Sudden performance drop when playing cod waw.

[jomberiini]

Suddently when playing cod waw on my laptop the performance has fallen down a lot. usually i would be getting over 60 fps but now its under 30 or 20. When i start up my laptop the game runs fine at like 80fps for few minutes then it drops to 20 fps. Also i noticed that the cpu usage is only under 20% when playing codwaw while in comparison while playing minecraft and such games its at 100%.

 

[velo3100]

There could be a lot of reasons for this.

But first what is the laptop specs and what are the temps while playing this game?

 

[jomberiini]

Processor is intel i5-4210U
graphics geforce 840m
8gb ram
temps are at around 50C while playing

 

[velo3100]

I have a feeling its the weak cpu. Maybe it is being throttled for some reason as the gpu can easily handle this game.

Are you sure it is using the nivida gpu and not the igpu?

 

[jomberiini]

I have a feeling its the weak cpu. Maybe it is being throttled for some reason as the gpu can easily handle this game.

Are you sure it is using the nivida gpu and not the igpu?

YEs i have set it as default in the nvidia control panel and weirdly now it seems that sometimes it runs fine with no lag at all and sometimes it just starts lagging alot. (i accidentually clicked that mark as solution)

 

[velo3100]

Then it is definetly your cpu as it may not be able to handle the 50 degrees and throttles itself down as the gpu is more than able to play the game.

My best suggestion is to get a cooling pad and see if that helps.

I have a feeling its the weak cpu. Maybe it is being throttled for some reason as the gpu can easily handle this game.

Are you sure it is using the nivida gpu and not the igpu?

YEs i have set it as default in the nvidia control panel and weirdly now it seems that sometimes it runs fine with no lag at all and sometimes it just starts lagging alot. (i accidentually clicked that mark as solution)

 

[jomberiini]

Then it is definetly your cpu as it may not be able to handle the 50 degrees and throttles itself down as the gpu is more than able to play the game.

My best suggestion is to get a cooling pad and see if that helps.

I have a feeling its the weak cpu. Maybe it is being throttled for some reason as the gpu can easily handle this game.

Are you sure it is using the nivida gpu and not the igpu?

YEs i have set it as default in the nvidia control panel and weirdly now it seems that sometimes it runs fine with no lag at all and sometimes it just starts lagging alot. (i accidentually clicked that mark as solution)

How much do cooling pads usually cost?

 

[velo3100]

They vary from £30 onwards I think. I personally don't really know as I don't use them but I am sure if you search on amazon you should be able to find a good one.

Then it is definetly your cpu as it may not be able to handle the 50 degrees and throttles itself down as the gpu is more than able to play the game.

My best suggestion is to get a cooling pad and see if that helps.

I have a feeling its the weak cpu. Maybe it is being throttled for some reason as the gpu can easily handle this game.

Are you sure it is using the nivida gpu and not the igpu?

YEs i have set it as default in the nvidia control panel and weirdly now it seems that sometimes it runs fine with no lag at all and sometimes it just starts lagging alot. (i accidentually clicked that mark as solution)

How much do cooling pads usually cost?

 

[jomberiini]

Then it is definetly your cpu as it may not be able to handle the 50 degrees and throttles itself down as the gpu is more than able to play the game.

My best suggestion is to get a cooling pad and see if that helps.

I have a feeling its the weak cpu. Maybe it is being throttled for some reason as the gpu can easily handle this game.

Are you sure it is using the nivida gpu and not the igpu?

YEs i have set it as default in the nvidia control panel and weirdly now it seems that sometimes it runs fine with no lag at all and sometimes it just starts lagging alot. (i accidentually clicked that mark as solution)

I got my cooling pad today and now the cpu temp is at 50C while gaming(it went to a bit over 60 before but I didn't really notice it before) still codwaw's fps drops quite alot after a bit of time now it starts at almsot 100fps and then drops to 30. (usage is at around 30%)

 

[jimmyh234]

the main problem here is not only the cpu being out dated, but seems like the entire computer is week, I would suggest investing into something a bit more modern, otherwise you will be left in the dust.

 

[jomberiini]

the main problem here is not only the cpu being out dated, but seems like the entire computer is week, I would suggest investing into something a bit more modern, otherwise you will be left in the dust.

It has been some time. But the laptop should be able to run world at war fine according to some sites. The laptop was checked and they said theres no hardware problems and it wasnt overheating. I tried reinstalling the game but the problem didn't get fixed.
here's a couple of new screenshots.
before the fps drop (you can see that the game is only using 20% of the cpu)

after the drop (The hdd usage seems to be quite high but the game screen was covering up that part of the taskmanager after I took the screenshot i noticed it was 99%)

you can see the cpu usage is really low on world at war.

 

[jimmyh234]

the main problem here is not only the cpu being out dated, but seems like the entire computer is week, I would suggest investing into something a bit more modern, otherwise you will be left in the dust.

It has been some time. But the laptop should be able to run world at war fine according to some sites. The laptop was checked and they said theres no hardware problems and it wasnt overheating. I tried reinstalling the game but the problem didn't get fixed.
here's a couple of new screenshots.
before the fps drop (you can see that the game is only using 20% of the cpu)

after the drop (The hdd usage seems to be quite high but the game screen was covering up that part of the taskmanager after I took the screenshot i noticed it was 99%)

you can see the cpu usage is really low on world at war.

It may only be using 20%, but depending on how strong your hardware is, that could be like me using 99.99% of my 4790k. Your best bet, would be to find a way to either tweak your graphics in game. All those old call of dutys came with performance tweaking hidden in the directory. You can download a mod online to run your game in super simple graphics settings with smooth/solid color textures. It looks like a cartoon with the solid, vibrant colors, but it takes a lot of stress off of your hardware. Try and find something like that, if you cant I would try and upgrade your system. The life span of a laptop is only around 3-5 years if your lucky, they last longer now a days, but anything bought before 2010, probably is not going to last to long considering the type of hardware they used. It might just be time for an upgrade, unfortunately these things don't last forever.

 

[Vynavill]

I'm just throwing an obvious-nade here, but you are running with the energy saving settings set to maximum performance, right? Regardless of the fact you're plugged or not.

 

[jomberiini]

I'm just throwing an obvious-nade here, but you are running with the energy saving settings set to maximum performance, right? Regardless of the fact you're plugged or not.

Well most of the time it uses the "ASUS power4gear high performance" setting because it automaticly chooses that. I do't know if it made any difference when i ran on high performance or balnced setting.

And for jimmyh234 I'm not sure if the problem is caused by the settings as for the first half years of having the game it ran completetly smooth and just recently it has gotten this weird problem (tried to change the settings lower and managed to reach 40fps while the fps drop had happened by switching off anti aliasing and shadows). The specs of my laptop can be found higher on the topic.

 

[jomberiini]

Apparently avast was causing this problem. When i uninstalled avast before trying to go back to a system restore point to fix the problem i noticed the laptop works alot faster and codwaw runs at 80fps without any drops at 1600x900 resolution.

 

[Vynavill]

Well, that's weird. AVAST is not the lightest free AV solution out there, but it shouldn't be THAT heavy.
Are you sure you didn't install anything in-between?

Also, I can't tell from the text, so sorry if I'm saying something silly, but if you now don't have any AV solution installed, you'd best get yourself one ASAP.

Still, glad you solved it. Enjoy, I guess? 😉