Alienware 17 - VERY LOW 3DMark scores on 780M

Below is a link to my 3DMark benchmarks.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-4700MQ,Alienware Alienware 17

As you can see, the scores are extremely low and obviously something isn't right.

I have the GPU selected in the Nvidia control panel under global settings and high performance mode in power options.

My temps in CPUID are 46C (min) / 84 C (max) for the CPU and 45C (min) / 71C (max) for the GPU.

Can someone please help explain why these scores are so low and what I need to do to get them up to standard?

 

Looks to me like you're running into the 71C throttle. I'd recommend updating to BIOS A03, as some people say that fixes their issues. If it still hits a maximum temperature of 71C (And your score didn't improve), I'd recommend trying EVGA PrecisionX, and setting the temperature limit to something like 85C.

Hope your system is running better soon!

 

throttling at 71, lol, soon they will shift it to 50 or 60 or something...what do they think? that we are playing in the walk in freezers ?

not everybody can afford it.....to have walk in freezer lol

 

On all the previous NV cards I have seen, above 70 on stock clocks is high in an AW laptop. The 780 does seem to run hotter but I'm not sure if that is just down to some other issue. There was a period about 18 months ago where the factory was doing bad heatsink applications, and on the 580/675 they are hardcoded to drop to P8/75mhz at around 77C so throttling all over the place!

There is also the power throttle that can kick in at any temp if the card is overloaded (as is often the case in benchmark programs) this drops you down to P1, or better known as 2D clocks, which can be quite a hit on performance.

Before trying anything to fix it see if you can identify just where the problem lies.

Get msiafterburner and go to the OSD tab. Set it to display clock speed, temp, voltage (which will also drop in throttling) and FPS, leave it in the background and run some tests seeing exactly what is going on on-screen (much easier than using something like HWInfo and examining the log ). A drop in clock speed is the main indicator you are looking at. Depending on what speed it drops to will identify which throttle is kicking in.

You can use nvidiainspector to see exactly what the different P states speeds are (in the advanced screen that pops up a warning window) for your GPU. I use this program for overclocking as it's the only one that lets you get to the P1 clock but since there will be a voltage drop, and there is no way to adjust voltage in software, you have to be careful with this one as artifacting can occur very easily.

You may need to get dell out to replace the heatsink, This is what they do when a repaste is needed. Of course if you have all the stuff and are happy then you can do it yourself if it is the overheat throttle.

HTH and good luck.

 

Hi, thanks for the response.

I updated the BIOS to A03 and did another benchmark. The results were the same as my first benchmark. Then I did your second suggestion of increasing the temp limit to 85C. This allowed me to get a better score in 3DMark, but the results are still far below average.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780M video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-4700MQ,Alienware 068R5X

Does this information shed any insight on what the problem could be?

 

I'm checking the clock rates, temp, and voltage now. Based on the fact that increasing the temp limit gives me better scores, but still not up to par, does this indicate a hardware problem or a bad paste job? I was assuming if the paste job was bad the minimum temps should be much higher.... but then you did say 70 seems high. What should it be? (another 780M user, please chime in)

 

I don't think anyone knows for sure right now, it does look like a power throttle, what do the clocks drop to under normal settings? Which P state does that match?

At a guess a decent pad and paste job may be all it needs but since I haven't seen any expert advice on the 780 yet it's a complete guess!

The fact that the AW guy 'liked' my post tends to make me think that I was right about 70c. After a new heatsink and new paste/pads, my 580m went from 77c and full throttling (P8) down to 65c at full load!

Good luck.

 

Try the newest BETA drivers from Nvidia, you're on stck Dell's right now i guess. Open MSI afterburner in the background and after the test finished you'll be able to check the clocks during the benchmark and see if it throttles for you.

Also, there's a modded vbios for 780M which really makes it beast!!!

 

What MickyD has said. He's given you good advice on how to diagnose the problem & also potentially how to fix it. You wanna find out if it's throttling, ie clocks lowering while gaming or benchmarking, and cross reference that with the temperature that is seen at that time.