Dell Precision 5520 runs hot and shuts down occasionally

I m having the shutdown when using Solidworks 2017 or Solidworks Visualize. I would be fine withe the CPU throttling back, but just  shutting down without any warning is unacceptable. Surely someone at Dell knows what is going on. I have all of the latest drivers and bios updates installed. 

The thermal paste used on the heatpipes that contact the CPU/GPU are pretty bad, my 5520 idled at about 70 Celsius - i ended up replacing this with some Arctic Silver 5 and it dropped to about 45c idle and stopped shutting down randomly. If you don't mind popping the lid off your laptop - try that!

I had the same issue. Repair persion tried every possible software solution. They tried checking the fans and blowing out dust with compressed air, updating BIOS, etc. Ultimately had the hard drive moved to new case under warranty (essentially a new laptop). After updating the bios and unlocking bitlocker, that solved the issue.

Hi there,

I have exactly the same issue with mine... I thougth at first it had to do with the new Windows 10 update 1803. But it kept happning even after a clean Windows install. Coudll have to do with the season - it's a pretty hot spring in Europe and didn't occur before, like in winter when I bought mine.

I use mine the same way, closed with an external screen via the dock TB16. Does anyone know if it helps to keep the lid open instead? I had even bought a vertical laptop stand so that the fan openings get more air instead of being just 3mm of the desk... The ones on the bottom are the intake and the outlet is where the screen is hinged - so maybe the air doesn't get enought area to get out when the lid is closed??

I will try the cooling paste solution too if nothing helps...

Best!

ViEa

I have the same problem... It is a faulty design in the CPU and GPU cooling system. I have the system with an intel i7 and have come to the conclusion that this laptop is not capable of handling the heat output of the processor. It is disgusting to have paid $2400 for a laptop with a processor that cannot function at full load... I would have been better off buying an XPS 15 with an intel i5. I was just working on a college paper had taken a break to play a game for a few minutes and was only doing a light mobile game for 5 minutes and it shutdown. I lost everything I was working on all morning. I really want my money back. I really hate that I bought this thing.

Yeah same here. They should place a recall on this model. At this price point there should be no issues with this.

I'm having this issue with 3 of these systems used by my company's engineers. The models with Xeon v6 CPUs are crashing due to thermal events almost daily when using Autodesk Inventor. Meanwhile, slightly older models using the Xeon v5 CPUs are rock-steady. This is literally costing us several $100 per day in lost productivity between time spent waiting on machines to reboot, and (even worse) having to redo design work. Having to reperform work is extremely disconcerting because who know at what point in progress the last manual or auto-save was, and if something had to be undone/redone since then?

Hi,

Do you think Dell can replace this laptop for another model I don't mind downgrading the system?

It just gets really hot and the throtling problem is annoying.

Cheers,

/Alex

Our company bought five of these same computers last summer, at first I was the only one having the issue, now it is two of us having the shut down issue. Our I.S. has tried various things but nothing has been resolved.

My question is, has anyone talked directly with Dell about this issue and have they offered any solutions?

It seems to do it the most when I am making headway on a machine design. Very frustrating thing to have your work go poof, then try to remember what you lost.

I agree, there should be some kind of a recall especially at the price our company paid for these little trinkets.

Same here. I use my 5520 for motion graphics (mostly 2D) and have had it shut down on me numerous times. When I first received it I had to send it back for maintenance due to a burning smell coming out of the unit. I love the power this thing has, but the cooling is obviously insufficient, and that means it's insufficient for a professional workstation.

Wish I would have gone with the Precision 7720, which appears to have much better cooling potential with the back vents. .  

I know this question is kind of old, but since I was kind of unsure whether I should try the repasting solution or not and finally did, I can definitely recommend that one.

I had the same problem with my Precision 5520: after using it for half a year, it started getting very hot and shutting down frequently under heavy load in GPU & CPU mode. It helped first switch the "Preferred Mode" in the "PowerMixer" of the proprietary NVIDIA driver (Linux version, don't know about the Windows one) to "Prefer Consistant Performance". It was fine so far for two years, but it is not satisfying having paid so much for a laptop wihtout using it on full speed and the problem with overheating occured again a few weeks ago.

I tried the trick with repasting with a proper thermal paste. I followed in that tutorial the repasting and adding the thermal pads, keeping one hand at the chassis for staying grounded and not damaging any sensitive parts if I would be electrically charged: https://www.ultrabookreview.com/14875-fix-throttling-xps-15/. The XPS 15 and Precision 5520 are very similar. I also removed quite some dust from the heat spreaders. All this really did the trick, reducing my laptop's average temperature by around 15°C and I didn't have any thermal shutdowns so far since then. Of course, it is not 100% risk free, but if you are careful and comfortable with opening up your laptop, it could be worth a try (of course I cannot take any responsibility if anything might get wrong and I don't know about the effects on the warranty, I can just tell you that my experience was good with that solution).

Chesali, I did exactly the same and my 7530 is now noticeably cooler and quieter.

Perhaps Dell can investigate this? Saving themselves money, resources, and improving their customer's lives?

https://www.dell.com/community/Precision-Mobile-Workstations/Precision-7530-and-probably-others-fans-and-noise-Probable/m-p/7544976#M3352

I am also having the exact same problem described by everyone here. It started happening after my warranty expired.  I should point out that I was pestered to upgrade/renew my warranty in I way I have never experienced in 20 years of buying and owning various Dell computers.  This should have raised a red flag.

I am very disappointed with this issue after having paid so much for this machine at the same time  my partner bought her MacBook Pro.  She has no problems whatsoever.  I have a Xeon-powered workstation with an Nvidia Quadro M1200 that can't operate at full capacity.  I really feel that Dell should address this issue and replace these units with upgraded laptops that do not have this problem.

I really hope Dell finds it in their conscience to do something about this or I may just have to migrate to an Apple platform.

Shame on you Dell!