S-XPS 1645 AC Power Throttle Issue Investigation

Nobody...?

 

Is it motherboard or battery problem, it happened to me and i thought it is the battery.

 

I think I hit it for a few seconds with wPrime...but, as unclewebb explained it, Windows has too much stuff in the background for the processor to be truly stressed on just a single core.

~Ibrahim~

 

Hey Frox and StarrySummerSky.. The lag issue with throttle stop is this just when the keys are pressed?! As this seems to be an issue sometimes when using throttlestop for some reason, some problem with dells software or something. It drops me to 10fps when keys are pressed.

Do this, enable throttlestop, close the screen on your laptop. Wait for the light to start fading in and out meaning its asleep. Then open your screen and it should wake itself up. Start up your game and happing gaming as the keyboard lag is gone.

 

Well, on my desktop I reach 3.46Ghz regularly (i7 860), so it is possible with Win7 and an i7. when I have no active programs (but also no services disabled), and am using a single CPU intensive program, I reach my i7's max. This is one of the reasons I wanted an i7 laptop as well. Once your used to the i7, the C2D laptop seems soooooo slow.

 

I don't think its got anything to do with the keyboard. The Framerate fluctuates and sound crackles when I don't touch the keyboard, throttlestop is enabled and the checkbox is ticked in clock modulation. However, when I have throttlestop enabled, and 'disable clock modulation' box is UNCHECKED, then the framerate seems to be fine.

This has only happened using the latest version of Throttlestop. I didn't have this issue when using the original version which uncleWebb emailed me the link to.

 

i dunno, i used the new version all last night and it worked for me. thats weird!?

 

Well, the power throttle issue won't be blame here, then, as I can't hit 2.8GHz solid on battery power, either.

Unclewebb posted back the three contributors to when the i7's will use Turbo Boost and when they won't and I recall heat being one of them, which could easily be seen here with my i7-720QM hitting 76C on some cores during heavy testing.

~Ibrahim~

 

Actually, you're correct with the 'sleep mode' trick. If I leave the game running, close the laptop lid so it sleeps then open up and go into the game again, the framerate goes back to normal. And throttlestop works as it ought to with the checkbox ticked. Very weird. As you say, must be some driver conflict with the keyboard perhaps.

 

Do what he said anyway, and try an external keyboard, your system will only go to sleep if it’s set to go to sleep when you close the screen.

same issue here, there is a 2nd issue with this system that’s related to the keyboard, or just a side effect of disabled dells modulation software with this tool, where they keyboard causes these issues.

 

ThrottleStop is the same program before or after resuming from Sleep mode. To me it almost seems like a keyboard driver issue or something like that.

fr0x: I'm sorry to hear about your issues. It sounds like the battery is toast. I'm not sure if this has anything to do with ThrottleStop or not. I don't know what the long term issues will be when using ThrottleStop 24/7. Hopefully they can get that fixed up for you without having to replace the mainboard. I've always thought that running Furmark and Prime95 at the same time is a little overkill.

ikjadoon: It's pretty much impossible to use the highest 21X multiplier on a Core i7-720 for an entire one second sampling period. There will always be constant background activity waking up cores and instantly dropping your multiplier lower so an actual overall average of 21 is elusive.

 

Funny you guys are talking about Hitting the high mark, I was trying last nite to do just that. I have the i7 gadget and was installing a app and seen the gadget hit 3.06 (820qm)
So i tryed to duplicate it...someone said use "set affinty for something" so i did that with loadtester.exe set to core 0.
ONCE it hit 23x otherwise it hung at 22x to 22.4x (2979 in realtemp and 2.93 in the gadget) ya, the problem was i couldn't get the CO in core 0 to 100% (99.34 is max).
How do the guys reviewing it get it to stick at 3.06?

Attaching a power meter to the laptop shows the Turbo Boost function in action – stress one core to 100% load and the clockspeed rises to 3.06GHz while power consumption hovers around 58W. Fully load another core and the overclock reduces to 2.8GHz and the power consumption to 70W. Load either of the two remaining cores, and Turbo Boost keeps power consumption hovering around the 70W mark by lowering the overclock to a maximum of 2GHz. Finally, with all four cores flat out, it falls to a maximum of 1.73GHz with power consumption hitting peaks of 74W.

 

I have experienced the same problem as fr0x: when test the notebook (core i7 820QM) only with the battery (no AC Adapter) with furmark + prim95 and with ThrottleStop (checked "Disable Modulation clock" and "Set Multiplier to 13") after few seconds the notebook shutdown suddenly. Fortunately my battery works well again, but it's ThrottleStop designed to work in Battery mode?

 

Could the discharge rate for the battery be too high? Apparently Dell doesn't want the system to consume more than 90W at any time. Disabling that limit might put too much stress on the battery? Possibly in the end even killing it?

 

I could add an option to ThrottleStop so it automatically disables when you switch to battery power but that's not going to solve this problem. If you are running full load on AC and you pull the plug, I can instantly disable ThrottleStop but it will take the bios a while to start adjusting the multiplier and the Clock Modulation settings again.

Is this a problem when playing a game? Running Furmark and Prime95 at the same time is a huge load and it's possible that the battery can't deliver enough power to run this type of load with a full multiplier and no clock modulation.

Do you have any suggestions on how ThrottleStop should handle this type of situation?

 

unclewebb, what are your suggested optimum settings for ThrottleStop and a 130 adapter? Thanks.

 

I think everyone on this thread should try to understand the difference between a synthetic test and a real-life situation.

Runnin Prime95 and FurMark at the same time results in an unrealistic load, while playing a (modern) game yield realistic load. The latter might be a load that is higher than the current XPS 1645 can handle, but nevertheless, it is something that can happen during normal usage.

I don't think anyone buys a XPS 1645 for the sole purpose of running Prim95 and FurMark. While the machines have a serious problem, we should still be realistic here.

I think this problem might be compared to the rev-limiter in a car. Dell has put an unrealistic rev-limiter in place, and UncleWebb provides a tool to remove the rev limiter. Running an engine at redline for a long time is unrealistic and might break something. The same is true for the XPS 1645. Running it under serious load for a long time might break a powersupply (90W?), or possibly the battery. We don't know this for sure so care should be taken. Use the tool wisely!

Don't get me wrong. I'm not on Dells side, but we should not get carried away, and we should use some common sense.

 

It depends on what type of applications you will be running. If you are a gamer then the reports so far with Disable Clock Modulation selected and with the highest possible multiplier being used is a power draw of about 110 watts. On AC power, you shouldn't have any problems at this level if you are using a 130 watt adapter. I don't know if this is possible on battery power or if the power draw would be too great.

With a 90 watt adapter and Clock Modulation disabled, you might need a multiplier setting of 9 to keep under the 90 watt limit. Hopefully guys with Kill-a-Watt meters and different games can post some numbers to see if it's possible to stay under 90 watts.

I just heard from one user via e-mail and he has a Studio 1747. He was testing with ThrottleStop disabled and it was just monitoring for Clock Modulation but there wasn't any. With the Furmark + Prime combination on AC power, the multipler was throttling back to the 9.0 to 10.5 range. As soon as he unplgged the AC adapter, the multiplier went up to 13 while still fully loaded. When he plugged the AC adapter back in, the multiplier stayed at 13.0 for about 10 seconds before it shut down.

When he went to boot up again his battery was dead according to Windows but it's working again now.This is without ThrottleStop doing anything besides monitoring. It sounds like it's not a good idea to be switching back and forth between battery and AC power when you are running an over kill stress test.

I totally agree.

I'm still waiting for some feedback. Does anyone want an option to immediately disable ThrottleStop when you go from AC to battery power? If the Dell bios uses the full multi on battery power then you still might have a problem during Furmark testing but for normal use you might be OK.

 

Yes, it's this. My laptop shutdown 2 times (~10sec after run Furmark+Prime95). And the second time, battery bye bye

No, all time.

---

BTW: unclewebb, if you look my different test (with the 3 version of ThrottleStop), yes the multi is stable to 12x, but in TrackMania Nation Forever, the game lags and it's realy unplayable (with the multi fix to 12x+ and AC 130w).
Exactly same lags without ThrottleStop and multi to 7x.

With battery (no AC plug), the game dosen't lag and it's playable (multi 12x+ too).

 

Did you try putting it to sleep and them resuming from sleep? like some users have suggested?

 

I will say that my SXPS 1645 has shut down twice on me, too, but this was before ThrottleStop. Might be unrelated.

@unclewebb

You're right. I tried reproducing the 13x again and I can't get it. I think I was thinking of the time when I got this:



But, of course, the C0 state is the pits.

~Ibrahim~

 

The low C0% in your screen shot is a sign that Clock Modulation was being applied to your CPU. If you run Prime95 again and if you use RealTemp to set the Clock Modulation to about 50%, you will see that 13X multiplier again. It looks like it's not possible to run 8 threads of Prime on one of these CPUs and still get some turbo boost beyond the 12X default multiplier. That's the Intel limitation.

 

I'm sorry but if you're already on your 4th motherboard, you're doing something wrong unless you're just milking dell like i plan to.

Also, try turning on throttlestop and enabling it, then put your pc into standby (close lid) reopen and run tests.

 

I'm really glad I have the Dell TotalCare warranty. Once I have some more free time and the novelty of a new laptop has worn off, I plan on costing Dell thousands of dollars in tech visits to my home trying to repair my throttle issue until they either fix it, acknowledge the issue and offer me compensation, or replace it with whatever the "new hottness" is (that doesn't throttle).

 

Zlog.. I hope you do not mean the above like it sounds, maybe you just had a poor choice of words.

I plan on making sure Dell gives to me what they advertised and I bought, but I am not looking to take advantage beyond what is expected.

If your words are what you meant, maybe that's what Dell will come to expect from all their customers and they treat them accordingly.. Customer and seller is a two way street, there should not be abuse by one or the other.

 

After I installed new IDT audio driver, it seems cpu throttling being improved. CPU will now constantly run at 2.26-2.39G with single thread application on a 90W adapter. Anyone has similar experience?

 

With the 90W, will thottlestop damage my laptop?
How do I adjust the brightness?
Thanks.

 

1. Using throttlestop with an adapter >90W is not a good idea and you will need to adjust the settings on throttlestop to stay within the 90W limit (see back a few pages for what the settings are). If you don't...things might go boom.

2.Adjust the brightness in the power settings of control panel or by pressing FN and the up or down arrows.

 

http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/3/3/1794507/ThrottleStop.zip

I've made a slight change to ThrottleStop which might help with the keyboard issue that some people are seeing. I'm not sure if this is an issue that I can fix or if it is a driver issue outside of my control. Any feedback would be appreciated.

I also added an option that is designed to immediately Turn Off ThrottleStop when you pull the plug and switch from AC power to battery power. I don't know if this will help at all with users who run Furmark + Prime95 and then like to pull the plug and go to battery power but it probably won't hurt.

It's possible that the computer won't have enough time to react and you still might crash and/or damage your battery. The smart thing would be not to do this type of testing since it has proven to be dangerous. ThrottleStop doesn't seem like it is needed when on battery power so I thought an option to automatically turn it off when you switch from AC to battery would be a good idea. At the moment, you'll have to manually turn it back on when you plug back in.

You can also turn it on manually when on battery power. Enabling this new option will only turn ThrottleStop off when you are using your laptop and pull the plug.

It certainly could. ThrottleStop disables the 90 watt limitation that the bios uses. This is only really useful if you have a 130 watt adapter.

With a 90 watt adapter, I can't tell you if you would have a better or worse user experience with or without ThrottleStop on. You would definitely need to buy a Kill-a-Watt meter and monitor it religiously to make sure power consumption does not exceed 90 watts. That's what the bios is designed to do and you might be better off letting it continue to do that until you can upgrade your updater to a 130 watt model. I think the Dell PA-4E is the adapter of choice.

 

Results anyone?

 

Why don't *you* immediately artificially throttle the laptop when battery power is first engaged, then pass control over to the BIOS and let it decide?

 

Do we know if the BIOS is even doing the throttling? I spent a bit of time in a disassembler and I found many places where it writes to MSRs, but not 0x19A or anything that controls multiplers/clock modulation. Not saying it doesn't, it could be burried somewhere that I haven't been able to interpret yet. But the logic of the throttling seems pretty complex to be doing in the BIOS, there's connection between CPU/GPU usage, power source, laptop brightness, possible additional variables.

Edit: Might be something in the ACPI tables.

 

Hmm, there should be no abuse? you're saying dell is not abusing us right now by not screwing our expectations and our wallets by providing us with a laptop that cannot even perform some sh*t older laptops can perform more efficiently which is way less than what they "advertised" as being a multimedia powerhouse.

Maybe you should read unclewebb's post a few pages back describing exactly how the problems we are having were very likely implemented deliberately by them and they know exactly what is wrong.

So I for one have no issues with Zlogs display that hes got a pair and his intentions to not take abuse without repercussions. As you said "customer and seller is a two way street", we're not paying them bundles of money to "abuse" us, if we wanted to do that we could of hired us an S&M stripper for a lot less.

what goes around comes around.

 

I agree in a less extreme manner. I don't think acting so maliciously is a wise course of action. All be it, Dell deserve it, BUT maturity?

 

I'm all for milking an upgrade or two out of this, it's the LEAST they could do for the massive headache that is the SXPS16. I pretty much emptied my bank account on this thing. Yeah like some people have said, it's fine so long as you don't stress it, but who buys a system with an i7 and doesn't intend to do some power computing? How did this elude their quality control team? (Assuming they have one.) I think Unclewebb is totally right, this was intentional and they know exactly what's going on and hoped people wouldn't notice. That's abuse. I'm not going to call out technical support if I don't need it but I think it's only fair that we get something for all this trouble... I would like a RAM upgrade or something lol I want to be placated. I bought the laptop for 2 reasons.
1. Gaming
2. Video editing
Why should I have to use a work around to do that?

 

I chose my words correctly. I should not have to run a non-approved application that Dell would without a doubt claim voids my warranty in order to get the advertised performance of these laptops.

If it comes to it, I will not hesitate to call in with the problem over and over again, and take whatever form of "repairs" Dell has to offer.

There is nothing inappropriate with using my service agreement as it was intended: To ensure that my notebook is running properly.

I don't care if I end up on a first-name basis with every Tech in my area.

Perhaps I wouldn't have to "abuse" (your words, not mine) the system if Dell had treated us appropriately in the first place.

 

Upon re-thinking the issue...I totally agree with you Zlog and Fenikkusu. We deserve to be compensated for our troubles..money does not come easily nowadays...

 

This guy gets it.

You know how much I actually paid for my 1645 after all was said and done? $990. I raised hell to every available outlet when my order was delayed for the 5th time. I was smart enough to have documented the name of every rep I'd spoken with long enough to get one, and the time of my call. With that I submitted my phone records indicating that I had spent over 10 hours on the phone with Dell in 30 days to multiple "supervisors" emails that I had collected from all the e-mails Dell reps had sent me, as well as Mr. Dell's e-mail which got the attention of alleged higher-ups. When this didn't get what I wanted I submitted complaints to the BBB. They finally offered me compensation for my time. Guess what? I didn't remove my complaint from the BBB because that was never part of the deal.

Regarding this issue, I've submitted complaints to UL regarding my 90watt AC adapter getting to temps so hot that the plastic was soft (i could smoosh it with my fingernail) and voiced my concern to them and Dell about fire and safety hazards.

Dell is cutting corners to make money. It's as simple as that. They have a very serious safety hazard here if they are truly taxing these adapters to their limits (xbox, anyone?) and to make matters worse, we arn't even getting what we thought we were.

If they had advertised this laptop saying "This laptop is not intended for gaming and CPU-intensive applications and will have limited performance during such tasks" would you still have purchased it?

I sure wouldn't have.

 

WHAT?!?! Your adapter plastic is to the point that it's soft. That's outrageous. I got to say, "BAD move, dell."

 

Yes, if you go back far enough in this thread i did a VERY low-tech temp test and had 150-degree temps, i did the test with a simple meat thermometer sitting under the adapter while i gamed. If anything I'd say the temp reading was probably low-inaccurate as opposed to high-inaccurate.

The brick was sitting on my desk so ventilation wasn't the issue.

 

Latest I see on Dell's site is: v6.10.0.6217, A15 released on 9/23/2009. Is that the one you installed?

 

The one in 1640 thread posted here. I installed ati mobility mod as well, but I think i tested speed after install video driver.

 

Guys,
I don't want to start a flame war, and we need to expect good service and a good laptop. Dell had fallen short in what they delivered here, and we should hold them to this. I just see some people spending money with a company, and think they now own the company. I'm not saying Zlog is that type of person, but the way I read his post, it sounding like he was going to make them regret him as a customer.

How can we expect companies to be fair, if so many people go out of their way to screw these companies? I want to get good products, and we should hold these companies to make sure they make good on what they sold to us.

I for one am sick of seeing people buy warranties with the purpose of it being a 4 year replacement plan. I know there are people out there like that, I once had sales rep try to sell me it as one, not surprisingly, it was a big company that is no longer in business. I bet it wasn't the companies policy to sell it like that, but he was a young kid trying to make a commission.

Please keep up the work showing the issues, so we can be sure it is resolved.

Thanks to all the guys looking into these issues. I know I've been able to replicate it, and I have my issue in with Dell. I am still expecting a resolution, and I don't think a BIOS change is going to cut it. The fix is likely to be expensive, but I'm not going into it thinking they have to give me the most expensive solution if they can solve it properly otherwise.

hey.. and give some rep points to uncle webb.. he deserves more than his current 1. (send him some cash too, I got to find a way outside of pay pal)

 

i agree with zlog and others about complaining etc, its unkown if we didnt make a big noise here whether we would have gotten this far with dell and solving this issue. We have the proof etc, nothing more now to do then wait and share issues etc. The front page should be updated to all we know, tstop, avg measurements etc and status on dell resolution so new comers can identify it themselves and have the fix without our assistance everytime. Leaving us to discuss our issues/stuff.

I dont know if it was done 100% intentional though. As in throttling is good when done right to protect the system etc in case of failure or something. In our case its actually doing its job, to limit the power to the 90w. I would say its more of a design flaw in that respect more then throttling. When your copy and pasting from the 1640 and just throwing in the i7 i can see how "maybe" the 90w could of just been copied. Though its something they should of had foresight etc, but i guess it could happen. Whats not excusable is how this could of gotten through testing without anyone knowing. I mean they had to know and probably rushed it out anyway.

Although I will too pester dell like zlog eventually if they refuse to fix it. But ill give them their first shot at a fix, even if it will take a while. Their reputation is already ruined by this, with me anyway. I took a jump as this is my first dell, probably be the last and anyone i know that asks me for advice will probably go other avenues. Once that happens, and its starts spreading through reviews etc(hard to miss this problem on this laptop anyway) dell will eventually have to start listening and start doing good design, or fail.

this "throttlegate" really does seem like a widespread issue. Though maybe just a design flaw for us. Still, its a ton of laptop lines that are under performing by dell when they shouldnt ever, leaving real quality issues on the table. It will bite them pretty big eventually, if not already but in due time.

 

What 130W adapter should I get from dell? I tried searching but the search function doesn't work here. Also I think dell may have took some models of their website.

 

UPS comes tomorrow for delivry my new battery and SSD.

I asked the Tech for the problem of throttle. Dell France knows the problem but for the moment, they wait an official report for replace adapter and other composant if needed.
By the technician, we will have information very soon. So, wait and see

 

I sent an unhappy email through to a dell 'tech' i had spoke too. He came back saying that the 1645 isn't designed for gaming (read: high load) and more for general use. If i wanted a general use laptop i would have paid a third of the price.

I shruggled with a manager who would only send me a 130W charger if i would void my warranty. This isnt acceptable... especially as others have had this resolved in this way.

Now unclewebbs program is very good but I don't see why it should be needed to run because of Dells mistake and possibly cause load issues on components over time due to dells lack of design. I think i'll be returning the laptop and waiting for it to be confirmed fixed or go for an alternative laptop.

If it wasn't due to such a wait to get it n the first place i'm sure lots more would return and they might actually speed things up rather than this capturing palava. Trying to get people past their return period with hope of a quick fix?

 

This thread is called the:

AC Power Throttle Issue Investigation thread

Not the

AC Power Throttle Ranting and Dell Bashing thread

I agree with everyone here on Dell royally screwing up, but PLEASE keep it on topic, if you have issues with dell, make a new thread complaining about it and keep this thread solely about the Throttle Investigation.

That being said, the last legitimate post was unclewebb asking someone to test out his last build to see if it fixed the keyboard issue, and no one has said otherwise yet, I will test it myself when I get off work today.

On a side note, I have been using throttle stop ever since it was beta tested and have had no problems at all with it and my system, (besides the odd keyboard thing) and continue to use it on my system.

I've been using my system to stream Hulu to my PS3 (Playon on max settings) for my wife watching Lost episodes while I play Dragon Age at the same time (Max settings 1080p as well), without any issues, and the laptop throwing its muscle around. - Very awesome hardware in this machine.

 

Erm Siphen, sorry, but welcome to the internet. People, you know, talk and argue and get upset and stuff.

Trying to control or scold people like that will get you nowhere. If you are so worried about the facts getting lost, then update the first page.

And regarding the 'Dell bashing' it's really not bad. at. all. I don't know which parts of the internet you frequent. But the 'bashing' here is really restrained and well articulated for the most part. And another thing... the people moaning are absolutely right to moan. This really is some mess Dell have gotten themselves into.

 

While I agree with you in principle, your suggestion isn't realistic since Siphen is not a moderator.

I would love to suggest creating a new thread with the intention of it being more details oriented, but I recognize that without dedicated screening by admins, that isn't manageable. People will be people and so we wind up with threads that are hundreds of pages long. All that aside, this thread has been and remains incredibly informative thanks to folks like unclewebb and atlstang. Sometimes it just takes a bit more time to weed through the fluff

The best we can do is keep the pressure on Dell outside this forum.