Dell XPS 15 (9500) won't boot up, keeps entering Preparing to Repair then Diagnosing your PC?

Plenty of other folks are having the same problem with the latest Realtek driver. The solution is to disable Audio in BIOS > Connected Devices, then you should be able to boot back into Windows and uninstall the Realtek driver. In future, use Dell Update instead of SupportAssist, as with it you can select which drivers to install and skip the Realtek one for now.

Thank you TOPG, I'll do that in the meantime, and use Dell Update in future, or at least not install updates via Support Assist, as it does other scanning tasks and performance tuning.

Thank you for the quick response.

David

Hi

I have the exact same issue. Received my XPS 15 (9500) two weeks ago. This afternoon the Dell Support Assist scanned my laptop and a new driver for RealTek Audio Driver. Updated done, laptop rebooted and then the issues started . Automatic Repair can repair. I've even done a full restore to factory image. Worked but when Dell Support Assist ran again and installed this time other updates...once the laptop rebooted I'm in the same situation... Automatic Repair... your PC did not start correctly. I'm on-line with support (actually waiting for them to take the call for the last 35 minutes). Brand new laptop. This is unacceptable 

I had the same exact issue. I just recently purchased mine tho and decided to completely factory reset it. I tried calling but the reset took too long so I never figured out till now what the driver might be. However, the issue started when I downloaded the driver from the dell update app instead of windows update.

Hi,

First of all I'm sorry for the incomplete message. What I meant was, I do not* see any know issues.

Let us try the below steps:

Disable Connected Standby on the device: https://dell.to/2EpZDN8
Clean Boot: https://dell.to/2CQE9se
Checking in a new user profile: https://dell.to/3aP8VOO

If the new user profile works, you can continue using this new account and transfer all the existing details such as data, files to this account.

Dell-ArunV

Same as above. The latest Realtek Audio drivers crashed my windows. I ended up formatting and re-installing. 

For good measure I installed them again and had the same problem. So without any doubt, the latest Realtek drivers (6.0.8988.1) are not safe to install. 

Hi All

To fix the the problem I deleted all references to Realtek drivers in Device Manager, remember these are spread around as they are not only in Audio. The re scan for hardware changes, I then noticed the Audio driver had an issue and updated the driver by download from internet (not from the PC) a new working driver was loaded succussfully and now all works okay including sound.

Also no need to tinker with the BIOS. I won't be trusting Dell Support Assist, what a disaster i nearly considered returning my brand new laptop thinking it was faulty. Bad Karma.

Hope that helps.

Hi everyone

Sorry for my late reply. Issue is fixed (the hard way). I've restore the factory image then re-installed the "driver" that caused the issue Realtek and rebooted...blue screen. Re-did the process the image factory, install all the Windows 10 updates plus all the Dell updates (except the Realtek)... works #1. Used my image software to create an image of my existing system. Once done I've install again the driver... blue screen. So for sure the latest Realtek driver IS the cause of the issue. I restored my latest image and laptop works #1. Lets hope the provide eventually a bug free new Realtek driver.

Kind regards

Update on this. The Dell Update shows a new version (6.0.9008.1, 07 Sep 2020).

Going to try and install it....wish me luck...

Hi, How did the install go. Did it work okay?