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Performance on a Mobile nvidia GPU
dilly Jul 4, 2016
Hi!

I recently bought a Dell Inspirion 15 7000 Gaming Series (7559), basically this one (with minor differences, mine has 4gb of video and a hybrid hdd):
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2497197,00.asp?tab=Specs

But in here in Brazil Dell offers it with a custom Ubuntu 14.04.1 (with a custom kernel, because of the skylake processors).

This laptop comes with:
Processor Name: Intel Core i5-6300HQ 2.3 GHz (base)
8 GB LDDR3
Nvidia GeForce GTX 960M 4gb DDR5 (running on 364.19 drivers)
1 TB HD (8gb ssd cache)
Resolution: 1920 x 1080

Everything works well with Ubuntu, but I'm having weird performance with games:
Some games run super well, Distance for example runs at 60 fps with everything on max. Divinity, Xcom 1, Dirt Showdown runs well too.
But other games run poorly, like Xcom2 (av. 17 - 25 on min and some effects), Borderlands 2 (av. 15 - 25 on min-med) and Shadow of Mordor (av. 20 - 32 on min-med) runs poorly.

Xcom2 I kinda expected, for reasons already know, but Borderlands2???!

And the funny thing is this:
Borderlands 2 starter without lighting and shadows (I had to edit a config file to activate it) and changing the resolution and lowering the configurations doesn't help much.
Before editing the config file I had 35 - 40 fps with "everything on max".

Soo... anyone with the same experience using nvidia mobile GPUs??
I have tried all the "common" things, like playing with different configs and putting "__GL_THREADED_OPTIMIZATIONS=1 %command%".

Any help or tip would be great!

Thanks!
Liam Dawe Jul 4, 2016
You are sure the games are running on the Nvidia GPU and not the Intel one right?

Are you using PRIME or Bumblebee for the graphics switching?
Xpander Jul 4, 2016
are you sure you are using your nvidia GPU?

that GTX 960M should be roughly about the same level in performance as desktop GTX950

are you using bumblebee or similar?
can u disable your intel gpu from the BIOS/UEFI setup?
dilly Jul 4, 2016
Sorry, forgot to add that I'm using PRIME and running everything on the Nvidia side (I have tough that would be the case as well)
Even Ubuntu, Blender and Steam Itself says I'm using a nvidia card.

I have checked the Bios and I dont have this option, Xpander.

Any other thing? :/
Xpander Jul 4, 2016
2,3 ghz is kind of slow indeed, but it still shouldn't be that bad i think

check whats your CPU load is when you game and whats your GPU load is.

theres a nice tool called psensors which can draw graphs how your loads, temps etc were while you were playing.
dilly Jul 5, 2016
Thanks!

Thats just the base speed of the processor. It can reach 3.2 under load. But I will try to monitor it.

Could it be a kernel thing? Like, I know for a fact that the processor (the mobile ones) has problems on Linux, related to power management. I'm imagining that Dell took some precautions and the processor could be limited because of it.

I need the new ubuntu to come out to test this! :]
Liam Dawe Jul 5, 2016
The new Ubuntu version is already out, has been since April.

The ports you described not working so well are well known to be on the heavier side.

Yes, Borderlands 2 on Linux doesn't run all that well.
dilly Jul 5, 2016
Quoting: liamdaweThe new Ubuntu version is already out, has been since April.

The ports you described not working so well are well known to be on the heavier side.

Yes, Borderlands 2 on Linux doesn't run all that well.

I know Ubuntu 16.04 had come out. :]
But unfortunately it does not run well out of the box on this laptop, doe to some bugs with Skylake mobile processors (related to energy management). So I'm waiting to test it on 16.10 or 16.04.1, kernel 4.7 has better support.

I didn't know borderlands was so heavy on Linux, I have run it on a GTX 550 Ti, which is less powerful than the GTX 960m.
It may well be related to the processor, but again, this laptop is know to run Witcher 3 o mid settings at full 1080p. :/
Borderlands 2 cant be "that heavy". :]

I was interested in other users experience with mobile GPUs from nvidia, even other cards. :]
dilly Jul 5, 2016
Quoting: GuestIf game A runs well on Windows, it doesn’t mean that game B runs well on Linux.

Yes, you are right. I'm sorry if I implied that.

I was just trying to say that the processor in this laptop is very good and that it could be a software problem with the custom Ubuntu Dell puts on this machine.

For example: I have a tried to measure what clock speed is currently running here... but all the numbers I get is "1.00", "00" or "0,76 mhz". That could be only a errors in measure, but it could also be that my current ubuntu is running at lower clocks to prevent the problems Skylake have on some past kernels.

Again, thanks for any help.
Xpander Jul 5, 2016
mzh? if its 1.00 ghz then theres your issue why those games run like crap.
you can probably try some distro with up to date kernel.. manjaro or antergos. 4.7 can be installed from AUR. 4.7 isnt finalized yet though.
dilly Jul 5, 2016
Quoting: Xpandermzh? if its 1.00 ghz then theres your issue why those games run like crap.
you can probably try some distro with up to date kernel.. manjaro or antergos. 4.7 can be installed from AUR. 4.7 isnt finalized yet though.

"Ghz" Misspelled that!
The ONLY doubt is, on the opposite side, other games are running well: like Dirt, GRID Autosport and Metro Redux are running on Medium to Hi at full 1080p (at "good" frame rates, 35 - 55 av.). :/

Since I can work on the laptop as it is, I can wait for a distro that uses the 4.7 (finalized) kernel.

I still find Borderlands 2 performance weird. I will try to poke the Aspyr devs to see if they can help me search the problem.
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