why is my onboard intel graphics outperforming amd radeon

[john_wayne]

running the simple 2D & 3D gpu benchmark from passmark on my HP envy15 3040-nr laptop with switchable graphics, the intel graphics is outperforming the amd graphics - WHY?? everything is up to date, I have the card selection in bios set to FIXED, so that card selection is done manually by the switchable graphics menu in the OS. What prompted this testing is: before today, i had the card selection via bios set to DYNAMIC, so the "high performance" amd graphics would be used on-demand by softwares. I noticed that chrome kept the amd graphics engaged, causing the fans to run at a higher RPM at otherwise idle (simply having chrome open). Is it possible the thermal compound needs re-doing on the amd chip?? it gives hot exhaust, not increased fan-spin of cool air. The system has had no stability issues. It seems that now the amd graphics are just better at creating heat and fan noise, with the intel graphics outperforming it. and fwiw, running heaven on this machine, the intel graphics beats amd as well: intel (9), amd (3). I would really value some insight and suggestions.

[Levent]

it might be throttling 

[Herman Mcpootis]

i'm not sure what benchmark you're using, check if the AMD GPU is actually being used and if it's throttling. use some other benchmarks to check as well.

[john_wayne]

what free older benchmarks can you suggest for older/small cards

[john_wayne]

@Herman Mcpootis ran novabench's gpu test and the intel gpu scored 107 (4fps) and the radeon gpu scored 99 (3fps).

ran uniengine's heaven benchmark the intel gpu constantly reached 4-5fps and the gpu temp was 53. the radeon gpu never got above 2fps and the temp was 49 (the radeon idles at 47). i've never heard of a gpu throttling at that low of temps - so i am at a loss. the system is stable, so i'm not sure what to do next. the passmark rating of the radeon over the intel says the radeon should be doing much better than it is.

[xAcid9]

13 hours ago, john_wayne said:

@Herman Mcpootis ran novabench's gpu test and the intel gpu scored 107 (4fps) and the radeon gpu scored 99 (3fps).

ran uniengine's heaven benchmark the intel gpu constantly reached 4-5fps and the gpu temp was 53. the radeon gpu never got above 2fps and the temp was 49 (the radeon idles at 47). i've never heard of a gpu throttling at that low of temps - so i am at a loss. the system is stable, so i'm not sure what to do next. the passmark rating of the radeon over the intel says the radeon should be doing much better than it is.

Open GPU-Z and check the radeon core and memory clock.

[john_wayne]

@xAcid9 the gpu clock is set to 600Mhz (which is the default) and the memory clock is set to 800Mhz (which is the default). i additionally found and ran FurMark, and the intel and the radeon both averaged 3fps, with the radeon temp occasionally bumping 50 Celsius, but spending most of the time at 49 Celcius.

[Tristerin]

On ‎9‎/‎28‎/‎2018 at 7:41 AM, john_wayne said:

running the simple 2D & 3D gpu benchmark from passmark on my HP envy15 3040-nr laptop with switchable graphics, the intel graphics is outperforming the amd graphics - WHY?? everything is up to date, I have the card selection in bios set to FIXED, so that card selection is done manually by the switchable graphics menu in the OS. What prompted this testing is: before today, i had the card selection via bios set to DYNAMIC, so the "high performance" amd graphics would be used on-demand by softwares. I noticed that chrome kept the amd graphics engaged, causing the fans to run at a higher RPM at otherwise idle (simply having chrome open). Is it possible the thermal compound needs re-doing on the amd chip?? it gives hot exhaust, not increased fan-spin of cool air. The system has had no stability issues. It seems that now the amd graphics are just better at creating heat and fan noise, with the intel graphics outperforming it. and fwiw, running heaven on this machine, the intel graphics beats amd as well: intel (9), amd (3). I would really value some insight and suggestions.

 

Can you monitor the GPU usage from the HD 7690m while playing games with something like Afterburner?  The Intel 3000 vs that Mobile GPU is 150% different lol:

 

http://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-HD-3000-Mobile-V2-13-GHz-vs-AMD-Radeon-HD-7670M/m7647vsm7810

[john_wayne]

@Tristerin attached is screenshots of afterburner after running Just Cause 2 ingame benchmark for just over 2 minutes. intel on the left (setting up steam was logged prior to the benchmark run), and radeon on the right. just watching the fps numbers, the intel stayed around 9fps or better, where the radeon stuggled to stay at 6fps. the intel was much further along in the benchmark at the 2 minute mark than the radeon even got to.

[Tristerin]

16 hours ago, john_wayne said:

@Tristerin attached is screenshots of afterburner after running Just Cause 2 ingame benchmark for just over 2 minutes. intel on the left (setting up steam was logged prior to the benchmark run), and radeon on the right. just watching the fps numbers, the intel stayed around 9fps or better, where the radeon stuggled to stay at 6fps. the intel was much further along in the benchmark at the 2 minute mark than the radeon even got to.

 

Being a shade tree guy this is probably beyond my technical realm of expertise.

 

However, reading your title you are saying its "switchable graphics" - do you have GPU drivers loaded up for the radeon? (I know you say everything is up to date but is it?)

 

GPU usage is spiking high, whats the GPU clock at (covered up)

[john_wayne]

@Tristerin yes the drivers are loaded for the radeon, the driver in use is 8.882.2.3000 and the radeon bios (which i'm not sure can be upgraded), is BR41055.001. In the computer's bios, i have things set to fixed switching, meaning that per the selection made in catalyst control center in the OS, either the intel or the radeon is in use for everything (the other option in bios of 'dynamic' would be auto-switching per program window in the OS). so for the screen shot tests above, i select the intel card, confirm the card is the only one in use via device manager, and run the test. then i select the radeon card, confirm the card is the only one in use via device manager, and run the test. fwiw, i just re-encoded a video file with nero recode on each graphics card. with seemingly the same fan spin on each run, the intel got up to 73C while radeon never got above 58C. I would almost suggest there is some damage to the radeon card, but there is zero instability in the laptop. It's like the radeon just never tries.

edit: per the gpu-z graphics card tab, the gpu clock is set to 600Mhz (the default) and the gpu memory is set to 800Mhz (the default), which is what afterburner read, but when i go to the gpu-z sensor tab, the clock reads 100Mhz and the memory reads 81Mhz. Afterburner read those as a constant 600 and 800 respectively.

Edited October 11, 2018 by john_wayne
more information

[john_wayne]

wow, so after accidentally finding a post in another forum, it seems that the setting for "powerplay" must be turned on in catalyst control center, otherwise the radeon locks the card down to its minimal settings, way below the default. now running furmark, i get an "astounding"  14 fps, and gpu-z shows the gpu core running at 600mhz, but the memory clock only gets up to 216mhz. So now i just have to find a way to force the memory clock up to the default 800Mhz, and I should be in business. I am searching for memory clock tools for this radeon, which may be an ATI instead of an AMD..

[john_wayne]

found how to get msi afterburner to unlock the core and memory clocks 795/925. now i get 17fps out of furmark, and a full 30fps out of just cause 2. oddly enough, despite the increase in the memory clock, the actual memory clock usage only goes up to about 270Mhz. Is this normal for built-in gpu to not use the full memory overclock?