[Video Card] FPS roller coaster

Taking a chance asking here. Been googling a lot last past days and I'm out of ideas.

I have a dell m1530 specs are:

-core 2 t7500 2.2 ghz
-3 gigs of ram
-vista 32 bits
-1440x900 or 1680x1050 (if I go on my external 22 inches)
-8600m gt 256megs with DDR3 (confirmed by rivatuner)

I know what the 8600m gt is supposed to give. It is not a 8800 and it is the m version. I'm not expecting this card to give zillions of fps in games (laptops are not for hardcore gaming anyway), but still, I have some weird performance behavior.

In l4d and other games (tried other stuff for fun, gh3, wow, titan quest, tf2 etc), I usually start a game with decent fps, then all of a sudden I get major fps drops. For example, first map of l4d in no mercy power ups with about 60 fps, then all of a sudden I can get a drop to 5-10 fps, which then gets back to 60 eventually. It doesn't seems to be related to where I'm looking or the amount of zombies in front of me. Sometimes, when a horde comes, I get 60 fps, sometimes, I'm getting inside a building with nothing much to render around me and the game starts to stutter with 5 fps. Other games seem to be acting that way too. I have also have forceware 179.13 installed (which seems, according to comments on laptopvideo2go the best up to now).

I'm out of ideas to why I'm getting such a behavior. If it was blocking at 30 fps all the time, I'd just say my system can't give me more. But if the card can get a 60-70 fps, it means it should be able to keep that average of fps with maybe a little drop when it had to render a lot, but nothing like going down to 5 fps for no apparent reason.

If you guys have some suggestion, it would be awesome

Hey Merranza,

There are some things you can do to rule some possibilities out before we completely blame your video card.

1. If these drops occur on a consistent basis, I would open Task Manager in Windows without the game open and watch for any processes that jump up in CPU usage about as consistently as the FPS drops you've been experiencing. Sort by CPU usage to help with this task.

If you see that it is a process running in the background, you then need to track it down and disable it, uninstall it, or remove it if it's a virus. It may even be something like a virus remover itself.

2. Defrag your hard drive. If you haven't defragged in a while or ever, and you have that many games, your hard drive probably looks like swiss cheese. Fragmented game files will keep you from experiencing consistent FPS in games and lessens the life of your hard drive.

3. I know it's rough, but do a memory test if you can. Microsoft has one and there's also memtest86 to use too.

I'll check that thanks Otaku

Sorry for taking so much time updating. With holidays and 3 weeks trip after, it left me with little time to update.

I've tried everything Otaku said in the thread.

#1. Everything stays very low. About 4% cpu usage, never more and physical memory is at 34% roughly. No spikes.

#2. I did a clean format.

#3. Ran a memory test, everything is top notch without any problems.

I kept doing some research on my own and found something about Powermizer which basically, is an internal set of instruction designed to auto-regulate ressource consumption from the vid card. It lowers/raises the performance of the gpu to ensure the best out of the battery. I discovered with techpowerup it was basically reducing my vid card to about 1/7th of its optimal performances. Followed all the instructions I found online, turned off Powermizer and now techpowerup shows optimal performance.

Problem is, it does the same thing. I'm currently benchmarking TF2. Here are the specs:

System Requirements
Minimum: 1.7 GHz Processor, 512MB RAM, DirectX® 8 level Graphics Card, Windows® Vista/XP/2000, Mouse, Keyboard, Internet Connection

Recommended: Pentium 4 processor (3.0GHz, or better), 1GB RAM, DirectX® 9 level Graphics Card, Windows® Vista/XP/2000, Mouse, Keyboard, Internet Connection

I am, by quite a bit, over all the recommended settings. Same freaking problems. If I run around in a map, there are specific zones where my fps drops (mostly outside and when there's a lot in my field of view) dramatically. It's not rare I hit 10-20 fps and all the settings are set to *low* or *disabled*. It's just absurd to get that little from such a system that blasts away the recommended settings.

The only other weird thing I've noticed is when I hit a bottom and my fps drop to 10-20, if I stay for a certain time in that exact spot, my fps sometimes raise to 60+ for a couple seconds then drop back like if something was *unlocking* somewhere then getting back to what it was before.

I'm pretty discouraged. Some people on the net are bragging running tf2/l4d with the exact same settings I have with a lot of settings maxed out and consistent/decent fps. Is there anything that comes to your mind I should look into? Settings in nvidia control panel or whatever? Could I have a bad card?

Could be just your ISP is crappy, who is it??
Could be your wiring/cable is crappy, how old is it??
Are you using wireless??
Do you notice a little extra heat when playing??
Got all your backround apps turned off(i.e.: msconfig)??
Is your AV running at same time?? If you are using and running Symmatic/Norton 'all in one', it is just a bunch of bloatware that slows a computer!!
If running from battery, plug it in...
How old is this laptop??
Ctrl+Alt+Del during game and check performance tab/graph..

Get rid of Powermizer and do your own tweaks...

Given your symptoms, I bet you got an overheating Vid Card or CPU so throttling back not to cook the hardware..

CED/Esmeralda said:

Could be just your ISP is crappy, who is it??
Could be your wiring/cable is crappy, how old is it??
Are you using wireless??
Do you notice a little extra heat when playing??
Got all your backround apps turned off(i.e.: msconfig)??
Is your AV running at same time?? If you are using and running Symmatic/Norton 'all in one', it is just a bunch of bloatware that slows a computer!!
If running from battery, plug it in...
How old is this laptop??
Ctrl+Alt+Del during game and check performance tab/graph..

Get rid of Powermizer and do your own tweaks...

Given your symptoms, I bet you got an overheating Vid Card or CPU so throttling back not to cook the hardware..

Click to expand...

I'm surprised by your answer, didn't think ISP could play in fps. I'll check into it. My ISP is a local provider called Vianet which I didn't really had any problem with in the past. I'm high speed dsl. Yes most of the time I'm wireless, so I could check plugged in?

Regarding heat, yes I notice more heat while playing. Regarding this issue though, I've checked online for normal temperature for my 8600m gt and it seems I'm in the *normal range* as most people report temp between 80-90 degrees which is what I get too.

No AV on my comp, and the fps result I just gave you is fresh from format.

Yes my laptop is plugged in and set up to run at high performance. Powermizer has been turned off, my laptop is 1 year old. I'll check ctrl-atl-del to see any variation. Regarding heat though, no specific heat variation reported with rivatuner running in the background.

If I do have an overheating cpu/vid card though, I'm still under warranty for 2 more years so for sure, I want to make sure that I don't have defect hardware.

is that 80-90 F or C?

Try looking in your bios for things that may throttle hard drive performance. Or anything like that.

-=TTC=-Serpreme said:

is that 80-90 F or C?

Try looking in your bios for things that may throttle hard drive performance. Or anything like that.

Click to expand...

Yep, 80-90C is high and not normal(if its C)...

I don't know much about PSUs for laptops, but wonder if you could post the specs(all) to rule out any other issue; I still lean towards your GPU and/or CPU overheating ===> I assume you are playing on a flat smooth surface(not your lap or pillow or blanket) ===> borrow someones laptop cooler and see if that helps...

You should see texture artifacts if its overheating. Make sure to watch for them.
Also sudden lock ups can cause issues.
What kind of HD do you have?

-=TTC=-Serpreme said:

You should see texture artifacts if its overheating. Make sure to watch for them.
Also sudden lock ups can cause issues.
What kind of HD do you have?

Click to expand...

Not necessarily.

The drop in frames could be from either the CPU overheating, the CPU's response is to underclock itself as the temperature rises. The CPU speed and system performance can also be diminished if he's running on the battery alone, I know that my old laptop would skim 200Mhz off the core processor speed, it's a small amount, but the difference was night in day in performance.

I haven't delved into each post, but this sounds like it's a laptop to me.

If it is, all I can give out are a few pointers:

1. Make sure it's not being placed on anything that could choke the air flow into and out of the laptop, that includes placing it on your lap, on a loose tablecloth, on an uneven surface, on a surface that absorbs and doesn't dissipate the heat. Cloth/Carpet is a huge no no.

2. Make sure that all the fans are operating, power the laptop on, stress the system by running one of your games; carefully flip the laptop over while it's running, observe each fan, check for airflow. Does the air coming out feel like a blow dryer? Are all the fans physically spinning? Is there any debris present in the vents? You may want to run some compressed air through the vents, to remove any excess dust/hair build up in the fans.

3. If the above check out, then consider the following... Is the room you're operating the laptop in unusually warm; such as a non-climate controlled room? Ambient temperature can make a massive difference in internal operating temperature of a computer, with or without proper airflow to begin with.

4. Can you determine the source of the heat? Is one area of the laptop's base seem to be considerably warmer than the others? Does it stem from the laptop itself, or is it coming from the battery? If it's the battery, does removing it while attempting to run your game for a while resolve this problem?

5. There's always the possibility that the system just suffers from a poor heat distribution system, you may want to start looking up your specific make/model of laptop, and investigate how many other people are having similar experiences. This can not only give you insight into potential solutions, but can also verify any specific issues, and can reveal whether or not there is a reasonable solution to be had from the manufacturer.

Alternatively, it may also reveal any bugs/glitches in the system that may be preventing it from operating properly under a heavy load, such as an update for the system BIOS, new drivers, etc, that may reveal an increase in stability and/or performance.

Thanks again to all of you for taking time to answer my questions.

Thanks to Serpreme, with all the tweakings/testing I forgot to check Bios :S There was an option that was indeed preventing my hdd from running full performance. I also flashed my bios to the latest version.

It did have a significant increase on the fps I get when nothing is around me. I would say I get around 30-50 more fps. Problem is nothing has changed when I get in combat situation so I see my fps dropping around 10-20 fps still and combat is almost impossible (that is with every settings set at low).

After a 10 minutes of playtime, I left I8kfan program running in the background and here are the results:



It's quite alarming. I decided to force the fan to max speed ensuring the best cooling impact. Every program seem to report the GPU temps differently. Riva reported around 90. Techpowerup around 85. I8k reports peak at 106. I have to agree, the bottom surface of my computer is pretty hot.

:\ Just pondering if I should contact Dell and try to get a new gpu.

What do you think of cpu temp also?

-=TTC=-Serpreme said:

You should see texture artifacts if its overheating. Make sure to watch for them.
Also sudden lock ups can cause issues.
What kind of HD do you have?

Click to expand...

Hash and I agree bout the artifact thang... Tired of peeps not giving us full info and expecting us to divine a solution...

CED/Esmeralda said:

Hash and I agree bout the artifact thang... Help us, give us the damn specs so we can help you....

Click to expand...

Ah crap, sorry forgot about it heh.

There were in my first post actually but here they are again:

It's a dell m1530 so yes a 15.4 laptop.

-core 2 t7500 2.2 ghz
-3 gigs of ram
-vista 32 bits
-1440x900 or 1680x1050 (if I go on my external 22 inches)
-8600m gt 256megs with DDR3 (confirmed by rivatuner)
-hdd : ST9200420ASG - Canada : Seagate Momentus 200gb 7200rpm 2.5" Serial Sata 16mb Hard Drive - Product Details
Let me know what else you need or anything more specific. I can get a dxdiag.txt if you prefer.

edit:

Regarding artifacts, I can't say I noticed anything spectacular or very evident.

Under certain circumstances i would agree heat is an issue.
But if he can cold boot the computer, load into a game and hit thos high action areas, get the same results, it probable isn't a heat issue.
So i guess you have something to try.
Also try a big metal surface while you are doing it, so it absorbs a lot of heat.

Edit:
You should try 3dmark as a test platform for fps increases.

Also go through dell's website and get every driver update you can.
Is your video cards memory based off of your total system memory? A shared memory situation?

I'll try 3dmark for sure, I'll post some results here. Regarding driver updates, I just ran through the system and made sure I was up to date with everything.

And please excuse my lack of knowledge regarding your last question. This is a portion of my dxdiag:

Display Devices
---------------
Card name: NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT
Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Chip type: GeForce 8600M GT
DAC type: Integrated RAMDAC
Device Key: Enum\PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_0407&SUBSYS_022E1028&REV_A1
Display Memory: 1522 MB
Dedicated Memory: 243 MB
Shared Memory: 1279 MB

I hope it can answer. I know the card by itself has 256 megs of ddr3. Here is also a screenshot of techpowerup:

Someone posted this on a forum

I would say that you were experiencing better FPS because NVIDIA supports directly the 7900GS with their drivers, unlike the 8600M GT, you need to get your drivers from the manufacturer.

Go to laptopvideo2go.com and download the latest drivers (169.09 are recommended) and make sure you read how to install it since you need the modified .Inf file.

I guarantee to you that you will get a perfomance boost.

Click to expand...

Already done Check driver version on techpowerup screen shot I post

Merranza said:

-vista 32 bits
-1440x900 or 1680x1050 (if I go on my external 22 inches)

Click to expand...

I would suggest this as a possible problem.
Your card is not meant for those high resolutions.
And with newer games demanding higher and higher bandwidth, your card simply wont be able to do it.
Try lowering your resolution down to 1280 or 1024, tell us what you find.

Edit: After re-reading a post about your temps, you need to get that straighten out asap or you will burn out your stuff.

Tried to down resolution to 1280, pretty much the same problem.
I gained maybe 10 fps global but I'm still hitting those rock bottom low zones where everything bottlenecks. All of a sudden, in this same zone, for a few seconds, it will get back to 40-60 fps then skyrocket down again to 5 fps. It's really inconsistent, I'm starting to think I have a bad vid card really :\

I'm leaning more toward a problem than the fact my card can't hold these games. We are talking about TF2, not Crysis. And if my card was having problems running tf2 in terms of performance, I wouldn't hit 120 fps at some points and 5 at some other. It would probably suck most of the time and never hit as high as 120.

I mean check the specs:
Recommended: Pentium 4 processor (3.0GHz, or better), 1GB RAM, DirectX® 9 level Graphics Card, Windows® Vista/XP/2000, Mouse, Keyboard, Internet Connection

I know a mobile gpu is never the equivalent of a desktop version, but my card is directx 10 compliant and probably rocks a couple lower cards. The DDR3 on it should help plenty too.

update: It seems I'm on the right way. I cleaned out fans/exhaust over again and this time, it seems it has a clear impact. All component seem to have dropped about 20 degrees down when resting/desktop mode. In games, gpu is peaking at 93 degrees which is still high but not as high as 106 degrees which was burning. The impact on fps is much better too. I have also found new drivers for the chipset and it seems to have helped. I'll keep testing, I just hope if it was mainly related to dust/exhaust bottleneck it hasn't affected the performance overall because of overheating over time...