Question CPU in Acer Nitro 5 refuses to go above 1.5ghz when gaming ?

Aug 16, 2022
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So I've been using this laptop for a while and it's been great, high fps on all the games I play, it's running a I7-9750H, RTX 2060, 16GB RAM and a 1TB SSD and it was working fine until I decided to disassemble it, and take a peek at the cooling. One of the screws for the CPU was broken so I couldnt fully so I lifted it up a little to see most of the cooling system and a lil of the GPU. I also removed the SSD and RAM sticks to check them out, and then put them back. When everything was reassembled, Windows was corrupted (still booted though, a bunch of random BSODs though) and there were a bunch of other problems. Reinstalling Windows fixed all of these problems, except one. The CPU refuses to go above 1.5Ghz when gaming. The temperatures were as normal (around 90-92), but the laptop could still boost and run fine before all of this. One thing I noticed is that it likes to boost to around 3-4Ghz when not focused on the game (aka alt-tabbed), it also boosts when it's not running anything intensive. As soon as i alt tab out of the game, it goes straight up to its normal speeds, aka 3-4ghz

Another thing I noticed is that games only take up about 15-20% of the CPU. (only checked CSGO so far)
CSGO used to run at about 200-300 FPS, now it only runs at around 90fps, sometimes going up to 120.
Another thing I did before this was undervolt it using throttlestop, but now that I have reinstalled Windows (and reset the CMOS) I assume it is not related to this issue.
 
So I've been using this laptop for a while and it's been great, high fps on all the games I play, it's running a I7-9750H, RTX 2060, 16GB RAM and a 1TB SSD and it was working fine until I decided to disassemble it, and take a peek at the cooling. One of the screws for the CPU was broken so I couldnt fully so I lifted it up a little to see most of the cooling system and a lil of the GPU. I also removed the SSD and RAM sticks to check them out, and then put them back. When everything was reassembled, Windows was corrupted (still booted though, a bunch of random BSODs though) and there were a bunch of other problems. Reinstalling Windows fixed all of these problems, except one. The CPU refuses to go above 1.5Ghz when gaming. The temperatures were as normal (around 90-92), but the laptop could still boost and run fine before all of this. One thing I noticed is that it likes to boost to around 3-4Ghz when not focused on the game (aka alt-tabbed), it also boosts when it's not running anything intensive. As soon as i alt tab out of the game, it goes straight up to its normal speeds, aka 3-4ghz

Another thing I noticed is that games only take up about 15-20% of the CPU. (only checked CSGO so far)
CSGO used to run at about 200-300 FPS, now it only runs at around 90fps, sometimes going up to 120.
Another thing I did before this was undervolt it using throttlestop, but now that I have reinstalled Windows (and reset the CMOS) I assume it is not related to this issue.
When you reinstalled Windows did you reinstall your GPU and chipset drivers?
 
So I've been using this laptop for a while and it's been great, high fps on all the games I play, it's running a I7-9750H, RTX 2060, 16GB RAM and a 1TB SSD and it was working fine until I decided to disassemble it, and take a peek at the cooling. One of the screws for the CPU was broken so I couldnt fully so I lifted it up a little to see most of the cooling system and a lil of the GPU. I also removed the SSD and RAM sticks to check them out, and then put them back. When everything was reassembled, Windows was corrupted (still booted though, a bunch of random BSODs though) and there were a bunch of other problems. Reinstalling Windows fixed all of these problems, except one. The CPU refuses to go above 1.5Ghz when gaming. The temperatures were as normal (around 90-92), but the laptop could still boost and run fine before all of this. One thing I noticed is that it likes to boost to around 3-4Ghz when not focused on the game (aka alt-tabbed), it also boosts when it's not running anything intensive. As soon as i alt tab out of the game, it goes straight up to its normal speeds, aka 3-4ghz

Another thing I noticed is that games only take up about 15-20% of the CPU. (only checked CSGO so far)
CSGO used to run at about 200-300 FPS, now it only runs at around 90fps, sometimes going up to 120.
Another thing I did before this was undervolt it using throttlestop, but now that I have reinstalled Windows (and reset the CMOS) I assume it is not related to this issue.
I can't seem to find any nitro 5 on acers website said to hold a i7 9750 at all
 
until I decided to disassemble it, and take a peek at the cooling. One of the screws for the CPU was broken so I couldnt fully so I lifted it up a little to see most of the cooling system and a lil of the GPU
i do wonder why? you could just check youtube to see whats in there, btw you will need to repaste CPU and GPU if you took a peek

View: https://youtu.be/Kz07agyNDVI?t=510
 
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Aug 16, 2022
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i do wonder why? you could just check youtube to see whats in there, btw you will need to repaste CPU and GPU if you took a peek

View: https://youtu.be/Kz07agyNDVI?t=510
Was just curious to see if there was any upgradability, yeah I couldve probably checked youtube instead, my bad.
I'll try repasting CPU and GPU once I can get some good thermal paste and a way to get this busted screw out.
 
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https://global-download.acer.com/GDFiles/Driver/AHCI/AHCI_Intel_15.2.0.1020_W10x64_A.zip?acerid=636364725645008553&Step1=NOTEBOOK&Step2=NITRO&Step3=NITRO AN515-51&OS=ALL&LC=en&BC=ACER&SC=PA_6
SATA driver may only work with raid,

https://global-download.acer.com/GDFiles/Driver/CardReader/CardReader_Realtek_10.0.14393.21294_W10x64_A.zip?acerid=636364727856220101&Step1=NOTEBOOK&Step2=NITRO&Step3=NITRO AN515-51&OS=ALL&LC=en&BC=ACER&SC=PA_6

Card reader driver

https://global-download.acer.com/GDFiles/Driver/Chipset/Chipset_Intel_10.1.1.38_W10x64_A.zip?acerid=636364724236139910&Step1=NOTEBOOK&Step2=NITRO&Step3=NITRO AN515-51&OS=ALL&LC=en&BC=ACER&SC=PA_6

Chipset driver

https://global-download.acer.com/GDFiles/Driver/IO Drivers/IO Drivers_Intel_30.100.1633.03_W10x64_A.zip?acerid=636364724639498775&Step1=NOTEBOOK&Step2=NITRO&Step3=NITRO AN515-51&OS=ALL&LC=en&BC=ACER&SC=PA_6

I/o driver

https://global-download.acer.com/GDFiles/Driver/Lan/Lan_Realtek_10.013.1223.2016_W10x64_A.zip?acerid=636364724033823003&Step1=NOTEBOOK&Step2=NITRO&Step3=NITRO AN515-51&OS=ALL&LC=en&BC=ACER&SC=PA_6

Ethernet drivers

https://global-download.acer.com/GDFiles/Driver/TouchPad/Touchpad_Synaptics_19.0.25.8_W10x64_A.zip?acerid=636364727654653164&Step1=NOTEBOOK&Step2=NITRO&Step3=NITRO AN515-51&OS=ALL&LC=en&BC=ACER&SC=PA_6

Track pad drivers

https://global-download.acer.com/GDFiles/Driver/Turbo Boost/Turbo Boost_Intel_11.6.25.1229_W10x64_A.zip?acerid=636364724438056833&Step1=NOTEBOOK&Step2=NITRO&Step3=NITRO AN515-51&OS=ALL&LC=en&BC=ACER&SC=PA_6

Turbo drivers

https://global-download.acer.com/GDFiles/BIOS/BIOS/BIOS_Acer_1.22_A_A.zip?acerid=636896848943847731&Step1=NOTEBOOK&Step2=NITRO&Step3=NITRO AN515-51&OS=ALL&LC=en&BC=ACER&SC=PA_6
Bios update
Already done most of these via windows update
 
Aug 16, 2022
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Windows doesn't use correct drivers you need to use the manufacturer drivers designed for the laptop
I have downloaded every driver for my system and it still doesn't want to work. I hopped on CSGO with Task Manager on Always on top, and my CPU was hovering at 1.5ghz, and as soon as i clicked on Task Manager it jumped straight up to 3ghz.
 
That's not going to control the CPU in game though

That was meant only to advise OP for GPU alone. The latest versoin of the driver on Acer will be out of date, or at least not a sup to date as Nvidia's current version.

In terms of the CPU, set up Throttlestop, and use the inbuilt benchmarks and limit reasons to determine what's going on.

OP could also change power plan to High or Ultimate to see if that may change the boosting.
 
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That was meant only to advise OP for GPU alone. The latest versoin of the driver on Acer will be out of date, or at least not a sup to date as Nvidia's current version.

In terms of the CPU, set up Throttlestop, and use the inbuilt benchmarks and limit reasons to determine what's going on.

OP could also change power plan to High or Ultimate to see if that may change the boosting.
This is what happens when I run the benchmark, I have no idea what to make of these errors except that its throttling, it never used to throttle like this before all of this.

EDIT: Power plan has always been on either Balanced (Acer) or High Performance, didnt change anything.
 
This is what happens when I run the benchmark, I have no idea what to make of these errors except that its throttling, it never used to throttle like this before all of this.

EDIT: Power plan has always been on either Balanced (Acer) or High Performance, didnt change anything.

Just in case, over write it if you've been fiddling around with them:
Ultimate Performance: powercfg -duplicatescheme e9a42b02-d5df-448d-aa00-03f14749eb61 High Performance: powercfg -duplicatescheme 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c

Paste these codes to powershell and just press enter, then test again.

If you use TS, you can change a setting called Speed shift - EPP. Change the number here to 100 or slightly lower. This will encourage your CPU to work at it's highest all core speeds while rarely clocking down. See if that helps.

I've an I7 9750h, in my HP Omen (very similar build to yours). I've rarely seen the CPU boost to 4.5ghz, but see all core go to 4ghz.

You can also use throttlestop to undervolt your CPU which may help reduce temps.
 
Dunno if thats a good advice if hes getting 92C at 1.5GHz, CPU cooling isnt working

I didn't get that from his the post, that temps were excessive since this issue has occurred. I may have misread though.

The temperatures were as normal (around 90-92), but the laptop could still boost and run fine before all of this

@ OP, can you let us know if you still have temps of 90+ whilst at 1.5ghz, or is the only issue being the CPU is clock limited?
 
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Dunno if thats a good advice if hes getting 92C at 1.5GHz, CPU cooling isnt working
Thing is that, it's not always at 1.5Ghz, its always at either 3-4ghz (when not running any intensive programs or not focused on one), which is normal (i believe), it instantly jumps up to normal frequencies when i alt tab out of the intensive program.
 
Last edited:
Aug 16, 2022
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I didn't get that from his the post, that temps were excessive since this issue has occurred. I may have misread though.



@ OP, can you let us know if you still have temps of 90+ whilst at 1.5ghz, or is the only issue being the CPU is clock limited?
Temps are decently low (around 70 to low 90s) at idle 4ghz, and then when I do the TS Bench in ThrottleStop, speeds go down to around 1.5ghz, and temps go up to around 92c, sometimes going up to 96-98 for a split second.

Image of it can be seen here

EDIT Idle speeds and temps can be seen here (temps sometimes jumps to around 90-92)