Alienware Aurora R16 BIOS Update Version 2.8.0 Discussion

The release notes say:  This release contains security updates as disclosed in the Dell Security Advisories DSA-2024-231 and DSA-2024-243

So unless it contains other undisclosed updates, I am assuming this does not improve the stability issues described in various other threads?

If it is supposed to improve system stability compared to previous BIOS version, it would be good to know as the BIOS change log is numb on that subject matter. There's several other threads on this board about the R16 instability issues...

We cannot speculate on anything other than what it actually states =

This release contains security updates as disclosed in the Dell Security Advisories DSA-2024-231 and DSA-2024-243.

Users will have to install it and test. Then post the results.

That was the point I was trying to make. I don't see anyone testing the security updates...

I looked at the security database for the Aurora R16 and cannot find the security advisory information in it for the 2 mentioned security advisories? Always possible I missed them, but I checked for a bit.

I think it's extremely difficult to determine the impact of the update, without knowing what is expected to have been improved. 

Hopefully we get some responses from those who had issues before.

@Vanadiel​ I've checked some other threads regarding the instability of the R16 configured with the highend 13th, 14th gen Intel CPUs (got the 14900KF myself). Got my system in May and while it comes with some small issues that never got resolved namely - Device Manager having constant errors on "Metadata Staging Failed". Despite my best efforts to manually update all available drivers and BIOS from Dell and hardware manufacturers, I still do not know which device is causing the issue.

The system itself did not have much stability issues however, ran CPU burn-in and GPU burn-in and it was relatively stable. However, since about 2 or 3 weeks ago, it start to go downhill starting with system stutters just browsing web, and eventually got worse that now my system will BSOD randomly with various different errors several times to several dozen times a day.

These hard lockups did not just happen in Windows, though I still tried the longshot of doing a "Windows Reset", obviously, it didn't help in the end. Since then, I have swapped the SSD just to rule out the possibility of a faulty SSD, turns out problem still persisted.

I have hence downgraded the BIOS from 2.8.0 back to 2.7.0 which at first, I suspected was the culprit since problem started showing when I upgraded the BIOS few weeks ago when 2.8.0 was released. That, still did not help and problem persisted.

I'm now running a full Memtest86+ passes to just rule out RAM issue, was hoping it "is" going to be the RAM, but so far, it passes with no errors which is disappointing, though it's still running and I plan to have it run for as long as possible, say at least 12 hours at least.

If the RAM is not the problem, then I'd conclude the problem lies with either the CPU or Motherboard component(s), which I hope isn't the case, but that'd mean I'd probably have to go through the back and forth of mainboard/cpu replacements or eventually a pathway to refund, which I hope it doesn't come to.

This is my first Alienware system, I have to say I'm pretty disappointed at this stage.

Due to my experience above, it means it's highly unlikely BIOS 2.8.0 was to address any CPU stability issues that you've linked earlier. I'm also pessimistic about the upcoming July 19th Fix as Intel stated themselves that it was only a discovered as a separate issue and not the main cause which is still under investigation. 

Regards,

*Currently Very Sad*

@Moggiato​ This was pretty much my troubleshooting path the past few months after getting my first Alienware system with the 14900KF/4090/64GB config. Also tried reseating the video card, uninstalling video drivers and installing only the Dell-branded NVIDIA card drivers. Only hardware I added was an additional 4TB SSD, removing had no bearing.

On BIOS 2.8.0 now and crashes still persist. Only by turning off SpeedStep, SureStep, and disabling OC will the crashes stop, but pauses while playing WoW persist, and the performance feels like the Sandy Bridge 2600K I replaced buying this system. Lowering graphic settings helps WoW play a bit smoother, but come on, I didn't pay almost $4000 for a system that is only functional if I lower performance. 

I decided to be lazy and figured buying an Alienware would be a good fit. I don't really power tweak systems, so I thought buying this would give me a viable system for at least the next 4-5 years. Whelp......

I've made a post earlier this year about having issue where games crash on random. My solution to this was disabling intel speedstep and speed shift in BIOS which worked, but it is not a permanent solution! Few weeks ago I enabled back these 2 in BIOS and switched to balanced mode in alienware command centre and I have noticed improvement ONLY for crashes. These would happen very rarely, which was great I can play with better FPS. However if I enable to performance mode Im back at the start of my post - crash on random many times per day. 

After the latest BIOS update Balanced or Quiet mode in alienware command centre does not help and I experience crashes more frequent again. Therefore in my opinion this update only worsened the issue I have had since purchase.

I have disabled again intel speedstep and speed shift in BIOS.

@mazhy​

This issue is unrelated to the BIOS update and will not be resolved by updating it.

Please contact tech support by clicking on Get Help Now for troubleshooting assistance.

the game called Tomb Raider Game of the Year Edition under Epic games store had crashed on me, while she was climbing up between the rocks to get to the top, after the men had set the building on fire, after she jumps down and keeps going up the mountain, in this part of the game, it first had locked up on me, so I exited the game, when I reloaded my save and tried to go up it again, the second time it had crashed with the message in a crash box with the text reading this "Tiger read request doesn't belong to this archive (was 102, expected 7)" 

Also note, I ran SupportAssist both on the dell.com website, and the app itself and all times the hardware gets passed for all stuff nothing fails on my hardware itself

Just some game errors, which some of which if it helps, I also filed Feedback Hub bug reports on under windows 11 if that helps or not. I know these pc do not come with windows 10 but do the games also crash under it, since on my gigabyte pc,

I can use a USB drive and go back to windows 10 from Windows 11, but I am not sure you can switch the OS on these Alienware pc, just wondering if the CPU if it crashes the games under windows 11 would it also do the same thing under Windows 10?

not really a fix but I was wondering, even though I know windows 10 is being discontinued in a few years if I am correct. Also I have used Windows 11 on my older desktop as an Insider, using the Preview Build of Windows 11 24h2 does these games also crash with the same message under it or does the newer build of windows help make this Intel i9 processor work correctly, I don't want to upgrade to a preview build of windows 11 but I was wondering, if these problems will be gone when they release the Windows 11 24h2 build of windows 11.

Since this is Windows 11 23h2 that the games are currently running under, or does the new builds fix any game crashes on these Alienware pc, has anyone tried Windows 24h2 yet does that fix these crashes I had reported here? again I think preview build is stable but I have not tried it with this pc, only my older desktop and current laptop I have windows 11 24h2 on them.

so, I don't know if it will work ok here if it keeps them from crashing on me, I think about upgrading to the preview build of windows 11 if its need or wait for the next bios upgrade to fix these bugs.


I do have the bios upgraded to 2.8.0 from 2.7.0



‎playing Tomb Raider Game of the year edition from epic games launcher, its getting an error, I checked verify files, all looks normal | DELL Technologies


I do not know if these errors are related to the CPU processor, or bios on this alienware. 

Game error in "Death Stranding" from epic games launcher  it had this error just once on this alienware pc Build : dso 206/2742586 17:50 - Thu Aug 04 2022 An Access Violation (C0000005h) has occurred in thread 'Background 1' at instruction location 000001EFF6151A10h Base: 0x00007FF719210000 CallStack : 1469040557   0. 0x00095250403E    ntdll.dll, 0x2B71403E   1. 0xFFFF81FA1CF41A10     RAX = f83fd798 RBX = f6151a10 RCX = f6151a10 RDX = f5ea1bd8 RSI = f5e98780 RDI = 88d23f0 R8 = f5e98780 R9 = 0 R10 = f83fd798 R11 = f6151a10 R12 = f6151a10 R13 = f5e98780 R14 = 86 R15 = 2920 RIP = f6151a10 RSP = 1cdf8b78 RBP = f79298b7 EFL = 10202   0. 0x7FF71AA7166E    DeathStranding.exe, 0x1AA7166E   1. 0x7FF71AA73572    DeathStranding.exe, 0x1AA73572   2. 0x7FF71AA73876    DeathStranding.exe, 0x1AA73876   3. 0x7FFF2B6E7F5A    ntdll.dll, 0x2B6E7F5A   4. 0x7FFF2B68E642    ntdll.dll, 0x2B68E642   5. 0x7FFF2B71403E    ntdll.dll, 0x2B71403E   6. 0x01EFF6151A10

| Dell USA

• Intel® Core™ i9 14900KF (68 MB cache, 24 cores, up to 6.0 GHz P-Core Thermal Velocity)

• Windows 11 Home, English, French, Spanish

• NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 4080 SUPER, 16 GB GDDR6X

• 32 GB: 2 x 16 GB, DDR5, 5600 MT/s

• 2 TB, M.2, PCIe NVMe, SSD

• 1000W Platinum Rated PSU, 240mm Liquid-Cooled CPU & Clear Side Panel

this also should be the same product, I think. something happened to that link I had bookmarked above.

Alienware R16 Gaming Desktop with Air Cooling & Liquid Cooling | Dell USA

Has there been a price increased since my dad got me this pc for my video games.

my post got a reply to this page from this below message to me about why the tomb raider game crash on me, but 
I did ask copilot about it

I asked it if it's related to the i9 CPU processor copilot told me the error has to do with this

The error message “Tiger read request doesn’t belong to this archive (was 102, expected 7)” in Tomb Raider Game of the Year Edition is typically related to file integrity issues rather than directly pointing to the CPU1. This error often occurs when the game files are corrupted or not properly installed12.
but I did check the Files verified them with epic games launcher, didn't find anything that needed to be redownloaded or fixed, so I think it's not related to a file integrity on this pc. below again was the reply that give me this page about it, I am not sure I was thinking it was related to the OEM Nvidia Drivers on my alienware but it sounds like it might not be, the windows 11 and the web access seems stable, no crashies besides the video game above, and the control video game only crashed on me since I tried to use nvidia new app, to download the offical nvidia drivers, which caused control from gog galaxy to crash in directx 12 mode on the offical nvidia drivers.

Vanadiel 6 Professor 0 July 26th, 2024 16:24 R16 issues with the latest BIOs file should go here. There are several threads on this forum about R16 crashes. If this is an Intel machine, pretty sure it is, Intel is aware of the CPU randomly crashing and working on a solution. However, you might not want to wait and instead opt for a return if you are still in your return window. That would of course be up to you.

Support for Alienware Aurora R16 | Diagnostics | Dell US

HARDWARE NAME CATEGORY RESULT ACTION Expand Intel(R) Wireless Bluetooth(R) Bluetooth PASSED Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-14900KF CPU PASSED CPU SF PUMP Fan Fan PASSED Rear Fan Fan PASSED Front Lower Fan Fan PASSED Top Fan 1 Fan PASSED Top Fan 2 Fan PASSED NVMe PM9F1 Samsung 2048GB HardDrive PASSED System Memory Memory PASSED Killer E3100G 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet Controller Network Card PASSED PCI SubSystem PCI Bus PASSED NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER Video Card PASSED Intel(R) Wi-Fi 6E AX210 160MHz Wireless Network Card PASSED Intel(R) Management Engine Interface #1 Communications Controller PASSED High Definition Audio Controller HDAudio Controller PASSED USB Root Hub (USB 3.0) Internal Hub PASSED Intel RST VMD Controller A77F Mass Storage Controller PASSED Intel(R) Shared SRAM - 7AA7 Memory Controller PASSED Intel RST VMD Managed Controller 09AB PCI PASSED Intel(R) GNA Scoring Accelerator module PCI PASSED Intel(R) SPI (flash) Controller - 7AA4 PCI PASSED Intel(R) Serial IO I2C Host Controller - 7ACC PCI PASSED PCI standard host CPU bridge PCI PASSED Intel(R) Innovation Platform Framework Processor Participant PCI PASSED USB Input Device PCI PASSED POWERPLAY PCI PASSED LIGHTSPEED Receiver PCI PASSED SteelSeries Apex 7 PCI PASSED Intel(R) PCI Express Root Port #8 - 7ABF PCI Bridge PASSED Intel(R) PCI Express Root Port #5 - 7ABC PCI Bridge PASSED Intel(R) PCIe RC 010 G5 - A70D PCI Bridge PASSED Intel(R) LPC Controller/eSPI Controller (Z690) - 7A84 PCI ISA Bridge PASSED PCIeStatus PCI Status PASSED Intel(R) SMBus - 7AA3 SM Bus Controller PASSED USB Attached SCSI (UAS) Mass Storage Device USB PASSED USB Input Device USB PASSED POWERPLAY USB Composite PASSED USB Composite Device USB Composite PASSED Intel(R) USB 3.20 eXtensible Host Controller - 1.20 (Microsoft) USB Controller PASSED UsbStatus USB Status PASSED

as you can see all the hardware passed its tests. I can wait for a fix if it is a problem with the CPU I think, since again the price of the pc, my dad paid for has gone up in price as its no longer priced the same as we paid for it, when I say we I mean my dad paid for it.

POWERPLAY	PCI	PASSED
LIGHTSPEED Receiver	PCI	PASSED
SteelSeries Apex 7	PCI	PASSED

these 3 items may not be common, as I own a Logitech wireless mouse and charging mouse pad, called powerplay  that I am using with my alienware pc.

 and my keyboard is the SteelSeries Apex 7 device. I also own a razer keyboard which I am using with my older desktop pc at home.

these are the games I own, that some of them I installed on my Alienware, do you know which games might crash on me besides the Tomb Raider game crashing which I was able to get passed that one error so far.


more epic games some games that I have installed on Epic Games launcher



Gog Galaxy games that I own are these in gog galaxy are these below, Control here didn't like the official NVidia driver on the Alienware so I did have to go back to the OEM version on the Nvidia RTX 4080 Super 3D card.



Ubisoft Connect games, I also own Far cry 4 but do not have it downloaded at this time


I do not have some of my EA games downloaded at this time. I use an external hard drive 2TB Samsung drive USB-C device for backup games, I have some of the EA games stored on my external hard drive, just not installed right now.



Star Wars on my external just not installed at this time, I do not know yet if their crashing bugs with this hardware for them. Dragon Age Inquisition, Mass Effect Legendary Edition and STAR WARS Squadrons I have download just not installed yet.

I think you created this topic twice here I found another page on the 2.8.0 Bios, I seen no posts on it. was that a mistake? 

3. How was the update done:

• Windows update

• Dell Command Update

• SupportAssist

• Directly from Web
  
  to answer that I would say I went into

  • Drivers and Downloads and downloaded the 2.8.0 bios then installed it manually, I was not prompted by SupportAssist to apply it to my 2.7.0 Bios that the Alienware aurora r16 came with. I run from windows 11 myself and let it update and reboot my pc.

‎Alienware Aurora R16 BIOS Update Version 2.8.0 Discussion | DELL Technologies




I normally trust that if a bios update is listed its going to be more stable than the current version, I don't know if that's a mistake on my part to think that way or if that is always the case and true, I had updated my z690 AORUS master bios to the last version they released, I always hope they test the Bios updates and that they do make the desktop more stable than less, but it's just my way of thinking if it says its Critical as the wording is that its going to be good for my system to have the update bios installed, I have never had a bios fail to update yet, but I don't know if that just luck or good to update it, I guess if its needed, and keep the system working well for gaming then its fine, but that's my thoughts on it in any case.

Well, it's been a rollercoaster.  I've been going through a LOT of issues with my R16, it's been 2 months since I ordered it and it's only started working today. 
And that was only because an engineer was here today to replace the mobo, memory. 
I've had so many issues, I asked for a senior tech, and when he turned up and unrolled his antistatic mat and got an anti static wrist strap on, I thought "thank goodness".   Soon as he opened the PC, he noticed the gfx card wasn't seated right.  Ok, well, whatever.  took everything out, swapped the mobo as the original error I had was the 2 orange, 4 blue lights.   Machine came back up, and as he was packing up, we noticed the new mobo came with 2.5.0 "before you go..." "sure, let me run the bios check to keep people happy, and as it's booting into windows I'll finish packing up".  First thing we did, fresh install of windows on a new nvme drive (so thank full for all this), it bricked the memory.    No idea why/how, did the Dell Support util, it didn't offer us 2.9.0, but 2.8.0, installed, rebooted, appeared to go in fine, but it trashed a memory stick.   Got new one being sent to be popped in, but, there appears to be be an issue with 2.8.0. 
My spec, i9 14th gen, 64 gb of ram (2 x 32gb of course).   

If ALL the problems I've been having with these machines have been borked Bios updates, ugh.    

I'm so incredibly thankful the tech was here, did it, saw everything going in, nothing odd, on a fresh Win11 install with zero other apps, and it bust in front of him.   If he'd have left, and I applied the update 2 minutes after he left, I'm not sure Dell wouldn't have thought I was trying to scam them somehow.   2 machines, 3 motherboards, errr... 4 memory sticks.  And it was the 2.8.0 bios update killing them. (in some circumstances, the very first machine I got it had memory issues on the very first boot).

Ok, very strange.  Machine turned up with 2.5.0 bios, flashing 2.8.0 caused memory errors.  New memory just arrived, I've put it in, and it's still having problems.   Is it possible a bios update can fry a memory controller?  Machine's dead again if I fill both slots.   This is the 2nd mobo replacement, flashing the brand new 2.1 today didn't bring it back (wondered if it was just that bios that needed to be updated to do something for the controller). 
But no, flashing 2.8.0 bricked my machine, luckily in front of the technician.