeding is again something I can't take points off for when it is a standard struggle for any IPS laptop."

Totally not. Every single SD card produced today, is micro sd. Every camera has micro sd slot, even if they have normal SD, use an adapter, and then put micro sd card in your laptop. Maybe a lot of IPS panels have backbleed, but totally not everyone. It is also as I see it, a problem not of the panel, but of the construction around the panel. The tiniest bit of uneven force of the edge around the panel, will bend it a tiny little bit out of its frame and produce a back bleed. That's mostly why 4k displays have less back bleed because the glass frame stabilizes it more even.

There is also no word on the (horrible) bad fan profile of Dell, a typical XPS issue since years. Dell never changed it really, and the trigger point of the XPS fans is just way too low of around 40-45°C, instead of a good one which would be maybe 65°C.