XPS 8930, what does EP_EXCEPTION SUB_HEADER mean?

Ron,

I did not know that windows automatically deletes old System Restore points.

This problem may have started about 10 Sept since I first posted about it on 11 Sept.  I downloaded the updates from Dell on 1 Sept but didn't start installing them right away, just the bios.  

I did install the bios update first on 1 Sept, the new bios is dated 07/08/2022 because my current bios was dated 10/31/2019.

I was able to do that from within Windows 10, as directed by the update.  It installed fine and I have had no issues at all.

This whole mess started because I was finally noticing that my computer was getting slower.  Takes 1:40 minutes (or longer) to boot up.  My wife's HP laptop bought at the same time as my Dell (Feb 2020) boots up in 11 seconds, an older HP laptop from 2009 boots Windows 10 in 27 seconds.

I figured it was time to do an backup and investigate why it so slow.  I did a full system backup with Acronis True Image and I had a problem with it because I am not used to using the software for a restore purposes.  I did use it to restore my external drive when I bought this computer.   With help from the Acronis forum, I figured out my software problems and backups are fine now and I'm sure I'll be able to restore.  I have two full backups on my two WD Hard Drives (7 and 12 Sept).  It will also make a bootable USB drive for restoring.

I was concerned that with my luck, I would probably end up with a computer that would not boot if I did a new install.  That's when I discovered that I could not enter the bios to make any changes for bootup.  Acronis makes a restore DVD that boots up.  I have never had an occasion to go into the bios since I've owned this computer.  I never noticed that I do not get a Dell logo flash at start-up.  After a couple of days research on here, I learned that one of the monitor cables (I have 2 monitors) has to be plugged into the HDMI port on the graphics card.  Changed the cable and now my Dell logo comes up and F2 and F12 work.

Solved the bios problem, solved the EP display problem, now just need to fix the speed.  I did a lot of research on here and tried some of the things suggested, to no avail.

Thanks for the info on the Windows license.  Since I only had two very old 4GB USB drives, I bought 3, 32GB drives today and will use the link you supplied to make a Win 10 install & boot up USB.

I am going to try and use the oldest Restore Pont and see what happens.  Win10 reports that 22 files will be deleted and 26 files with be reinstalled/restores (included 4 Dell files).

Thanks again for your patience and time require to respond to my problems.  It is appreciated.

I will let you know what happens.

Jerry

In regards to the slow boot, see if you have the Realtek sound driver 6.0.9025 installed. That caused slow boots on many XPS 8930's, mine included. If you do have that driver, either rollback or go to Dell site and download that version which is Realtek 6.0.8248, it's from 2019. Hope that helps, a clean install is what I did in October last year to fix the slow boot problem (it didn't). Rolling back to the Microsoft generic driver did.

Ron,

Just thought I'd report, right after I posted my last message I started the Restore System on my oldest Restore Point.

It has been running for 4 hours and 45 minutes.  It is still displaying the:

Please wait while your Windows files and settings are
being restored
System Restore is restoring the registry...

Do you have any idea how long it is supposed to take to Restore the system ?  It is only a 256GB hard drive, but it is an SSD.  It did restart one time that I saw.

I hope this sucker doesn't crash.  Right now I'm on the wife's old HP G70 Laptop.

Jerry

tolduso,

Thanks for the response pointing out a possible solution to my slow boot problem.

But, as you can see from my last post, the 8930 is running System Restore (almost 5 hours now) and I can't check to see which Realtek driver is installed.

I will certainly check after I get access to the 8930 and let you know.

Jerry

@jmallard  Sorry the restore didn't work, but at least no harm was done!

Glad rolling back to previous Realtek driver helped. v9107 is the version on my XPS 8930. I also have Microsoft driver v10.0.19041.1 for speakers/headphones. So that's not a problem.

Lets back up...
Don't think you ever told us which CPU, and how much RAM in this system. Can we assume you still have at least one monitor connected to the add-in video card in this system?

How are you measuring "startup time"? Are you looking at "BIOS time" on top right side of Startup tab in Task Manager?

Is Fast Startup enabled or disabled in Windows? That makes a big difference:

1. Boot to desktop
2. Open Windows Power & Sleep screen
3. Click Additional power settings
4. Click Change what power buttons do
5. Click Change settings that are currently unavailable
6. Check Turn on fast startup (if currently unchecked)
7. Click Save changes, if any
   #8 & #9 below only necessary if you enabled Fast Startup
8. Do full shutdown, not just a restart. Then power on and boot
9. Do another full shutdown and boot before you measure boot times again.

How much "junk" is loading in background at boot? You've gotten rid of Killer and Dell stuff, but what else is loading, eg CLML server (Cyberlink software),  printer software, etc, etc? Look on Startup tab in Task Manager.

Ron,

No worries about the restore, I'm just glad it didn't end up dead.  If it was still running or dead, I was just going to shut it off and hope for the best.

I just measured "startup time" with the stop watch function on my cell phone (hit start then stop).  Didn't realize you could see it in Task Manager (16.5 BIOS time).

I tried to "disable" everything that I could in the startup tab to save resources.  Of 26 listed, on 10 are "enabled".

Fast Startup was not enabled.  I enabled it following your instructions but it didn't change the start up time.

You mentioned what about my system, I listed the "system" along with hard disk and printer information added.

As far as how much "junk" is loading, Startup tab is displayed above but I listed below my "Programs and Features" list to show how much junk I have on the system.

I know some of the stuff is very old and not supported software, but I kinda don't care.  As long as it continues to work I will use it.  Some of the software that I have I've had to buy because different versions of Windows stopped supporting it or it just wouldn't work on my computer model (physical or operational non support).

I probably won't upgrade to Win 10 until I'm forced to (2025 I think).

Since I did the HDMI cable move to the graphics card I am able to see the "Dell" logo and boot up and can access the bios with F12.  I haven't changed anything yet but I did try to boot with an old DVD from Acronis backup that was bootable in the past, but it didn't work.  I am going to make a bootable USB and DVD to try and see it they will load on boot.

I'll let you know.  I'll try to respond faster next time.

Thanks again for all your help.

Jerry

16.5 sec BIOS time isn't bad at all. Only ~4 sec slower than mine. We have same i7 CPU and you have 32 GB of RAM but I only have 16 GB.  You have different SSD and it may have slower read/write speed than mine which could impact boot times. We both have Win 10 and we both use ZoneAlarm too.

On your Startup tab you have a two items with "high" impact on startup. Don't know what DT-Startup or Verizon 2.0 UA are, but do you need them to launch at very boot?  Just because something is disabled at startup, doesn't mean you can't manually launch it via a desktop shortcut when you need to use it.

You also have an HP app loading that may not have to load at every boot, even though it has a "low" impact on startup.

You need to connect at least one monitor to your add-in NVidia card....

You have a later version of the XPS 8930 motherboard, A02, while I have A01, and don't know if that has any impact on boot times.  But bottom line, your boot times are pretty good...

As for old software, have you tried setting their "compatibility mode" to an older version of Windows to see if they will run in Win 10? 

As long as the app has a 32-bit installer, you should be able to install it in Win 10. Then right-click the shortcut for that app and select Properties. When that opens, click Compatibility tab. You can run a compatibility test there to see what Windows thinks you need, or just manually set compatibility for an older version of Windows where the app ran. If the app originally ran under XP, setting compatibility for Win 7 can frequently work. I've got a couple of Win 95 apps running in Win 10 using Win 7 compatibility mode with no problems...

Ron,,

I  just spend 30 minutes crafting an answer to your message and messed up and clicked somewhere else and I lost the answer.

Anyway, my first bootup today, the BIOS time was 10 seconds.  YEA! 
That equaled yours.  Checked the wife's HP laptop and BIOS time was 4.4 seconds.  The electricity must be flowing faster in our area today.

I did go into Task Manager and disable DT-Startup, Verizon 2.0, hpwuSchd App, and Trackball Works (it was listed twice and I don't know why - so I disabled one). 
My BIOS time was 9.9 seconds for this bootup.  Seems like my slow boot problem is gone.

You also may be right about you maybe having a faster SSD with a faster read/write speed.  Mine is only 256GB.  A new 500GB is about $80. and a 1TB is about $130.  I might upgrade!

Yes, I also learned on this board that one of the monitors has to be plugged into the NVidia card for the computer to boot to the "Dell" logo, hence, an opportunity to get to the BIOS.

Using Acronis True Image I did create bootable recovery media on both a new USB and a DVD.  You were also right about not having to do anything to get the PC to boot to one of them on start up.  I tried them both and they both boot up.  I will now create a restore USB with Windows. 

I am also aware of the "compatibility mode" in Win 10.  I am pretty sure I used it on some of my software that currently resides herein, maybe the Mirosoft Front Page 2003 and Office XP Pro (I don't remember for sure).  However, I do remember that Corel Draw/Photo Paint (ver 6) and Corel WordPerfect Suite would not install on this PC when I first got it.  The compatibility mode did not work, at least not for me at the time.  I was able to get the version 7X in both software packages at a good discount because one of my daughters is a teacher. 

Again, Thanks for passing on a lot of your knowledge.  It sure is appreciated.

I'll be back for more help, I'm sure.

Jerry

Note:  The board notified me:
"You used a bad word,  in the body of your post.  Please clean up the body before posting"

I used that word at the very start. 

Sounds like all your probs are resolved! Create a new image of the SSD while everything is good.

There's no guarantee a new NVME SSD will improve on your 10 sec Boot time. You can't compare a Brand X PC with entirely different hardware to the XPS 893.  So if it ain't broke, don't break it!

The forum is supposed to auto-save posts every few min while you're writing them, so surprising it didn't prompt you about a saved draft and offer the opportunity to recover it when you started your last post over. Or maybe you just didn't notice the green banner right above the Reply box with that option when you came back to start over.

As I said, software has to have a 32-bit installer to be installed in Win 10. Really old software only had 16-bit installers which can't run in Win 10, so that software cannot be installed...

And yes, the forum's censor software scans posts for bad words, etc, so please behave... ;o))

Ron,

Yes my 3 problems have been solved.  I have one more I'll get to shortly.

I did create a new backup of both my C: SSD and my E: SSD onto my F: drive.  I did also create a bootable USB and a DVD from Acronis.  They both boot up the machine using F12.  I also created a Windows system backup to USB.

I agree on the not worrying about upgrading my NVME SSD, don't need to break it !

Didn't know about the auto save on the forum, I'm still new to using it. Although I've been a member since 2008, my last time on was in 2014 working with my daughter's Inspiron.

Talking about old software, how do you determine if software has a 32-bit installer?

For my other problem, just sorta came about because of using my 2 laptops in addition to the XPS.
For my 'home' network, all of the machines don't see all the other machines.

Is it o.k. to ask about those problems ?

Thanks Again.

Jerry

(BIOS Startup 9.8 seconds)

OOpps, I spoke too soon.  I just developed another problem.

My speakers just quit working.  I will start a new thread (Dell 8930 Speakers Stopped Working).  I will also start a new thread about the network problem.

Thanks.

Jerry

The auto-save notice looks like this and will appear above the Reply box if you have any saved content. Saved content may not be totally complete because you may have added text between the last save and when you lost your post:

Since you replaced the Realtek audio driver on your PC, you probably need to play the Waves MaxxAudio "waiting game"....

Go to Windows Sound screen and make sure Output is set to Speakers/Headphones (Realtek)(assuming you're not using speakers in your monitor via HDMI or DP with the NVidia audio driver).

Fully power PC off and disconnect speakers completely from PC. Power on and boot to desktop. Make sure Waves Audio Service is running in services.msc, and Waves MaxAudio Service Application is running on Processes tab in Task Manager.

Assuming that's all good, plug front speakers into PC and wait for Waves to pop up and ask what you connected. Select best option available on the list offered. If you have surround sound, connect rear speakers next and wait for Waves to pop up and choose best option. Plug subwoofer (if you have one) in last and wait...

When all speakers are connected, open Waves Control Center, by clicking the W icon on taskbar, near the clock.

Click the Playback box in Waves and move the little slider to the right to turn the Equalizer on. Then scroll down and make sure "Select Output Device" is still set correctly.  Then test speakers by clicking the sound test button at bottom right corner.

If they work now, you can adjust settings for type of music, bass, etc, etc. Be sure to save your settings by clicking the disc icon and give the profile a new name (not one of Waves' pre-set names). Last profile used will be loaded automatically at next boot, so you can have multiple profiles with different names for different types of music but you have to remember to change the profile when you change music...

If you have surround sound, click Playback box, move that slider to right and then see what options are available for configuring your speakers...

I also got this problem when I was trying to register my new XPS 9315. Since this problem stroke my screen I don't know how to register it anymore. Does anyone can help me?