I have a Dell / Alienware Aurora R15. Randomly I get LARGE CPU usage spikes from something in the background, regardless of whether I am gaming or not and regardless of what applications I have open. I finally took the time to sit and watch the task manager when this happens and found it to be a bunch of Dell specific applications and services. In the attached screenshots you can see large CPU spikes in 15 minute intervals (one at 1:27 AM and the next at 1:42 AM)

In particular "Dell Data Manager" and "Dell Instrumentation" processes seem to be involved, and it looks like they cause other non-Dell processes to gorge themselves on CPU also, such as "Service and Controller app" and "WMI Provider Host".

I don't have other applications open. My OS, BIOS, firmware, applications, etc. are all as up-to-date as I can make them.

Stuttering issues related to the SupportAssist app are also noted by u/greakath in a separate thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/Alienware/comments/11tcpao/comment/jciyast/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

From my experimenting, it also seemed like disabling the "System Repair" feature in the SupportAssist application made the CPU spikes less severe.

This is a high-end gaming machine. It is really unacceptable to ship something with severe performance problems in 15 minute intervals. This all but ruins a gaming experience in let's say, CSGO, where if one of these CPU spikes happens at the wrong time it completely ruins the game.

Dell- I am really unhappy about this. Are you aware of this problem? Are you working on a fix?

*facepalm*