Horrible performance on battery?

Just wondering, why when I run 3dmark, on the battery as opposed to off the power, does the m1730 run like a pile of crap?

The opening scene of Return To Proxycon usually hits 85-90 fps and about a 70 minimum, then goes down to 30 when it goes across the room to the troopres with guns.

But when I run it on battery, it wont go over 30 fps for the opening scene and foes into single figures when it goes across the room? Is this normal ? Surely not, as it makes a 'gaming laptop' non existant basically. If I plug the power cord in the fps shoots up instantly. All power settings are maxxed, as far as I can see? Unless thre is a GPU one I haven't noticed?

Ive just noticed because I got a Dell battery for my 1730 today (didnt come with one - refurb). It's a T9300 / 8800M GTX SLi model.

Anyone got an idea?

Thanks,
Monstrous

 

When you are running on Battery power, your CPU goes into power saver mode (battery). Why would you want to run 3DMark06 or any other 3D intensive app on battery power? All you are going to do is drain your battery even faster and in the long run decrease battery life.

Also, FWIW, 3DMark06 is just as CPU intensive as it is GPU - meaning it depends on the CPU quite a bit.

Not that your drivers will account for the behavior you described, but I'm curious - what driver version shipped with your laptop?

 

Well im guessing that gaming performance will be HIGHLY affected by running on battery too? Hence my trying 3dmark.

Drivers are the latest from the nVidia website.

 

I just tried Age of Conan. Same situation, 8-10 fps on battery, 40 - 50 on power supply.

That's on 1920x1200, High.

Surely this is not normal?

 

Its a feature, low level auto GPU downclock on battery power.

Your battery probably cannot supply enough power to run a pair of 8800m GTX @ full power

 

It's an official dell battery.

If this is an un changeable feature, I am extremely pissed and highly regret buying this laptop.

 

Can't you force it to preformance mode?

 

I havent seen the option to do this?

I just downloaded GPUz:

GPU/Memory is 500MHz/800MHz on power supply.

GPU/Memory is 200MHz/100MHz on battery.

How can I force them to stay high?

 

You could try with nTune. http://www.nvidia.com/object/ntune_5.05.54.00.html

 

Well, if you really want to do it, just disable PowerMizer via the INF file. You'll need to reinstall your video driver once the INF is modded. Once reinstalled, your GPU clocks will be locked at the factory default of 500/799. The performance will still not be the exact same you see on AC Power (Intel SpeedStep will kick in and decrease your CPU clocks) - but it will be a little better. Your battery time will be decreased as well.

 

How do I do this exactly?

Sorry, i've never realy done anything this in depth before, and its my first gaming notebook!

 

Take a look at this thread... use at your own risk (I have not tested this app. I found it by performing a search).

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=368384

 

It didn't work. I'll try it using another thread, just doing it manually.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=261929

Tried that method and it still wont go off!

 

You may be able to disable CPU power-save mode in the BIOS. I don't have a 1730 on hand to check this with, but I have seen this in several laptops using the Intel mobile processors. This would be in addition to any Windows settings you have to change.

 

It's the GPU's that are the problem not the CPU. Made a thread about disabling powermizer in this dell section by accident!

 

The battery probably doesnt provide enough power, what is the difference between the batterys rated output and the adapters? If there is a significant difference underclockthe CPU to free up some power.

 

The GPUs will be downclocking when on battery to save power. To prevent this you can disable Nvidia PowerMizer to prevent this.

 

Yeah, but it wont disable no matter what drivers or method of doing it, are used.