New Dell Bios rendered XPS 8900 desktop unusable

There is no current solution to this problem: XPS 8900, BIOS v.2.2.1 Flash renders system unbootable. As  a recently 30 year retired IT veteran, I will detail how I came to this conclusion. However I would like to let all of you know, if your XPS 8900 system is out of the Dell warranty, sorry to say ya'll are until Dell admits they released a poor build that obviously wasn't tested thoroughly. My  system warranty expired last October, however I purchased it at Costco so I'm golden. Costco Concierge Services will be coming out tomorrow to fix the issue. However I have my doubts as you will come to agree with me as I explain how I tackled this problem.

Yesterday,  28 Dec, I ran the Intel Mgmt update, then the upgrade to v  2.2.1 BIOS Revision. Then performed the following after The BIOS flash had completed:

1) Rebooted

2) Optimized my OS (operating system) only SSD drive (Win10, build 1703.15063)

3) Ran chkdsk/ f

4) Ran sfc/scannow

5) Ran DISM /online /Cleanup- Image /scan Health /restoreHealth

6)  System rebooted each time without any apparent issues. All utilities returned no corruption. However, there were a load of ESENT Info entries in the system log which concerned me.

7) System ran all night as well as streaming about 8 episodes of Dexter. :-)

8) Rebooted this am. That is where it all went South real fast. Just as it finished POST and the Windows 10 little flag Windows splash image appeared, it suddenly disappeared and was replaced with, "Preparing Auto Repair" for 10 seconds or so then a pop-up appeared, flashing and yelling that a system error occurred, to note the stated STOP CODE=Memory Management, and to scan a QR Code for more details. I was redirected to another menacing pop-up stating: ERROR CODE: xxyynn & VALIDATION CODE: ZZYYWWW (the variables are inconsequential). Following were the nasty details; "Cable problem: Check the following cable, jumper, connection or sensor: CARD READER."

9) I attempted to boot into WINRE with both USB,  AND THEN, DVD WINRE media. With each attempt the follow error was stated: " Page Fault in Non-Paged Area."

10) Ran Dell Diagnostics which returned the previously mentioned, "Card Reader Cable error."

11) I then Cleared CMOS. **NOTE: The Dell XPS 8920 Service Manual because it does not even COME CLOSE to the reality of the baseboard. It said to remove the power supply to access the Psswrd/CMOS jumpers. NOT! They were on the OTHER side of the baseboard, though I did have to remove the PCIe Video card. AND only to find that as is normally the case, both jumpers were not even close to each other, but also very poorly marked. ****

12) Upon boot into SD Drive 0, immediately a pop-up stated, " System seems to be having trouble starting - - Scanning hardware for possible cause."

13) H/W Scan returned: "Hardware scan completed with no issues." It looped several times, each time identical to the previous scan.

14) At this point I knew I was hosed. So for poops and grins, I attempted to boot with a Falcon Four v. 4.5 mini XP minimal OS. No such luck w/ BSOD. I figured it would anyway, but I ran out of ideas.

With it impossible to even boot into a minimal OS in order to downgrade the BIOS to the previous build, I have no clue in how Cisco us going to work through this issue short of Dell stepping up and releasing a well tested BIOS  build or pulling it out of production release and posting a Warning.

I have read here in thus blog that one or more of you called Dell, with your warranty expired, only to hold ya'll hostage just like the Malware  that has be one so prevalent the past several years. That sort of response from Dell is UNACCEPTABLE, especially since It was DELL who released a not-even-close to prime time f/w flash that leaves no way to recover.

Hey, if anyone has any ideas, I'd like to hear what they may be because I am stumped on how to workaround this show stopper.

Anyway, I have to give credit to Costco. They were very polite and listened to me without interruption as they Ied me thru my troubleshooting steps. And they arrived at the same quandary.

Good luck to all of you who are being abused by Dell Support. As soon as I know  Costco will do to fix this issue, if at all, I will post the solution.

HAPPY New Year!!!

Forrest

Forrest in IT - You started out talking about an XP 8900 but then you mentioned the XPS 8920 Service Manual.  So do you have an 8900 or 8920? And if it's an 8900, why did you look at the motherboard diagram for an 8920 which is an entirely different model, and expect the jumper locations for an XPS 8900 mobo to be in the same place as the 8920...??

I made Dell aware of this problem and they will investigate, but they have been -mostly- closed for the holiday week, so they probably won't get to work on this until next week, or so...

(And lets please avoid using those words which the automated censor software removed from your posts and replaced with asterisks - thank you.)

I also updated an XPS 8900 that is out of warranty. I have Windows 10 Home, and I have an SD card I am using as a ReadyBoost cache.

When rebooting, it gets stuck on the blue "Restarting" screen. If I power off and right away power back on, it will start for about 5 seconds then power itself back down. If wait 15 seconds before powering it back on, it will boot and complete Windows start up.

I'm not too happy with Dell.

Cherie

Here's what I've been told about a boot failures after updating to BIOS 2.2.1:

If your system is under warranty, contact Dell Tech Support and arrange to have them replace the motherboard.  

If the system is out of warranty, contact Dell Tech Support and ask them to escalate the issue to their L2 for further review and action.

Hi RoHe, glad I found this thread BEFORE attempting the update. From what I understand this is a faulty Bios update, although still available on the download site. Now I'm thinking whether or not to upgrade from v2.1.8.. I don't have issues right now but am expecting Dell to release a patch for the most recent major security issues "spectre" and "meltdown", so I'm looking forward to update to the upcoming version at least.