FREEZE. Surprised to see such an abrupt start to this blog post? Definitely, you are, but I have my reasons to do so. The thing is that we are now all living in an era wherein our gadgets mean everything to us. The digitization has further made us heavily rely on our 
But, what if you wake up one morning and find your laptop/smartphone acting weird and freezing abnormally. In such circumstances, your first instinct would be to reach out to the official store and get it repaired. However, there are 2 easy tweaks that you can perform at home before you decide on taking either of these DELL XPS 15 7590/9570/9560 variants to a hardware store.
Word of Caution: These tweaks are based on practical tests, but may or may not work for your DELL Laptop. So, proceed with caution.
With that advisory, let’s check out how you can UNFREEZE your Dell laptop quickly and in the easiest way possible:
- Running a Windows Update Utility
- Updating your Graphics Driver Manually
Running a Windows Update Utility
Running Windows Update frequently on your laptop is a good habit to ensure your drivers and software are all up-to-date. So, if you are experiencing freezing issues on your Dell laptop, the first thing you need checking on is if your system is properly updated or not.
To perform Windows Update on your system, follow these steps:
1. Click on the Windows icon on the bottom-left corner of your laptop screen OR Hit the ‘Window’ key on your keyboard to activate the Start Menu of your Windows OS.
2. Type in Windows Update and you would be presented with multiple options to pick from.
3. Click on the “Check for Updates” option OR the “Open” option (marked by arrows) you see on the right side of the Start Menu. Either way, you will be redirected to the main screen of the Windows Update utility.
4. Once the Windows Utility screen opens up in front of you, hit the “Check for Updates” button (as shown in the image above) again and the utility will start looking for updates for all the drivers and software’s which are installed on your system.
5. Most likely the utility will list down the required updates (for your driver/software). Once the entire list is populated, hit the “Install/Update” button to start the updating process.
6. Post running the scan, if you are reverted to the main screen of Windows Update utility, you can be rest assured that your system is updated. If that’s the case, head over to the next segment.
Updating Your Graphics Driver Manually
Common hardware/software issues are mostly resolved with a simple Windows Update scan. However, at times, when it fails, users are required to manually check for updates. As graphics drivers are an integral part of a laptop, so keeping them updated is of paramount importance.
Obsolete graphics driver can impact your laptop performance in terms of speed, abrupt hanging or freezing issues. So, check out this segment to understand the process to manually update your graphics driver:
1. Identify your Intel graphics card version and download the latest zip file from the given link. Once zip gets downloaded, extract it on your chosen folder. Let’s assume you extracted it on desktop. So, your file path would look something like C:\Users\Manu Mathur\Desktop\Graphics (where Graphics – indicate your desktop folder).
2. Hover your mouse on the bottom left corner of your screen (Start Menu) and right-click. Select the “Device Manager” option from the context-sensitive menu (as shown in the above image). The device manager window will open right in front of you.
3. You would notice a multitude of options. Expand the “Display Adapters” option by right-clicking on your Intel driver. Choose the “Update Driver Software” option from the populated menu options.
4. On the “Update Driver Software” window, the system will give you two options:
- Search automatically for updated driver software
- Browse my computer for driver software
5. Click on “Browse my computer for driver software” option and subsequently, click on the “Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer” option.
6. On the next “Select the device driver…” window, checkmark the “Show compatible hardware” checkbox and the system will generate few driver options compatible with your hardware. Again, click on the “Have Disk” button (as marked in the image above) to proceed further.
7. Browse to C:\Users\Manu Mathur\Desktop\Graphics – the folder where you extracted your zip file. Find the “.inf” file within the sub-folders and click on the “Open” button.
8. You will be redirected back to the “Select the device driver…” window. It will show you the graphics driver’s name you just selected. Hit the “NEXT” button to proceed with your driver installation process.
9. Once the driver gets installed, the system will generate a window confirming that your driver update was successful. Click on the “Close” button and reboot your system as a general procedure.
Conclusion
As time passes, electronic gadgets of all sizes and shapes start lagging. Such lags or freezing or other performance issues can occur due to multiple reasons. However, if you are particular with updating your system regularly, you can ignore such petty issues with ease.
What steps did you take to fix the freezing issue on your Dell laptop? Were you successful in unfreezing your Dell laptop? Do share your experience with us through the comments section below.
