Helios 500 CPU temperature

lilenday

hi there, Ive recently bought this laptop based on its good cooling. However, I feel like it’s not up to par compared to other people I’ve seen on this forum and on some reviews. I already undervolted my cpu to -140mv. I don’t know how this CPU runs at stock voltage. As soon as I saw the idle temp being high (55-60C) I already undervolted. Here are my CPU temps with the fan set at 3600rpm.

Idle: 48-55 (running at 3.9ghz)

Gaming: 

CS 1.6 55-62C (running at 3.9ghz)

PUBG 70-81C (running at 3.9ghz)

Benchmarking:

Furmark + Intel XTU CPU:71C (running at 3.3-3.5ghz), GPU: 65C (1750-1900mhz) with max fan on and cooler boost on.

im happy with benchmark numbers, not so much with PUBG. Can anyone post their numbers here? I’m so paranoid with this that I always leave Rivatuner on to monitor the temps.

Any input is greatly appreciated.

thank you
Duc

Skree

In truth, i would consider your numbers more than acceptable. You are well within the limits, and you must not compare the temperatures of a laptop to those of a desktop pc: they will never be the same or comparable.

If you take the time to have a look at other posts about temperatures in this forum, you will see that people complain about temps reaching 90° and above and you will find yourself surprised as to how in truth that is quite normal.

If i find it again i will post you a graph of other gaming pcs temperatures, you will find that yours are lower than most, if not the lowest.

Skree

Here you are:

Red-Sand

lilenday said:

@Red-Sand

Ive been undervolting and right now I’m at -160mv and got 1222CB score. During AIDA64 stress testing the temp never went over 61C and CPU frequency was at 3.4ghz the whole time. My question is if I keep undervolting more and more, would there be enough power to get it to my 3.9ghz boost frequency. I still get 3.9 with games like cs1.6 (really low load on the cpu). I haven’t tried any good optimized games like BF or Overwatch since I don’t have it. Do I still keep on trying to go lower?

Whoa!!
-0.160 is crazy low!
Becareful that you dont have your undervolting software auto start at bootup while testing so it doesnt cause a bootloop.

To be honest thats the best undervolt Ive seen so far and the highest CB score on the i7 8th Ive seen.
I would give the advice "quit while your ahead"! Lol

If your content with temps and performance why push your luck??
Excellent job btw!!

M4rdock

Interesting, in my country There is no option to but Helios without windows 10 lol

Skree

In truth, i would consider your numbers more than acceptable. You are well within the limits, and you must not compare the temperatures of a laptop to those of a desktop pc: they will never be the same or comparable.

If you take the time to have a look at other posts about temperatures in this forum, you will see that people complain about temps reaching 90° and above and you will find yourself surprised as to how in truth that is quite normal.

If i find it again i will post you a graph of other gaming pcs temperatures, you will find that yours are lower than most, if not the lowest.

Skree

Here you are:

Red-Sand

Hey brother I just got a Helios 500 and have a few suggestions.

First of all I stayed on Windows 1709 instead of 1803 and had a solid 5-7 C drop in idle temps (putting me sub 40 C for fans off).
When on 1709 I disabled all the windows features in settings > privacy, including all the background applications etc.

Then I had noticed a memory leak for pred sense where my ram would slowly be filled up over time, I fixed this by clicking start and typing "services" and hitting enter then scrolling down to Killer Network service that was auto restarting on a failed attempt to start which would produce indefinite number of killer network services running (which eventually filled my ram usage and highered my cpu usage). Right click the service > properties and navigate to the tab on properties menu where it has like 3 drop down boxes and make each take no action on a failed service startup. It didnt effect anything as far as I can tell just fixed the memory issue until Acer can patch it.

I made a video on windows optimizing (basic but still good) for the Helios 300 but applied the same for the 500 and also had great results in lower cpu idle %.

Let me know the results

https://youtu.be/XTPMwQKlfPE

Red-Sand

Now I CANT surpass 68 C no matter what I do.

I also found undervolting with throttlestop (instead of xtu) and using speed shift epp at 128 helped improve performance of CPU and lower temps.

M4rdock

Yo, from my experience undervolting in helios 500 dont really reduce temp, it only increases peformance.

My temps are lower (73 on heavy load, occasional spikes to 78, idle 40) but your temps are still low for this kind of cpu.
Differences like that can come from luck on silicone lottery or how good thermal paste is applied.

Until your temps reach 90c you dont even need to care about it - neither they will damage your cpu or reduce performance.

80c under heavy load (pubg is garbage from optimisation perspective) are really good for laptop.
You wont find cooler one.

Also cpu temps can be higer if you are in hot enviroment.

Red-Sand

30 minutes of Prime95

lilenday

Thank you @Skree @M4rdock all for the fast answers. @Red-Sand I believe you are the one who wrote a review on Amazon about this. Your review is the reason why I got this instead of Asus g703 lol. Ill watch your video right now and see if I can lower the temperature even lower. 

Red-Sand

@lilenday
Good stuff bro, I had very similar temps when running stock but undervolting and a few tweaks and this monster is unreal.

Feel free to ask more questions here or PM me to get the same results I am. 👍

I plan on making videos for the 500 as well on my youtube channel.

lilenday

@Red-Sand
I watched through your whole video and yes the cpu usage is around 1-2% now. thank you
Your Cpu temp is amazing. Can you share your fan profile please!

Red-Sand

lilenday said:

@Red-Sand
I watched through your whole video and yes the cpu usage is around 1-2% now. thank you
Your Cpu temp is amazing. Can you share your fan profile please!

Muahaha its auto fans 😁

Whats running in the background to give you 1-2%? 
I idle at 0-1%

lilenday

Red-Sand said:

lilenday said:

@Red-Sand
I watched through your whole video and yes the cpu usage is around 1-2% now. thank you
Your Cpu temp is amazing. Can you share your fan profile please!

Muahaha its auto fans 😁

Whats running in the background to give you 1-2%? 
I idle at 0-1%

Jesus christ... Howwww? 

Mostly system interrupts, windows explorer...

I just found out that my undervolting is not saving on Intel xtu. Everytime I turn it on it goes back to the stock voltage. Can you help me with that? Now Im idling at 34C

Skree

XTU does that. If you want to have undervolting applied automatically you need to use throttlestop and make it so that it starts on boot. 

In the topped post you will find instructions to do so...

There are also some steps to do when you uninstall XTU and use Throttlestop, but on that topic Red-Sand is more knowledgable than me.

All in all, Throttlestop is the better solution, not only for undervolting, but also because it allows for speedstep. (you will find that too in red-saand videos).

Red-Sand

Please be careful though!!
If you plan to use Throttlestop you should remove XTU after defaulting its undervolt so the two programs dont conflict which can cause your system to think its default values are the undervolt you set.

XTU is terrible lately and this is just one reason why I wont use it.

-0.140 is a decent undervolt..
Here, follow this video but instead of the -0.125 shown in the video, set both cpu core & cache to -0.140 and let me know results.

I apologize for the notepad tut it was my first video ever lol

https://youtu.be/F1rs92CiYxU

lilenday

Red-Sand said:

Please be careful though!!
If you plan to use Throttlestop you should remove XTU after defaulting its undervolt so the two programs dont conflict which can cause your system to think its default values are the undervolt you set.

XTU is terrible lately and this is just one reason why I wont use it.

-0.140 is a decent undervolt..
Here, follow this video but instead of the -0.125 shown in the video, set both cpu core & cache to -0.140 and let me know results.

I apologize for the notepad tut it was my first video ever lol

https://youtu.be/F1rs92CiYxU

Skree said:

XTU does that. If you want to have undervolting applied automatically you need to use throttlestop and make it so that it starts on boot. 

In the topped post you will find instructions to do so...

There are also some steps to do when you uninstall XTU and use Throttlestop, but on that topic Red-Sand is more knowledgable than me.

All in all, Throttlestop is the better solution, not only for undervolting, but also because it allows for speedstep. (you will find that too in red-saand videos).

Idling at 40C now . Doing AIDA64 test right now to check for stability and thermals. Will report in a bit!

Thank you both in advance!

lilenday

So I have some great news... to me lol.

After running AIDA64 for 30mins my max CPU temp was 64C on max fan settings! PUBG hovers around 50C now with 3600rpm fan setting. really happy right now haha! Thank you everyone on this forum. You guys have been very very helpful, especially @Red-Sand and @Skree. 

I have one last question. After undervolting, I noticed my frequency dropped from 3.9 to 3.3 when running benchmarks. Should I be concerned? I dont notice any lag in games though.

Skree

It *could* be power throttling. Try going to -125 or -120, and see if the frequency returns to 3.9. Of course the temps will be a bit higher, but still better than vanilla configuration.

When i undervolted myself, i got to -150 as a test, and i got power throttling, for example. Right now i am at -125.

Red-Sand

So you want to check the initial cpu speeds.

How it works is you have 2 package power levels. One is 45w and one is 56w.

When all cores are pushed in a stress test your laptop will use 56w package power for 28 seconds, then revert to 45w package power.

You *should* be getting normal cpu speeds when your bench is initiated and it should stay that way for the 28 seconds. After that however it will drop to about 3.4-3.5ghz to meet the 45w power level.

Try adjusting Speed Shift EPP to 100 and run your tests again.. keep an eye on the initial values and time it yourself.

Red-Sand

This only has that dip in speed in benches or long processes, as the 28 second timer is only for a single specific task.

If you reach 3.9-4.0ghz on the 56w package power during benches, then you should have 3.9-4.0ghz at all times during gameplay due to changes in process execution.

lilenday

Hi again guys!

For some reason, I could only get 3.9ghz in Cs1.6. I got 3.9ghz while idling before the undervolt. Changing the Speed Shift EPP to 100 did a little to no difference when it came to benchmarking. So I tried Cinebench R15 just to see which had the best results. So here are my scores:

-140mv: 1202
-140mv with shift epp to 100: 1195
-125mv: 1180
-120mv: 1002
-Stock: 985

Should I just keep my current undervolt settings? I mean I cant really notice any fps drops in games at all.

M4rdock

Red-Sand said:

Now I CANT surpass 68 C no matter what I do.

I also found undervolting with throttlestop (instead of xtu) and using speed shift epp at 128 helped improve performance of CPU and lower temps.

Waaaait, i thought its better to set shift epp to 0, instead of default 128, can you elaborate?

lilenday As far as i observed (and read) helios 500 with i7 processor deals with powerthrottling, thats why your processor drops down to 3.4 or something under heavy load, until some professionals find a way to deal with it (probably by modyfying bios settings) we wont be able to do much with it.
From my observations it seems like -140 is sweet spot for performance, go lower and your system will be unstable go higher and your performance will decrease.