2017 Macbook Pro: Intel GPU stuck at max. clock speed, terrible battery life

[Moriarty]

I have a very strange problem. The Intel HD 630 GPU in my 2017 Macbook Pro is stuck at its maximum clock speed (~ 1.14 GHz), despite the % utilization being very low (~ 1%). These figures are from the Intel Power Gadget, so I figure them to be quite reliable.

This very high GPU idle frequency is causing my battery life to be terrible – it takes about 9 W of power to idle at this high frequency.

The iGPU drops back to a fully idle state if I force the dGPU on, sleep the laptop, and wake it up again.

I have already re-installed High Sierra on my system drive, which didn't fix it. Booting from a completely clean installation does fix the issue, which means that it's definitely a software issue, and presumably caused by something I have installed myself. However, I have no idea what piece of software could cause this, and I fear that re-installing from Time Machine won't fix it either.

Has anyone else experienced this problem? Any ideas on how to troubleshoot?

 

[Fishrrman]

Well, since it's under warranty, the first thing I'd do is take it back to an Apple genius bar at a brick-n-mortar Apple Store...

 

[Moriarty]

Solved! For anyone else who may have this problem, it seems to have been caused by a bug in a kernel extension of version 3.5.0 of the Intel Power Gadget (the same version also caused crashes in older processors). Updating to 3.5.1 and restarting fixed the problem.

I would be quite surprised if a Genius could figure that one out...

 

[hajime]

Solved! For anyone else who may have this problem, it seems to have been caused by a bug in a kernel extension of version 3.5.0 of the Intel Power Gadget (the same version also caused crashes in older processors). Updating to 3.5.1 and restarting fixed the problem.

I would be quite surprised if a Genius could figure that one out...

So you could become a Genius if you want to work for Apple.

 

[Moriarty]

So you could become a Genius if you want to work for Apple.

What's with the hostility? It's a 5 hour round trip to my nearest Apple Store, and Apple is under no obligation to troubleshoot third-party software issues.

One of the reasons for which forums like these exist is so that people can help each other solve their problems. And then other people can later search and find the solution.

 

[PBG4 Dude]

Are you saying that having the intel power gadget program installed (but not running) was causing excessive iGPU usage? Or did it only trigger iGPU high usage when it was running?

 

[Moriarty]

Are you saying that having the intel power gadget program installed (but not running) was causing excessive iGPU usage? Or did it only trigger iGPU high usage when it was running?

The former. The Power Gadget installs some files in /Library/Frameworks, which I guess were the source of the problem. I confirmed with iStat that the high iGPU usage persisted even when the Power Gadget was not running, and also when the dGPU was being used (though running a sleep-wake cycle with the dGPU on sometimes seemed to help).

It's a really weird bug, and particularly difficult to isolate because I don't think that the app was actually using the GPU. I think it was just forcing the iGPU's clock speed to the highest setting. I couldn't see anything out of the ordinary in Activity Monitor or the OpenGL Driver Monitor.

I often use the Intel Power Gadget to monitor my computers, and I updated to 3.5.0 (the version with this bug) last month. Ironically, the program which I used to finally figure out why my laptop was running so hot – because the iGPU was never being throttled – was the cause of the problem in the first place...

 

[PBG4 Dude]

Thanks for your reply!

I’m still on version 3.0.3 so I guess for once it’s a good thing I didn’t update LOL.