Alienware 15 R3 runs lightweight applications slow on battery

Kimimaru

Estimable
Nov 23, 2015
3
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4,510
Hello everyone, here are my specs:

Model: Alienware 15 R3
OS: Windows 10 Home 64-bit
RAM: 16 GB
CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-7700HQ CPU @ 2.80GHz 2.80 GHz
GFX:
-Integrated: Intel HD Graphics 630
-GPU: Nvidia GTX 1070
VRAM: 16 GB

All my drivers are up to date and this laptop is brand new. It runs modern games beautifully and I have no complaints in that regard. I'm not expecting this to run intensive games at 60 FPS on battery, but the problem is it runs things that aren't very intensive, like older console emulators and very lightweight games and applications at lower speeds (30 FPS for some), but consistently. I have my power settings configured to have the minimum processor state while on battery be 100%.

The Nvidia control panel does not give me an option to choose between integrated graphics or the GTX card for some reason. Despite that, I tried changing the settings to be what I'd set on my old Lenovo laptop with an AMD card. Namely, I'd set anything CPU-reliant (such as older console emulators) to be optimized for power to tell the computer to use the integrated graphics for that application, but I'm not sure if it's working.

Has anyone else had this problem or can give any advice?
 
Solution
To test the CPU performance when on battery and plugged in you should run a CPU benchmark like Super PI. I assume if the CPU is set to 100% on battery, then the test should yield similar results as when plugged in. Set Super PI to calculate pi to the 32 millionth decimal place for the longest test.

https://www.techpowerup.com/download/super-pi/


I believe the Alienware 15 R3 has a G-Sync screen, if so then that is the reason why you cannot switch to the Intel HD 530 graphics core. There is a limitation with that type of screen where it MUST always be driven by the nVidia GPU.
To test the CPU performance when on battery and plugged in you should run a CPU benchmark like Super PI. I assume if the CPU is set to 100% on battery, then the test should yield similar results as when plugged in. Set Super PI to calculate pi to the 32 millionth decimal place for the longest test.

https://www.techpowerup.com/download/super-pi/


I believe the Alienware 15 R3 has a G-Sync screen, if so then that is the reason why you cannot switch to the Intel HD 530 graphics core. There is a limitation with that type of screen where it MUST always be driven by the nVidia GPU.
 
Solution