[GL702VM & similar] Solution to Performance issues / Overheating / Throttling / Whine

[onjax]

Hi guys, I bought GL702VM and was upset with its ability to handle games and high load. I had immediate temperature jump to over 85 jump and throttling / frame drops in games. So I decided to understand how to improve things, even though, I already lost my warranty due to my experiments, but at least I can answer for everyone, that:
- the main problem of this notebook is inefficient, insufficient cooling system with too thin fans, too small heatsinks, vent holes in a wrong places (aside, not above the fans).

To prove this, I first changed the thermal interface to liquid metal. That doesn't solve the issue. This proves, the thermal contact is ok, but heat dissipation is bad. Second, I ran stress tests with back cover removed - helped a lot, about 15-20 degrees off. The proves that air intake is wrong in this system.

I also removed an antidust tape with holes covering all the intake holes. That helped by around 5 degrees and also brought down air noise.

Then I came to idea of downvolting CPU and GPU, thanks to devs of ThrottleStop and MSI Afterburner, we can do this with relative ease.

The result: Fan noise reduced by half. Temp drop is huge. More speed due to ability of CPU/GPU to properly boost to max speed.

For your information - CPU is responsible for about 30% of heat, GPU - for 70%. So best idea is to undervolt the GPU, but for best results go for both.

THE GUIDE - CPU
Variant A - Install Intel Xtreme Tuning Utility

• Go to Advanced Tuning tab and Change Dynamic CPU Voltage Offset to negative value (move slider to the left). -100mV is a good starting point. Leave Mode to Adaptive.
  
• Apply changes.
  

My CPU holds -150mV well.

Variant B - Install Throttle Stop 8.3 or above

• On main window click FIVR button
  
• Under CPU Core Voltage move Offset Voltage slider to the left. -100mV is a good starting point. The lower value the less heat.
  
• Click Apply. On the same window you can save settings to make them apply every time you start the app.
  

THE GUIDE - GPU

• Download and Install MSI Afterburner 4.3 or above
  
• In settings turn on Unlock voltage control and Unlock voltage monitoring
  
• Close MSI Afterburner
  
• Download my Voltage Profile for GTX 1060
  
• Extract profile to some folder and then copy file to "C:\Program Files (x86)\MSI Afterburner\Profiles". Click continue as Administrator when Windows asks permission to write.
  
• Run MSI Afterburner, click on profile 1 (out of 5). Then press Ctrl+F. (1 - least heat, but may be unstable for some... 2, bit more voltage etc till 5.)
  
• You will see my Voltage Curve (screenshot). What you'll see that it's flat until 1050mv. that means. 1050 will never be used, so will never be used any voltage except 831mV @ 1860 MHz and below.
  
• Click apply to test this curve
  
• If this curve is not stable for you - edit it to your taste: Click on 831mV dot and move it lower, so that lower freq will be used for that voltage, and for 1860 freq next available voltage will be used. Etc. Work with leftmost voltage dots to make everything stable.
  

This curve drops heat of GPU by at least 30%, which is huge.

THE GUIDE - COIL WHINE
Workaround described here: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/975530

Perform only these steps as Administrator:
1. At a command prompt, run the following command:
reg add HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Processor /v Capabilities /t REG_DWORD /d 0x0007e066
2. Restart the computer.
3. Run ThrottleStop v8.3 or above and uncheck C1E. Click save.

In theory, it will make CPU a bit hotter while system is idle, because it disables some advanced C-states, but i didn't notice that in monitoring app.
That solved like 99.9% of the noise, and in addition, disabling C1E in ThrottleStop solved noise issue completely.

[mirkazemilad]

TornaD-oz wrote:
I'm back and forth between Intel XTU + FurMark, Intel Burn Test + FurMark and RealBench. I personally prefer the first combo, because the other ones might freeze the system due to overkill RAM usage. I started getting PL1 just recently, noticed it while playing Dishonored 2. I've had this laptop since November and I didn't have Power Throttling before, this only leads me to believe that something is amiss with either the latest BIOS update or my PSU.

I'm concerned with all those 100% stress tests because sooner or later there going to be games that push the hardware to it's limits. Even Assassin's Creed Origins used to push the CPU to around 80%, but, well, I didn't have any Power Throttling back then, only Thermal one.

Ok. So.. if you are satisfied with the older bios You can downgrade it using winflash.

Run cmd as administrator and Open winflash installation directory, run this commands without "" :
"cd C:\Program Files (x86)\ASUS\WinFlash"
Then :
"Winflash /nodate"
That's it. Now u can flash older bios over newer one.

[Ramz33]

mirkazemilad wrote:
Hi, Setting Package Power Limit (just 56) to lower value (<25) will only apply when you are using 100% of CPU power. I just tested this in GTA and AIDA64..



can I ask what app/game you are using?

Can you help me out? I followed all the steps on throttlestop and MSI afterburner but it does not work. I still get low fps on the GL702VM model. I played with and without turbo with bad results. Every time I play with turbo, the cpu speed gets stuck on 3.08 GHz when it should be 3.6 GHz. And when I play without turbo the cpu jumps all over the place, sometimes even join to like .80 GHz or 1.3 GHz every second when my base speed should be 2.6 GHz.

[mirkazemilad]

Ramz33 wrote:
Can you help me out? I followed all the steps on throttlestop and MSI afterburner but it does not work. I still get low fps on the GL702VM model. I played with and without turbo with bad results. Every time I play with turbo, the cpu speed gets stuck on 3.08 GHz when it should be 3.6 GHz. And when I play without turbo the cpu jumps all over the place, sometimes even join to like .80 GHz or 1.3 GHz every second when my base speed should be 2.6 GHz.

Yes max turbo frequency is 3.50 GHz but for single core.
3.4 GHz for 2 cores and &..
You can't use max turbo frequency when all of your cpu cores are active.

Try to optimize your game setting using nvidia geforce experience app. And test again.

[Ramz33]

mirkazemilad wrote:
Yes max turbo frequency is 3.50 GHz but for single core.
3.4 GHz for 2 cores and &..
You can't use max turbo frequency when all of your cpu cores are active.

Try to optimize your game setting using nvidia geforce experience app. And test again.

I tried using the nvidia geforce experience to optimize already. It raises all my settings for a game to like ultra and high settings when I press optimize. Why should I increase my settings if I am already having fps problems? This would make my fps even worse if I optimize. I looked at the recommended specs for witcher 3, GTA V, Rainbow Six Siege and it says my pc specs is better than the recommended specs for the game. Why does it say that I have the recommended specs when my pc can barely run the game? I need help to fix this issue and get my fps back.

[TornaD-oz]

Tri4C3 wrote:
to place the speaker covers you removed the part as chromed plastic? with these values I am seriously tempted to do so ... What cover speakers did you buy?

I believe what you refer to as chromed plastic is just a chrome paint from the inner side of the case (at least on my device) - no, I didn't remove anything, I just marked where I wanted to drill from the inside and went on with it. I used 2 inch speaker grill from AliExpress, however, I later found out that the laptop was sitting on those grills as they were higher than the back "legs". So I went on and bought 3 mm thick rubber, carefully removed the original ones, glued the rubber inside and glued the legs upon it. It is now 3 mm higher from the back side and sits upon "legs" as it's supposed to.

---

[/HR]

Ramz33 wrote:
I tried using the nvidia geforce experience to optimize already. It raises all my settings for a game to like ultra and high settings when I press optimize. Why should I increase my settings if I am already having fps problems? This would make my fps even worse if I optimize. I looked at the recommended specs for witcher 3, GTA V, Rainbow Six Siege and it says my pc specs is better than the recommended specs for the game. Why does it say that I have the recommended specs when my pc can barely run the game? I need help to fix this issue and get my fps back.

Open up ThrottleStop and look for the "Limit Reasons" button. Test your games and see what it reports. Check the maximum temperatures also. There can be a lot of reasons for your issues, if you need help, you have to be more specific.

Also, do you use stock Windows installation? If not, did you install the drivers from the support page?

[Ramz33]

TornaD-oz wrote:
I believe what you refer to as chromed plastic is just a chrome paint from the inner side of the case (at least on my device) - no, I didn't remove anything, I just marked where I wanted to drill from the inside and went on with it. I used 2 inch speaker grill from AliExpress, however, I later found out that the laptop was sitting on those grills as they were higher than the back "legs". So I went on and bought 3 mm thick rubber, carefully removed the original ones, glued the rubber inside and glued the legs upon it. It is now 3 mm higher from the back side and sits upon "legs" as it's supposed to.

---

[/HR]



Open up ThrottleStop and look for the "Limit Reasons" button. Test your games and see what it reports. Check the maximum temperatures also. There can be a lot of reasons for your issues, if you need help, you have to be more specific.

Also, do you use stock Windows installation? If not, did you install the drivers from the support page?

What should I be looking for when I press limit reasons? And my problem is that I good fps when I first start the game, then the fps declines after the first minute or even seconds. My pc had better fps when I first bought it a year ago (I have the GL702VM model) and now it just doesn't even feel like a gaming laptop. My pc came with windows 10 and I updated whenever I got a notification for a new version. Also, what do you mean the drivers from the support page? Do you mean the nvidia drivers on the ASUS support page for this model? If yes, then I have not because downgrading to older drivers had caused issues for me in the past. Like some game having graphical glitches, crashes on startup, or just not being able to run it. If you mean other drivers on the support page like the chipset driver and other stuff, I have tried that and it did not fix my issue.

[TornaD-oz]

Ramz33 wrote:
What should I be looking for when I press limit reasons? And my problem is that I good fps when I first start the game, then the fps declines after the first minute or even seconds. My pc had better fps when I first bought it a year ago (I have the GL702VM model) and now it just doesn't even feel like a gaming laptop. My pc came with windows 10 and I updated whenever I got a notification for a new version. Also, what do you mean the drivers from the support page? Do you mean the nvidia drivers on the ASUS support page for this model? If yes, then I have not because downgrading to older drivers had caused issues for me in the past. Like some game having graphical glitches, crashes on startup, or just not being able to run it. If you mean other drivers on the support page like the chipset driver and other stuff, I have tried that and it did not fix my issue.

Limit reasons will show you what limits are reported by your CPU, GPU or motherboard, that is, if you see PL1 (like me) during FPS drops that means CPU has hit Package Power Time Window and can no longer maintain Turbo, which results in multiplier dropping to 1 and then crawling back up - FPS drops to 20 and goes up with CPU clocks.

By drivers I mean the drivers from the support page of your device, NVIDIA drives should be obtained directly from NVIDIA unless you're looking to downgrade.

From what I gather, maybe you have the thermal issues? How hot are your CPU and GPU in C degrees? How low does the FPS drop, to 1-2 or around 20?

[Ramz33]

TornaD-oz wrote:
Limit reasons will show you what limits are reported by your CPU, GPU or motherboard, that is, if you see PL1 (like me) during FPS drops that means CPU has hit Package Power Time Window and can no longer maintain Turbo, which results in multiplier dropping to 1 and then crawling back up - FPS drops to 20 and goes up with CPU clocks.

By drivers I mean the drivers from the support page of your device, NVIDIA drives should be obtained directly from NVIDIA unless you're looking to downgrade.

From what I gather, maybe you have the thermal issues? How hot are your CPU and GPU in C degrees? How low does the FPS drop, to 1-2 or around 20?

The CPU temp is usually around 75-85 and the max is 90C degrees. When I start a game I would get maybe around 70 fps and it would drop down to 30 fps and just stay there.

[FastM]

Yeah a cpu undervolt alone wont do much since its the GPU creating the majority of the heat. A -100mV CPU undervolt is enough temp wise, definitely start messing with Afterbuner you'll see huge results with all the physical changes already done to your system.

[JArias]

FastM wrote:
Yeah a cpu undervolt alone wont do much since its the GPU creating the majority of the heat. A -100mV CPU undervolt is enough temp wise, definitely start messing with Afterbuner you'll see huge results with all the physical changes already done to your system.

Having never tampered with voltages of either CPU or GPU, Would you think it were safe for me to start messing around with it? Do I risk any permanent damage to my machine?

Also, I installed Afterburner on my GL702VMk but it seems like the only options it gives me to change are for Core voltage (assuming this is CPU) and I think another other for just the GPU. None of the other options are accessible and grayed out. Is there a way to unlock everything else?