Closing the lid does not enter hibernate or sleep mode

I've bought Dell XPS M 1530 recently. Earlier with bios version A_05 my
notebook didnot detect wireless network if it became available while the
computer was already On. The computer had to be waking up or restarting in
the presence of network and then only it registered it.
The Dell technician downloaded the latest bios (version A_07) and the
wireless network problem got corrected.
But the new problem thats comeup now is that closing the lid doesnt put the
computer to sleep. I checked in the power options, thats correctly
configured. Even changed it to hibernate when i close lid. That doesnt work
either.

One more thing i must add - that it's not like my computer doesnt get to
know at all that the lid is closed. When i open the lid, everything is ON but
the mouse arrow behaves 'drunk' for a while before becoming normal. Can
someone help.

AK

[Tony S]

The hybrid sleep feature and the hibernation feature in Windows Vista may
become unavailable after you use the Disk Cleanup Tool :
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/928897

Thanks for the interest
I'll wait for the solution till you can come across something.

AK, I'm having the exact same problem as you with my M1530 that I purchased in January.

Were you able to find a fix? I'm not a techie so any simple help will be greatly appreciated.

Darn! I really appreciate you getting back to me though AK. I am anxiously awaiting a solution to this as Dell Tech Support have been completely useless in resolving this.

Some claim it's a Vista problem while others think it's a Trend Micro PC-Cillin 14 problem. I've downloaded SP1 for Vista in hopes that this would repair the problem but it has not.

Any suggestions? Anyone???

t-4-2,

Thanks for the suggestion. I've made the changes you recommended but the computer still does not sleep when the lid is closed, and if I press Function+F1 (sleep mode) the computer shuts down.

I am using a wireless Logitech mouse. Could you explain how I get the optional Hid update, or what it is for that matter? Again, I'm a bit technical but not when it comes to Laptops.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Hi there, it's been some time and I'm still having the same problem listed above. I'm running the latest A09 BIOS and have tried all of the sleep/hibernate settings in Vista.

I would really like to get this problem resolved if any one has some suggestions?

Could it be an issue with Trend Micro PC Cillin Internet Security 14? I recall something about a year ago regarding this but can't find anything.

Hey 350Z,

Thanks for replying and yes please keep me posted! I've been having additional problems with my notebook, specifically with the Dell Media Direct button which, when pushed, gets stuck in an infinite loop of trying to load and doesn't! If I then press the Power button NOT the Media Direct button the notebook does not load into Vista like it's supposed to but rather into Media Direct and that vicious loop! I've tried running the repair utility off of the Vista CD but I'm still having problems. I'm going to format the hard drive and reload everything in hopes that some of my problems will be resolved.

Any help you can give will be greatly appreciated!

Tony S

I'd check the Dell forums to see if this new BIOS has this issue. There
will be a Dell driver that tells the OS when the lid has been closed, so
it's possible that an update for the driver is necessary for it to work with
the new BIOS. As the BIOS is the interface between the hardware and the OS,
this is a possible explanation.

Assuming you already knew that if you do have wireless mice/keyboards,
you'll need an optional Hid update.
That aside, please try this : -
Control Panel > System/maintenance > Power Options > Change Plan
settings > Change advanced settings > click the (+) sign in front of
Multi media settings > click the (+) sign in front of When sharing media
> PLUG IN, change to "allow computer to sleep".
Let me know if it's ok now.

Hello Tony,
The optional update is called " Hid Non-user Input Data Filter". It is
designed for wireless applications, particularly useful for machines Not
going to sleep mode.
It is/was initially available through Windows update, optional. If you
cannot find it there anymore, then you'll need to install Intellipoint
software first, then search for the optional
google Intellipoint in the search box. It's easy.

[350zEnthusiast]

Looks like I'm a little late to the discussion, but I'm experiencing the same problem. I bought the laptop back in Oct. 2008, and then had to have a faulty keyboard replaced in Dec. 2008. Ever since the tech opened up the laptop, the screen does not sense when it is shut, so it does not turn off the monitor, let alone sleep or hibernate. I thought I could live with the issue, but it drains battery life if you forget to manually hibernate. Now, I have been emailing Dell tech support for a week, running tons of diagnostics, etc. If I get a solution, I'll let you know. Btw, I'm up to BIOS A12.

It seems I've reached a stalemate with Dell Technical Service. After reinstalling the video card drivers, flashing the BIOS, updating a MS patch, and reinstalling the Intel chipset, the tech now says to just try to format my drive with the Vista recovery partition and hope that works. After that if it still does not work, then he will send out the same crappy tech to "replace the faulty parts." Of course, that is not what I requested six emails ago, and I have no interest in reinstalling all of my programs. So for now, I think I'm just going to put up with this fluke until some other, more serious, problem arises.

[Tony S]

So it's been a while and I'm still having the same problem. My Dell XPS M1530 still will not sleep/hibernate when I close the lid - everything stays on.

Has anyone found a solution yet?

[jenpigeon]

I have a Dell Studio 17 that recently developed a similar problem. It would start to sleep when I closed the lid, then it would suddenly pop out of sleep even when the lid was still closed.

Since sleep used to work fine and my power and other system settings were unchanged since that time, I figured a background program was telling the computer "hey, wake up, I'm doing stuff back here!" The only problem was, which one was doing that?

I opened the Task Manager and ended active processes until I was down to the bare minimum necessary to keep the computer running. The first time I did this, a few weeks ago, it worked and the computer stayed asleep. After that, I was able to gradually narrow down the number of processes I had to cancel, and eventually pinpointed the offending process. Then it was a matter of disabling the process so it wouldn't start up on its own--a quick search online gets you that info so you can disable it.

More recently, after I installed and uninstalled some programs, the computer stopped sleeping again. I used the Task Manager to stop processes again, but this time the computer kept popping out of sleep even after I'd ended all but the minimum processes. So after I shut the laptop lid, I listened for the hard drive to start up again.

Then I quickly opened the lid (I'd left Task Manager running) and saw that a process called mobsync.exe was trying to run. This process doesn't appear at any time other than when the laptop is popping out of sleep mode; it vanished from Task Manager in about four seconds. I wouldn't have known it was the culprit if I hadn't been paying attention. I disabled mobsync.exe by following some good online instructions here: I probably accidentally enabled mobsync while making some changes to Internet settings. Now my laptop is back to sleep with no problems.

So, in conclusion, I have learned that when my computer can't stay asleep or hibernating, it's probably a background process keeping it awake. However, it's not just one process, but many different processes, that could be the culprit. When I start experiencing sleep problems, I follow the above procedure to stop processes until I find the one that's keeping my computer awake. Then, I change system settings so that the process can't run by itself anymore.

I also keep a list of known guilty processes so that when I encounter this problem in the future, I can peruse the Task List for the usual suspects first.

I know this may not be exactly your computer's problem, but maybe it will help someone. :)