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    GPU dead?

    Discussion in 'Alienware 17 and M17x' started by spinez, Feb 25, 2015.

  1. spinez

    spinez Notebook Enthusiast

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    I have a M17x R3 from 2011 with an AMD/ATI GPU. My battery went dead some time ago and I never got around to replacing it - so it's always plugged into the wall. Last night I accidentally flipped the surge protector off and down she went.

    It booted back up normally, but I am now getting 5 FPS in every game I try no matter the resolution. I uninstalled the GPU drivers and reinstalled them. No luck. The desktop itself seems fine - do you think I fried the GPU? Would it be worth a fresh install to see that would help (doubtful in my eyes as I've already refreshed the drivers). What else could I try to resolve this?
     
    spinez, Feb 25, 2015
    #1
  2. MickyD1234

    MickyD1234 Notebook Prophet

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    The bad battery seen at boot could be putting the machine into it's lowest power mode effectively killing off gaming? Try it without the battery at all? Don't know if that will help but a simple test.

    Run up hwinfo and game. Then look at the min and max GPU clock reading, I don't know the clock speed of your card but would expect a number 600~700 range max.
     
    MickyD1234, Feb 25, 2015
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  3. Raidriar

    Raidriar ლ(ಠ益ಠლ)

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    Do two things for me:
    download GPU-Z and MSI afterburner. Run your system in PEG mode (AMD GFX only).
    Run MSI afterburner installer, find the shortcut on desktop, and edit it like "C:\Users\Blah\Desktop\Afterburner.exe" and add -xcl after the quotation marks to enable overdrive in catalyst control center. This will require a restart. Do so. On restart, open both GPU-Z and catalyst control manager's overdrive tab. Try to make raise the clocks by like 5mhz to ensure that high clocks are sticking. Make sure your power profile (where the battery icon is) is set to high performance. Monitor temperature and load in catalyst control manager and actual clock speed in GPU-Z with something graphics intensive (I use OCCT for stress marking, supposedly safer than FURMARK).

    Let me know if your clock speeds are still bad.
     
    Raidriar, Feb 25, 2015
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  4. spinez

    spinez Notebook Enthusiast

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    technos, I did everything you suggested including putting PEG mode in the BIOS. As soon as I ran the game, everything was back to normal. Not sure if PEG mode did the trick or something else, but I appreciate your help regardless!
     
    spinez, Feb 25, 2015
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  5. Raidriar

    Raidriar ლ(ಠ益ಠლ)

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    Glad you got it fixed!
     
    Raidriar, Feb 25, 2015
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