Unsolved
This post is more than 5 years old
12 Posts
0
68040
SECURITY ISSUE Dell Studio XPS 1645
Hi I would like to get all the help from dell to fix an issue. All dell studio xps models are affected and perhaps more. Any bios versions as well to date A12, A11 have been tested and show the same problems. I have gone through extensive testing calling up many people who have xps 1645's and seen the exact same issue on each of them. The issue: Bios factory defaults when restarting using only battery (no ac adapter plugged). This can let an attacker get into your system for example If you have a bios power on password the attacker can get into your system by rebooting your computer, The bios then factory resets and boom no more password prompt. Try to do it and see, put any settings in bios then restart the computer from windows and see that the options has been reset.
You can also see and test this glitch out for yourselves. Please note the glitch happens only on battery power! Enable for instance an option like summary screen in the bios. Then after the dell screen on boot you will see a summary screen. Now go into windows and reboot. (You may do this before the login screen.) Upon rebooting you will notice that the summary screen is no longer present. If you access the bios you will see this option set back to disabled! The same thing happens to all the options in this bios.
Dell I am hoping you can get this issue fixed and please try to test this out on other machines. So far I have tested this out on systems which have ati 4670 motherboards, and ati 5730 motherboards. Both the same issue occurred on systems running 6 gb of ram and 8gb orf ram, a 720 processor and 740 processor, A12 bios and A11 bios.
So my general understanding is that it must be a bios glitch or bug. As for the rest of you guys here on this forum please test this out and write back your results.
Steps used to re-enact the glitch: First use no ac adapter. Then access the bios and put a setting like summary screen in found in the advanced bios menu. Save the bios settings, watch how the Dell screen appears and summary screen appears afterward. Then when the windows login screen appears restart the computer (from the bottom right little icon) and watch to see if the summary screen is present! Note do not try to enter the bios now! Just watch to see if the summary screen appeared or not. You may access the bios on the next reboot to find it set back to factory defaults.
gpig
48 Posts
0
April 4th, 2011 10:00
I have tried this out- the BIOS resets the values to the default with a restart on battery.
In addition to being a security threat, it's plain annoying that our values reset.
BIOS A09 here
RacingGun
2 Posts
0
April 4th, 2011 12:00
I can confirm that this problem also affects me exactly as described by the original poster. I have a Stuido XPS 16 (1645) running the latest bios from Dell. Very annoying because settings like "Wake on USB" and disabling bluetooth/WWAN are all affected.
ikjadoon
15 Posts
0
April 4th, 2011 15:00
I am the same issue, too.
My touch-sensitive radio button's function keeps getting reset! :(
~Ibrahim~
Joe_XPS
12 Posts
0
April 5th, 2011 13:00
I wonder if any Dell tech is going to help us out on this thread.....
Joe_XPS
12 Posts
0
April 6th, 2011 14:00
thanks hopefully we can get a new bios or a fix
Niranjan2
207 Posts
1
April 6th, 2011 14:00
Hi All,
Welcome to the Dell Community. Thank you for notifying the security issue on this forum. I have escalated this issue, soon we will have our engineers look into this.
I will update you all ASAP.
-Niranjan
Joe_XPS
12 Posts
0
April 8th, 2011 12:00
To Dell Technicians a note the problem still exists with the new bios A13.. By using multiple shutdown/restart/hibernate sequences on battery power and on ac charger only!!!!
Bios A13 prevents it from happening on each battery restart BUT DOES NOT FIX THE ISSUE!!!!
Joe_XPS
12 Posts
0
April 8th, 2011 12:00
Also to add I did a sleep cycle. I will narrow down the exact procedure to re-enact the problem! Please let your engineers know that this problem still exists!
gpig
48 Posts
0
April 11th, 2011 17:00
To be fair, we were never told that A13 fixes the problem. We should wait to be "updated" by the nice Dell person.
Joe_XPS
12 Posts
0
June 22nd, 2011 16:00
still no response can one of the techs get back to me?
DELL-Terry B
4 Operator
4 Operator
•
3.5K Posts
0
June 23rd, 2011 18:00
I know that Niranjan reported the issue to our engineers. I know that Niranjan has received little information regarding the problem or I am sure he would have reported to you all sooner.
I have a few questions regarding the problem. If the notebook is protected by a password and is shut down, baring the use of the password, are you able to access the system and boot to Windows? That is to say, from a cold boot if you start the system up, will it ask for the password?
If you do make a change in the BIOS and save the change, what process do you use to save the change? After making the change what happens if you boot into Windows and then shut the system down completely? When you power up the system has the BIOS kept the settings?
Is the only time that you notice the problem is when the system is in your possession, you make a change to the BIOS but restart windows and before logging in to windows you notice on the following restart that the settings did not keep? If you log back into the BIOS after wards, make the change to the BIOS, save the changes, allow Windows to boot and log in. Then shut the system down normally. Have you noticed that the BIOS failed to save your changes on the next boot?
Again I do apologize for the lack of answers, with this information Niranjan and I may have more ammo to take back to the engineers. I appreciate your patience and look forward to receiving your replies.
TB
Joe_XPS
12 Posts
0
June 23rd, 2011 20:00
p.s the bios prompts for a password on every reboot but eventually no longer does.
Joe_XPS
12 Posts
0
June 23rd, 2011 20:00
to replicate the issue just do these steps. Set a bios supervisor password and enable the option for password on boot. Save and exit the bios.
Use the pc normally, play with it, turn it off normally, restart it normally etc after a couple of restarts/shutdowns/on battery and off battery the bios password prompt will no longer exist. You will also notice that your settings have reverted back to factory if you enter the bios now,
DELL-Terry B
4 Operator
4 Operator
•
3.5K Posts
0
June 24th, 2011 08:00
It certainly is not supposed to be doing that. This could be a hardware defect on the system, the cmos battery could be defective as well as the system board. If you wish shoot me a private message with your service tag and I will look into possible service options just to verify that it isn't defective hardware that is causing this.
TB
RacingGun
2 Posts
0
June 24th, 2011 09:00
Actually, over on the notebook review forums (http://forum.notebookreview.com/dell-xps-studio-xps/) we did some fairly wide range testing and everyone with a Studio XPS 16 laptop seemed to be affected by this problem. So while it might be hardware related, it certainly isn't an isolated case. Just thought I would chip in with that information before too much energy went in that direction.