High Performance vs Balanced / Graphics switching vs Dedicated GPU

Hi all,

I'm trying to get the best performance out of my M17X R4 and I have a few questions.

Power options:
High performance vs balanced: What are your thoughts about this?
If you go to advanced options, they are pretty much the same under "pluggid in" state. What benefit would high performance give that are not visible in the advanced options?

Graphics switching vs Dedicated GPU:
I have read a lot from other posts stating that if I turn enduro off by running my laptop at full GPU (fn+f7), I would get better performance and higher FPS as supposed to graphics switching mode. Is this true?

 

Rule of thumb is to go with balanced when on battery, high performance when plugged in. This is true regardless of if you are using enduro or not because a balanced profile will still lower the clocks on the 7970m and increase your battery life.

Disable Enduro. Go dedicated. You will see a performance increase. And i don't know how the R4 does on battery, but in my R3, i can still get almost 3 hrs on battery with the 7970m while i'm doing light tasks

 

So you mean when my Alienware is plugged in, it must be on performance mode? All this time I have it on balanced. Is there like a disadvantage when you are using balanced mode when plugged in?

One more question, how come when I overclock then revert back to stock clocks, my Alienware stays at the 300/450 clock speed? Weird. :< In order to fix this, I must reset my M17x. Is that normal?

 

Thanks for this!

Great info on the High performance option. I never saw an option to change the performance of the GPU regardless if it is plugged in or using battery so I guess this is one of the hidden advantages.

For dedicated GPU, the only fear I have and that is why I am running on switchable graphics is because my GPU might get hot over a long period.

For example, on weekends, I have my laptop on almost all day but I only game for 3-5 hours straight playing BF3. When I would game, I would peak at 65 degrees. If I do not game, since it switches back to intel graphics, my GPU temps go down to around 58 degrees. If I run at full GPU mode, will I be getting the same GPU temps or would it be higher on both higher load and lower load?

 

Kyrius, it doesn't have to be on performance mode, you can leave it on balanced if you like...you're just letting the computer decide for you when to pump up the clocks. By putting it on performance, you alleviate possible errors that might be made by the laptop decision

If you're using MSI Afterburner to overclock, this is normal. Unfortunately, we just have to live with it for now until official support comes

You temps are always in a similar range regardless of if you game or not because when you are gaming, the fans come on...when you are surfing, you hear no fans. So 55c idle is normal (i.e., with no or very low spinning fans)

Your computer is fine. Just shut off Enduro for the time being until the tech becomes more mature. Peaking at 65c is cold for a laptop gpu

 

Very helpful and informative. + Rep!

I've owned this laptop for months and I am not using it to its full potential.

Thanks for this! I will try it tonight and will post back if I run accross any problems.

 

Thank you Slick!

 

Hey Slick, so I tried what you recommended last night by setting High Performance mode and turning Enduro off.

for some reason, I feel that my frame rate has dropped.

When I play BF3, I used to get 42-62 on ultra settings using switchable graphics. Now using dedicated GPU mode, I get 37-54 fps.

Is this normal. I do notice my temps to be cooler with Enduro off.
with switchable graphics, I peak at 65; with dedicated GPU, I peak at 62.

Is this normal?