670m Downclocking Itself

[king10]

Hi guys,

My 670m has downclocked itself for no apparent reason, this morning it had a core clock of 598mhz. Now however it has downclocked itself to 594mhz the same settings i was using for games before are now dropping below 30fps (which wasn't the case before)

I've run some checks on msi afterburner and gpu-z and they both say the 670m is clocked at 620mhz.

Why is my card running way below stock speed?

 

[king10]

I am running high performance power mode, and the charger is plugged in.

 

[dangro474]

Hi King,

Can you confirm that these clocks are being displayed in the same application?

Typically your GPU will underclock itself as soon as its full potential is not required, however small underclocks such as that (30 mhz) is a little percular.

Please try running Furkarm for a few minutes, which will stress your GPU to its limits: http://www.geeks3d.com/20111216/furmark-1-9-2-released-gpu-stress-test-utility-opengl-benchmark/ (USE THE GREEN DOWNLOAD BUTTON WI TH A BLACK ARROW POINTING INTO IT HALF WAY DOWN THE PAGE, the other 5-6 download buttons are viral / ads :/)

PCS and most other custom system builders use this application to ensure the stability of graphics cards during the systems testing phase.

You do not need to run GPU-Z at the same time as Furmark as Furmark will keep track of your GPU clocks and temperature, however I recommend doing so for clarity.

Asmentioned above this will use 100% of your GPU processing power and available memory. As a result your card will get extremely hot, however as long as your machine does not have any pre-existing faults, you have not blocked your cooling vents and your room temperature des not exceed 25 degrees it should not cause damage to your laptop. If it does, your laptop was faulty to begin with.

I am however uncertain as to how it would effect your warranty so purely for the purpose of checking your cards maximum clock speeds try not to run it for longer than a minute.

Please let us know how high your clocks go during the minute of running furmark.

 

[dangro474]

As for why this happens I honestly dont know, however as i mentioned above your GPU clocks will vary slightly depending on the game you are playing, but if you are noticing a sudden and substantial framerate drop in games this may indicate an issue.

Please remember however that depending on the game your framerate will vary massively depending on the games coding and what is being displayed, especially if VSYNC is enabled.

Also if you are playing DX10 or DX11 games, your FPS may suddenly drop from 60 down to 30. This is because in many of these games Nvidia drivers will lock your framerate while using vsync to the closest whole number fraction of your screens refresh rate that is available. This means the following framerates will be experienced with vsync:

60 or higher = 60 FPS ingame
31 - 59 FPS = 30 FPS ingame
20 - 29 FPS = 20 FPS ingame
19 or below = the exact figure

This can vary from game to game. The above framerates are those I have experienced in one of the games i played a year or so ago, i cant remember which one now but it prompted me to researcht he subject as I was convinced there was something wrong with my 580 GTX. In other games such as metro 2033 using DX9 API, your framerate with vsync enabled will be equal to your real frame rate.

Although the reason for this occuring is to give you the smoothest experience possible, transitions of 60 to 30 FPS come with a HUGE and very noticeable stutter in most games. With my 580 GTX I was constantly on the verge of 60 FPS in metro 2033, and my ingame framerate would jump from 60 to 30 every few seconds. It drove me nuts.

The best way to test this would be to disable vsync and play the same areas to watch the real impact on your framerate. It could be that your framerate is dropping from say 65 to 55, but as 55<60 your game will drop your framerate to 30.

Please let us know how you get on.

 

[king10]

Hey Dangro,

Yep the clocks are staying at 594mhz with the exact same settings and game. My gpu does underclock itself when its not needed but doesn't reach its full clock when i play demanding games.


im reluctant to use furmark i had a bad experiance with it a few months ago :/ any other suggestions?

For skyrim i was having a minimum of 34 fps at any location it has now droped to 25fps minimum with nothing changed (the difference between playable and unplayable)

thanks m8

 

[dangro474]

Hi King,

Please see my post above regarding ingame FPS with Vsync as i think that will answer your question as to why your performance may suddenly drop massively in certain games.

Notebookcheck states that your GPU core should indeed operate at 598 mhz, but it is possible that (as the 670M cards ar emanufactured by different companies) yours may peak at 594.8. I would recommend running furmark briefly; as I mentioned it would only cause damage to your system if it was faulty to begin with, however if you are not comfortable ind oing so thats fair enough.

http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-670M.72197.0.html

Can you confirm that your card previously ran at 598 mhz core, or doe sit peak for you at 594.8?

 

[king10]

sorry didn't specify i always run with vsync off on all games.

my 670m was running at 598 mhz this morning so its definately capable of doing its maximum stock speed.

 

[dangro474]

Ok,

Still without running an application like furmark to push it to its limits we cannot be certain if youve experienced a permanent downclock

Again framerate drops in games are a given and can be substantial from time to time depending on the games coding.

How substantial are your FPS drops and which games do you experience them in? I can try to recreate them to confirm if they are more to do with the games than a potential issue with your GPU.

These drops can also be due to background programs, depending on the program itself. For example if I run a live stream from ustream, own3dtv or twitch tv in the background while I game, i will suddenly suffer a huge FPS drop which remains until i alt tab out and back into the game. This is of course not present if i am not running a stream.

 

[king10]

Your right, my previous experiance was down to a faulty gpu. I've run a 30 second test its still saying 594mhz but with a message next to it saying 3mhz throttled (which is the difference im missing) :/

-my temps are low all round and i have done no overclocking

 

[dangro474]

your GPU is throttling itself it seems, and by a very small amount. Unless this is causing massive FPS drops i wouldnt worry about it mate

 

[king10]

What causes it to throttle ? i wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary. Is there anything i can do to fix this ? :/

 

[dangro474]

What causes it to throttle ? i wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary. Is there anything i can do to fix this ? :/

Hi King,

It could well be a driver issue, as only one driver release is available for the 670M GTX as of yet.

Does it make a huge difference in our framerates?

If you can give me a list of average framerates you experience in games as well as your settings I can confirm whether or not the card is performing as well as it should be.

 

[king10]

Hi m8,

Unfortunately it does make a noticible difference , i lose between 5-10 fps meaning my fps will drop to below 30 typically (20-25 fps)

Skyrim for example very high settings at 8x AA and 8x Anisotropic Filter = 21-27 fps

(before i had a minimum of 32 fps in any area up to around 45 fps with the exact same settings)

 

[Finn]

The clockrate change is less than 1% but the framerate difference your seeing is greater than 20%. It sounds more like the downclock is symptomatic of something else and its that which is causing the slowdown. I have no idea unless the heatsink has become detached and its throtting for heat? What are the GPU temperatures and are they unusually high?

 

[king10]

Gpu temp ranges from 45 degrees - 60 degrees really not that hot for a gpu.

The gpu core clock does jump up and down but its max is 594mhz permanently