I am having the same issue with my Dell Studio 1555.  Started with Starcraft 2 beta now it has seeped into the rest of pc use.

Gaiden,

I just came across your excellent diagnosis and solution to your problem.  Amazing.  I have a Dell Studio 1555 bought exactly 12 mo. ago and just yesterday it failed.  It will not power on with the ac adapter or without.  When AC plugs in the blue LED light on the adapter goes off and nothing.  I've trouble-shot the heck out of this thing.  As you say, Dell is worthless since I'm about 3 days past warranty; and the Geek Squad looked at it and said it is probably a fried motherboard and it's best to get a new laptop.  Huh?  Having spent close to $900 for this I refuse to lay down and give in.  Your excellent analysis seems to point in the direction of the heat sink and thermal adhesive issues.  Not knowing too much of these laptop internals, do you have any advice on how to proceed with my major problem?  Any help would be wonderful before I have to go out and have to purchase something new.  Thanks.

You'll have to find a new Studio buyer.  I still have this problem on my 1537 - Dell never fixed it.  I am looking at buying a new Asus or Acer - a cheap laptop at a low price instead of a Cheap Dell laptop with poor support at a high price.

I create a user just so that I can post here. I found the cause of the sudden seemingly random shutdown: it was intel turbo boost. It seems buggy/defective heatsink/fan  not removing heat fast enough to handle super hot 1 core. Using Orthos stress test using first setting (stress test cpu only) and intel turbo boost v2 utility, I can simulatewithin 10 second :) The solution was from another thread on Dell latitude laptop: go to your windows power profile, set the maximum process state to 99%. This effectively disable turbo boost.
sudden shutdown

TLDR; set your power profile's maximum process state to 99%

Note:

This applies to my Dell Studio 14 using i7 740QM processor on Windows 7 64bit. Which should be the same across Dell Studio laptop.

The A04 bios update is available for download now.   If you go to http://support.Dell.com and click on the Drivers & Downloads section you can use your service tag to select the drivers for your system.  Then select the BIOS category and download the latest BIOS.   Hopefully that should resolve your issue.

Hello just bought a Dell Studio 15z and I LOVE it it's beautifu!, BUT it's randomly shutting off also, I called tech support concerning an unrelated issue and they updated the Bios this did not solve the random shutting off in my case.

 This is my first Dell and I find it a little disturbing that I read here on this forum that you tried to charge a customer although the computer was under warranty because you felt the problem was software related. This is my first Dell and I tell you I'm not happy I've had nothing but problems. I have a i5 and this thing is insanely fast and gorgeous, but that doesn't makeup for the poor design. I will say customer support in India by the way as me how I know this :) up to this point has been very good. Hoping you can suggest a solution this machine is only 3 days old! Thanks

Tom j.

I create a user just so that I can post here. I found the cause of the sudden seemingly random shutdown: it was intel turbo boost. It seems buggy/defective heatsink/fan  not removing heat fast enough to handle super hot 1 core. Using Orthos stress test using first setting (stress test cpu only) and intel turbo boost v2 utility, I can simulatewithin 10 second :) The solution was from another thread on Dell latitude laptop: go to your windows power profile, set the maximum process state to 99%. This effectively disable turbo boost.
sudden shutdown

TLDR; set your power profile's maximum process state to 99%

Note:

This applies to my Dell Studio 14 using i7 740QM processor on Windows 7 64bit. Which should be the same across Dell Studio laptop.

Hi thanks well if thats the case I'll jus take mine back I want the turbo boost thats why I bought the machine in the first place. I have an i5 so I'm hoping it doesn't apply to mine.

Tom j.

gaiden,  my son would like to communicate with you via e-mail about this problem.    We have the  problem with a Dell Laptop,  2 years old,  Studio 1537,  Vista o/s.    Please e-mail me at  .   thanks.    

I just bought this Dell Studio 15Z a little over a month ago and am having the same problem of the computer randomly shutting off.  I tried to update the BIOS; however, I got the message that my version is the same and therefore would not update.  This is annoying!!  i thought I would try a Dell after having been a Toshiba consumer for years--.  After reading the other posts about this same problem with no effective results, I'm beginning to be sorry I bought this computer.  DID ANYONE EVER GET A SOLUTION TO THIS ISSUE?

Hi I bought mine almost a year ago and they have replaced the motherboard and heat sink and I still having the smae problems this is a known issue to Dell and I really believe they are just trying to sweep it under the rug, I'm now writing  Micheal Dell and going to bring this to his direct attention. The only fix I'm aware of is the guy that got them to replace his. This is the worst investment I think I've ever made! Thank God it has a TWO YEAR WARRENTY. Good Luck.

Tom

I bought a dell 1458 with i7 processor, i bought the extended warrently which ran out last november (extra 2 years warrently is actually only a 1 year extension since it negates the original manufacture warrently of 1 year) i began hitting 100 degrees on the processor a few month ago and since i bought this machine specifically for the load i could put on the i7 processor i dont want to disable the turbo boost option, since dell support knew less about the issue than i did i tried repasting the heatsink myself however even that has not fixed the random shutdowns. so i am thinking of replacing the fan with something more powerful, does anyone know of a suitable heat sink and fan upgrade for this the studio 1458 ?