m15 R2, if you undervolt, do not install BIOS 1.5.2

Question

Hello. Good day. So as a proud owner of the Alienware m15 R2, I am honestly happy with the laptop. However, after a few days, I realized that the laptop gets hot, REALLY FAST. Like even when not gaming, I could hit 90c easy, when a CPU-intensive task runs for a quick moment, even hit the 100c mark, when gaming under a full load.Being a casual gamer, with a little knowledge on general computing, I knew I had to undervolt the laptop in order to drop the temperature under usage. I will still hit 90c on some games and other activities, but after undervolting the laptop, that's usually the worst-case scenario temperature. With the undervolt, I'd get an average of around 75c to 80c, and that's a good thing being the Philippines. Now 3 days ago, I updated my BIOS from 1.3.1, to 1.5.2. At first, I didn't notice any difference and I figured a BIOS update is always appropriate, even when experience has already shown me with this laptop that it is not always the case. Still, I updated. Today, I noticed that my laptop was getting rather warm again surprisingly, so I decided to checkout my Throttlestop settings. To my surprise, my undervolt settings were all back to 0.00 mV offsets! And no matter what I do, they won't even activate anymore. I have therefore concluded that the BIOS update has disabled any undervolting of any kind now. I've been looking around on how to revert back to the old BIOS because as supposed to being concerned about the patches for the BIOS, I am more concerned with my laptop temperatures, and no one can change my mind on that right now. If there's anyone here who can tell me the steps to revert back to a previous BIOS, or reinstall it, it would be greatly appreciated.

thomaskeano · Accepted Answer

Unfortunately, that didn't really work for me. However, a Rollback was really all I needed, and after scouring Google for the solution, I found it back again in Dell's forum! This was it.

This worked for me as it should. Thank you for your comment! and thanks for the admin who messaged me immediately.

From: m15 downgrade from BIOS 2.0.4

So I've managed to downgrade it using the BIOS Recovery. One of the admin gave me these steps, I was trying to do it before, but couldn't get it to work. This time, I had secure boot in bios disabled, don't know if that helped but pretty much follow this and in the recovery screen, select BIOS Rollback and that will flash the previous version you had installed.

How to Initiate BIOS Recovery

Verify that the device is powered OFF and disconnect the AC adapter or power source.
Press and hold the CTRL key + ESC key on the keyboard (Ensure primary Battery is 30% charge)
Plug in the AC adapter or power source to the device.
Release the CTRL key + ESC key on the keyboard.
Select Rollback BIOS in the BIOS Recovery and press the Enter key to start the recovery process.

uwebb2 · Answer

@thomaskeano On some Dell laptops there is an option in the BIOS called restore factory defaults. This has allowed some users to run the latest BIOS while still being able to undervolt.

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