Hi guys, sorry in advance for this mammoth post.
Basically i've tried everything, but the only thing i've found that stops the throttling when playing games that require a fair bit of CPU, is playing on battery. So i've come to the conclusion that the problem must lie either with my charger, or the magsafe port and something to do with that. This is mainly while playing Steam games in bootcamp, i never really use OSX for high intensity CPU programs, so i'm not entirely sure if it throttles like this on the mac partition... But regardless, a powerful machine like this SHOULD be able to play these games for more than 10 minutes without throwing a total hissy-fit. This can't be normal.
I've scoured the forums and i can't find anything that's worked. I've got good ventilation, and temperatures tend to hang in the mid 60s when gaming, which doesn't seem too hot to me, yet my 2.3Ghz is constantly being throttled down to around 1.1Ghz, which makes games stutter and totally unplayable. I'm not talking about Crysis or anything here either, i mainly play Chivalry, with the settings turned down so low it looks like it's from 1998... But it doesn't seem to matter what game, when the power cable is plugged in, the throttling is persistent as soon as it hits 67 degrees or so.
I've tried PRAM and SMC resets, i have good ventilation, i have the fans maxed out and i've recently cleansed it of dust, i've tried programs like Throttlestop, forced Pstate 1 in Nvidia Inspector, reduced the max processor state to 95%... you name it, i've tried it. Everything short of reinstalling Windows partition, which would be a major pain in the arse. I can't say for sure whether it's the magsafe port, but all i know is that i can play perfectly stutter free until the battery runs out, and the very moment it's plugged, i start getting GPU throttling.
Some other points worth noting are that i experienced this problem from the get go, but managed to fix it using fan control and Throttlestop, and now it's back with a vengeance, and nothing bar playing on battery seems to stop it.
There is a heatwave at the moment, but if this were the problem then how on earth could people game in a climate even remotely hotter than grey Britain... In fact, i'm certain that with the fan control and better ventilation, my macbook is significantly cooler when gaming than when i got a good few months of stutter free gaming by using throttlestop... yet it's more aggressive than ever.
FINALLY it's probably be worth noting that the wire sheathing on my magsafe plug has ripped near the base of the connector, exposing the wires, so i patched it up with electrical tape. I need a new connector, whether it's causing this problem or not, so i'm off to buy one tomorrow hopefully, but is it even possible that this is causing the throttling? Maybe it's just me but the magsafe plug does feel hotter than it used to, but i never really gave it any mind before... The only other possible thing i've done recently that may have caused it is recently reinstall Skyrim with a whole load of mods, which has only left me with about ~2.5gb free space on this partition. Needless to say Skyrim isn't even remotely playable.
Anyway, any help, advice new perspectives or similar stories would be greatly appreciated because this is driving me potty. All my eggs are in the new power cable basket at the moment, i'll ask while i'm there but I have a feeling that bringing it up at the apple store won't help much. I've already had to have my original rMBP replaced within the past year...
Basically i've tried everything, but the only thing i've found that stops the throttling when playing games that require a fair bit of CPU, is playing on battery. So i've come to the conclusion that the problem must lie either with my charger, or the magsafe port and something to do with that. This is mainly while playing Steam games in bootcamp, i never really use OSX for high intensity CPU programs, so i'm not entirely sure if it throttles like this on the mac partition... But regardless, a powerful machine like this SHOULD be able to play these games for more than 10 minutes without throwing a total hissy-fit. This can't be normal.
I've scoured the forums and i can't find anything that's worked. I've got good ventilation, and temperatures tend to hang in the mid 60s when gaming, which doesn't seem too hot to me, yet my 2.3Ghz is constantly being throttled down to around 1.1Ghz, which makes games stutter and totally unplayable. I'm not talking about Crysis or anything here either, i mainly play Chivalry, with the settings turned down so low it looks like it's from 1998... But it doesn't seem to matter what game, when the power cable is plugged in, the throttling is persistent as soon as it hits 67 degrees or so.
I've tried PRAM and SMC resets, i have good ventilation, i have the fans maxed out and i've recently cleansed it of dust, i've tried programs like Throttlestop, forced Pstate 1 in Nvidia Inspector, reduced the max processor state to 95%... you name it, i've tried it. Everything short of reinstalling Windows partition, which would be a major pain in the arse. I can't say for sure whether it's the magsafe port, but all i know is that i can play perfectly stutter free until the battery runs out, and the very moment it's plugged, i start getting GPU throttling.
Some other points worth noting are that i experienced this problem from the get go, but managed to fix it using fan control and Throttlestop, and now it's back with a vengeance, and nothing bar playing on battery seems to stop it.
There is a heatwave at the moment, but if this were the problem then how on earth could people game in a climate even remotely hotter than grey Britain... In fact, i'm certain that with the fan control and better ventilation, my macbook is significantly cooler when gaming than when i got a good few months of stutter free gaming by using throttlestop... yet it's more aggressive than ever.
FINALLY it's probably be worth noting that the wire sheathing on my magsafe plug has ripped near the base of the connector, exposing the wires, so i patched it up with electrical tape. I need a new connector, whether it's causing this problem or not, so i'm off to buy one tomorrow hopefully, but is it even possible that this is causing the throttling? Maybe it's just me but the magsafe plug does feel hotter than it used to, but i never really gave it any mind before... The only other possible thing i've done recently that may have caused it is recently reinstall Skyrim with a whole load of mods, which has only left me with about ~2.5gb free space on this partition. Needless to say Skyrim isn't even remotely playable.
Anyway, any help, advice new perspectives or similar stories would be greatly appreciated because this is driving me potty. All my eggs are in the new power cable basket at the moment, i'll ask while i'm there but I have a feeling that bringing it up at the apple store won't help much. I've already had to have my original rMBP replaced within the past year...
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