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December 29th, 2024 00:37
XPS 8940, white flashing light on the top-left rear?
Hi all. What is the white flashing light on the top-left rear of my Dell XPS 8940? A Google search tells me a steady blinking white light means it's in sleep mode. My light is sometimes steady blinking and sometimes blinking sporadically with no detectable pattern. It has never been in sleep mode while this was happening, so it's not that. According to Dell, certain patterns along with an amber light apparently flashes error codes or maintenance issues, but I have no amber light and again, no detectable pattern coming from the white light. So, I am at a lost of what this could be or what it could mean? Any feedback will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
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DELL-Chris M
Community Manager
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December 29th, 2024 00:49
Online XPS 8940 Field Service Manual page 20 =
Tom62e
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December 29th, 2024 00:51
Thank you! Hence the sporadic rhythm!
ispalten
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December 29th, 2024 01:43
@Tom62e
Older XPS's had the light either on the Power Button (XPS8500) or on the front panel (XPS8700??). Some people have rigged a mirror on a wall or back of the stand, to see when it is blinking. Some feel if they are doing 'nothing' it should be off, but that is not the case... OS can do things in the background or Internet activities like checking email.
computerhead58
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February 6th, 2025 12:58
@ispalten My XPS 8950 is doing the same thing. But why would my hard drive be active for 3 days straight with no activity on my part? Doesn't make sense. I finally rebooted the desktop, but the white activity light is still flashing. Didn't do this before, and there has been very little activity on this machine.
ispalten
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February 6th, 2025 15:04
@computerhead58
You'd have to look at 'who' is active at the time and using the hard disk.
Resource Monitor will show you that. Those are over time readings too, but for instantaneous ones that use the Disk, use Task Manager and sort on DISK.
Here is my Resource Monitor for instance, and I think I was doing 'nothing' but reading your post:
See how active the disk was when I was looking at this message?
Almost anything can cause disk access, and not all might flicker the LED if not persistent.
Are you doing Indexing of file (for quicker searches)? Do you have programs updating in the background? Could be any number of reasons.
To see the 'big hitters' you should click on the disk column header to bring the most active in order to the top of the list.
You can also Google 'disk light blinking' and find a lot of link, with varying answers.
However, it is best to check what is accessing the disk (can see that with Resource Monitor which easily shows the file name and Googling that name to see what function it is from or with).
Bottom line is I think generally speaking it is 'normal', but it could also portend some problem such as a failing disk doing many re-seeks. F12 diagnostic would check the drive and verify if it is the problem or not.
computerhead58
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February 6th, 2025 19:45
@ispalten Thank you! Using the tools you mentioned, I believe motion on my cameras are what's causing usage on the hard drive.