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XPS 8900 slow boot time
I am seeing slow boot time on my XPS 8900 desktop (Skylake Core i7). The desktop is booting off an M.2 Solid State Drive (the only drive) and boots into Windows 10. The total boot time (from cold start to Windows login prompt) is about 19 seconds of which 14 seconds is taken by the BIOS - verified by the startup page in the Windows Task Manager as well. Changing the POST behavior in the BIOS setting to minimal, thorough or auto does not change the boot time. Looks like that part of the BIOS is not working and needs to be fixed.
For comparison, a one year old non-Dell, Core i3 with American Megatrends UEFI BIOS from 2013, fast booting enabled, booting from an older solid state drive into Windows 10 takes about 4 seconds. The startup page of the Windows task manager shows that the BIOS takes 1.4 seconds to boot.
Dell XPS 8900 | Older Machine | |
Processor | Skylake Core i7 | Older Core i3 |
Boot Device | M.2 SSD | Older SATA SSD |
Boot Type | UEFI | UEFI |
BIOS | Dell | American Megatrends from 2013 |
Fast Boot | Yes | Yes |
BIOS Boot Time | 14 seconds | 1.5 seconds |
Total Boot Time | 28 seconds | 4 seconds |
Any suggestions on how to improve the boot time will be appreciated.
smkreddy
7 Posts
1
November 14th, 2015 14:00
Thanks for the response. I was hoping that Dell would fix this but doesn't appear that it is high on their radar. I have contacted support about this as well. Will update this thread if that leads to something.
Dan-H
1.2K Posts
0
November 14th, 2015 14:00
Same problem with 8700 after one of the BIOS updates around A06.
To work around this, I put the desktops to sleep (not hibernate) and and reboot weekly or so.
Dan-H
1.2K Posts
1
November 14th, 2015 15:00
I would not hold my breath waiting for dell to improve this.
It took a long time for dell to update BIOS to get it to work with GTX 9xx class video cards and there was a huge uproar.
The thing is, once you use retail hardware (vs OEM hardware) that has competition (eg Gigabyte, ASUS, EVGA ) you will start to see the Niche that Dell plays in, and most buyers don't know what they are missing.
It is unfortunate that Dell doesn't improve their BIOS because their hardware choices are decent and middle of the road and at the price point of an 8900 it could be much, much better if their software was better.
pea1052nut
121 Posts
0
November 15th, 2015 07:00
Your 8700 should be A10
Dan-H
1.2K Posts
0
November 15th, 2015 09:00
blitzkrieg79
1 Message
1
December 4th, 2015 11:00
Hello,
Few days ago I have received an XPS 8900 but with a regular (non-SSD) 1 GB hard drive and I have actually timed the total boot time (from machine being turned off, to Windows 7 log in screen) and it takes a total of 48 seconds which seems to be rather slow.
smkreddy
7 Posts
0
December 4th, 2015 17:00
An update: After spending several hours with Dell support, there was no progress on the issue. Since it was a new system, I was able to exchange it for another XPS 8900. The second one had the same issue as well. So, it was not specific to my original XPS 8900 (as Dan-H mentioned earlier). The other desktop I was comparing the boot times to in my earlier post is an HP Pavilion 500-200t (a low end model) and it is surprising that Dell wouldn't fix the issue. I wonder if HP advertising how much quicker their desktops boot up in comparison to Dell's would do the trick :-)
smkreddy
7 Posts
0
December 4th, 2015 19:00
That does sound rather slow. However, I have not time the boot times with the hard drive that came with the desktop (non-ssd). So, can't comment on that. I am not sure if there is anything in Windows 7 that would provide how long the BIOS is taking to boot. In Windows 10, that information is on the "startup" page of the task manager.
joosujin
21 Posts
0
April 14th, 2016 14:00
I have XPS 8900 with Windows 10 and BIOS v2.1.3. It takes 115 seconds to boot... There seems to be nothing that I can do but to wait for a new BIOS release.
joosujin
21 Posts
0
April 14th, 2016 15:00
I have just found out that my external hard drive was the cause! After disconnecting the drive, it takes 14 sec to boot.
metamorphosis
121 Posts
0
April 14th, 2016 18:00
I recently upgraded my XPS 8900 by adding a EVGA 650 G2 power supply. It did not increase the boot time, nor did I expect it too. I also tried upgrading my memory from 8 GB to 16 GB. It did not increase the boot time from the time I push the power button to login or from login to desktop. I am using a Samsung 850 EVO SSD. I am satisfied with the boot times and the general speed of the computer. But I am disappointed that it is not much faster than my XPS 8300. Both computers are using SSD's. I don't game, and use my computer mainly for word processing and the internet, but I do like a fast computer. The memory increase did improve the time it takes to launch the internet, VLC videos, Windows Live Mail, and the time it takes after you push administrative tools, computer management, storage and then the disks show up. Overall, I would say it is a 15% increase in speed, so for $37 it was worth it. I doubt it if using a Samsung 950 Pro PCIe NVMe would speed up boot times from what I have read, so I am not wasting my money. They were supposed to come out with a new version of SSD early this year, but I have yet to see it.
jester
10 Posts
0
December 12th, 2016 13:00
Disable all power-management. Just don't turn the box off. Then it's instantly available. It will even run and last longer if you do this.