S-XPS 1645 AC Power Throttle Issue Investigation

Nope. I thougt that the A04 should solve the throttling issue.

 

I tried this but I have throttling as Administrator, too.

 

I tried to read all this pages, but are too much. After 10-11 pages decided to ask.
I recieve my xps16 today, what should i do to solve heating issues?
Please inform about ac adepters number. I don't play too many games.
thanks

 

As far as I know there are no heating issues with the 1645( since its throttling). The only problem plaguing this laptop is throttling. It under performs at almost over 50%(speed loss) The only temporary solution is using ThrottleStop with a 130W adapter or above.

This is the slim version you should be looking for: http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/...etail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=dhs&cs=19&sku=330-1830

Dont buying from DELL unless you like being $@%&#. You can find it cheaper on ebay.

 

It did eventually throttle down to 11x when the GPU hit 90c. It went back to 15x after the GPU had cooled below 80c.

The GPU clocks never changed though.

Just remember that I am a new to throttle investigating. I could have done something wrong. I have a screen shot that I took after 45 minutes without a throttle, so maybe the process of getting that shot messed something up. Who knows...

 

If all 4 cores are active, that's a physical impossibility for a Core i7-720QM. A full load disables all turbo boost so you end up with at most the default 12.0 multiplier.

CPU-Z is not capable of accurately reporting the throttling issue. Next time you are testing with Furmark + Prime95, run ThrottleStop and don't check the top 3 boxes so it is in monitoring mode. Does the CMod% (Clock Modulation) column start dropping below 100.0% at full load? That's a sign that your CPU is not running internally nearly as fast as it is pretending to run at.



Run the Log File option and send it my way or post it here if you want me to show you what it's telling you.
Either upload it to www.sendspace.com or post it in a message here and use the code html tags before and after your data.

[ code]
blah
blah
blah
[ /code]

Leave out the space before the code tag and before the /code tag.

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

 

I was testing on an M6500 with the i7-920M. I should have made that clear. Will get the info to you. All I have now is a screenshot.

 

Does the M6500 come with a 90 watt adapter and what GPU does it use?

The Dell website shows that the M6500 comes with a 210 watt adapter. That's likely why you're not seeing any of the throttling that the XPS 1645 is plagued by due to its under powered 90 watt adapter.

http://www.dell.com/us/en/business/...500/pd.aspx?refid=precision-m6500&cs=04&s=bsd

 

XPS 1645 is crippled not only by standard AC adapter but by its BIOS too.

On another thread, I've asked M6500 owners to perform throttling test on their machines, just to (hopefully) exclude that Dell did some silly choice on M6500 BIOS.
Bokeh kindly did that test (that substantially confirms the results of another test reported on an Italian forum).

 

210 watts....rofl. There is no other term that describes what I'm feeling....rofl.

~Ibrahim~

 

This is the slim version you should be looking for: http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/p...9&sku=330-1830

They don't say anythink about xps16, could the adapter cause a problem?

 

Finally the truth comes out. Dell's business class customers get 210 watt adapters to power their Core i7 laptops while the peasant class XPS 1645 owners get supplied with a 90 watt adapter.

Kind of like getting on a plane and finding out the economy class is down below in the baggage area while the business customers are dining on filet mignon.

thodoris kountouriot: Any adapter beyond 90 watts is not approved for the XPS 1645. It's strictly use at your own risk at the moment.

I brought the throttling issue to the attention of someone at Tom's Hardware today. Hopefully a thorough review of this issue will be conducted and published. Dell needs a little pressure to get this matter properly resolved.

 

What are the specs of the M6500?

 

nevermind wrong thing

 

The 210/240w switchable power supplies come with the M6500 because the top shelf video card Quadro FX3800M consumes 100 watts of power by itself under load.

 

Wow.

 

Bokeh: Do you have the ATI or the Nvidia card in yours? Have you ever tried doing any testing with a Kill-a-Watt meter or similar?

 

I would wait and see what the M4500 gets. I will be curious if it comes with the same 130w slim power supply that the M4400 has or if they up it to the 150w.

The M6500 has a 100w video card option which is probably why it and the M6400 had the larger power supplies.

I am going to back off hijacking this thread. Let me know if you want me to run any tests for you. I have access to a lot of Dell gear at the office.

 

I have the 3800M. I would be happy to run any kind of testing you can come up with. I have access to a Kill-a-Watt at work.

I will also send you detailed logs from Throttle Stop tomorrow. I am working away from my desk for the rest of the day.

 

If you can just PM me a log file when you are testing. It would be interesting to see your results while running Furmark + Prime95

Edit: Thanks for that. Any additional info will help confirm how underpowered the 90 watt adapter really is.

 

I actually priced out an M6500 earlier today for kicks. The final price was just under $8000.

In addition to the ridiculous video card that others have spoken about, it might be worth noting a few other differences:

1. Possibly insignificant, but the screen is obviously bigger (17" versus 16")
2. The system supports 2 hard drives in Raid 0 or 1.
3. The system supports 4 DIMMs (up to 16 GB) RAM
4. The processor (920XM) is listed as 10W higher TDP.

 

Moreover, it also can host a second HDD and the screen is larger (and optionally RGBLED) too.

 

woww. Then the least they can get is 210W ac adapters

 

The studio 17 i7 supports 2 drives and gets a 90w (and throttles like crazy). We just got one where I work in and it died after 3 days of use. It just beeps about 7 times when you try to turn the thing on.

 

This is what concerns me the most: Dell has a clear business incentive not to fix this and cannibalize their higher-end laptop trade. Next bios update will probably contain code to "protect" the laptop from being damaged by programs like ThrottleStop.

Thanks so much for pushing this story at Tomshardware

 

330-4127 210W/240W switchable Slim 3-Pin, AC Adapter Dell Precision M6400/M6500

and the full sized version of the 210-Watt AC Adapter use the same connector as the 90 and 130 watt supplies. Just in case you wanted to engage in overkill on the S-XPS 1645.

 

I was asking Dell about the 130W adapter and here is what the XPS Tech Support department emailed me:

I do understand your concern and I do see that as you have mentioned , the adapter was replaced earlier.The issue with the adapter has been escalated to the technical expert team, as many of our customers were having a similar issue with the adapter .The 130 w adapter that was being shipped seems to affect the battery life and also the motherboard of the system hence the replacement will not fix the issue for us rather it may damage the system even more .The 130w adapters are on hold as of now till the issue is rectified . I would appreciate if you could give us some time to research on this issue and depending on that we can check what best can be done.

Thank you again for contacting Dell Technical Support.

 

I don't know if it was caused by throttling or just another stupid Dell defect, but the accepted solution for 7x beeps is to remove the battery, remove the panel beneath the battery, pop out the CMOS battery, and put it back in.

This I caught from Dell's forums.

~Ibrahim~

 

Have you guys read this?

Alienware M15x BIOS Correction
Who wants to test first??

 

Did I miss something? What's there to test? They just tell you to call Dell to get it fixed, whatever it is.

Just to be clear: that has nothing, as far as anyone knows, to do with throttling.

It's just a bad BIOS they put out...if they did that with the SXPS 16.....my blood boils just thinking about it.

~Ibrahim~

 

ikjadoon,
HaHa! ya, thats my point..we wait and hope for some kinda fix.....,and Like you did, completely reinstall the operating system..all your software, get it like you want it...and then the elusive new bios that will save dells rep....ends up bricking your lappy [read: Who wants to test it first?]

 

I've already tested it. Works quite well, everything runs fine, with 130-watt adapter and 90-watt adapter. Performance is better but throttling is still present under some conditions.

 

what do you mean by performance better but still throttling?

 

There is a simple way to go back from X29 to A03 (or any other BIOS). I have just tried it in my machine. I have extracted the WinPhlash utility and modified the settings. The X29 BIOS is set up so you can only flash a newer version over it. With my modified settings you can flash any version.

Just to be clear. I did not change anything to the actual BIOS file, just to the WinPhlash program settings. I compiled a package with every BIOS so far, and the working WinPhlash tool:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/3iipb2

To test this, I went from A03 to A01 to X29 and back to A03.

Here is my system on X29:





Using the above mentioned tool, I flashed it back to A03 with no problems.:





I did not do any throttling tests, as I just wanted to know / prove that it's possible and easy to downgrade back to A03.

 

Thats an excellent tool. I tried downloading it but it looks like the folder was corrupted or not fully uploaded. Can you check please?

 

I downloaded through the same link using a different computer, and it downloaded and extracted without issues.

Do you have another machine to try this on, or simply try again on the same machine?

If all fails I can get you the files some other way.

 

I didn't actually test the utility, but I was able to successfully open and extract the contents of the posted ZIP file... so no corruption here.

 

Nv. it worked now must have been a connection glitch. Tx again.

 

Is the X29 a New BIOS for the SXPS16?! Is it the intended fix by Dell?

 

It is a development version of the BIOS. This was given to a user by Dell, but it is definately not the fix. This is not a final version.

The package I compiled is only meant as a proof-of-concept to show it is possible to downgrade from the development BIOS back to a released BIOS. My package contains all known BIOSes, so you can choose which version you would like to use. There is A01, A02, A03 and the development version X29.

If you do want to install and test the X29 version, do so at your own risk. I myself have flashed it, and my system booted into Windows. Others have done some more testing. It might or might not work on your system.

Please Note: Dell does not support this version and we cannot give you any guarantees.

 

Mitchell2.24v: Great work. Too many users have been living in fear of even trying a new bios if they couldn't go back to the original one. I hate it when manufacturers try to block going back to a previous bios.

The early negative reports were this new X29 bios might lead to an increase in core temperatures (CPU + GPU) which could trigger even more throttling than before.

If anyone has time for some before and after testing to prove this how about try running 8 threads of Prime95 Small FFTs for about 5 minutes until the peak temperature has stabilized with A03 and X29.

Try the same test using just Furmark and monitor the GPU temperatures. If there is a significant difference in GPU temps between these two bios versions then my guess would be that they have upped the GPU core voltage slightly. A Kill-a-Watt meter or similar would also be handy to try and prove this out.

 

Thanks & no problem. I'm curious by nature, and being a developer myself I could not believe there is no possble way to go back. And I was right (fortunately).

I can do some tests this weekend. Due to a work deadline I'm unable to do any tests before the weekend. I also still only have the 90W adapter, but I will do the tests like before, with the Kill-A-Watt meter.

 

I have time to spare tonight, so I'll do the tests. Just tell me: you want separate test for GPU and CPU? Or a combined one too? What do I have to record, CPU Temps? GPU Temps? Throttling? All of the above?

 

I would probably do a 5 or 10 minute session with only Prime95 running 8 threads of Small FFTs and record CPU temp, GPU temp, Throttling and power draw if you have a Watt-meter. I think peak values are most important.

Then a 5 or 10 minute session with only FurMark and record the same data. You could probably use GPU-Z to log the GPU temp and load.

Just for fun you could do the simple 8x Prime95 & 1x FurmMark test. It should throttle back real quick. It would be interesting to see if it throttles more or quicker on either BIOS.

If you're on the 90W adapter, keep an eye on it. I have had mine shut down on me without using ThrottleStop. If that happens your battery will be used, and that could result in trouble, if the drain is high enough. It probably won't die in a minute, but staying alert is a smart thing to do.

You could do the same tests on the X29 BIOS.

I will still try to do these tests over the weekend, as it might be interesting to compare results.

 

We might have to wait for a tester with a 130 watt adapter so throttling doesn't confuse the results. If a user ran just a Prime test and just a Furmark test with ThrottleStop enabled to prevent throttling, we might see a repeatable difference in either the CPU or GPU temperature which would lead one to believe that the "fix" was probably a boost in core voltage. That is no fix at all for most users that are battling against a 90 watt power consumption limit.

A ThrottleStop log file along with a GPU-Z log file might give us some data to prove this theory.

I'm thinking a separate CPU and a separate GPU test to try to isolate each. A GPU or CPU running hotter will influence the core temperature of the other one so it might not be possible to clearly prove what's causing the problem. Just curious.

 

Bummer. I only have 90W. I'll wait.

 

It might be interesting to do some tests anyway, since Dell claims to be able to fix this entire issue with just a BIOS update. We all know their claim is impossible. Some tests might prove our thoughts.

 

Hey, the guys who are noticing the throttling while playing crysis is it warhead or the original crysis?

I don't seem to see much difference in the original crysis with the ac adapter in or on battery!

All settings are on high!

 

It was crysis warhead, I haven't tried the original. I was playing warhead with 720p and everything set to gamer, no AA. Everything set to maximum performance on the power profile. Mine started throttling about 2 seconds after I loaded it up. I pulled out the 90W adapter and it went silky smooth once it went to battery power. Plugging it straight back in makes it throttle again.... Using TS with 150W adapter results in no such problems....

 

In that case I don't think we could raise up our voices with a beta firmware, which I am not supposed to run