Razer Blade 15" 2021 issue with Optimus enabled with external monitor help? Poor performance! RTX3080 mobile - fix

[sqlling]

So, before i finished this post, i managed to find a solution myself I will share my findings with you anyway!

Hi there!

New to this forum though i have been following TPU for years!

So, recently i bought a Razer blade 15" advanced top spec, i7 10850, 32gigs, RTX3080, 240hz QHD G-Sync display. I thought this laptop could "somehow" Substitute my former desktop with an i5 10400f + RTX3070. It can! - most of the time. You see, Nvidia have this beautiful thing called Optimus, which auto selects which GPU is rendering to display. None gaming, it will switch to IGPU, when gaming it will select the 3080. This is somewhat nice due to longer battery life, and so on. But, it has it's drawbacks.

1: When using the IGPU, the display is unable to refresh more than 60hz, meaning 240hz is pointless until gaming.
2: And this one i wierd. When optimus is autoswithing to the 3080, the 3080 frames rendered will have to go through the IGPU to the display. This makes a severe performance drop when playing CPU bound games (ex. Starcraft 2) More on this later.

Anyway, i have several docks in house. One for my office, one for my living room and one for the bedroom, depending on mood. I'm used to dock my computer when playing various games. Starcraft 2, Mouse and Keyboard - Office. Outriders, controller - Living room, and so on.

Now to the issue. Due to the performance drop when using optimus, i would like to select RTX GPU only, which i can when not docked. When i connect the computer to an external monitor, the option grays out, stating that option is not available when using external monitors - What the hell.......(Screenshot attached) I was like, who buys a gaming laptop and does not connect it to an external monitor from time to time.

Annoyed i started to test how much of a performance drop i was actually experiencing, so here are my raw results, tested with external monitor and internal monitor. Everything at max setting in 1440p + Performance setting in powermanagement and Razer Synapse.

CPU intensive game
Starcraft 2 + Optimus external monitor - avg. 79fps
Starcraft 2 + 3080 GPU only internal display - avg. 152fps

GPU intensive game
Outriders + Optimus External monitor DLSS Quality - avg. 83 fps
Outriders + 3080 GPU only internal display DLSS Quality - avg. 113 fps

3Dmark Time spy + Optimus external monitor - 8352p
3Dmark Time spy + 3080 GPU only internal display - 10430p

This is some serious performance drop. Starcraft is one thing, but looking at outriders it's amazing how software is pulling GPU potential down!

Anyway. Managed to fix it. Nvidia software is shit (on this part at least). Googled all night for a solution to override external monitor limitation but found none unfortunatly. Found out Bios can force 3080 on all time, which disables Optimus in Nvidia controlpanel completely. This is not the ideal solution, but works for me. Sacrificing some battery life for full performance when needed + 240hz and gsync. You dont have this kind of laptop without your powersupply within range haha. Now i have the same performance on external displays, as with the internal display results above.

Maybe this post can serve as inspiration to others with optimus capable laptops. RELEASE YOUR LAPTOPS FULL POTENTIEL!

Have a great one!
Simon

 

[Ja.KooLit]

First off, let me welcome you to forum

Thanks for sharing but you should change the title to Razer Laptop ONLY! My 3080 Asus is totally different from your solution

Here is a video that I have watched about Razer's implemention on 60hz / 240 hz

start at 4:39

FYI, thats not my channel nor my video. But thought worth looking for you

 

[sqlling]

First off, let me welcome you to forum

Thanks for sharing but you should change the title to Razer Laptop ONLY! My 3080 Asus is totally different from your solution

Here is a video that I have watched about Razer's implemention on 60hz / 240 hz

start at 4:39

FYI, thats not my channel nor my video. But thought worth looking for you

Thats interesting. The initial problem for me though wasn’t the 240hz issue. Suppose this might be fixed in an update.

for me the performance bottleneck was my main concern.
Had a friend over yesterday playing some starcraft arcade games. Even though he had to dial down every graphic setting on his MacBook pro 13”, with only igpu, he ran more smooth than me. I had to go from Extreme to medium to maintain +60 fps late game. Thats some bad software stuff from razers side going on there, i suppose!

I should change the title, but i dont know how to :-(

 

[P4-630]

I should change the title, but i dont know how to :-(

Top right.

 

[sqlling]

Top right.

You got it!

 

[Elastico]

I had to create an account here just to add my view on how much I hate the Razer Blade 15" Advanced. I did not have as deep pockets as you @sqlling so I only have the RTX 3070 variant - perhaps there is a difference between them in terms of how they handle external monitors but I doubt it. Keep in mind the laptop is the only thing I have changed. I have a desktop PC and I have been using 3-4 different laptops prior to this one with the same monitors/cables/adapters without any issues.

I changed out my Lenovo Yoga 930 15" with the Razer and I had been using the Yoga plugged in to my TV (Samsung Q90). The Yoga also required adapters and I was using a Thunderbolt to HDMI 2.1 adapter 4k@120Hz. Switching to the Razer I could only make it work at 30Hz! Skipping the adapter and using sqllings suggestion (dedicated GPU only) I can make it work at 4k@60Hz.

Next problem is my Lenovo P44w-10 monitor. I took me forever to figure out that I can't run the monitor @144Hz, I have to drop to 120Hz. Natively it goes to 144 Hz so I tried all kinds of cables and adapters before I figured this out.

Finally I tried the Razer with my LG Ultragear 38Gn950 monitor and here it does not work at all. It flickers like crazy @60Hz, anything above does not even work. There is a higher probability I will figure out how to turn water into wine than making the monitor work at 160Hz. Perhaps it has something to do with G-Sync (I tried on/off but no difference) or there is some other setting or I should try ten different cables to figure out which one works but I simply don't have time to deal with this crap. Don't buy the Razer Blade 15" Advanced 2021 if one of your requirements is for it to work with an external monitor.

 

[sqlling]

I had to create an account here just to add my view on how much I hate the Razer Blade 15" Advanced. I did not have as deep pockets as you @sqlling so I only have the RTX 3070 variant - perhaps there is a difference between them in terms of how they handle external monitors but I doubt it. Keep in mind the laptop is the only thing I have changed. I have a desktop PC and I have been using 3-4 different laptops prior to this one with the same monitors/cables/adapters without any issues.

I changed out my Lenovo Yoga 930 15" with the Razer and I had been using the Yoga plugged in to my TV (Samsung Q90). The Yoga also required adapters and I was using a Thunderbolt to HDMI 2.1 adapter 4k@120Hz. Switching to the Razer I could only make it work at 30Hz! Skipping the adapter and using sqllings suggestion (dedicated GPU only) I can make it work at 4k@60Hz.

Next problem is my Lenovo P44w-10 monitor. I took me forever to figure out that I can't run the monitor @144Hz, I have to drop to 120Hz. Natively it goes to 144 Hz so I tried all kinds of cables and adapters before I figured this out.

Finally I tried the Razer with my LG Ultragear 38Gn950 monitor and here it does not work at all. It flickers like crazy @60Hz, anything above does not even work. There is a higher probability I will figure out how to turn water into wine than making the monitor work at 160Hz. Perhaps it has something to do with G-Sync (I tried on/off but no difference) or there is some other setting or I should try ten different cables to figure out which one works but I simply don't have time to deal with this crap. Don't buy the Razer Blade 15" Advanced 2021 if one of your requirements is for it to work with an external monitor.

I use my laptop with my LG C9 77” Oled (120hz). In the beginning i was unable to activate gsync or above 60hz@4k. Found out my hdmi cable was incompatible. Bought an 8k cable which States 144hz and vrr support in 4K and boom, no problem using 120hz with gsync in 4k