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Help: rMBP 650M GPU Throttling on BootCamp
- Thread starter MiG123
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I am experiencing this kind of frame skip too and i am not entirely sure what is causing this. It might be temperature based and not SMC bug related after all
While playing Skyrim i notice it occasionally in dense forests. While playing Crysis 2/3 i notice it all the time...
Or is it still possible that all this is still related to the SMC bug?
I have detected a new strand of the SMC bug that causes slow down without throttling the hardware (no frequency change detected in either CPU-Z or GPU-Z), so...
...tough luck, eh?
Tough luck indeed. Right now i am totally confused about this. Is it the SMC bug, thermal throttling or maybe both?
I did actually try disabling turbo boost, but that wont keep my rMBP from reaching 78°C under heavy load while playing Crysis. It is then, when the GPU lowers its clocks for short amounts of time.
Is there actually some way to disable thermal throttling? I mean i would understand it if it throttled around 90°C, but 78°C is still quite ok...
Or is disabling this only possible via editing the GPU´s bios, which isnt possible?
I did actually try disabling turbo boost, but that wont keep my rMBP from reaching 78°C under heavy load while playing Crysis. It is then, when the GPU lowers its clocks for short amounts of time.
Is there actually some way to disable thermal throttling? I mean i would understand it if it throttled around 90°C, but 78°C is still quite ok...
Or is disabling this only possible via editing the GPU´s bios, which isnt possible?
I just use windows power profiles to disable it pretty much permanently in windows. I also use Lubbos fan control so it ramps the fans up a bit sooner. I rarely see 75c on the gpu now.
What exactly did you set the maximum and minimum processor states to? Is it ok, to set both to 95% ?
Also, i noticed that you can actually allow Lubbos to run the fans at 6500RPM a minute (I thought the max was 6000). Is 6500RPM safe?
Mines at 95%
I noticed SMC fan control in OSX will also let you set one of the fans above 6500 if you untick the sync sliders box.
I've set Lubbos to run my fans at max when temperature hits 90c on the CPU, but they never get anywhere near that.
Ok, i will try that. My CPU usually doesnt hit 90°C either, but my GPU can reach 77-80°C in Crysis 3 which will cause throttling. I wish it was possible to have 2 independent sliders for the CPU and the GPU..
So 6500RPM is safe?
just my 2 cents on the fan speed. would you drive your car at red line for a long period of time?
that's the max speed of the fans. it will greatly reduce its life.
Lots of misinformation in this thread...
This throttling issue occurs when the system hits 80w total consumption. When the system crosses 80w, the GPU will throttle.
This used to not occur because the battery drained to allow the computer to surpass its 85w power supply. A recent SMC update from a year ago caused a software patch to throttle the GPU if it hits 80w. This solves the battery draining bug that many users complained about when gaming heavily.
This sucks; plain and simple. The best solution is to use ThrottleStop and lower your CPU clocks to a bare minimum that saturates the GPU.
I made a post about it here: http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?p=35333734
A good way to monitor power usage is to fully charge your laptop, then download AIDA64 (free trial) and then monitor power supply usage. Its amazing how little leeway there is in some games with stock clocks. Intel TurboBoost is a major culprit.
After further analysis, some games are more memory clock oriented, while some are core clock oriented. I created a few .bat files that have a high core clock and low memory speed to fully maximize frame-rates while minimizing power consumption.
Splinter Cell: Blacklist is heavily reliant on Memory speed; whereas Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit is reliant on Core Clock.
This throttling issue occurs when the system hits 80w total consumption. When the system crosses 80w, the GPU will throttle.
This used to not occur because the battery drained to allow the computer to surpass its 85w power supply. A recent SMC update from a year ago caused a software patch to throttle the GPU if it hits 80w. This solves the battery draining bug that many users complained about when gaming heavily.
This sucks; plain and simple. The best solution is to use ThrottleStop and lower your CPU clocks to a bare minimum that saturates the GPU.
I made a post about it here: http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?p=35333734
A good way to monitor power usage is to fully charge your laptop, then download AIDA64 (free trial) and then monitor power supply usage. Its amazing how little leeway there is in some games with stock clocks. Intel TurboBoost is a major culprit.
After further analysis, some games are more memory clock oriented, while some are core clock oriented. I created a few .bat files that have a high core clock and low memory speed to fully maximize frame-rates while minimizing power consumption.
Splinter Cell: Blacklist is heavily reliant on Memory speed; whereas Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit is reliant on Core Clock.
Throttled to death, tried everything
I have tried everything!
Surfed the forums, tried all tips and tricks, no success.
Im using Throttlestop to stop turbo boost, running at 2.07Ghz. Temperatures of CPU = at around 80. In game, running at 40% of CPU.
GPU force-state via Nvidia Inspector, to 1035/2800, and temps of around 73.
Force-state doest work properly. Using MSI afterburner, I can see that originally it works, but 10 minutes into game it drops to around 700, with spikes down to 125
The spikes are the throttling obviously.
Im running on dim, and trying to conserve power wherever I can, but nothing works. Throttlestop is supposed to help by using less power. I have noticed that while using it I have a serious drop in max temps, as much as 10 degrees.
What can I do?
Using AIDA64 I noticed that I only using 54W of power supply. So Powersupply is stable, temps are not bad, yet force state fails, and getting throttled sucks.
rMBP late 2012, 2.3Ghz quad core, windows 8.1 bootcamp, latest nvidia driver, GT650M.
I have tried everything!
Surfed the forums, tried all tips and tricks, no success.
Im using Throttlestop to stop turbo boost, running at 2.07Ghz. Temperatures of CPU = at around 80. In game, running at 40% of CPU.
GPU force-state via Nvidia Inspector, to 1035/2800, and temps of around 73.
Force-state doest work properly. Using MSI afterburner, I can see that originally it works, but 10 minutes into game it drops to around 700, with spikes down to 125
The spikes are the throttling obviously.
Im running on dim, and trying to conserve power wherever I can, but nothing works. Throttlestop is supposed to help by using less power. I have noticed that while using it I have a serious drop in max temps, as much as 10 degrees.
What can I do?
Using AIDA64 I noticed that I only using 54W of power supply. So Powersupply is stable, temps are not bad, yet force state fails, and getting throttled sucks.
rMBP late 2012, 2.3Ghz quad core, windows 8.1 bootcamp, latest nvidia driver, GT650M.
Experiencing the same thing here. After hours of testing, I couldn't associate the throttling with anything specific. Can't be the 80W limitation since it's running at well under that (~65W). I don't think it's related to temperature either, since the GPU is always running quite cool (always under 80oC). All I can say is that after a few minutes of gaming, the Core Clock falls to 725mHz, sometimes going up to 797mHz. I did notice that reducing the Memory Clock does increase the time in which the Core Clock is at 900mHz. But after a while, it inevitably drops. Anyone have a solution?
I posted about this exact issue on Apple's forums, no responses yet.
Has evidence (from FFXIV benchmarks if anybody was wondering)
In this thread people have mentioned throttling due to power limitations, though mine has never reached that high while gaming (also using external display). I have tried using throttlestop to down clock the CPU, to no avail.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5770592?tstart=0
Has evidence (from FFXIV benchmarks if anybody was wondering)
In this thread people have mentioned throttling due to power limitations, though mine has never reached that high while gaming (also using external display). I have tried using throttlestop to down clock the CPU, to no avail.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5770592?tstart=0
I have good news my friends!
I got the same problem and tested pretty much what everybody suggested, and it didn't work... the GPU still throttled a lot (rMBP mid-2012, 650m).
BUT, I installed the OSX 10.10 beta, and apparently it changed a few things in the SMC/EFI. It doesn't throttle anymore (just like a normal GPU should throttle).
Some update happened on the SMC or EFI and apparently it solved it for me.
Update: I installed the 10.10 DP2, and I got even more improvements! Now it throttles like a decent GPU should throttle! (Small clock jumps, stable framerates!). Testing on Battlefield 3/4, Grid 2, I got stable framerates even without Throttlestop or underclocking the GPU. I'm really, really happy with this.
Update 2: After more extensive testing, I can say for sure that the throttling problem is STILL bad (*****).
I got the same problem and tested pretty much what everybody suggested, and it didn't work... the GPU still throttled a lot (rMBP mid-2012, 650m).
BUT, I installed the OSX 10.10 beta, and apparently it changed a few things in the SMC/EFI. It doesn't throttle anymore (just like a normal GPU should throttle).
Some update happened on the SMC or EFI and apparently it solved it for me.
Update: I installed the 10.10 DP2, and I got even more improvements! Now it throttles like a decent GPU should throttle! (Small clock jumps, stable framerates!). Testing on Battlefield 3/4, Grid 2, I got stable framerates even without Throttlestop or underclocking the GPU. I'm really, really happy with this.
Update 2: After more extensive testing, I can say for sure that the throttling problem is STILL bad (*****).
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I have the 750M version. It definitely does not throttle in win 8.1, as my battery drains when gaming. In OSX, i've never seen the battery drain issue, so it is possible that throttling is occurring there. But, i rarely game in OSX, so it's not that big of a deal for me.
You are lucky. All what I reported happened on Windows 8.1.
And also I have strong evidences that the throttling isn't caused by a power problem (even using throttlestop and underclocking the GPU still resulted in serious throttling, while the power consumption was around 50W).
Hello, just a heads up to anyone still experiencing this. I tried just about everything already mentioned in the thread to no avail. But, today I installed the latest beta nvidia driver 340.43 (I've got the 650 card), and it seems to have significantly reduced the throttling for me (at the cost of increased temps) even without throttlestop running. I can finally play Dark Souls 2!
Edit: Nevermind
Edit: Nevermind
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Don't have time to read every post here so I apologize if this has been asked already.
Have you guys trying setting the max CPU state to 99% in windows power settings?
This will essentially disable turbo boost and will allow more thermal and power headroom for the GPU to remain at full(ish) speed.
Had to do this on a friends windows laptop to keep it from throttling and it did the trick. It was an MSI.
Have you guys trying setting the max CPU state to 99% in windows power settings?
This will essentially disable turbo boost and will allow more thermal and power headroom for the GPU to remain at full(ish) speed.
Had to do this on a friends windows laptop to keep it from throttling and it did the trick. It was an MSI.
Hi guys, i did try the SMC reset for 5-6 times but no avail. Also I clock down GPU core to ~680 in NVI and the CPU usage to 99% in power management but after playing Arma 3 for a while, the CPU clock rate drops. and once it drops, it won't back itself up when under little load. (only backs up if I open the map or alt+tab out for 20-30 seconds)
Also, My CPU NEVER exceeds 85 C and GPU only sees at 70-72 degrees maximum.
Also, My CPU NEVER exceeds 85 C and GPU only sees at 70-72 degrees maximum.
Hey
What is the advantage of having the Balanced mode do that? I mean, it's Balanced already so you are not expecting good performance out of it.
In theory you are setting 95% to disable throttling but in the end the performance will be reduced anyway.
Please can someone enlighten me?
The idea is to limit the amount of CPU power consumption to the point at which your gpu can run at full clocks without the total power consumption of the system exceeding what the power supply cans provide. It also limits the amount of heat the CPU will generate, helping with thermal throttling.
Hope this helps clear it up.
So you actually lower CPU power so the GPU won't lose power?
And how do I know whether my macbook pro's power supply won't be able to handle both GPU and CPU without throttling?
Lastly, does that all mean running on battery is better, given that the power supplied by the battery is unlimited as opposed to the psu?
I also wanted to point out that another way you can help this issue is to download xcode, and use the preferences in the included Instruments app to disable a core or two of your CPU.
As an example, running CineBench with all 4 core/8 threads active, my CPU consumes 50w. When I disable 2 of those core bringing the system down to 2 cores/4 threads, power consumption falls to 30w.
Depending on the game, the extra cores will not provide much benefit. Doing this will also leave more power and thermal headroom for turboboost to clock the two remaining cores even closer to their max.
Cheers.
As an example, running CineBench with all 4 core/8 threads active, my CPU consumes 50w. When I disable 2 of those core bringing the system down to 2 cores/4 threads, power consumption falls to 30w.
Depending on the game, the extra cores will not provide much benefit. Doing this will also leave more power and thermal headroom for turboboost to clock the two remaining cores even closer to their max.
Cheers.