I think there is confusion, especially when folks are panicking, they may be viewing this post on a phone and not a computer and not reading through the thread. It seems Dell is aware of the issue and as mentioned it takes time to push out an update especially if it is through windows, what I am disappointed about is that they have not recall the .17 BIOS and is still marked urgent. 

To those viewing this thread whom are new to this issue here is what I gathered, somehow the way Windows Update installs the BIOS update results in the power button not working. This will present as a bricked computer, if you press the black button in the back (PSU) it will power on but not start up, this means the system has power and your PSU is working, if it does not then you have another issue.

Before you can attempt a workaround you need to boot your system, there are 3 ways to boot, some should work and I would list them from order of complexity.

• Triple tap the power button (I only had a small amount of success doing this and usually only works if it is done fast and if the system has recently been powered down.
• Unplug the powercord, hold down the power button to drain the power from the system, keep holding it down for 15s or so do not let go. After 15s and while still holding the alien head plug the power plug back in and do not let go of the power button until it lights up. If after 10s this does not work then try the next one.
• Disassemble the computer side plate, ground yourself, move the jumpers of the CMOS to clr position for 30s then back to its normal position. The jumpers are on the mobo at the bottom. 
• If all 3 above does not work then you may have a damaged mobo, if the black button does not spin the fan you may have a damaged psu. Due to WU updating my pc back to the bad bios I had multiple successful attempts to power on my system to do the next part. 

What to do once you boot into windows

• (must do) Search for 1.0.9 bios version using your engine of choice. Download it and save it somewhere you will have easy access to. Install it by running the .exe file. !!! IMPORTANT !!! MAKE SURE IT INSTALLS - Sometimes it would not install even when it reboots, make sure it goes into bios mode and you see a progress bar if it restarts and goes back into windows that means it has failed and you need to run it again. It may take several attempts to write the bios, this may be due to the corruption from Windows Update. ONCE you have confirmed 1.0.9 is installed Immediately restart, spam F2 to go into BIOS and disable encapsulated boot
• (optional) disable/pause windows update for 30days
• (optional) delete windows update files, if you skip this it may try to reinstall the bad version of the bios automatically when it detects your system is idle. This needs to be done in 2 places, first on the drive properties/cleanup delete system files and check Windows update and second from your %win dir /SoftwareDistribution folder (the contents of the folder can be deleted)

Once you have done this it should not try to download / install the bad bios version. Check the drivers site and also this forum for an update.

This is exactly what happened to my AW X51 R2 7/8 years ago.

Something happened which caused it to begin freezing, the tech guy came out and swapped parts and started to install BIOS updates which bricked my machine. After 3 service call outs they got the machine to power on but since then it was never stable. At any random time the unit would just crash severely. Eventually i had to throw it away

You must also go to device manager and delete the bios driver 1.0.17 Or nothing you do will work. Panic is natural when it is your work/production machine and you are not sure if it's going to start any given day. Mine has been down since Oct 26. They tried to fix it but bricked it instead. Now, I am waiting for "another" tech to come and fix it. This is not my doing so ya, I am not happy.

For info, when trying to update Win10 to version 21H, updater still downloads 1.0.17 firmware as required driver (I believe as it marked as 'critical' update).

So there is a chance that it can be installed by default as well while updating to 21H

Good point! Also, the windows push to update the 1.0.17 should be paused.

If Dell is aware of this problem why does the R8 Drivers Bios page still have 1.0.17 listed and marked  Urgent?  How many more unsuspected users are going to have this bios loaded to there system?  The least Dell can do is remove the 1.0.17 bios.

I don't think .17 bios is the issue. I had the same issues on .16 once I installed a Windows update and Alienware App was updated as well. 

Since the update Command Center is broken as well and that is when the power button stopped working for me. Something must be in the updates after .9 that don't work with the Command Center and/or the Windows update. 

Just my assumption as I never was on the new bios and was having same issues everyone was having the last week of October where that Dell Software was released. 

That's the bios I was on when this all started 1.0.16. 1.0.17 wasn't even present in the downloads nor as a driver.  I am inclined to agree with you assumption.

Since Oct 26 I woke up to this issue first thing in the morning. Since Oct 28 Dell has promised to fix it. Now they want me to send my "bricked by a dell tech" machine to the Dell depot for full evaluation. That is not what I paid for. This is nothing but a stalling tactic that will make me without a very good working machine with all the information on it I need for work (Dell has no idea) to being without a machine that has all the programs and files on it that I need to make a living. 12 days and counting. If I send it to the depot you can easily add 5-7 days to that. If they deem in "no repairable" I can only imagine what a nightmare that would be. All my information is on the drive on that computer. Will I get my drive back? Will it be in the condition that I can just boot to my old desktop? Serious "FAIL" on this one. I am buying a PCI M.2 drive reader so I can get my files off the AuroraR8. I could even do that if I agree to send it to them, which I don't.

Don't buy the "extended warranty"! They will make you send it to the depot anyway. There is a shortage of chips and mother boards for this machine. They are sandbagging everyone on this including me. I will just keep calling dell support every other day until it's fixed. I asked for my money back, crickets.

Until we get official response from dELL, we can only guess about the reason.

I  was on 1.0.17, updated via Dell installer, had no problems with powering up.

After some days, WU forced update to 1.0.17, although BIOS was flashed earlier.

Right after that power button started to have problems.

Disabled WU, deleted firmware from Device Manager, re-flashed to 1.0.17 via installer from Dell web site again. Power button still had issues.

Flashed all versions down from 1.0.17, and - all of them now have issues with power button.

So the issue started exactly after WU forced update of BIOS, and even re-flashing in normal way - does not help.

The only Bios version that works good is 1.0.9.

Probably it somehow linked to new versions of OC controls, or other updates released in Oct, but looks that the only solution for now is to have 1.0.9, with disabled UEFI capsule.

Agreed so far only 1.0.9 with disabled WU UEFI is the work around.

When this originally started for me late October i was able to just roll back to 1.0.9 and WU UEFI was still enabled and id say for about 1 week everything was fine then all of a sudden Windows kept forcing the BIOS update to 1.0.17 on every single restart/shutdown so then the UEFI disabled had to be done.

Its actually sad when you sit and think about the whole situation. Were here sitting fine and enjoying and using our PC's then all of a sudden a forced update is pushed to us with no power from us to stop it and it goes and wrecks our system to this extreme. Then you deal with the fact as your saying the planet is suffering a global shortage of chips.

Just unbelievable how a forced update/s has lead to this  

Thank you all for posting here.

I was able to get my R8 running again because of this thread, specifically unplugging EVERYTHING and then using the back button to turn the system on.

Awaiting a proper fix from Dell now...