single core games with an i7 720.

I have the i7 720 for my M15x. I probably should have gotten the i5 as I mostly play older PC games but it's too late now so I'm wondering if there is anything I can do to improve performance on older games that only use a single core. For example a game like Neverwinter Nights drops down to 30fps in areas with lots of people. Adjusting the processor affinity in task manager for these sorts of games doesn't show any noticeable improvement. Are there any tricks or tweaks I can utilize to get better performance? Thanks in advance.

 

720qm has a single core frequency from 2.4-2.8 GHz. there shouldn't be any problem playing those games.
If that is too slow. You could get an 920/940xm es processors on ebay. 920xm costs around $380 USD.

 

I agree it shouldn't be a problem, but it is. Maybe I'm having actually having some driver, or other software-based issue and thinking it's processor based, but it genuinely does seem to be so. I generally notice it in the generation of games released just before multi-core became standard.

 

Whilst I appreciate the response, I don't believe that is true. I am running at stock clocks, unthrottled, and there is very little load on the GPU according to GPU-Z. The frame drops also don't occur in graphically intense games of that period, just the ones with lots of processing stuff like Civ 4 etc.

 

You sure you're not running in Stealth Mode? I've got the same specs as you except I have the GT 240M, and I run NWN 1 and 2 all the time without issue. I just got 50fps in the latter with a horde of undead surrounding me.

 

Make sure you are having A08 BIOS. It did solve a lot of throttling issues and improved performance. Maybe that would help. Also if its a driver relate issue. You might wanna try using the Dell NVIDIA Drivers. And lastly double check on whether stealth mode is on or not.

 

Thanks for the help guys. Wasn't stealth mode, but it seems to have been a driver issue. Everything is running fine now. Thanks for the help.

 

Have you run a ThrottleStop log file yet while gaming?

The M15x + 260M + Core i7 combination can result in chipset clock modulation which will instantly kill your gaming frame rates. This might not be your problem but you definitely need to check for it. Download ThrottleStop, check off the Log File option and go do some gaming. After you notice a slow down, stop playing, stop ThrottleStop and then upload your log file to MediaFire and post a link or PM me a link and I'll have a look. The CMOD% column in the log file should never be anything less than 100%. If it is dropping down then that's likely what is causing your problem.

 

Thanks unclewebb, but I already use your awesome software and I haven't seen the cmod% go under 100% ever since I installed A08. Thanks for the offer though.