HP Omen 15 benchmarking - cannot decide which power mode to use

[misterclaude]

Hello everyone,
First of all, i want to say that this is my first post on Tom's hardware forums, but I'm a long-time lurker and I want to thank you all for the helpful info I've got from here over the years.
Introductions aside, please bare with me:

A few days ago I have decided to replace my old grinder with a brand new HP Omen 15-dc1035nq (i7 9750h, gtx1660ti, 512 ssd nvme, 16GB DDR4 @ 2666Mhz).
Now... I'm a freelance web developer and I use it mostly for my projects, which include a lots of google chrome tabs opened, MS Office suite, some photoshop, etc... I know it will thread to all my daily needs without any hiccups, but nonetheless, I'm a bit confused about the "Performance Control" in the Omen Command Center app.

Basically you can choose from 3 preset modes: Comfort, Default and Performance. As per HP's website, Comfort will keep the temperature low and it's recommended for "non-resource -intensive tasks". Default makes a balanced setup from cpu/gpu/fans and Performance dynamically assigns power where needed, to increase game performance.
I mostly play on a console, but from time to time I would like to play on the laptop as well, so I did some benchamrks to see what's what:
Below you can see the results from Geekbench 5:
Geekbench 5 Testing - HP Omen 15-dc1035nq

CPU Testing
Comfort
Single: 1159
Multi: 5685
Max temp: 84

Default
Single: 1124
Multi: 5781
Max temp: 88

Performance
Single: 1151
Multi: 5819
Max Temp: 91

GPU Testing
Confort
CUDA: 63801
OpenCL: 60127
Vulkan: 48462

Default
CUDA: 62247
OpenCL: 59851
Vulkan: 52229

Performance
CUDA: 62648
OpenCL: 60357
Vulkan: 48583

Analyzing these results, it occurs to me that it doesn't actually matter the power setting... all of them seem to be quite consistent, with very small fluctuations, which I cannot say for sure that are because the change of power setting or just pure inconsistency.
Now... because the above results are not very conclusive in my opinion, i also installed a game (world of warships, because it's free ) and played it for about an hour.
I have cranked absolutely all the details at maximum (ultra settings where available, AA to max, etc...)
During my play sessions, I've switched from comfort to default and performance every 10 minutes or so.
regardless of the setting, the game ran very consistently at 75-78 FPS)
The only difference was that in "performance" mode, the cpu temp was getting pretty high (85-90 C, then rapidly dropping). The GPU never got past 60-65 degrees C)
Also another interesting fact: In the Omen Command Center, the temperatures are color-coded (green - normal/moderate, orange = high and red = critical). Even in geekbench testing, where the top temperature was 91 C for a moment, the color of the temperature number in omen Command Center was green all the time. If at 91 is green, i wonder at which treshold it goes orange or green.

If you had the patience to read so far.. I promise I going to end it soon
To summarize it:
I think that the benchmark results are mostly in the same range, regardless the "performance" setting in Omen Command Center
Also, I find that the temperatures can get a bit high (90degrees C, even if it was just for 2-3sec)
During normal usage (browsing + youtube + ms word) it stays around 50-55 C on default and performance mode and between 45-52 in comfort mode.
Hopefully there are some more tech-experienced owners of hp omen laptops around, because I have a few questions:
What are you guys thinking of all this? What power setting would you recommend? Should I keep it on performance mode all day? Honestly i didn't notice any difference while daily browsing, between comfort or perfomance.
Note: i'm also using a deepcool n9 aluminum coolerpad.
Thank you and looking forward to see what you're thinking.

Later edit:
I also found something on HP Support Forums. A HP agent said this:
"The comfort mode is designed to cool down the device, and it shouldn't normally affect the game performance,"
Which is pretty interesting.. considering that on the Omen Command Center it says that it's best to be used when no heavy tasks are needed.

 

[misterclaude]

Based on the lack of replied, i assume nobody is interested in this subject but, nonetheless, here I go again with some new findings:
Using OpenHardwareMonitor and SpeedFan while doing some stress tests with Prime95 I also found out what these 3 performance modes do:
First of all, on light tasks, there's really no difference. Maybe "confort" mode keeps the fans running a bit more, in order to keep the CPU at a lower temperature.
Now, things change when the CPU is under high load and the temperatures increase significantly.
Basically these "modes" limit the CPU's clock, in order to prevent overheating.
Confort does a more aggressive thorttle. Default an average throttle and Performance mode does no / very little throttle.
That's it. Nothing else.
Also.. default allows for CPU to boost until it gets higher temps than confort. and performance mode allows the boost even further.

 

[vekspec]

Hey! Thanks for putting together your research. I recently purchased an Omen, 1660ti/9750H and was curious about this too.

From what I gathered performance mode provides the highest wattage to GPU and CPU and forces it to operate at max mhz, be like a overclock in a sense. However HP set the fan curves really high on it so it doesn't kick in until like 90deg. I found performance mode doesn't make my games perform any better but causes all cores, even after a -125mv UV to rocket up to 90+deg. GPU stays pretty cool though like 70s.

Comfort mode is misleading. In the CC it says for light tasks. But from experience it's like Turbo mode in other laptops and really is meant for long gaming sessions because the fan curve is much lower and ramps up at 60 or 70deg so with it my CPU doesn't go past 80 and GPU is 60deg. GPU and CPU clocks are unaffected as well as fps.

So IMO for heavy gaming and to keep temps low, comfort is the way to go. Performance maybe use for benching? Yeah tooltips are very misleading in Omen CC.

 

[misterclaude]

Hi,
Indeed, after a few more tests with Aida64 and i reached about the same results.
Basically all these modes affect the fans, but the CPU frequency. And same for me.. "performance mode" just made the laptop hotter, not faster )

 

[vekspec]

Hi,
Indeed, after a few more tests with Aida64 and i reached about the same results.
Basically all these modes affect the fans, but the CPU frequency. And same for me.. "performance mode" just made the laptop hotter, not faster )

Yeah they should just call it Overheat Mode. With comfort mode only during RealBench or Cinebench do the fans go audible. Gaming, it's relatively quiet. These are my results from playing an hour of ESO. Definitely sticking to Comfort from now on.

If this was in Performance Mode it would be in the high 80s on the max with like a Core or two hitting 90.

 

[tsdobbi]

Glad to know this. I got the same system for gaming while I travel for work. I've had it on performance mode this whole time and yeah it could heat a room in the winter.

 

[wonka007]

Hi, I would like to ask if undervolting CPU helped with fan speed and if so then how I can do it? I thought I have to do it in BIOS but in my OMEN 15 2020 there is no option for it.