GPU throttling issue on a laptop

[bloodknight2012]

I have absolutely no idea whether that's the right place to post this but I'm really desperate, so... I've been getting some FPS issues lately and ran a program called "FurMark" realizing that my GPU is throttling from 718 Mhz to -583 Mhz constantly when plugged and to -189 Mhz when unplugged. Furmark was showing that my GPU was at 42 degrees celsium at the start of the test and reached 90 at the 15-minute end mark. Usually, though, my GPU is 60 degrees when idle and no more than 80 when in-game. I just want to state that I'm running Windows 8.1 with the latest BIOS and drivers, and that everything is set to Maximum Performance both in the NVIDIA Control Panel and the Windows Power Management. That constant throttle is bothering me. My laptop is only 4 months old. It's true that lately I've been holding it mainly on my feet (which are not exactly a very flat surface) but I've given my best to let it cool from the bottom. Is it overheating or something? Does it need a cleaning or is it some other issue?

 

[Frag_Maniac]

Hard to tell when you don't even list it's spec or what games you're playing.

90% of the time when people have trouble with games on LTs it's because they're asking too much of them.

 

[DRDNA]

4 months use and I would think it could be dusty seeing as how you mentioned it. I would blow some canned air threw it while it is off and if you can try to keep the fan from spinning..I use a tooth pick..it keeps the high rpm's on the fan from ruining the fan or fan motor. A laptop cooler will help a little tiny bit too. I also wouldn't recommend using furmark on a laptop as it creates a lot of heat.

 

[bloodknight2012]

I'll copy my original thread in some other forum (which got no replies whatsoever). It describes what my problem really is. This experiment is made on Assassin's Creed 4. Though the problem occurs on pretty much every single game no matter the settings. Games like League of Legends, for example are far more playable as the fps drops from 90 to 50 and is not as noticable:

I'm using Acer V3 772G with Intel i7, GTX 760M, 8 GB of RAM, running on Windows 8.1, if it matters. I've been getting FPS issues lately. I was randomly experiencing sudden FPS drops (down to like 15) in all games no matter the settings. What I did when this happened - I reinstalled all the computer's drivers, cleaned it up a bit (viruses, registries, etc...), restarted it and the FPS was back to normal. I just want to mention that exactly two weeks ago I did a clean new install on Windows so that's why I didn't resort to reinstalling it. However, yesterday I discovered something very peculiar:



- Laptop is plugged in and everything goes perfectly fine - I play a game at a constant 40 fps.

- I unplug the laptop and suddenly the fps starts varying between 15 and 30 fps via very sudden and uncomfortable drops.

- I plug the laptop again and it gets better.. just not enough. It ALMOST locks in about 33-5 fps with drops (just not as frequent as before's) to about 25. I change the settings to the lowest possible and it keeps dropping to 25 no matter what.

- I restart the laptop and suddenly it's all fine.



With the exception that today restarting doesn't help anymore.

 

[erocker]

Seems to be a battery problem with the issue coming up when you unplug the laptop.

Also, try checking your temperatures using a monitoring program.

 

[DRDNA]

That sounds like power management to me.....Seems as though it working correctly except for not returning the original power scheme once it is plugged back in... Look at windows Power Options in the control panel. Try using Performance or edit each setting individually.


When you unplug the laptop it switches power scheme automatically lowers CPU and GPU spreads, that's why it slow right away when you unplug it.

 

[bloodknight2012]

I've set EVERYTHING possible to "max performance" be it in advanced settings or not. The problem persists...
Idle:
Playin Assassin's Creed 4 for 15 minutes:

 

[Tatty_Two]

That sounds like power management to me.....Seems as though it working correctly except for not returning the original power scheme once it is plugged back in... Look at windows Power Options in the control panel. Try using Performance or edit each setting individually.


When you unplug the laptop it switches power scheme automatically lowers CPU and GPU spreads, that's why it slow right away when you unplug it.

This ^^ Good advice, I would go with windows power settings also, try setting everything to high performance and see if you get the same throttling issues first.

 

[bloodknight2012]

But I already said I have done so... :?

 

[kn00tcn]

& in the nvidia control panel, maximum performance instead of balanced on the global profile?

i'm a 570m, always plugged in, i even removed the battery, & set the nvcp option to maximum performance

i dont think i've seen an issue back when i used the battery, in fact i was able to keep pretty much full peformance on battery

could it be a recent nv driver bug?

 

[bloodknight2012]

I have already done this as well.

 

[Frag_Maniac]

I would not recommend canned air on a laptop. It's OK for blowing dust out of Keyboard slots, but blowing it in the CPU vents could cause any dust that's in there to just get pushed into the HS fins. The only good way to clean a LT is by taking it apart. If it's only 4 months old though, you'd have to have been using it in pretty dusty conditions for it to be dirty enough to cause these problems already, so I'm thinking it's something else.

Do some scans with tools like CCleaner, HijackThis, Malwarebytes, SUPERAntiSpyware, Glary Utilities, and GMER is a very good rootkit detector. I'm not saying it's a bug, but eliminating that as a possibility helps narrow things down.

 

[bloodknight2012]

I clean it regularly. Today I tried several NVIDIA drivers (incl beta ones). I even reinstalled Windows. But the problem persists. Could someone please tell me some other program than Fur Mark where I can check how much my GPU is throttling. Thanks !

 

[de.das.dude]

That sounds like power management to me.....Seems as though it working correctly except for not returning the original power scheme once it is plugged back in... Look at windows Power Options in the control panel. Try using Performance or edit each setting individually.


When you unplug the laptop it switches power scheme automatically lowers CPU and GPU spreads, that's why it slow right away when you unplug it.

this ^

set your high performance profile if you dont want the battery to throttle.

remeber if u play with that 760 on battery, it will go own in 10 to 15 minutes.
and acer does not make the best batteries.....