Extensa 215-53g How to fix sudden fps drops ? I looked at older treads but nothing worked.

MON808

My laptop is Extensa 215-53g .2 weeks ago i started to have this weird fps drops on games. Used to have a steady fps around 100-150 but now my fps suddenly drops to 30 for a sec then it goes up to 150 again. Makes my game stutter.

I reinstalled windows and drivers. Did the optimization thread on here but didnt do anything. I changed thermal paste like 2 month ago with grizzly bear. Did thermal and hardware tests and nothing is wrong. Only my highest C is around 85 and i usually see 82 highest on cpu. What might be the problem ?

           [Edited the thread to add model name to the title]

StevenGen

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/682675/how-to-fix-sudden-fps-drops-i-looked-at-older-treads-but-nothing-worked

The Acer Extensa EX215-53G is not a full on gaming laptop and was never designed to be one. Acer says the following about the Extensa - This entry-level laptop provides you with all the performance you need, whether you’re at home or work. And with an Intel® Core™ processor1 at the ready, all your apps run at a consistently smooth pace with Powerful Productivity, Color-rich Display, High-speed Storage, Impeccable Security, Plenty of Ports etc etc😁

This laptop with its Intel Core i5-1035G1 cpu and the NVIDIA GeForce MX330 at 2GB DDR5 gpu could have bottlenecks between cpu and gpu with the games that you play and your settings as it overheats, hence and why you get fps drops, you can't run games at any settings as this laptop at max can only handle some games at high settings only but it should be run at medium settings only at 1920x1080 FHD 1080p resolution. Also you need to upgrade this laptop to its max 20GB ram (add a 1x 16GB DDR4-module to its 4GB on-board soldered ram) if you want to play games as really this laptop is not a gaming laptop. Best is to use the Crucial System Scan to find out your models exact ram, so do that.

Also make sure that you have all the software and drivers up to date like windows update, Intel drivers (install the Intel® Driver & Support Assistant and scan your laptop to update your Intel drivers) and get the latest NVidia driver and also install the GeForce Experience software and run the games within this software to utilise NVidia’s ultimate settings for your gaming and also set Nvidia Control Panel at Program Settings for these games to the High=performance Nvidia processor, as ll these settings and driver updates will most certainly make sure that your fps will be at their peak for this laptop, so that it perform to its best within Win-10.

StevenGen

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/682675/how-to-fix-sudden-fps-drops-i-looked-at-older-treads-but-nothing-worked

The Acer Extensa EX215-53G is not a full on gaming laptop and was never designed to be one. Acer says the following about the Extensa - This entry-level laptop provides you with all the performance you need, whether you’re at home or work. And with an Intel® Core™ processor1 at the ready, all your apps run at a consistently smooth pace with Powerful Productivity, Color-rich Display, High-speed Storage, Impeccable Security, Plenty of Ports etc etc😁

This laptop with its Intel Core i5-1035G1 cpu and the NVIDIA GeForce MX330 at 2GB DDR5 gpu could have bottlenecks between cpu and gpu with the games that you play and your settings as it overheats, hence and why you get fps drops, you can't run games at any settings as this laptop at max can only handle some games at high settings only but it should be run at medium settings only at 1920x1080 FHD 1080p resolution. Also you need to upgrade this laptop to its max 20GB ram (add a 1x 16GB DDR4-module to its 4GB on-board soldered ram) if you want to play games as really this laptop is not a gaming laptop. Best is to use the Crucial System Scan to find out your models exact ram, so do that.

Also make sure that you have all the software and drivers up to date like windows update, Intel drivers (install the Intel® Driver & Support Assistant and scan your laptop to update your Intel drivers) and get the latest NVidia driver and also install the GeForce Experience software and run the games within this software to utilise NVidia’s ultimate settings for your gaming and also set Nvidia Control Panel at Program Settings for these games to the High=performance Nvidia processor, as ll these settings and driver updates will most certainly make sure that your fps will be at their peak for this laptop, so that it perform to its best within Win-10.

MON808

Thx soo much for fast reply. I dont use my laptop mainly for gaming but when i do try not to force the hardware of it. I didnt had any problem on low settings before and this sudden drops made me think maybe there is an issue on my system. Welp i will upgrade the ram and will see what happens.

MON808

So on stock i have 8gb ram but 4gb of it can be changed with 8 or 16 gb ram ? Or out of 8gb system can use 4gb of it so i can add 8-16gb on it also? Can i use different brand of ram then my stock one ? sorry dont know much about hardware

StevenGen

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/comment/1191481#Comment_1191481

You can add 1x 16GB DDR4, do a Crucial System Scan to see what the exact ram specs for your laptop is and buy the fastest 16GB DDR4 (like DDR4-3200MHz or similar if its compatible) that Crucial recommends.

billsey

Don't buy memory that's faster than what you have onboard, you will be spending extra for downclocking to match the onboard. Crucial will point you toward their highest priced memory first, so be aware of that and choose widely.

MON808

Hi again mr billsey ^^ Thx again for replying on my post. So from what i understand i can remove the 4gb and upgrade with 8-16gb. I am thinking about 8 or 16gb 2666mhz ddr4. That would be the correct option right ? bec other ram on my board is 2666mhz.

Can my problem might be an throttling issue tho ? i use a fan pad and clean my laptop regularly. i dont expect too much of an performance from my laptop at the end gpu is mx330 but the sudden fps drop to 30 is then going all the way up to 200 is crazy. What other things might be the issue and what can i do ?

thx again for the replies. i really appreciate it.

billsey

Yes, 2666 is the correct option, as long as it's not XMP memory (and XMP is usually marketed as faster than 2666). It doesn't look like throttling to me, but it would be helpful to know the frequency of the drops. Every minute on the minute? Every 30 seconds, once in five minutes, but not consistent? Your graph doesn't show the X axis… If it's consistantly on a schedule then it's likely something running in the background causing the issue, if it's more random it might be throttling, since that's usually based on temperature, which itself is based on load.

MON808

Thx for the reply. The drops happen super randomly. I usually look at if anything started working on background when it happens and sometimes its the antimalware service but it doesnt use much cpu. The tempretures are not extreme when the fps drops happen also. Would changing the thermal paste again fix the throttling ? Maybe i didnt apply correctly

billsey

That should be fairly easy to tell. Run an app in the background like CoreTemp and see what temperatures you are getting. Throttling the CPU won't happen until you get close to the 100C shutdown point. If you are in the 80s when under a full load it's not being throttled.

MON808

I get max81 and min71 if i am gaming. cpu on %45 percent and memory %80 percent.

billsey

OK, with those temperature numbers you aren't doing any hardware throttling. 80% memory might be swapping to disk on occasion though. What type and size of drive do you have? IIRC various models came with either a SSD (256GB-1TB) or HDD (1TB-2TB). If you have just a HDD in yours then that, along with the occasional swaps to disk, will certainly cause those symptoms.

MON808

Its an 512gb ssd. How can i fix it ?

billsey

OK, so a SSD shouldn't be as bad as a HDD for the issue. How much memory is installed in your laptop? 4GB or 8GB is what most of the models had, IIRC.

MON808

8gb but i just bought 8gb 2666mhz. so its gonna be 12gb.

billsey

OK, let us know how well that works.

MON808

Well i just upgraded and the problem still exist. I check the task manager and memory at %48 percent but the moment cpu numbers are soo weird. I will install windows from usb again and clean the drives.

MON808

I applied a new thermal paste like 4 months ago. Can it be that it dried up or applied wrong bec i used thermal grizzly and they say its not good for laptops. It seems like an temp issue to me. Should i change the max temp limit ? Using the coretemp i see 81C sometimes.

billsey

With a CPU temperature maxing out in the low 80s, you aren't having temperature throttling related issues.

MON808

Is there any test i can do to determine whats wrong ?

billsey

You can only monitor what tasks are running and compare them to what is happening. Likely you have a background task that is taking up resources needed by the games at inopportune times.