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XPS 9300 reducing speed when battery drops below 15%?
Hello
Is it possible that the XPS13 9300 is reducing CPU speed when the battery level falls below 15%? I notice a strong drop in performance around that mark which affects usability. Is there a way to disable this behaviour? Since the 9300 doesn't last a full working day on a charge anyway, I don't mind so much that I have to charge it faster, but I'd prefer if it maintain full speed throughout.
Cheers
jphughan
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14K Posts
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May 13th, 2020 10:00
@fiskjavel Even assuming the underlying cause is as you suspect, if you're actually thinking someone from Dell might pop into this thread and make an official statement saying, "We confirm that this is firmware-enforced behavior, that this is by design, and that we have no plans to allow this to be customized," then don't hold your breath. First of all, these forums are primarily for user-to-user support, which means very few statements of any kind are made here by official Dell reps. And even Dell reps practically never post anything that could be characterized as an "official statement" or a policy of some kind, except maybe to link to some other KB article, press release, etc. Dell reps here typically try to provide basic troubleshooting and purchasing advice, although even the suggestions and information they provide in those capacities aren't always reliable. And lastly, from a purely pragmatic standpoint, I'm surprised you think it's realistic to think that Dell might make a statement that would serve as a "warning to potential buyers". Even if it would be nice if companies did that, I don't know of too many companies that make official statements to warn/discourage people from buying their products.
fiskjavel
17 Posts
1
May 13th, 2020 10:00
Well; what else you going to do if you just dropped 2000 on a machine and find it behaves in a way you've not come to expect from Dell. At least I try. I really don't need you to tell you how high my hopes should get. I'm looking for agreement, similar user experiences, and potential workarounds. Not a lecture.
Brunni132
5 Posts
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June 28th, 2020 17:00
I have the same problem, except that it's already reducing the performance significantly at around 70%, and continues to reduce as the battery depletes. It's even worse if you plug in an USB device such as a mouse, where an additional 5 watts are removed from the CPU budget.
Have you managed to go anywhere with this @fiskjavel ? I think that's a pretty huge issue. Why would you buy an expensive computer with the best ultrabook CPU on the market, when it basically behaves like a netbook for 2/3 of the battery life? What's the point of an ultraportable computer with huge battery life when it's only really usable on AC?
Ferrarista
6 Posts
0
September 5th, 2020 12:00
Same problem here. I disabled any possible energy saving option of my 9300 but still it is running quite slow when on battery (whatever is the level of charge). I launched a CPU stress software and the CPU clock frequency is dropping when I disconnect the power cable.
iniy
6 Posts
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September 6th, 2020 10:00
I can confirm, on windows 10.
When reaching 15%, everything slows down significantly. Tried changing power plan, even setting power mode to best performance - no difference.
Ferrarista
6 Posts
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October 9th, 2020 07:00
Also my problem is still there. Whenever I disconnect the power cable, the performance drops significantly. I have tried changing all the power options, but I guess we might need a BIOS update to solve it.
DELL-Cares
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October 17th, 2020 05:00
We have troubleshot the issue and we are suspecting it to be a software related issue. It is mandatory to perform this step.
Dell-Deepti
Ferrarista
6 Posts
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October 17th, 2020 05:00
After my post I've been contacted by the support service. They have told me to try any possible test with no results. The last test they've suggested is to restore the factory settings. Has anybody tried that, so that it can be excluded? I think it is clearly due to the BIOS.
DELL-Jesse L
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October 23rd, 2020 08:00
DELL-Jesse L
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October 29th, 2020 04:00
criskoe
14 Posts
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November 1st, 2020 19:00
So I also have noticed the same behavior on a brand new 9310.
It seems that as the battery level gets low the performance drops with it. The strange weird part is that this behavior is also present with the charge plugged in. How I noticed this was that when the battery was low the device seemed sluggish.. I double checked and made sure all power saving features were off and they were. And when I plugged in the device I still noticed it was sluggish.. So Upon googling xps 13 lower performance on low battery I found this thread.
I decided to do some of my own testing regarding this and I have found some interesting results. I tested the impact of low battery on both battery mode and plugged in mode.
For all tests the "Ultra Performance" mode was used in the Dell Power App. The standard "Dell" Power profile was selected in the windows 10 power plan. And the Power mode selected via the power slider on the task bar was set to Best performance for all the tests.
I ran Cinebench R20 at different battery level intervals on both battery and plugged in.
I recorded CPU wattage at three different points.
First at the start of the test = Peak W
Second at the halfway point of the test = Mid W
Third just at the end of the test = Min W
I also recorded the R20 Score that corresponded with the Test.
What I found is that during battery in order to get max performance the battery needs to be over 50% charge. And as the battery drops the performance lowers. And when you get low the performance becomes horrible!
**On Battery**
100-50% lvl = Full Performance
50-25% lvl = Small Performance Hit.
25-20% lvl = Med Performance Hit
20-15% lvl = Big Performance Hit
15-0% lvl = Massive Performance Hit.
Now for the the bad part... This behavior is also seen even when the charger is connected. Its not as bad but it still is clearly present at lower battery levels. This I don't understand.. So if you battery is low and you connect the charge. You not getting the best performance until the battery gets to a certain level.
**On Charger**
100-30% lvl = Full Performance
30-25% lvl = Small Performance Hit
25-0% lvl = Big Performance Hit
So basically I have found that connected to the charger that you performance is throttled until you get at least 25% charge.
Again I have no power saving features enabled. All tests the Ultra Performance mode was used in the Dell Power App. The standard Dell Power profile was selected in the windows 10 power plan. And the Power mode selected via the power slider on the task bar was set to Best performance for all the tests. And the automatic battery saver is set to NEVER and is disabled in the battery saver section of the control panel. This is a brand new fresh laptop. So yeah..
Not sure what's going on here. If its a background windows power saving power setting hidden away built into the operating system. Or this is programed directly into the firmware of this XPS 13 9310. Seems that as the battery gets lower it is automatically limiting the wattage to the cpu...
Here are the actual numbers I recorded..
**On Battery**
Charge LVL -5% Peak -9W Mid -8W Min -8W = CB R20 Score: 775 Bad!
Charge LVL -9% Peak -9W Mid -8W Min -8W = CB R20 Score: 773 Bad!
Charge LVL -14% Peak -15W Mid -12W Min -10W = CB R20 Score: 1121 Not Good!
Charge LVL -19% Peak -15W Mid -15W Min -15W = CB R20 Score: 1350 Low
Charge LVL -25% Peak -20W Mid -20W Min -20W = CB R20 Score: 1750 Better
Charge LVL -35% Peak -25W Mid -23W Min -23W = CB R20 Score: 1895 Good
Charge LVL -50% Peak -30W Mid -23W Min -23W = CB R20 Score: 1955 Best.
**On Charger**
Charge LVL -5% Peak -15W Mid -15W Min -15W = CB R20 Score: 1450 Low
Charge LVL -10% Peak -15W Mid -15W Min -15W = CB R20 Score: 1464 Low
Charge LVL -14% Peak -15W Mid -15W Min -15W = CB R20 Score: 1460 Low
Charge LVL -20% Peak -25W Mid -15W Min -15W = CB R20 Score: 1475 Low
Charge LVL -26% Peak -45W Mid -28W Min -21W = CB R20 Score: 1970 Good
Charge LVL -31% Peak -52W Mid -28W Min -25W = CB R20 Score: 2149 Best
Why I did all this. I don't know. LOL. I guess I really just wanted to understand the behavior. Im trying to decide if I want to keep this device and if its for me. I do really wish that these newer devices still allowed better control over this stuff for advanced users. The Dell Power Manager is OK I guess but it would be much much better if each profile could be adjusted. Its really lame all this stuff is locked down. Also a huge pain that windows has completely removed so many power option settings with the newer 2004 version of windows. And with undervolting and boost limits locked and cannot be adjusted its lame. I don't know. I really hate not being able to control my power plans to my liking. And am stuck using what someone else thinks is best. And between dells power plan and windows removing normal power plans its locked down. At this point I don't even know if adjusting the power slider in windows taskbar actually does anything. Cause in other tests I have run I've tried to adjust the slider between tests and it doesn't seem to do anything to performance results. Other then the Dell Silent profile I don't know how to even put the device into ultra battery saving mode if I wanted to. Like how can I force it to go into what its doing above at very low battery levels???? This would be great if this could be forced to give absolute BEST battery performance.. "IF" I WANTED! Anyone know how? If this IS a firmware thing, Dell can you make this crazy performance throttling a OPTION??? And not force it when you think is best????
criskoe
14 Posts
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November 1st, 2020 20:00
Sorry What do you mean by "Clean Boot"?
This is brand new... All drivers updated via Dell Update and the most recent firmware bios. No programs installed.
DELL-Cares
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25.5K Posts
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November 1st, 2020 20:00
Thanks for sharing your finding.
We appreciate your time and effort.
Have you tried clean boot to see if that help?
fkubrick
20 Posts
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November 16th, 2020 09:00
I can confirm I'm seeing exactly the same behavior, when the battery drops below 20% it's not even possible to watch a movie, this needs to be fixed.
It's like clockwork, "clean boot" as you say, no app running in the background, always reproducible.
Ferrarista
6 Posts
1
December 1st, 2020 02:00
After being contacted by Dell Support and tried all the possible fixes, even from DELL, they admitted that the BIOS of the XPS 13 9300 is designed this way with the purpose of making battery life longer. I wouldn't expect a firmware fix of this problem in the future, then.