XPS 17 9700 Thermal Runaway

Same thing happened on my brand new one the other evening. I wasn't even using it, lid closed, in sleep mode, I thought. Was close by, fans were going nuts, and the case was extremely hot.

Hello Holonalu. For what it's worth: for reasons I'll not belabor here, Dell replaced my XPS 17 with an identically configured copy approximately 2 months after this incident. I mention this because the replacement laptop has never exhibited the behavior I described in this message. This is true despite equivalent behavior from me. I frequently walk away from this laptop without closing it; I may be absent for some time. It will now go to sleep in the expected, safe manner. It has never ever acted self-destructively.  For this reason, which is empirical, it strikes me that Dell should be ready, willing and able to supply you with, at no cost to you, a download that will permanently remedy this anomalous behavior. My understanding is that Dell have reprogrammed the BIOS in a way that precludes specifically this modality of thermal runaway. Good luck, Holonalu!     

This is still an issue. Bought brand new XPS with 2TB SSD, 10th gen i9-10885H processor, NVIDIA(R) GeForce RTX(TM) 2060 6GB GDDR6 with Max-Q and it's running 32GB DDR4 and uses a 97WHr battery. Well my wife left her laptop plugged in and open and when she went to access it the computer was off and would not start.  I was able to restart it by first unplugging it from power source then allowing it to cool for about 30 minutes (just left it on a glass table in room temp setting) and then by pressing and holding power button for about 20 seconds and then repeatedly pressing it thereafter 3 times or so it came back to life. No further issues..UNTIL 3 days later and it happened again. 

Not sure what is going on here, but I have the same model except that I have 64GB DDR4 on mine, and mine has not had any issue. Both are under a month old. Luckily I have the care package so I will call Dell, but good to know this is a broader issue than just her computer. I'll update. 

I do as well. Same way it’s described for everyone else. This is brand new. I’ve had it less than 4 months. 

I have the same issue occurring. They sent a tech over to fix what they called a heatsink fan issue. It was nonsense because the fan and sink worked fine in normal operation and it was crashing because of a runaway system memory issue during sleep mode. Anyway it happened again 6 hours after the tech left. I am waiting to see how they reply this time.

When I first spoke with the service rep they said they would replace the CPU, sink and fans but when they submitted the service request they left out the CPU. The part that was likely the real issue. Anyway they tried the cheap option that has nothing to do with the issue at hand and we will see what the next proposal by them is.  

XPS 13 have this issue too, I have my XPS-13 9310 for about 3 months now and have learned to always close the lid when I walk away, it's not optimal and sometimes I forget, luckily everything is in the cloud so no work lost but I hope Dell fixes it soon, it is really unnerving to find a hot non-responsive €2300 machine hoping it is not toast.

I've done all the power setting changes that are suggested but have not found the magic bullet yet.

This is an update to my previous post. This morning I received an email from tech support that was vague and didn't answer my direct questions. They said they were sending the technician back to fix "the problem". I'm not sure if that meant the actual issue or their idea of it being a heatsink issue. So I called support and after another remote session it was advised to reinstall the OS and if that doesn't fix the issue they well replace the mother board with the CPU built in. 

I skeptical for now because the very first support tech stated they would replace the CPU/mother-board yet only submitted fans and heatsink for the service request and when pressed on it during the service call while the tech was working on the computer came up with some heat issue that was never the problem in the first place. As others have experienced the heat issue is a symptom of the Sleep mode runaway state not the cause of it. 

Enough people have had this same issue they must be aware of it and the cause of it. The fact there is not a software update to fix it and they are replacing computers or motherboards suggests to me hardware issues.  I really like my XPS when in normal operation but am not at all impressed with this issue or how its been handled so far. These are issues that should be dealt with before they release these models. 

For whatever it may be worth, approximately 2 months after my episodes of thermal runaway arose I was allowed to exchange my damaged laptop to Dell for a brand now XPS 17 for possibly unrelated reasons. Specifically, I blamed damage to the laptop's speakers on these episodes of this alarming behavior. A tech found the damage irreparable, and this got me over the hump. This was, in any event, the overt basis for the exchange - speakers, not calamitous thermal runaway behavior. Even though I subsequently engaged in modes of use with the replacement computer that had previously induced the laptop to bluescreen and to thermally run away, no such alarming behavior has ever appeared in this new laptop. Though my recollection of this is now vague, I seem to recall that the Indian support staff claimed that Dell had revised the BIOS to ensure the absolute and reliable elimination of this awful behavior. This new computer has, to date, as it were, substantiated Dell's assurances. On the other hand, I deeply support the right to exchange of every customer who has experienced this class of behavior, on the theory that every such customer has a right to infer from this kind of unexpected thermal catastrophe that the event has damaged the computer during the warranty period. I was, in fact, preparing to invoke rights when the exchange opportunity materialized, I was so incensed.      

• Further update Dell sent a technician over to replace the motherboard.  After installation the refurbished motherboard, which I wasn't happy about, the computer wouldn't boot up bios or windows. The technician ended up reinstalling the original motherboard saying the refurbished one sent was incompatible. So after 2 services calls nothing has been solved and Dell is trying to fix my almost brand new computer with refurbished parts.

Not impressed at all.

The exact same thing happened to me. I am a bit worried as I closed the lid and went to sleep (no apps running, the laptop was plugged in). When I came back in the morning the fans were at maximum while the laptop was off. It was only the keyboard lights that were on. I tried to press keyboard buttons and the shut down button and nothing happened. Then I held the power button for 5 seconds and had to force restart. The space above the keyboard was burning and even the power button to the point where it was burning my finger while holding it.

It went into some bios scan memory thing and then as soon as it opened I went to check the gpu temperature and it was close to 80 degrees.... had to leave it to cool down for a bit.

My specs are i9 11900H, RTX 3060, 512gb and 16gb RAM.

Really hope DELL does something regarding this as it is slowly toasting my computer (over night in this case). I've only had it for 2 weeks and it is already the second big problem I've been having besides the left speaker not working..

I have the same behavior. 

computer goes to sleep, I come back to it being insanely hot and crashed. Sometimes says crashed for temp reasons other says for memory reasons.
Tech replaced my heat sink, fan, motherboard, still persists.

They just issued a box for me to send in the laptop for a week (which is kind-of insane to me). 

it is clear that something is happening that someone knows about.

i asked for a new one and they said that i had to send this one in.

insane update on what is going on here.
Dell had my laptop at their depot and they are saying that... there is a problem with the heat sink and fans and they replaced them.
This is the same issue that they said it was before and they fully replaced those pieces, but the problem still persisted. 

I asked them what was going on - they replaced piece they already replaced - how can I trust that this actually fixes an issue? Also, the laptop got crazy hot on many occasions when this issue was occurring did this effect the lifetime of any of other parts of the computer? I asked them these questions and all they told me was that i would continue to receive some support until warrantee ends and then i could pay extra for this amazing support.

So to recap - 

the computer got crazy hot when sleeping on multiple occasions, crashed, etc.
Spent hours and hours on the phone with dell running diagnostics, reinstalling windows, updating the system.
Spent hours on multiple occasions for follow up calls as system continued to crash.

Spent more hours on multiple occasions where parts were replaced.
I couldn't bring this laptop anywhere for work for fear of the thing reaching 10,000 degrees in my backpack.
They they requested the laptop be sent in and I was without it for over a week.
This is just NUTS!

Clearly there is some issue here with this system. I have bought XPS systems for 15 years for myself, my family, and friends and I am blown away at how much customer-disregard we are getting for this laptop. I have no idea what issues ramping the system to these temperatures repeatedly has caused to the longevity of the computer's components and they don't seem to give it a second of concern, they are just throwing it back at us.

AMAZING that we are being treated this way. Really makes me think about ever spending money with dell again, and definitely changes how I will recommend this brand to others.

so what is the conclusion today?
Probably 10 hours of my life gone to their tech support, tons of lost productivity at work without being able to travel with this XPS system, lots of frustration, multiple tech support visits and replacement parts, and now they are sending the system back after doing what the other tech support said they did. It's a disgrace. This probably has been going on with this system since like April. It is painfully obvious what Dell should do - Just take back the computer, say sorry for the inconvenience, and issue credit in exchange for a new one. What happened instead? they took a customer that's involved with >$50k going their way over the years and thrown the loyalty into the trash over a $2k laptop. An Amazing customer's service failure

Further update - 
computer was returned from depot with one of the screws on the back partially stripped. I pushed hard to try and avoid any further stripping when opening the back and was completely unable to get it to moved without the screwdriver skipping. I obviously stopped at this point, but .. wow. This is the state of the laptop returned from the official dell depot.

Another follow up...
The computer arrived back from the depot with a stripped screw in the back. 
I cannot open the computer.
They are asking about me taking time out from my day, again, to send out a tech to fix the screw.

un-be-lievable