Ocasional FPS drops related with GPU memory clock and Frame Buffer. Maybe temp as well?

[Lucas_76]

So I got this Dell laptop with the following configurations:

Windows 10
16gb RAM
SSD 128GB + HD 1TB
GT 940MX 4GB DDR5
Intel® Core™ i7-7500U (2.7 GHz up to 3,5 GHz)

I play only 3 games on it: League of Legends, Overwatch and FFXIV. All of then have random fps drops out of nowhere.

I did some analysis and found out that the GPU frame buffer goes to the roof (from 40% to 90%) whenever the drops occur while the GPU memory clock goes to 2000MHz to 800MHz for no reason (temperature for GPU is 60-70 and CPU 70-80 constantly)

In the following picture is a test I did playing overwatch in the worst configuration possible looking at the WALL of the game and standing still.

http://imgur.com/a/rtDJU

The game is running at 80fps when the memory clock is at the normal 2000MHz and goes to 60 when it reaches 800MHz


This happens even in league of legends in the worst settings and lowest resolution, although is less frequent.

What I also observed is that whenever I am using a cooling pad the frequency of there drops are reduced, funny enought, no actual improvement in the temperature occurs.

What have I tried:

-Runned BIOS diagnosis
-Reinstalling GPU drivers
-Runned Dell tests provided in their website
-Format the computer

Nothing seens to work, this is frustating and I would love some output. Thank you for reading.

 

[dontlistentome]

Some computers will 'throttle' performance to prevent overheating. In other words, you won't see it overheat before it throttles because it's throttling to prevent the overheating. This is why using a cooler helps, the cooler is helping to keep the conditions that trigger throttling from happening. Part of the inconvenience of gaming on laptops is they aren't as easy to keep cool as desktops.

 

[Lucas_76]

Some computers will 'throttle' performance to prevent overheating. In other words, you won't see it overheat before it throttles because it's throttling to prevent the overheating. This is why using a cooler helps, the cooler is helping to keep the conditions that trigger throttling from happening. Part of the inconvenience of gaming on laptops is they aren't as easy to keep cool as desktops.

There is a couple of things that makes me disconsider such hypothesis.

1- This video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5co5iS4X4uo&t=10s

In this video the guy is playing with the same GPU and worst CPU and RAM then my computer.
His temperatures are the same as mine (sometimes higher) and he gots none of that.

2-MSI readings do not show any temperature spikes or anything that would imply that the temperature has something to do with it.

3- A thing that I just tested out was that those drops in the memory clock and, consequentialy, the fps, just happens when my computer is connected to a power source. Whenever I leave it at the battery the GPU usage drops substancially (from the usual 80-90% to 50%) but the MHz stays still and no drop occurs, regardless of temperature. The thing is: most games won't play well with just 50% of the GPU active and playing with the battery hurts it so I rather not do.

 

[Lucas_76]

Ok I did some testing and found out something interesting.

I downloaded and played this game called Hollow Knight (http://store.steampowered.com/app/367520/)

This game is not very optimal atm so he is using the full capacity of the GPU for some reason, the catch is, even so he is using everything the others games are, the drops don't happen. And I think that is because this game is fully 2D.

I believe that my GPU is having some trouble running 3D games, maybe a hardware problem?