Dell,offers up-rated power adapters to close the Studio Throttlegate

Just read this on Engadget! do not know if this has been posted yet! Hope this helps someone!

Dell finally makes right, offers up-rated power adapters to close the Studio Throttlegate -- Engadget

" It's taken a long time, too long by most accounts, but Dell finally has what looks to be a proper, honest to gosh fix for the CPU throttling issues that have been plaguing some of its Studio laptops. Users were reporting that the machines, when faced with slightly elevated temperatures, would throttle themselves back by up to 95 percent, leaving some folks with 100MHz paperweights. Dell issued a firmware update quickly after we shed a little light on the situation back in December, a "fix" that helped some but, apparently, not all. We're just now hearing that the company apparently launched a program back in February to replace the stock 90 watt power adapters with more capable 130 watt models for anyone suffering this affliction. "

 

Looks like it only applies to Studio XPS 1645

 

Why is this not being offered to 1557 owners or indeed any Dell laptop user with the i7 CPU and 90 Watt PSU combination? If it fixes the problem for the XPS 1645 with an updated bios, which in effect allows the CPU to draw more current and a higher rated PSU to supply this extra power then the same should be true for the other models using the same i7 CPU/ 90 watt PSU combinations. We could all then have the benefit of our i7 CPU’s being able to be run at their full potential, appears obvious to me.

 

Does this problem only exist on i7 CPUs?

 

No, this problem also exists in the XPS 1640 line and all they have are Core 2 CPUs. Even some of the low watt CPUs still throttle when you try to push both the CPU and the GPU at the same time such as when trying to play a game. This problem can be found pretty much anywhere in the Dell laptop line up during the last 2 years. A half baked fix for a few throttling Dells does not fix all the other Dells that throttle. Check the forums here on NBR. There are still lots of XPS 1645 owners with the new and improved 130 watt adapter and updated bios and they still have lots of throttling issues. Nothing has been truly fixed.

That's a nice way to "close" the studio throttlegate problem. Just come out with a press release and say that's all we're going to do with this model, tough luck.

 

I just got a replacement 130W PSU for my Studio 17, so it's not just available for/applies to the 1645. It took a couple of tedious calls to tech support (in India?), since they sent me another 90W adapter first!

 

Yes, but as I understand you also require a specific bios update (only released by Dell to certain models) to fully take advantage of the extra power available from the 130 W PSU.

Quote from Dell “Additionally, as this BIOS update allows additional power to be drawn from a higher-rated AC adapter, we can send to you, free of charge, an upgraded adaptor (130w) to help protect against degraded performance.”

 

I tried to get it for my studio 1558 and I was told it would damage the motherboard and is not compatible with it.. makes sense coz i guess the BIOS needs to be updated otherwise it'll simply say power adapter not recognized on boot up..

After explaining everythin bout my throttling issues n that it occurs only while playing games i was told either to contact the game vendor or Dell special expert support which is a paid service!!

My God! Why cant they just accept that their laptops are not cooled well!!