[Guide] How to control fans on Dell Laptops under Windows

I just found this thread. How come, no one knows if it works with the XPS line too, for example, XPS 15 9560 or maybe even the new model 9570? Anyone ever tested it?

 

AFAIK, this hasn't worked for any models released in the past ~6 years.

So....don't hold out any hope.

 

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Hello. Thank's a lot for your work! I'm not sure to do the right thing because i'm not sure to understand correctly what you mean about this sentence
"": You have to put OP "bzh_dell_smm_io_x64.sys" (or x86) side by side with my EXE."""
Could you explain what you mean and how to do it this please ?

Best regards from france in Paris.

Vincent.

 

Working on Dell 7577 BIOS 1.5.0, you must choose Override in EC Control. Also the fan on 7577 can go up to 6000rpm, but the sw only max out at 5000

 

Yes I managed to make it work on Dell G5 5587 which I bought just yesterday (First I used dell fan utility with GUI and it was able to disable my EC. Then I switched to the the.exe CMD version shared in this topic by another member and my setup works like a charm!)

However by using hwinfo64 I can set only three values for my fans: 0, 2200 and 4900. I wish there was something in between. Is there some way to unlock bios to customize these values?

Also, for some of you this solution is not necessary.

Dell released an "Intel Dynamic Platform and Thermal Framework" driver which overrides default EC controls and works much better. For example if you own a Dell G5 like I do, you can find it by going here http://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/19/product-support/product/g-series-15-5587-laptop/ clicking Drivers & downloads and then clicking View More a couple times and you should be able to find it.

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/8t8nqe/my_dell_g5_runs_at_100c/

P.S. I noticed that my custom auto profiles in hwinfo stop working sometimes. I have to open the sensor window and click minimize. Are there any better alternatives? I tried SpeedFan but its a mistery for me how to set it up properly.

 

Works very well on DELL 9560, click on Disable EC Control and don't forget to choose the override radio button.
Now you can set the fan speed with the button below

 

After stumbling on a reddit post, I found this thread and tried the utility once again and it works beautifully. I'm using Precision 5520, which is the sibling of XPS 9560.

I tried Dell Power Command and other options before but nothing worked. The "quiet" option in Dell Command just caps the CPU performance, and if you ever forget to set the system power plan to "High Performance", you'll be left with a crippled CPU when not on AC. Granted these rules are there for safety reasons, but in my opinion there has been way too much caution exercised.

A few other software configurations I've done in the past year: uninstalled Intel Dynamic Platform and Thermal Framework and modified the installation folder privileges so that they don't come back (otherwise you can expect them to silently reinstall within 5 minutes) - this disables the thermal throttling when both CPU and GPU are loaded. Throttlestop - undervolt and fix CMOD to 100% so CPU doesn't stop working at 70C. I should add that I've carefully repasted and added thermal pads for better passive cooling. There are tradeoffs but I'm personally very happy with them.

This fan control utility brings it one giant step closer to reasonable configuration. The fan noise at low temps is finally gone, and I'm perfectly fine with CPU @ 40C when using word or browsing. I've had the fan replaced a number of times due to the noise and faulty replacement parts. The last one appeared to be less noisy at first but now I think it's starting to whine a little bit again. I use MacBook pro at work and, even though I prefer Windows PC, MacBooks have much quieter yet more powerful fans and very reasonable fan control. I understand that it adds non-negligibly to the R&D cost and it might not be something we can expect in a PC yet but Dell blocking the users from easily optimizing their machines when they themselves failed is quite ridiculous. I'm very thankful to the people who figured this out initially and the OP who posted a tutorial. About to try to remove the Test Mode watermark for long-term use but I'm otherwise very satisfied (finally).

I apparently have only 3 RPM levels too, but I think it works well for my purposes. Go to Speedfan-configuration-fan control and you can set a mapping from component temperatures to fan speeds. Pretty easy to use and very effective. Not sure about your system but like I mentioned, DPTF is only trouble for my system. I would recommend staying away unless there is a reason not to.

 

Is there any way to disable the EC permanently or set to startup disabled? This tutorial worked for my Dell 7567 just fine, but I use a custom fan speed config in HWiNFO and would be nice having all this starting automatically with windows 10.

 

I found a not insignificant problem though. Disabling EC also disables brightness control via Fn+F11 and Fn+F12.

After failing to identify anything in the Dell Fan Utility or driver code that is connected to brightness control, I'm currently using ClickMonitorDDC as a workaround with Ctrl+F11, Ctrl+F12 controlling brightness. Fn key doesn't seem to be supported by the hotkey function. But on the positive side, the program allows you to control brightness at the smallest step supported by the LCD (in this case 63 steps) and you can specify the step size associated with hotkey.

I hope Dell soon realizes that their strict and unintelligent control of the fans is a disservice to many users and with no benefit to the rest. It would appear quite evil to me if they did it knowingly.

P.S. Another surprising benefit is that since there is a control key on the right side of the keyboard, I can now pretty effortlessly control brightness onehandedly. It is quite nice especially in the dark, since I don't like keyboard lights. With a sigh of course, bemoaning the lack of flexibility in Dell default fan control and the resulting inconveniences for us users.

Edit: Strangest thing, Fn key for brightness started working again (perhaps after a long sleep). Will report back if it lasts.

Edit2: Turns out that the brightness control is disabled after EC is disabled in the utility app, but not when the computer is restarted and EC is still disabled. Putting the computer to sleep and waking brings back brightness control as well. There might be more to it but for now this seems a reasonable way to control both fans and brightness without too much effort...

 

Is your brightness control still working lol?

Edit: Nvm see my last post