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I have a Dell Inspiron Laptop, I never use it for other purposes than web surfing and most usually use it on battery power. But nowadays my laptop is heating like ironbox. It is a pretty new laptop (used about 2-3 months). If I open photoshop or any medium to high usage application, it heats up (soo hot that it is no more a "Lap"top) and for performance I moved the slider on battery options to best performance and the laptop fans spin loud like an old ceiling fan. When I keep the slider on best battery life the fans go down.

So I checked my power settings there is only one power plan = Balanced

create a new Power planWhen I try to create a new power plan, again only the default option selected as Balanced.

From some websites and YouTube videos I've seen adding new power plan schemes such as adding the high performance and ultimate performance using commands in cmd (For High Performance-powercfg -duplicatescheme 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c), unluckily none of them works. Another option was to edit registry file named Csenabled, located here - HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power. But for me there is no registry file named Csenabled. Any solution?

I'm pretty sure my laptop supports high performance, I don't know what is the problem

Laptop: Dell Inspiron 5501-Intel Core i5-1035G1 CPU @ 1.00 GHz (8GB RAM) Windows: Windows 10 Professional

3 Answers 3

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If you have a modern PC, you may find that the only available Power Plan is Balanced, while other power schemes are hidden and not available.

The reason behind this issue is that modern PCs use a new power efficient technology, known as "S0 Low Power Standby", or "Modern Standby".

When the hardware supports this modern Standby mode, the motherboard firmware (e.g. BIOS) may exclusively stick to that mode, and prevent other power modes from being reported to the OS. That is not a bug, it is by design. If you need to use other Power plans in Windows 10, you need to reconfigure the firmware of your device's motherboard.

To do that:

  • Boot into the BIOS
  • Find an OS Type option, possibly under the Boot category. It may read "Windows UEFI" or "Windows 10". If the option doesn't exist, then this method cannot succeed.
  • Try to set the option to "Other OS" or similar
  • Reboot.

If all passes well, Windows 10 will now allow you to create other power plans.

If you run into trouble after changing the option, revert the changes back, if it interferes with Secure Boot or UEFI boot mode, depending on your firmware software.

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  • there seems to be no such option. I checked all over, but no such option. Commented May 30, 2021 at 17:45
  • Try to disable "Modern Standby" this way.
    – harrymc
    Commented May 30, 2021 at 17:58
  • I did, the new registry key is there, but after the restarting as per mentioned nothing happens. Still the same. Guess I'll have to let it be the same. Commented May 30, 2021 at 18:55
  • Your BIOS seems to be hardwired to "Modern Standby" and the S3 power state is not supported. Try perhaps the latest BIOS update (carefully), if you don't have it already. If it also doesn't support this mode, then I'm afraid that there's nothing more to be done.
    – harrymc
    Commented May 30, 2021 at 19:27
  • Thanks!, but I tried updated yesterday everything was new still flashed the downloaded one. No change Commented May 31, 2021 at 6:39
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Windows 10 newest versions and Windows insider just have one pre-built power plan - Balanced. This is as you see.

However you can create new power plans with new names - Custom plans based on the selected plan you start with.

Be aware that Power Plans just use the available options, so it was a bit of "Who is on First" to have many power plans. Confusing to some, so the default eliminates them.

To create a new plan, open Control Panel, Power Options, and then on the left side, select Create a Power Plan.

enter image description here

Select your plan. I see Balanced, Power Saver, High Performance. Then click on next, enter your settings and choose Create to create the Plan.

enter image description here

This should create your plan and be available.

If there appear to be issues for you, update both BIOS and the Power Driver (Dell Support Site) for your machine.

You say "it heats up (soo hot that it is no more a "Lap"top)" . Power Plans will not help cooling, so you may also need to contact Dell Support.

Good luck. All working here.

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  • I did that as per mentioned in my question. But there seems to be no other options than balanced while creating a new power plan, I have uploaded an image of the same, would you kindly analyze it. Commented May 30, 2021 at 14:01
  • Two things: (1) Try updating drivers and Windows to see if the plans appear properly. And (2) Power plans do not normally aid cooling. If overheating, you need also to contact Dell Support.
    – anon
    Commented May 30, 2021 at 14:11
  • I checked and updated everything. Anyway thanks for spending your time. I guess I'll stick with Ubuntu ( I hate windows) Commented May 30, 2021 at 19:05
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Modern Windows installations may make use Power Modes instead of traditional Power Plans. These are tiers (overlays) on the Balanced power plan. You can think of them as light power plans.

On these systems, you'll only see a Balanced power plan, but you will be able to toggle between the Power Modes in the Battery options, using the Performance Mode Slider or Power Settings.

For more information, see https://bitsum.com/power/only-balanced/ or https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/customize/desktop/customize-power-slider .

Power Mode Selection in Settings

Power Mode Selection via Battery icon in tray

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