Dell XPS 15 9560 Blue Screens

I've uploaded my recent Windows mini dumps to a shared OneDrive folder which you can access here:

https://1drv.ms/u/s!AskWgbebxoIHgrFV1P-9v_FL2diHPg?e=Vl2ee8

Hello, 

We are many with this problems, i hope DELL and Nvidia resolve rapidly this bug...

Here a person with apparently same bug : 
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/bsod-video-dxgkrnl-fatal-error-windows-10-dell-xps/5b96e0c0-ea34-4cae-956a-f946b7fc942a 

It has recently occurred to me that maybe the aged battery might be triggering the blue screen DRIVER_POWER_STATE_FAILURE errors. Even though I have the AC power connected all the time I guess it might be possible that the battery is causing issues.

I just ordered a new mini toolkit with a Torx T5 driver so I can get the casing off this weekend and completely remove the battery. I'll update here again if that helps or not.

With previous laptops, when the battery capacity gets to the point of being useless, I have just removed it and used on AC alone. Fingers crossed... 

Got the Torx T5 driver bit set today, took the casing off the laptop and removed the battery. It did start up again fine afterwards. I did run the Dell BIOS diagnostics again to make sure I hadn't broken anything while doing that and all seemed ok.

Unfortunately, after leaving the XPS for an hour or so (without interacting with it) the same DRIVER_POWER_STATE_FAILURE  blue screen error occurred. It also crashed again later on when I was trying to use it.

Well, that eliminates the battery as the cause of the issue...

Since then, I've now used DDU to completely strip out the NVIDIA and INTEL drivers while in safe mode. After rebooting, I re-installed the latest Intel HD 630 graphics drivers as supplied by Dell (27.20.100.9664). Rebooted again, all good.

Device Manager was initially showing the NVIDIA card as an unknown device. I decided to ignore it and see how the Intel HD 630 managed on its own in Windows. Annoyingly, after a while Windows decided to auto-install some older NVIDIA drivers (from Microsoft) and the NVIDIA Control panel (v462.31). These seem to be a bit older than the current Dell release drivers for v471.35.

Interestingly, the Windows installed NVIDIA drivers did not install the GeForce Experience stuff.

I've had the XPS on for a couple of hours since the v462.31 drivers auto-installed and it's not blue screened yet.

Having had another read around the web I have come across the following additional recommendations for eliminating the NVIDIA driver triggered DRIVER_POWER_STATE_FAILURE error:

• Disable Windows Fast Boot
• Uninstall (or never install) GeForce Experience

I have just disabled Fast Boot, but haven't restarted since doing so anyway. So far I've not installed GeForce Experience.

I might try the laptop for the next few days on this older v462.31 driver. If it seems ok, I'll once again try installed the Dell supplied v471.35 NVIDIA driver but choose not to install GeForce Experience.

Well, after having the NVIDIA v462.31 drivers on for a day and just using Chrome web browser and basic Windows tasks things seemed ok until I shutdown. Got a VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR blue screen then...

The following day I re-installed the Dell supplied v471.35 Geforce drivers, being careful to do a Clean install. I was going to un-tick the Geforce Experience option but that Dell installer didn't includ it anyway. Initially all seemed ok, I managed to open Steam and GOG Windows clients but as soon as I tried Epic Games I got the VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR blue screen again.

I had another sift through the Dell forums and I've come to the conclusion that this is not a software issue, but rather the GTX 1050 is dying. As its soldered onto the XPS motherboard there is nothing I can do about this. I've gone into the Device Manager and disabled the GTX 1050 completely. 

Today I've been running the XPS all day just on the Intel HD 630 GPU. No blue screens so far and that's after opening all clients for Steam, GOG, Origin, Battle.net and Uplay and leaving them running in the background (have't tried Epic Games yet). I've been using Chrome for web browsing, email and YouTube videos. I'm typing this on the XPS too.

Very sad to see the end of any gaming on this XPS. After my main gaming PC died before Christmas I was still able to play Skyrim and Xcom 2 for a few months on this laptop. Guess I'll just be using it for the basics now. Feel pretty bad now having spent over £2000 on it originally, it was meant for for software development (32GB RAM, 4K Screen, 1TB SSD) but I used it for all sorts over the years. Just feels wrong that there is no way to fix this issue

After my last post, I have been running with the GTX 1050 disabled in Device Manager. The XPS has performed exceptionally, no crashes or blue screens etc.

During that time, I ran the following tests (again) to completion without any reported issues:

1. Dell BIOS standard & thorough diagnostics.
2. Dell Support Assist application standard & thorough diagnostics.
3. Command lines tools: chkdsk, sfc, dism etc
4. Hammered Windows by simultaneously running lots of apps e.g: Steam, Origin, UPlay, Battlenet, Epic Games, Chrome, Firefox, Edge, HWMonitor etc. 
5. Entire days of use without issues.

Last weekend I replaced the thermal paste (new Arctic MX-4) for the CPU & NVIDIA GPU and re-ran all the above again to make sure I hadn't broken anything. All good, CPU cores reporting around 40 degrees C on average when idle. Cooler than before with the original thermal paste (which there was very little of before I cleaned it off).

I was surprised by how healthy looking the inside of the XPS was. Very little dust, and only gathered around the fan exhausts. It was easy to clean. The XPS was also surprisingly straight. forward to disassemble (with the right Torx T5 & Philips drivers thanks to an iFixit kit I bought). It did help to first watch a couple of YouTube videos of people doing this to know what to expect.

Then I re-enabled the GTX-1050 in Device Manager. Within a couple of hours it blue screened with VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR. That was just in Windows doing some basic web browsing. It was the same NVIDIA driver files again.

Contrary to my previous posts, I now think this is a driver rather than hardware issue.

This is reinforced by having directly seen the NVIDIA GPU chip and circuitry on the main motherboard. It all still looked new with no burn marks, bends or cracks on the chip or surrounding boards.

If you search on the Microsoft Community site for VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR you'll see most replies from staff suggest this is caused by a broken NVIDIA driver with instructions to re-install those drivers. I also noted several replies from customers whose problem went away after a BIOS update from the laptop manufacturer such as ASUS (it's not only Dell laptops!).

I've already been through the DDU steps to strip off the NVIDIA driver and re-install the Dell supplied version. Also tried the same with the NVIDIA direct drivers. It didn’t fix anything.

I do now believe that 471.35 NVIDIA driver from Dell really could do with an update. It's a long way behind the main release of 512.59 for this card. There have been a lot of Windows updates since last year and we all know how they can interfere with your system and/or drivers!

It could also be the case that Dell may need to provide a BIOS update to help resolve these issues. Given the number of posts I've read where customer's laptops got magically fixed (from this particular NVIDIA driver related blue screen) I really do hope Dell can have a look into this for us.

Hi Rage Ferret, 

I also have an XPS 9560 and seem to also have the blue screen VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR issue. Just as you have done, I have tried rolling back drivers, uninstalling using DDU, changing the power manager settings, etc to no avail.

The blue screen VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR crash happens to me when opening a graphically demanding software like Photoshop (which I have set so that it always uses the NVIDIA GPU) after my computer (or the GPU) has been idle. For me, the issue seems to be that the NVIDIA graphics card is not able to start again after being idle.

You can monitor if your laptop or any app is utilising the GPU by having it as an icon on the bottom right of your task bar (the small icons next to where the date and time is located). If you currently don't have the icon there, you can open the NVIDIA control panel application >> click on  "desktop" on the menu bar >> check the "Display GPU Activity Icon in Notification Area"

After having the icon (shaped like a GPU) pinned to the bottom right of your task bar, you can monitor it. When no apps are using the GPU, the icon is usually greyed out. When there is an app using the GPU it will appear as coloured. 

I am posting because you mentioned in your original post that the crashes seem to be random. I just wanted to ask if the crashes you experience are triggered by the same causes as me?

If you want to check whether our case is the same, check if the crash happens after your computer has been idle or the GPU has not been used for a while (icon greyed out) and then try and start an application that will utilise the GPU, if it crashes, then I think we might have the same issue. 

I hope you write back, it would put me at ease if I am not the only one experiencing this

Hey doorhingee,

Back when the blue screens started happening (maybe just before), I noticed that the Epic Games client would not start and would show some error message such as "Graphics card not supported". I did re-install it a couple of time and it did start working again briefly, then stopped working again...

After I did the whole DDU driver removal then Dell NVIDIA driver re-install, I got Epic Games re-installed too and then it seemed to be happy starting again.

What is worth saying: I kept an eye on the Task Manager tab that shows GPU use for the Intel and NVIDIA cards as I was doing things. When opening Steam, Origin, GOG Galaxy, Ubisoft Connect and Battlenet none of those caused the NVIDIA GTX 1050 GPU to trigger any use at all i.e. remained at 0% the whole time (and that's even when opening them all back to back). Instead they all seemed happy running only on the Intel HD 630 GPU.

However, on opening the Epic Games client that will trigger the NVIDIA GPU immediately, and every time. It doesn't matter if there's any other clients or programs running or not.

I did notice a pattern with trying to open Epic Games that it would often (but not always) trigger that blue screen VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR crash.

Aside from Epic Games client, I haven't tried playing any actual games at all since these blue screens started happening. I assumed anything using DirectX (related to the blue screen issues) would likely trigger a crash pretty quickly.

Epic Games may be the only obvious Windows application that I have been using that that would trigger the NVIDIA GPU to be used. That said, I did find if I just left my XPS alone for a while (30 mins, 1 hour etc) it would occasionally have just crashed with the same blue screen issue anyway - and that's with no interaction or having Epic Games client loaded and/or running.

I had been previously using the same Dell NVIDIA drivers since last year and did not have any issues at all until some time in March 2022. At a guess, some Windows update may have made the older Dell NVIDIA drivers conflict with the system changes. In this case, a more recent NVIDIA driver might fix the issue for a normal desktop machine but I did try the non-Dell GTX 1050 drivers direct from NVIDIA but it didn't fix the issue. That said, it's generally not a good idea to use the non-Dell drivers since the latter are tweaked to the XPS system power profile and BIOS behavior.

Hope that helps to clarify things a bit?

Hi Rage Feret, 

Thank you for writing back. I think we have a similar issue. I also have a similar experience regarding what you mentioned (below).

'I noticed that the Epic Games client would not start and would show some error message such as "Graphics card not supported". I did re-install it a couple of time and it did start working again briefly, then stopped working again...'

The only work around that I found when encountering the problem of an app saying "graphics card not supported" is to open device manager >> display adapters >> double clicking NVIDIA Geforce GTX 1050 >> going to the drivers tab >> disable device and then re-enabling it. Usually after that, reopening an app like Epic Games client would work and no error message would pop up. 

I also did not know that dell produced their own GTX 1050 drivers. I am currently running the latest NVIDIA driver which I downloaded from the NVIDIA website. I might check if using the dell driver would make a difference

Again thank you for writing back!

Hi Rage Ferret,

Reading through your comments here is like reading a log of the last few weeks of my life with my 9560 XPS. I'm having all the same problems on the same timeline. In fact, one of my two posts to Microsoft Help was linked in one of the earlier replies on this thread. I was initially having problems in late April with the DXGKRNL error. I updated my drivers direct from Dell Support website and all my problems went away for a time.

Then, as of the last major windows update (KB5013942) all hel broke loose on my system again. BSOD errors coming thick and fast. Tried the same fixes to no avail. Like you I started to think it was probably a hardware issue and my system was toast, but we don't appear to be alone with this.

A couple of things have happened on my system that I'm wondering if you've encountered. Firstly, I can't load the Epic Store app at all. Every time I attempt it I have a window pop up that informs me I have an "Unsupported Graphics Card", and then the app shuts down. Secondly, when I boot up Steam everything is fine, until I attempt to lunch a game. I hit the "Play" button on said title, it begins to boot, then it just stalls out and acts like nothing ever happens. No error warning, nothing. Thirdly, my Nvidia Control Panel will only open for a matter of seconds before it crashes with no dialogue. And lastly, I can get my system functioning perfectly as if it were fresh off the delivery van. Everything working fine with Steam, Epic and Nvidia Control Panel and no Blue screens: DDU remove all graphics drivers and reinstall drivers in safe mode. Boot back into the OS and everything's fine with no problems. The instant my XPS goes to sleep it either BSODs on sleep or it BSODs shortly after I wake it, but not before Epic tells me I have an "Unsupported Graphics Card" (I always find myself shouting at the screen "Yeah? Well ya liked it 3 months ago!!").

Any of this sounding familiar?

I've tried updating my drivers from multiple sources, rolling back my drivers, reinstalling windows, and threatening violence. Nothing has worked so far. At this point I'm sort of hoping the problem will fix itself after another windows update.

I haven't had the Driver Power State Failure bluescreen, but I imagine that's in my future...

Hey MistakeNot...

Yes, that is all a very familiar experience to me. Sounds like we are all getting pretty much the same issue.

When I was leaving my XPS alone, I guess the screensaver and/or sleep modes may have kicked in which is why I too was getting blue screens occasionally by the time I came back.

Also, as I often use an external Asus 27" QHD monitor via the HDMI socket, I found when switching the monitors between 'Primary Only', 'Secondary Only' or 'Extended' could trigger a blue screen while the GTX 1050 was enabled.

The Epic Games client "Unsupported Graphics Card" issue was one of the first things I started noticing back in March. For whatever reason, the way they have programmed it, it's deliberately picking the NVIDIA card for rendering rather than the default Intel 630 HD card.

I'm a software engineer and did work on DirectX many years ago. A programmer can ask Windows/DirectX for the available GPU's and it can return indexed devices (this is a simplified description) such as 0=Intel, 1=NVIDIA. Most apps don't care and will just use the first returned device - since any GPU should be capable of standard Windows GDI graphics API calls (software rendering) to draw windows and simple stuff in them. I guess Epic Games specifically pick the NVIDIA GPU if one is available. The dev's will know it will provide better performant hardware acceleration (I'm assuming they try to default to this in the Epic Games client window) vs an Intel GPU and don't just default to using the first GPU device found.

With my GTX 1050 disabled in Device Manager, Epic Games client will open with no problems at all now. It can't find or pick the NVIDIA GPU as it's not told one is available and so just uses the Intel GPU instead. As such I don't get the "Unsupported Graphics Card". The downside is that I'm not going to be playing any actual games at all with the Intel 630...

Also, the XPS is 100% stable with the GTX 1050 disabled in Device Manager. I can have it on all day, let it sleep, wake (several times over) and have loads of apps left running. No blue screens for any reason at all. I'm still using my external Asus 27" QHD monitor via HDMI as 'Primary' or 'Extended' screen mode and its working fine from just the Intel 630 surprisingly!

As you also suggested, I do think this is a conflict between a recent Windows update (for me sometime in March 2022), the older Dell supplied NVIDIA drivers and a possible need for a Dell BIOS update to help prevent it. Having already tried the very latest NVIDIA drivers direct from their own site (much more recent than the Dell drivers) I didn't find it stopped the blue screens.

Between December 2021 and March 2022 I had played entirely through several games before these blue screens started happening. Xcom 2, Grim Dawn and The Force Unleashed II all ran fine with a 30 fps limit set in the NVIDIA driver to help prevent the GPU overheating and throttling. I did have to limit Xcom 2 to 720p, but Grim Dawn was happy at 1080p. No crashes or blue screens at all during those months of laptop use and gaming.

We really Dell to step in and sort this issue out. If they think not fixing it is going to force me to upgrade to a new XPS laptop then they are going to be disappointed. I'm saving for a new gaming desktop PC at the end of the year when the new GTX 4080 (or more likely 4070, cuz I'm more likely to be able to afford that) become available. No more laptops for me thanks. 

I'm having to use the XPS so much now as my existing gaming desktop died just before Christmas. The old GTX 770 is giving me a Code 43 in Device Manager. That causes the NVIDIA drivers to uninstall themselves and now Windows will only work with a very low res basic Microsoft Driver

After some peaceful days of XPS use on only the Intel HD 630 GPU, I decided to have a go at updating to the latest NVIDIA drivers direct from NVIDIA rather than Dell. The 512.95 drivers are only a little newer than the previous 512.59 that I tried already.

The short story is that those newer drivers did not stop the VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR blue screens from happening.

The longer story: initially I did think it had fixed things. I installed the drivers through a careful process of:

1. Left the GTX 1050 disabled in Device Manager.
2. Use msconfig to restart in Safe Mode.
3. Uninstalled NVIDIA drivers via Control Panel.
4. Tried uninstalling NVIDIA PhysX but it wouldn't let me in Safe Mode. So, I left it.
5. Used DDU to remove all signs of NVIDIA but did not mess with Intel drivers.
6. Used msconfig to un-set Safe Mode boot. Made sure my LAN cable was disconnected (WiFi off anyway).
7. Rebooted into normal Windows.
8. Uninstalled Nvidia PhysX (why was that even still there if DDU was supposed to remove it?)
9. Installed the NVIDIA 512.95 drivers with the Clean Install option.
10. Plugged the LAN cable back in.
11. Switched from the primary 4k screen to my external Asus 27" QHD monitor via HDMI. 

All seemed well. No crashing.

Also note that I have already disabled Windows Fast Boot as many mention this being a potential cause of BSOD and XPS sleep/wake issues.

Without restarting the PC, I started up Skyrim in 1080p (& mostly High detail) and ran around in my happy place for a bit. Aside from the XPS fans making a lot of noise it all went well.

Exited Skyrim and used the NVIDIA control panel to set a max FPS of 30. Launched Skyrim again with a slightly less noisy XPS fan effect. All good again. Played for about 1 hour, no issues.

Shut down windows (no crashes) and booted up next day and just left the XPS alone to see what it did. It happily went to sleep after 30 mins (what I'd set it to). I woke it up later by tapping the touch pad. All good.

Opened web browsers for Chrome, Firefox and Edge at the same time. No problems.

Starting to think all was fixed, I thought I run a benchmark but needed to download something like Unigine Heaven. Used Chrome to browse to the website, started clicking around... and got the BSOD with VIDEO_DXGKRNL_FATAL_ERROR again.

I've disabled the GTX 1050 in Device Manager once again. Ah well. 

Over on the Microsoft Community forum there seem to be a lot of people recently getting this particular BSOD. Not always on Dell systems, but often enough.

I'm still hoping Dell with magically produce a new NVIDIA driver and/or BIOS update to sort this out.

I've experienced similar problems with blue screens when using DirectX stuff it seems, I believe this may be caused by the PhysX driver which by default is installed when you install the full NVIDIA Drivers, tried removal, clean install etc.  The latest and previous Nvidia studio/game drivers acted exactly the same as well still crashing.  Did a clean install but unticked physx drivers and good so far.. give it a go and see if this makes any difference for you, will report back if crashes out again.