FPS Drops/GPU clock speed goes down in GTX 960m in Assassin's Creed Unity.

[RealPain]

Guys I need help. Everytime I play Assassin's Creed Unity, the clock/memory speed on my GPU keeping going down until it hit 405 Mhz (clock), 805 Mhz(memory).

My temperature goes into 78° (Max temp, when playing high-end games such as this) I'm using the MSI Afterburner to monitor it as well as my FPS.

My GPU Clock speed: 1097 Mhz (1176 Mhz in Boost). Memory Speed: 2506 Mhz

But whenever I alt+tab, the original clock/memory speed goes back. Then if I go back in game it just goes down again. Which is completely annoying. Same thing when I play Shadow of Mordor but not the same as ACU. When I play Shadow of Mordor, GPU clock only goes down in about 993- 850 Mhz. Still I prefer on having on the MAX speed of my GPU.


I've been looking all over in the internet for a solution to stop these annoying underclocking on my GPU.
- My laptop is always plugged in when playing ACU.
- I already set Power Management into Prefer Maximum Performance in both Global and Program Settings = set in ACU.exe
- I also try to set it in Adaptive.
- I try to change the Power Plan either in Balanced or High Performance, still doesn't change anything.
- My drivers are always updated (NVIDIA Driver 368.95, done in clean installation)
- I've done reinstalling the games several times, still doesn't change anything.
- The game is already patch in 1.5

I've done everything I could to fix this. But still none of them don't work well.

By the way, I've become aware of the issue that ACU is not well supported in Windows 10, therefore, 10-15 minutes gameplay = crash. But I've already gone through of it.

Please I need help over here.

ASUS Zenbook Pro UX501
Specs:
Intel Core i7 4720HQ 2.6 Ghz
8GB RAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 960m 4GB


List of Games I'm playing:
- Assassin's Creed Unity - (clock speed goes down in 405Hmz)
- Shadow of Mordor - (clock speed goes down in about 993,915,850 Mhz)
- World of Warships - (clock speed goes down in 405Mhz when starting a battle, until it goes up again in a short period of time then goes down again)

 

[DillonJ3K]

Its throttling, 960m is known to do it when it gets up to its max temp. If you can RMA it.
If not , then remove the covers and blow the dust out. Then use a good laptop cooler.
Or kick the fans up to 100% in an effort to avoid the temps an throttling, those are really the only things you can do.

 

[Shaun o]

Your using a laptop are you not with a Nvidia mobile Gpu solution on it the 960m.

If your laptop is about a year old.

Then the cause is likely that the Gpu is getting too hot, or you have overclocked the Gpu and the memory of the 960m Nvidia graphics card too much RealPain. So if you have lower the Gpu core speed by about 50 to 100 Mhz in speed, and the memory speed also.

If not overclocked in anyway.

Then the cause will be down to the cooling solution fitted to the 960m card if it comes as an add in where it connects to the laptops motherboard via a mini Pci-e card slot.

The end of the cooling solution, that has fine aluminium fins on it will be clogged with a thick matte of dust.
Where it will prevent cold air from passing through the fins from the fan in the laptop.

With laptops that have mobile Gpu solutions they have two fans in them, one to cool the cpu of the laptop in the same manner of cooling solution as the graphics card cooler has.

And another fan for the 960m card it`s self.

If you remove the main back service plate on the underside of the laptop.
You should see the two fans of the laptop.

Undo the screws that hold the fan, or fans in.
And disconnect the tiny power connector pins for the fan, or fans from the motherboard of the laptop.

You will then see the aluminium cooling fins I have been talking about.
Clean them both free of dust with a small clean paint brush, or use an air canister to remove the dust build up RealPain.

Then attach the the fans back to the laptop with the screws through the fans to there screw points on the laptops motherboard, making sure you connect the power for each fan back to the laptops motherboard.

It should solve your problem and lower the heat the gpu reaches. and the drop in frame rates in games RealPain.

I have included a picture link to show you what you are looking for to help you. where you see the fans in the main picture.
When you remove them you will see the aluminium cooling fins that need to be cleaned free of dust that lead to the edge of the laptops case vents.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=laptop+cooling&espv=2&biw=1264&bih=1327&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi4oNPF_bDOAhWIcBoKHZQMBIsQ_AUIBygC#imgdii=mkpwIDMCkltKMM%3A%3BmkpwIDMCkltKMM%3A%3BFpF9jNoUexXLHM%3A&imgrc=mkpwIDMCkltKMM%3A

Ok, that is the fix anyway.

 

[RealPain]

My laptop isn't a year old yet. This is just about 4 months. The first time I used it, everything is fine. I upgraded it into Windows 10 and I know that has nothing to do with this problem. Until I started to notice that my GPU clock speed keeps lowering down everytime I played high-end games, except Shadow of Mordor which is still stable in about 993Mhz to 850Mhz (but still not acceptable for me)

But this, I don't know how exactly am I going to do what you said, I can undo the screws on the back of my laptop but when I gets to it, I'm thinking this is a risky thing to do, since I haven't done this before.

I posted this topic in NVIDIA Forums and someone said it is a driver problem. But if it doesn't fix this, then the best solution is to RMA my laptop. My dad brought this laptop to me, and I don't know if its ok to RMA it since this purchased in Saudi Arabia, and I'm here in the Philippines.

BTW I already have a cooling pad which is fine.

 

[Jason219]

(this is a stupid and obvious solution but) you can use something like unigine valley or heaven and a temperature monitoring program and check to see when the gpu clock speed drops (as in at what temperature do they drop) "open hardware monitor "is a good program to monitor the temp. of all your hardware and its simple enough do this test to make sure its a temp. problem where your gpu reaches high temperatures and as some sort of fail safe your gpu underclocks to lower temperatures

 

[RealPain]

As I said in the post, I'm using MSI Afterburner to Monitor GPU Usage, Temp. Clock Speed, etc... -_-

 

[Jason219]

well maybe the temp readings are wrong did you use any other program to monitor temp and it gave you the same result?

 

[RealPain]

While in game? no, only MSI Afterburner.

 

[Jason219]

okay are you overclocking (cause that's the purpose of MSI after burner)

 

[RealPain]

I'm also doing that, although it is completely useless when the clock speed drops into 405 MHz, if I overclock, it'll just add 135 Mhz = 540 Mhz, which is still not acceptable. But I wish I wouldn't have to do this again. I just want my clock speed go back and remains in the original

 

[blacky_d2]

I had a similar problem with a laptop I brought: HP Omen 15 ax011no, with 960m GTX found out it was the charger causing issues when playing games... severe FPS drops and blue screens... The charger I got once with the laptop wasn't good enough, a chinese copy unable to deliver the power needed.