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HowTo Partial fix for gaming Battery drain

Seneleron

Active Member
So by now most everyone is aware that setting the SB 2 to "Max Performance" can cause battery drain under certain loads, with a particular focus on gaming. Today I had a thought, and after implementing it I'd like to share it.

So the whole thought revolved around lower power options "tuning down" the GPU as well as limiting the CPU. It occurred to me that the way they were most likely limiting Link State Power Management in the advanced power management settings (which of course aren't accessible by default on the SB2)

[some of you long timers probably already know where this is going]

So way back when I remember there being registry edits to Max Processor state and several other advanced power options in my SP4 days. I thought to myself "self. .I wonder if there's one for Link State Power Management"

And so there is! I added the registry key, restarted the machine, left the slider at medium settings. . . and voila!

Previously I was running D3 at 2k 16:10 aspect ratio with Vsync, and was still getting drops into the mid 40 FPS range in regular T4 rifts [Hardcore Seasonal, and I'm having bad luck with drops, don't judge me] AFTER turning off link state power management, I not only no longer get dips, but my FPS is a constant 60 with Vsync on, and consistent 80+ with Vsync off! After 45 minutes or so, still 100% battery

I know D3 isn't a particularly tasking AAA title, but I HAVE in the past had battery drain with it [as well as HoTS, suspect because they're using 1 core and turbo throttling up] so I thought I'd post this, drop the page with the links to the registry edit, and see if anyone else has decent results.

And so, without further ado:

Solved Options Missing from Power Options Advanced Settings

Hope y'all have as much luck as I have so far with it, I'll continue to test, but let me know how it works out for ya!
 

mario64

New Member
This change made no difference on my SB2 15". Still get random massive fps drops unless using Max Performance
 

wynand32

Well-Known Member
I'm still hoping Microsoft breaks down and at least offers a larger power supply. There's some headroom in the Surface Connect port -- if they maxed it out at 120 watts, that would give 25 watts of additional power before the battery started to drain. For many use cases, that might be sufficient.

Don't mean to derail the thread, just wanted to vent a little. The SB2 is such an excellent machine, and I'm bummed that I can encode a video at full speed in Premier Pro without it hitting the battery.
 
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