Aspire 5 Low framerates and framedrops, laptop overheating, and no fix.. so far. Any tips?

mahmoud152

Hello!
I got this Aspire 5 laptop just over a year ago. CPU is an Intel i5-1035G1, GPU mx350, and has 8gb ram (and 512ssd). With all these specs I thought at the day of purchase the laptop would handle low-grade games that wouldn't require high end specs (growtopia, minecraft, etc.) since I didn't want a high-end laptop/pc and wanted one for school and future college. With these specs I still somehow have very low framerate compared to other weaker laptops and systems. I mentioned these two games specifically because they don't require much to run at all. In growtopia, my laptop gets an average of 45 fps with framedrops down to 12fps. Never gets 60 frames. Exact same results happen with minecraft. It reached a point that the laptop couldn't handle running chrome then I sent it back around 4 months ago since I couldn't send it any earlier because of school. After that the issue was solved temporarily and I was able to play far cry 3 on medium-low settings. Now fast forward to today the same problem is happening again and is gradually getting worse. I am now convinced that the laptop is defective but the problem is that my warranty has finished. Is there any way to replace it? If there isn't, does anyone have any thoughts on this? Laptop costed a fortune and I don't want it going to waste. Thanks for your time.

AnhEZ28

@mahmoud152 you can try updating BIOS, GPU drivers to the latest version from manufacture website like(Intel and Nvidia, not from Acer driver), always plug the laptop in while playing games, close any background apps, or use an app to check temperature while playing game like MSI Afterburner to see if the laptop is too hot and throttle itself.

mahmoud152

@AnhEZ28 Sounds like a plan. If it does not bother you, may you please send me instructions on how to do that? I don't have any experience with updating my drivers. For temperature I always try to ensure that my laptop cools off properly but nevertheless it isn't enough. At times I put the front side of my laptop on top of a small box in order to create a much bigger airway. My frames and laptop performance get better as a result but never reaches it's full extent. For example if I normally have 40-45 frames on low performance games, with that method I would get 45-50 frames. Still never 60. I did do temperature checks and sadly average temperatures (according to Core Temp) while running low performance games starts at 69C and peaks through 94C occasionally. 

mahmoud152

Update:

after digging in more, I realized that the cooling is probably not the problem. CPU temp rises suddenly (most commonly while running games, occasionally while using chrome) and drops suddenly too. Fan speed does not change when that happens

AnhEZ28

mahmoud152 said:

@AnhEZ28 Sounds like a plan. If it does not bother you, may you please send me instructions on how to do that? I don't have any experience with updating my drivers. For temperature I always try to ensure that my laptop cools off properly but nevertheless it isn't enough. At times I put the front side of my laptop on top of a small box in order to create a much bigger airway. My frames and laptop performance get better as a result but never reaches it's full extent. For example if I normally have 40-45 frames on low performance games, with that method I would get 45-50 frames. Still never 60. I did do temperature checks and sadly average temperatures (according to Core Temp) while running low performance games starts at 69C and peaks through 94C occasionally. 

@mahmoud152 updating Nvidia GPU is pretty easy with Geforce Experience. You can just use that app and log in. It will let you know if a new driver is available and you choose to install.