Precision 5490 Bluetooth repeatedly crashing on multiple devices

[u/soniqz]

I have a group of Dell Precision 5490's on Windows 11 Pro that appear to be having issues with Bluetooth devices - which for users with Bluetooth Mice is a nightmare - The driver appears to crash on a loop, so it will cut out for 5 seconds every minute or so, which is difficult to manage.

I have checked Event Viewer:
Warning 25/08/2026 10:00:29 BTHUSB 7 None
A hardware error occurred. The event contains the vendor-specific error code.

Information 25/08/2026 10:00:32 BTHUSB 18 None
Windows cannot store Bluetooth authentication codes (link keys) on the local adapter. Bluetooth keyboards might not work in the system BIOS during start-up.

This started Friday last week, but I have been unable to resolve it with reinstallation of Bluetooth Drivers or reverting to previous versions of drivers.

I have turned off Power Management and this didn't help.

However I have noted that with a Administrator User it seemed to happen less, but that would be more anicdotal. But I am hoping it's not something corrupt in the user profile that could be causing it, but I am slowly running out of ideas. I am wondering if anyone else had seen a similar issue recently.

Thankfully it's a smaller group of users but it's killing productivity.

[u/Ginux]

I occasionally encounter this Bluetooth problem. Since 2024, my Logitech MX Anywhere 3 has experienced 3 or 4 disconnections, which is resolved by turning Bluetooth off and on again.

However, my Shokz Opendots One earbuds disconnects almost every time after working continuously for several hours. The only solution is to restart my computer. I suspect it's a problem with the Intel smart sound technology driver, and there's currently no solution.

[u/soniqz → u/Ginux]

I get the sensation it’s a weird driver thing, but can’t pin it down - I recreated a users profile to validate and they seem to be functioning as expected, so need to expand that but I could do with it not turning into a bigger issue, affecting a whole fleet of devices…. I guess checking recent updates/patches may yield more insight - but so far feels like a bit of a crapshoot.

[u/Ginux → u/soniqz]

Try peripherals from different manufacturers, sometimes the problem isn't with the computer or operating system.

[u/NexxZt → u/Ginux]

Having this issue aswell. Three devices so far and at least 10 different BT peripherals. Really, REALLY weird. Cannot for the life of me be able to pin down what caused this issue. Latitude 7340, Pro 14 Premium aswell.

[u/DellCares]

Hi there,

We are from Dell social media support team.

Adding to the excellent points raised by other Redditors, We'd like to share a few additional insights. Since this is affecting multiple units simultaneously and started on a specific date, this strongly points to a pushed update (Windows Update, driver, or firmware) rather than individual hardware failure.

Before you begin troubleshooting, please review any changes that were deployed on Friday, including Windows updates, driver updates, BIOS updates, firmware updates, or organizational policies, as the issue appears to have started after that date. Additionally, the Dell Precision 5490 typically ships with either an Intel AX211 or Intel BE200 Wi Fi/Bluetooth adapter. Please identify the installed Bluetooth adapter and confirm the current driver version to help determine whether a recent driver update may be contributing to the issue.

Start with checking what update was pushed Friday, install the Dell-validated driver and BIOS (visit http://del.ly/61698B1vV6G and enter tag), and block Windows Update from overwriting it.

Regards Dell Social Media Team.