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    Slow performance on Battery XPS M1730

    Discussion in 'Dell XPS and Studio XPS' started by J Temper, Jan 2, 2009.

  1. J Temper

    J Temper Newbie

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    Does anyone have experience with very slow performance on battery power with the Dell XPS M1730?

    The problem I am having is the following:

    AC plugged in - everything works fine.
    AC unplugged (on battery power) - the system is very slow. Watching basic video or a DVD is painfully slow, and video is choppy with skipped frames.

    I have been working with Dell, and have updated all video drivers, Bios, tried different power settings (including high performance), and it has made no difference.

    I see all these reviews about how FAST the M1730 is ... but is this only when it is plugged in?

    Dell claims that I should expect slower performance on battery power, but come on ... I can't even watch a simple DVD or low resolution mpeg4 movie on battery? I'm not exactly rendering high def video or playing games...

    Does anyone with an M1730 have this problem, or is it just my system?

    I thought running on battery just meant a shorter time to use the computer, not altered system performance.

    Any ideas?
     
    J Temper, Jan 2, 2009
    #1
  2. goodspeed(TPF)

    goodspeed(TPF) Notebook Deity

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    This is very common as the CPU and the GPU are throttled back when on battery power. Should still play a DvD fine though. Throw up a list of ALL the processes running on your PC and maybe we can help you figure it out. :)
     
    goodspeed(TPF), Jan 2, 2009
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  3. shadowlaw

    shadowlaw Notebook Consultant

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    You should have realised that the word 'battery' doesnt exist in the world of m1730 when you buy it.

    Anyway, these are the stuff you can try:
    1. You can try disabling nvidia powermizer in battery mode (prevents the GPU to go into slow mode)
    2. Use high performance profile in vista.
    3. Set the lowest and highest CPU % in the vista power profile setting to 100% (ie, doesnt allow the cpu to work in less then 100%)
    4. Use the official nvidia driver or laptopvideo2go driver, instead of dell driver.
     
    shadowlaw, Jan 2, 2009
    #3