[SOLVED] How do I fix CPU Pwr. and Thermal throttling on gaming laptop ?

Mar 31, 2022
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I've been trying to fix this for over a week now but I still can't find a soltion. Whenever I play games, GPU-Z's perfcap reason changes to pwr. therm, which I assume is power and thermal. How do I fix this? My CPU reaches up to 100c when I play games. I don't play heavy games unless im testing my performance because I think it might damage the cpu permanently.
I'm having massive performance issues due to this. Hope anyone could help.

Here are some of the stuff I did:

- I bought a 80 dollar notebook cooler
-opened my windows (5c outside)
-new thermal paste (might be the reason why it got hotter in the last 3 days tho)
-undervolted my cpu

Link to ss of GPU-Z:
https://pasteboard.co/whSzy5cLVwIe.png - gpu clockspeed depends, this was taken about a week ago and now I seem to have better clockspeeds but higher temperatures. Memory clock seems to be stuck at 202.5MHz, no higher no lower.
specs:
CPU: Intel Core i7-9750H 45W TDP
GPU: Nvidia RTX 2060 (Mobile)
SSD: Samsung MZVLB256HBHQ-000L2 256GB (19.5 GB free)
HDD: WD WD10SPZX-00HKTT0 1TB (24.1 GB free)
RAM: Samsung M471A1K43DB1-CTD 89C2 8ATF1G64AZ-2G1B1 16GB
MBD: Lenovo 81Q6 (Legion Y545)
OS: Windows 11 Pro 22H2 22579.1 (yes, I have dev builds on, I went to get on dev builds to try windows 11 out last year only to find out that you can't get out unless you do a clean reinstall.)
PSU (power adapter of my computer, I don't know where to find my psu on my laptop): 240W 20V
 
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Solution
I see many complaints about gaming laptops not performing well.
Usually gaming while plugged in.
One common cause is thermal throttling.
Laptop coolers must, of necessity be small and light.
The coolers are also relatively underpowered.
If you run an app such as HWMonitor or HWinfo, you will get the current, minimum, and maximum cpu temperatures.
For intel processors, if you see a max of 100c. it means you have throttled.
The cpu will lower it's multiplier and power draw to protect itself
until the situation reverses.
At a lower multiplier, your cpu usage may well be at 100%
What can you do?
First, see that your cooler airways are clear and that the cooler fan is spinning.

It is counter-intuitive, but, try changing the windows...
What Thermal paste are you working with? Lower tier thermal pastes tend to impede heat transfer as opposed to higher quality, more pricier options. Latest BIOS for your laptop's motherboard? Where did you source the OS installer from? Are you using ThrottleStop for your undervolting endeavors? If so, what sort of an undervolt are you working with? Link to your notebook cooler?
 
What Thermal paste are you working with? Lower tier thermal pastes tend to impede heat transfer as opposed to higher quality, more pricier options. Latest BIOS for your laptop's motherboard? Where did you source the OS installer from? Are you using ThrottleStop for your undervolting endeavors? If so, what sort of an undervolt are you working with? Link to your notebook cooler?
The thermal paste im using is thermal grizzly kryonaut. I don't know where I can find the latest bios for my laptop's motherboard, I'm in devbuilds so I used the windows insider program for my os. Yes, I am using throttlestop for my undervolting.
 
Your CPU has turbo boost, if it is enabled it will use all the temperature power and voltage it is allowed to use (you can change those limits in bios but laptop bios might be restricted) to give you the most performance, this will show up as temp or power throttling because those will be the reasons that turbo cant turbo any turboier.

If your CPU hits 4.5 on single core and more than 2.6Ghz on all core than it is running normally and has no throttling, it is just using all the power it can.
 
The thermal paste im using is thermal grizzly kryonaut. I don't know where I can find the latest bios for my laptop's motherboard, I'm in devbuilds so I used the windows insider program for my os. Yes, I am using throttlestop for my undervolting.
A word of caution, Kryonaut is not recommended for bare die applications, especially in situations where cooling is a little more limited. Kryonaut degrades at 70C, which laptop CPUs can easily get to. Also it's a lower viscosity paste and coupled with possible lower heat sink mounting pressures, it'll pump out more easily. Recommend using something like Arctic MX-4 or Thermal Grizzly Hydronaut for this sort of application.
 
I see many complaints about gaming laptops not performing well.
Usually gaming while plugged in.
One common cause is thermal throttling.
Laptop coolers must, of necessity be small and light.
The coolers are also relatively underpowered.
If you run an app such as HWMonitor or HWinfo, you will get the current, minimum, and maximum cpu temperatures.
For intel processors, if you see a max of 100c. it means you have throttled.
The cpu will lower it's multiplier and power draw to protect itself
until the situation reverses.
At a lower multiplier, your cpu usage may well be at 100%
What can you do?
First, see that your cooler airways are clear and that the cooler fan is spinning.

It is counter-intuitive, but, try changing the windows power profile advanced functions to a max of 90% instead of the default of 100%
You may not notice the reduced cpu performance.
 
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