Question HP OMEN Laptop appears to run smoother on battery than AC Adapter ?

DeathDealer117

Distinguished
Jun 25, 2012
4
0
18,510
Friend's laptop is having an issue where it's incredibly sluggish. Even opening Windows Settings hangs up a little. We messed around with it a bit... and decided a complete wipe was the way to start this adventure (had a completely full C drive we didn't want to bother going through).

So now I'm working with a completely wiped (I used the Windows Recovery thing and picked to delete everything).

It's still slow... He told me he had AC adapter issues... so this may be a different AC adapter than what came with it. However the battery is 100%.

What's even more strange is unplugging it appears to make it run better.

Really appreciate any ideas... I'm usually the go-to guy to fix computers or build them in my circles... I'm pretty stumped on this one. Im currently doing my best to update everything... Including upgrading to Win 11. I'm also trying to find like a utility to upgrade the drivers on this but I'm seeing it just yet.

One thing to note, the integrated AMD GPU appears to be being used and the nvidia GPU isn't. The display is being ran through the IGPU and I cannot switch it to the 1660. I read once that laptops have a switch that switches between the turn depending on load.
 
Update your post to include full laptop hardware specs and OS information.

Identify if the adapter is or is not HP. May be a proprietary issue....

Use Task Manager and Resource Monitor to observe and quantify the laptop's performance.

Use both tools but only one tool at a time.

First on battery, then on AC.

Run an app or game where the performance is readily noted as being sluggish.

Look for what changes or has changed when the performance becomes sluggish.
 
You may have a cooling issue.
By default when running on bettery, the integrated graphics is used and the cpu clocks are lowered to conserve baqttery run time.
Plugged in on high performance boosts the cpu clock and uses the discrete graphics chip.
This generates heat and laptop coolers are of necessity small and inefficient.
That results in cpu throttling.
See that your airways are clear and use a balanced profile.
Try setting max performance to 98%