XPS 15 9560 owners thread.

Thanks guys. So should I expect the 6.9 wear to just continue to get worse or have you noticed the wear number fluctuating both up and down from regular use? I will follow your advice and do nothing right now but if this continues I will be demanding a new battery from Dell. 3.1% wear in two weeks doesn't make any sense.

 

YMMV

 

It will fluctuate both up and down. All batteries have some wear right outside the box. This is "expected", as it also works as a measurement for the battery not to charge to 100% of its capacity (that will damage the long-term life of the battery). I wouldn't worry about it. If it goes over 10% you can tell Dell, but don't replace it. Wait until the next of the year, as batteries only have one year of warranty (they are considered consumables).

 

Hi Everyone,

Having read through all 231 pages, I have picked up lots of great advice for my 9560 32gb, 1tb SSD, 4k screen.
What I am trying to achieve is less fan noise and better battery life.

Having Undervolted my machine to CPU -125mW / GPU -75mW
In Bios disabled - Webcam, Touchscreen, Bluetooth, and C stats.
Changed numerous suggested settings in power options from the posts here, including the sections power adjustment settings/Intel graphics settings/PCI Express/Processor Power Management/System Cooling Policy/Adaptive Brightness, even changed the TDP settings to Low & power limit level to 1 on battery.
Even turned off backlit keyboard, and lowered brighness to 35%.

The Results - Temps playing Second Life game down from 88c CPU / 82c GPU to 60c CPU / 55c GPU which is a massive improvement.
Fan also a lot quieter and coming on less.
BUT ...... Battery life is still only 3 1/2 hours, and thats just browing in firefox or typing word documents. I know the 4K screen uses a lot more battery, but some people on here are still getting 6 hours.

Any ideas ?, not sure what else I can change, my battery full charge capacity is 95,851mWh, so only slightly down.

Many Thanks

Redskins1791

 

When you say you disabled "C stats" in the BIOS, what exactly do you mean? That sounds suspiciously like "C states" which the CPU uses to save power. If you disable those, the battery life should indeed be low.

 

Enable C-states back and you'll notice massive battery improvement.
(BTW: it looks like you read those pages not carefully ... )

All things you consider to improve performance - decrease battery life. Just find proper compromise or just switch profiles when you want better battery or performance...
I was able to achieve 9.5h on battery by all software tweaks @25% brightness.

 

Well, has anyone actually used that on a XPS15 and got it working? Have tried several supposed-to-work solutions but neither has worked IRL. Closest was probably WinMagic SecureDoc but never actually got it to work reliable.

 

- Disabling c states is typically done to have CPU run full throttle all the time. That is not exactly what happens with the XPS, but that is a good way to consume power and kill your battery.

- Uncle Webb, the developer of ThrottleStop software, believes that best laptop battery life often is with SpeedShift enabled (EPP=255 or 100%). Using SpeedShift you should probably have the turbo enabled and Windows Power Options at "High Performance".

http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/dell-xps-speed-shift.796891/
_______________

==> Reenable c states in BIOS

==> Try SpeedShift (EPP=255)

==> Go to Dell Command-power manager (thermal management tab) and choose a setting. Maybe quiet for less fan action

==> Consider a repaste of CPU & GPU to reduce thermals and consequently reduce fan action

 

Thanks for the advice, I have now enabled c states again in the bios and will try speedshift and see what battery life I get.

I think your right, after 231 pages my reading wasnt as careful as it should have been lol

 

These settings could also affect DPC. I'm currently running with all disabled to test, but will try to switch then on soon and see what difference they make in that regard.

 

When using speedshift at 255, the CPU will (almost) never hit full speed, thus affecting performance.
I would suggest setting it at 102. That way you get full performance (when needed ofcourse) with 1, 2, 3 and 4 cores running at max turbo speed.

 

For example my EPP values in ThrottleStop profiles look like this (after some time of tweaking):

1. Performance - 32
2. Normal on AC - 112
3. Normal on battery - 160
4. Power saver - 240

and undervolting by -130mV.

 

My 9560 has HDD and SATA passwords . I have used it and it works fine on both the HDD and M2. The only issue i have faced is when you resume from standby it asks for password only for the boot drives skipping the secondary drive which won't be accessible . I don't understand why people keep mentioning the BIOS does not include HDD password option. I have a confusion if the HDD password is just an AT password or it enables the SED feature of the drive ? What about drives that support HDD password but not SED , is there any way to check this?

TPM also works fine. @Gonzon My Crucial MX300 M2 supports IEEE-1667 and Opal 2.0 . Does that mean hardware encryption is used. Is there any way to check ? My second HDD is not SED . bde status shows the same remark for each drive.

 

It would be interesting to get a pic up of your BIOS screen where you set the HDD password (not the bit where you enter it each boot/power on) as I have no option that I can see???
A system password otoh isn't a HDD password and is often confused with a HDD password meaning me taking your drive out could mean I can see all your data. All I have is a BIOS and system password option.

To check if bitlocker is working it may not ask for a password once windows starts to boot unless specified in group policy, bitlocker isn't the BIOS style password though it will be against a blue background stating bitlocker?
Anyway back to checking, via an elevated command prompt type

manage-bde -status c:

Replace the c: with the drive you want to check, the results will have an "Encryption method" this will state hardware if in use.

Paste up the results plz.

 

http://imgur.com/a/w0VYp I have disabled the HDD passwords momentarily since i was planning for a BIOS update. Now i am worried if the option will vanish.

It shows TPM in use along with a numerical password but the message is same if done on a drive with no SED. I am resizing few partitions so it is disabled for now

 

Bloody hell, how come you have those and I don't?
Secure boot on/off legacy mode?

 

Asking myself the same thing, I have searched MANY times for it and it just isn't there in my BIOS.

 

Never seen it in older BIOS either, got another 9560 due in this morning for an upgrade, I expect it is on an older BIOS so I will check that with it's stock drive.
Nevermind, I see it is showing a password option for Sata drives, no mention of NVMe, I guess it doesn't support NVMe based passwords due a dell oversight no doubt?

 

This explains why, taken from intel forums

 

Last night I noticed a somewhat strange behaviour of my fans.

They start spinning while on battery with the CPU <10% load and temps be 39-50c. However, if I go to Power Manager and press "Optimise" or "Quite" they will stop spinning. It is as if the fan table is being overwritten.

 

What SSD do you have?

 

Sata ones hence the password option. He even stated what make the main boot drive is

 

Would be interesting to know if the Precision line had support for this on NVMe drives as well, have the impression that they have a more "company oriented" BIOS but could be wrong.

 

I got lucky with dell quality control . A lot of energy went into purchasing this laptop

Are the cache drive PCIE , the ones included in the HDD configuration ? afaik , the options were there with the cache drive too.

Right now i am using Crucial MX300 M2 SATA 1TB + Seagate SSHD 2TB no SED

 

Neither drive is NVMe just one is m.2 fitting, as they are both sata they support HDD password and no I cannot see the precision range having an nvme password after reading the link earlier.

 

Hey guys I've been keeping up with the last couple pages and some great info. someone mentioned their battery. I had my 9560 out of the box read the battery was at 89% capacity and it didn't change for a week. Ide accept lower single digits personally. I asked dell to replace it which they did after some prodding. A week later my HDD fails so they replaced that with a crappy sandisk 512ssd so asked them to give me the SM961 that shipped with the laptop and am now getting that tomorrow. So hoping to have plain sailing after that. All very politely without being a prick about it ofcourse . Loving this thing otherwise, certainly a powerhouse and that screen is just unbeatable. I'm now thinking I should extend my warranty another year for the extra $300, what do you think?

 

Argue with them on the price for the warranty. I did an extra year of warranty for $80 even after purchase.

 

Wowsers! That's a huge saving....I'll def give it a go! Ty

 

$300 for a year extension sounds too much . you could get a decent full hd i3 laptop for $350. I paid $260 for 3 year premium extension but that was with the laptop purchase.

 

Ask for a discount, but definitely add another year or two. It is absurd that Dell provides only a single year of warranty on a such expensive machine. Especially, as a European, I got used to two years warranty be a "standard".

 

I currently have the 9550 and the touchpad is raised about 1/8 of an inch (probably because of battery swelling according to some posts online). The MS Store (I have MS complete) offered me to exchange for any laptop I want, however, the only laptop at the MS store that has similar specs is the 9560 but is out-of-stock.

Two questions:
1) Any signs of touchpad problems with the 9560?
2) Any one knows how often MS restocks the Dells? It has been out of stock for a few days now. MS is telling me to keep calling/checking. Zero guidance.

I really like the laptop minus the hardware problems I had (failed soundcard (got a replacement) and now the touchpad issue).

 

http://www.dell.com/support/home/us...-15-9560-laptop&languageCode=en&categoryId=BI

Dell XPS 15 9560 BIOS v 1.3.3

Fixes & Enhancements
Updated Intel ME Firmware to address security advisory CVE-2017-5689 / INTEL-SA-00075"

 

Anybody having problems with the XPS 15 9560 not reliably turning-on (cold boot)?

Received in March, updated to latest BIOS and drivers as-of 5/11/2017. i7, 256Gb SSD, 8GbRAM, basic LCD (not touch-screen). Factory config (no mods).

Symptoms: Pressing power button illuminates power button for maybe 30 seconds, but *nothing* else happens (nothing on LCD). After waiting a while (hours?), it boots normally. Does not matter if power-adapter is plugged-in, or how long power-button is pressed.

 

Have you tried a bios reset?

Sent from my SM-G920F using Tapatalk

 

I've owned the 9560 for about three months now and literally just had this problem for the first time this morning. Was freaking out, but after like the 10th attempt... it just turned on. Not sure what the issue is here either. I've done no updates recently.

 

No, but I will; thanks! Daughter is using it for work; probably can't try for 1-2 days. Will reset as part of updating to the 1.3.3 BIOS, which fixes that *nasty* Intel bug being reported on recently. I checked my other PCs, but my daughter's 9560 is the first here to pop-up having the Intel bug.

Thanks! I really - really - don't want to have Larry, Curley, Moe and Shep doing a complete tear-down to replace parts (probably refurb parts). I'm at about 42 days (past 30-day return period). I mentioned to Dell that the problem started after she had it about 3 days, but because of full-time work, school and job-hunting, there was not time for her to part with laptop. Will call Dell Customer Care Monday, but not holding my breath...

 

To be clear, we didn't notify Dell until after the 30 days expired (in spite of having problems about 3 days out). An *expensive* mistake, but her stress levels were so high, I just couldn't add to it at the time.

I suspect with all the high-tech (and fast) parts in this laptop, timing tolerances are extremely tight, and stray capacitance ("flea power") are becoming more of an issue. I've had more reliability from my i5 laptops, with crummy battery-life. Heavy, and tied to power-adapters, but reliable!

 

Just wana share my experience concerning Dell PremierColor.
When switch gamut in this app - nothing happen. Until I reset all color profiles from monitor settings.
To do so open display settings -> color management -> select Generic PnP Monitor -> press Profiles button -> choose Reset my settings to system defaults.
After mentioned manipulations everything start working. (PremierColor now able to change not only contrast/brightness but also color gamut)

 

Update to BIOS 1.3.3 from 1.2.4 has been smooth on my XPS 9560 i7 - 16GB - 512GB Samsung PM961 - FHD.

 

After a long wait and multiple mail exchanges since March 27th trying to explain them why it's not fair to sell some unit with the XG4 and some with the PM961 at the same price and after their "experts are done doing tests to confirm the performance difference between those SSDs", today which is May 15th I received a PM951 (****tier than the XG4) because the PM961 was out of stock...

 

Well that sucks!
Waiting for the price of the 1TB SM961 to go down further to the 350 region (a pretty long wait lol) before I upgrade this lite on dell gave me,

Sent from my ONEPLUS A3000 using Tapatalk

 

Mine shipped with a sm961 (luck of the draw by the sounds) i told them ide wait when it failed as there are considerable speed differences between the crappy san disk they sent me as a replacement. Now I have a pm961 but that'll do and I only had to wait a week. So if you can wait ask them for the Samsung ?

 

Anything new guys? I haven't been here in awhile... lots of changes happening in my life lately...
For starters. Lost my job last month. Got laid off... so I've been working on securing a new job, which I have and I'm starting at the end of the month...woohoo! On top of that, finished up my grad class before the end of the semester. Just got over a 3 week illness also. So yea, working on my laptop has taken the back burner on my list of priorities.

I've been gaming in BF1 lately since class is over. Laptop is holding steady at a +250 memory overclock and +120 core which gets me about 1820-1844MHz on the core when gaming. Temps are alright on the cooling pad, maxes out around 74C on the CPU and GPU with that overclock. I've locked in my battery changing to stop at 92% for battery life purposes. I'd say I still have a modest 6-7hours of battery life with a half screen brightness. Did some driver updates over the past few days. No issues and the laptop is working great. Really pleased how well its working gaming in BF1. With graphics on medium I get a solid 60fps steady.

 

Hi Vas, can you explain that further? How do you checked that color gamut is changing? I hit "Reset my settings" but still not able to see any difference when clicking sRGB or aRGB on PremierColor. I checked that by looking at a picture open with photo viewer since others like Chrome are color managed. Maybe Windows Photo Viewer is color managed too?

Or by changing color gamut you just meant that the profile in Windows color management changes? I.E: is it automatically set to the "Native" profile that I see on your picture when PremierColor is set to use Vibrant(Full) (and to the aRGB 6500 profile when you set that Photo(AdobeRGB) on PremierColor and so forth).

Also do you know what the "Device Color" in the "Windows Color System Default" of the Advance Tab does? Should I changed to the profile used in the device or leave it to the default sRGB?

Thanks

 

Open dell premiercolor app and try to change between sRGB and AdobeRGB profiles... you could notice huge difference in green area (green become a lot more warmer and more like young leafs), and a bit less but still noticeable difference in red and blue area. if you don't see it - then you still not able to change profile.

PS: I just checked scenario mentioned by me few posts earlier and found that it doesn't work for me either...
But after I went to intel color management, slide and back color-gamut slider - premiercolor app start to work properly too.
Wish to find proper settings to make it work permanently.

 

Hi Van, thanks again but I am not sure if I understand there. What Intel Color Management setting are you referring? I opened the Intel HD Graphics control panel and in Color Settings I see Brightness/Contrast/Hue/Saturation, but not a color-gamut slider. Where did you find that?

 

Here it is... see attachment

 

Hehe, I haven't got this slider on the 9550 with the latest Intel video driver.
An I recall there used to be one gamma slider here, which has disappeared or been renamed.

 

Make sure you chosen proper display ... if you run multiple displays it might show this slider for one display and hide for another.