astrohip

I wonder if that's behind some of the sluggishness I'm seeing. Two rando examples: I load Quicken daily, and I have a huge file (just shy of 200MB). It started taking slightly longer to load a couple weeks ago, not terrible, but enough to notice. Starting MS Word used to take 2-3 secs to load, very quick. Now it's a couple seconds longer. I wondered why everyday programs were taking longer, then I see your post, and wonder if they're related?

There's a need for both. My wife is a huge "i" user, having used both iPhones and iPads since they came out. She lives on her iPad. But she also has an XPS 13 2-in-1, and keeps it close by, as there are times you need the advanced functionality of a Windows laptop (as vs an iPad). This nails it. She consumes mass quantities of Internet garbage on her iPad, but when she needs to DO something, out comes the XPS.

I had an XPS 15 9550 (still have it, actually, just stored away). Similar case. My current XPS (17 9710) fits a little snugger.

My wife has the XPS13 2-in-1, but not the detachable.

How do I run Dell SupportAssist? Do I *need* to run Dell SupportAssist? The other day, it started running on its own. I assume some scheduled event I wasn't aware of. I killed it, as it was interfering with something else I was doing, and made a note to run it later. Now I can't find any way to manually run it. I did find a file called SupportAssist.exe, which one would think was it, but it doesn't appear to do anything. So how do I run it? And is it something one needs to run, or is it Dell BS? Thanks.

Thanks, nice write-up. I have the 9710 (i9-11900H, 4K display). The fan does seem to come on at some odd times, when I'm not doing anything stressing the system. But it's not loud enough to concern me or even look into. Love the display. I don't really miss a USB A port, I've upgraded everything to C. Except... Logitech doesn't make their Unified Dongle available in anything but "A".😡🤬

Holy Moley! What a rabbit hole to get lost in. Amazing info. Most of it indecipherable, but a few nuggets in there. If I ever knew "Event Viewer" existed, I forgot about it. BTW, in addition to the Win+R access, just type "Event" at the start menu, and it's the first thing that pops up. I changed the "Auto Restart" back to on (from @Aaron44126 post above), to see if it happens again. Then I can check Event Viewer to see any audit trail. Thanks!!

Done. Thanks.

Weird quirk: About one out of every 4-5 times I shut down my laptop, it restarts instead of shutting down. Since it first started (2-3 weeks ago), I've been careful to click SHUTDOWN not RESTART, and yet it clearly restarts. Any ideas? As to what's causing it, and how to correct it?

Thanks for the feedback. This is an excellent idea. Keep me from having to unplug the adapter when I travel, which is a PITA (I have it winding thru a desk to hide the cable). Plus it's much smaller to carry, than the current adapter. And a great way to test. Thanks! PS: Where's the like button on posts?

Question about charging: I see these new smaller USB wall chargers on the market, can they charge/power this unit? Instead of using the block that came with it? Specifically, as an example, Anker has a new pint-size (their words) 100W USB-C charger. All else being equal, can this serve as my charger? What I don't know is if there is something special about the provided charger, and is 100W enough? I realize that if I plug other devices into it, the power is reduced. I rarely push my XPS 17 that hard, so I don't think it's drawing huge amounts of power from the charger, at least not most of the time. I leave my laptop plugged in all the time; I don't use it unplugged a dozen times a year, and then just briefly. If I did this, could I use any highly-rated USB-C cable to connect, or is there something special about the Dell cable (other than the little light on the end)? As to why? By using a wall wart, I won't have the charging block laying around; it just makes for a cleaner use. I've never considered doing something like this, until I saw how powerful these wall chargers are getting.

I've used a clock app called T-Clock for 10+ years. It allows you to customize the time display. Any color, format, etc. Solves this issue (as did your solution). Here's a screen shot of my T-Clock. Note that it's actually centered and displayed perfectly, but my screen scrape can't get to the bottom of the display, so it looks off-center/sliced off.

When I got my new XPS 17, I promised myself I would no longer eat near it. That lasted about 15 minutes... 😁

Also, pressing the SPACE BAR is the same as Page Down in many browsers, on most web pages. I have a Logitech MX Mouse, and I've programmed one of the buttons for Page Down (and another for P-Up).

The TrueCrypt vulnerabilities mainly had to do with (as I understand it, and I could be wrong) two areas: One was if you used total disk encryption, and the other was the weakness of the encryption. I use a mounted volume, which I only mount when needed, so #1 doesn't affect me. And my data isn't super secret stuff--just misc files you don't want someone else scrolling thru. So the fact the encryption could be broken in days instead of years was a non-issue to me. I did look at VeraCrypt, and it appears to be a TrueCrypt clone, but with all the issues resolved. Plus it's an ongoing supported program. But it's just not an issue for me, so for now, I'll stay with TC.

Thanks, off to take a look at VeraCrypt. I'm aware of the TrueCrypt vulnerability, and it is so obscure, and the chances of it affecting me so miniscule, that I'm willing to take that risk. Nonetheless, I'll explore VeraCrypt. Thanks for sharing that info.

I decided not to use BitLocker. Instead, I created a TrueCrypt volume, and all my sensitive data is stored there. I only open it (AKA mount it) when I need to use that data. When I heard TrueCrypt was shutting down, I made sure to d/l the final version.

Ditto. My previous laptop, XPS 15, was also this way, so I'm used to it by now. But the one before that did have the dedicated keys, and that was a tough transition. One thing I did that helped... I use a Logitech MX mouse, that has buttons all over it. I programmed the two small triangular buttons, just above the thumb rest, as PGUP & PGDN keys. Really handy! Good luck, and enjoy!

It certainly doesn't have the speed difference that existed in the "old days". A quick Google search shows benchmarks of 5-10 times faster than SSD (vs 50-200X for a spinning disk). I do a lot of temporary file manipulations, playing around with images, audio files, and more. By using a RamDisk, it's fast, it's not creating wear & tear on the SSD, and it makes it easy to wipe out when I'm done.

One other use... I use a RamDisk extensively, and now I can create a multi-GB RD without worrying about stealing too much RAM.

No thinking at all.😁 I like to max out my laptop when I get one, so it lasts a while, and I don't have any regrets down the road. Same reason I got 8TB, when I don't need that much. I ran out of room on my old XPS 15, so I wanted to make sure I have enough for the next 3-5 years.

Thanks... off to learn more.

Question: Anyone have some suggestions for programs that stress a processor? I mentioned I wanted to push mine, to see if/when/how the fan reacts. But I'm not sure any of my programs really push an i9 that hard. Maybe some freeware/public domain piece of software designed to push the CPU? Thanks in advance!

Disclaimer: My hearing ain't worth toots, so I'm not the best to ask. Having said that, I don't hear it come on when idle. I'll run some tests over the next day, doing some CPU-intensive stuff, and see if it kicks in, or if I can hear it.

Nope, it works. Just tried it now, can use both mouse & trackpad. No misfires (PS: thanks for this word, I knew there was a better word out there). While obviously YMMV, I have no issues with typing causing msifires.