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12 Posts

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February 10th, 2024 13:54

Precision 7770 - BIOS 1.18.0 - Overall system performance degradation.

To whom it may concern / can help ...

a few hours ago i did upgraded the BIOS from version 1.16.0 to 1.18.0 and what became instantly noticeably is an overall system performance degradation.

Most worse became playing videos through the MPV Software, during first seconds of playback the video completely freezes, then it does recovers but playback is at times very choppy, with dropped frames and such (according to the stats of the program itself)

Boot-up times are much longer now, which i suspect may be because of the DSAs fixed according to the release notes, but then getting into the Windows's welcome screen everything feels choppy, specially noticeable with the "loading spinner" shown there which isn't smooth any longer.

In the release notes, is mentioned the following:

Fixed the issue where the system works slowly when the CPU utilization is high. This issue occurs when the system is connected to the Dell Performance Dock WD19DC And the battery is fully charged.

Well, i don't have any Dock here, just the laptop and an external monitor, and i have the feeling what i am experiencing might be related to whatever was shipped to fix that.

Furthermore, something very interesting i did noticed, through some Rainmeter widgets i do use to monitor system health and such, is that when the system is "idle" (with background tasks/programs, nothing on the foreground) i see the CPU status as "53° - 4888 Mhz - 61 W" and whenever i start using MPV it does changes to "45° - 399 Mhz - 76 W"

You see... it went from utilizing 4888 Mhz to 399 Mhz (?!)

If it does help, i am providing below screenshots of some of my BIOS settings which may be related, dunno.

Now the question is, can i downgrade the BIOS back to 1.16.0 with 100% confidence, or could it remotely cause any kind of side-effect doing so ??

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13 Posts

February 21st, 2024 11:27

@brunooo84​ consider yourselves lucky. I'm in Uruguay...with luck I'll have my part in 15 days.

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22 Posts

February 21st, 2024 11:51

@pmontilla​ 😱😱😱

Hopefully they release a new bios soon

#prayforourcomputers

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12 Posts

February 21st, 2024 12:07

@brunooo84​ nice that, i consider to call dell to replace mb asap. 

@pmontilla in 15 days maybe they think to release an update :(

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22 Posts

February 21st, 2024 12:26

@Xtr3m3ro​ 15 days? <Profanity is never allowed on our Forum. DELL-Admin> they better have tons of mobos to replace then...

(edited)

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21 Posts

February 21st, 2024 14:25

@brunooo84​ You have to use the

when wanting to express your disgust.

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22 Posts

February 21st, 2024 14:32

@Vipast​ ah yes... maybe we should add some FN to the bios?? so DELL can do something 🤣

7 Posts

February 21st, 2024 15:50

Are folks actually getting motherboard replacements approved when they mention this? On Prosupport or Prosupport Plus? I said this originally to the Level 1 people (basically to find a way to allow me to revert, override, replace motherboard if that's what it takes) before getting to the level 3... but Level 3 is seeming to be buying time.

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8 Posts

February 21st, 2024 15:59

Hi all,

as confirmed by Dell Germany today I got my mainboard replaced.

Pre-Installed Bios-Version was 1.8.0 and I upgraded to 1.16.0

Performance issue is history thanks to Dell Germany ProSupport Team :)

February 21st, 2024 16:07

@Skoorb317​ Apparently, yes. I have a tech appointment today to get it replaced. It serves them well to have to spend all this money on parts and labor for a dumb BIOS update with no rollback. 

15 Posts

February 21st, 2024 16:30

@dahes​ in other words, they are aware that 1.18 is problematic. 

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12 Posts

February 21st, 2024 16:31

The most interesting thing is that the update is still on the site.. and in the windows updates servers. there will be more and more people doing it automatically or automatically down the throat

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8 Posts

February 21st, 2024 17:32

@andyschoe​ most likely, for me it's strange that the problematic Bios is still available

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21 Posts

February 21st, 2024 18:29

@dahes​ Did you do any testing of performance before you upgraded from 1.8.0 to 1.16? 
I heard stories for performance drop from 1.14 to 1.16 as well, I am curious as to what performance differences there are. 
They just had me send logs of FAILed bios upgrade. I am sure my Mother board replacement option is coming soon . I have Prosupport plus and still haven't talked to a lvl 3 tech yet. its been 3 business days now. I really hate them having to change out the board for a stupid bios issue, This is when things really get



If it wasn't under warranty , I would just pull it apart myself and use my USB programmer to manually set the BIOS back. I have all the equipment to manually update the bios.

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8 Posts

February 21st, 2024 19:09

@Vipast​ I did the Unigine Superposition Benchmark before and after the Bios Update and the result was identical.

Due to the 4 installed NVMEs I'm fighting with thermal throttling but that's a different story.

For me the performance issue is solved

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21 Posts

February 21st, 2024 19:28

@dahes​ Yeah, thermal throttling is a problem with BOTH models regardless of the BIOS , that is just poor engineering design for the CPU/COMBO , I knew going into this laptop thermal issues were a problem. Originally I was just going to kill the E-Cores and use only P-Cores since my loads focus more on GPU and the GPU/VRAM usage , its why I went with the  a4500 ,decent performance and 16GB VRAM. I don't use it as a laptop , its basically mounted on the wall with the vent on bottom facing outward and hot air goes up and away. I am going to 3D print a clip mount for fans to force air in the vents and fans sucking air from the back - since they only have fans on one side an a heat sink system that covers both sides. the side where the power corde goes becomes too hot too even touch .. lol when I first got this system, I tried to play a game on it in laptop mode and nearly burned myself. The keyboard is almost unusable when its full blast mode.

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