Razer Blade running at full clock on idle. I'm out of ideas.

[polakiz]

Hello guys,
I'm coming here in desperate need of help, hoping this community might have an answer to my problem.

Specifications:
Blade 15 Advanced Model (Mid 2021) - RZ09-0409
11th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-11800H @ 2.30GHz, 2304 Mhz, 8 Core(s), 16 Logical Processor(s)
NVIDIA RTX 3070

The problem:
The CPU is running at full clock speed. I've done a full reset of Windows to no avail. The image attached below is right after the reset. The only programs downloaded after the reset was Firefox, Core Temps and Discord. As seen, it's running at 4539.84 MHz. Constantly. "Best power efficiency" does not work. Balanced mode in Synapse is chosen. Nothing seems to work or do anything. The laptop is extremely overheated as a consequence of this and running on full speed with fans going wild.
Everything in BIOS is as supposed to as I haven't touched it. Matter in fact, I went in and chose "Load default options" which did nothing either as the options were the exact same as before I choose it.

I'm out of ideas. I have no clue how to fix this. I hope someone has a solution because this is impossible to work with. I can't have this laptop with me to class or exam in this state. I can barely write on it and the noise is unbearable.
PLEASE note all of my complaints are for IDLE. I'm very well aware gaming is different but all of this is in idle with nothing running.

 

[JackOO7]

Just to get started.
What does the task manager say?

 

[polakiz]

Just to get started.
What does the task manager say?

Hello Jack!

I did a restart to ensure the screenshots shows "idle" state. Only things open out of the ordinary are Firefox (this very thread) and Core Temps.

 

[JackOO7]

Did you install the Intel drivers yet?
Take a look at: i7-11800H instantly turbo's to max freq (4588/4600 mhz) as soon as I plug the laptop in - Troubleshooting - Linus Tech Tips

 

[polakiz]

Did you install the Intel drivers yet?
Take a look at: i7-11800H instantly turbo's to max freq (4588/4600 mhz) as soon as I plug the laptop in - Troubleshooting - Linus Tech Tips

Yes.

This laptop is 1.5 years old.

It seems to be running fine again for some reason. Not even sure why or how. Now I'm locked out of ThrottleStop though.

A week ago I reset this laptop for the 2nd time in 1.5 years. Everything worked fine except it would run at full clock and have really high temperatures because of it. Hence why I made this post.
However, ThrottleStop worked fine. I just had to disable VBS. It didn't help on the temperatures though.
Then I made this post after resetting it today again for the 3rd time, thinking it would work. Same problem. Except now it magically fixed itself. But as I said, I'm locked out of ThrottleStop suddenly. VBS is disabled.
The only difference between my 2nd (a week ago) reset and my 3rd (today) reset is that I downloaded Synapse 4. Which I thought was the culprit.
Was that what allowed me to enter ThrottleStop?

One problem after the another. One step forward, two steps back. I think I'm going to take a break for now after 8 hours of troubleshooting this. It's starting to get to me.

I'll look in here tomorrow again and see if there's anything useful I could try. I think I'm going to try to download Synapse 4 again and see if it unlocks ThrottleStop for some reason.
I didn't update BIOS so it can't be that. Honestly, I'm out of clue again like before. This shit is confusing haha

Forgot to show the new temperatures and MHz. Seems to work fine again like I mentioned.
However, I lost my power plan. No idea how either.

Don't get a Razer laptop is all I can say

 

[eidairaman1]

@unclewebb

Here is another victim

 

[unclewebb]

As seen, it's running at 4539.84 MHz.

Next time you have a problem, start by posting a screenshot of ThrottleStop. It is the only monitoring program that reports C0%. This is an accurate measurement of how busy a CPU is. When an Intel CPU has tasks to perform, it is supposed to run at full speed.

laptop is extremely overheated

Razer laptops look great but many of them have barely adequate cooling. They tend to run at high temperatures.

Don't get a Razer laptop is all I can say

Wise advice!

Your ThrottleStop screenshot shows the CPU multiplier being reduced so it looks like the Balanced power plan is working now as designed. Windows 11 includes lots of useless features that can keep a CPU busy when it really does not need to be busy. It is a pain staking process trying to hunt down every useless background task. Maybe someday I will write a guide!

Now I'm locked out of ThrottleStop

Your screenshot and ThrottleStop both show that VBS is not enabled. That is good.

It is usually the BIOS that sets the lock bit in the CPU which will lock out CPU voltage control. If ThrottleStop was not locked before then the BIOS might have been updated during your Windows reinstall. Most people do not keep track of what BIOS version they are using. It is difficult to troubleshoot when you cannot compare the BIOS version being used now compared to what was being used before when ThrottleStop voltage control was not locked. The CPU-Z Mainboard tab reports BIOS information. I am using an old BIOS version on my desktop computer because I know it works. I avoid updating the BIOS or re-installing Windows.

Maybe you can find an older BIOS version for your computer that is not locked.

However, I lost my power plan.

I am not sure what that means. I do know that Windows has a feature that can hide power plans when you are not using them. Maybe your power plan is not lost. It is just hiding.

Edit - I run my MSI laptop at full speed when it is idle. It runs cool because there is not a pile of crap running in the background. That is the secret. Both fans are sitting at 0 rpm. I never thought it would be possible to have a 24 core, 32 thread laptop with all of the P cores running at 5.2 GHz and for it to also be silent. As long as you do not play games on this gaming laptop it remains mostly silent. When both fans go into airplane mode, it is time to find the headphones.

Check out the C0% data. There are cores and threads spending 0% of their time in the C0 active state.

 

[polakiz]

Hello @unclewebb,
My pleasure to get a reply from a legend like you.
I've spend countless of hours reading your replies on several threads. Thank you for all your work that you do.

Next time you have a problem, start by posting a screenshot of ThrottleStop. It is the only monitoring program that reports C0%. This is an accurate measurement of how busy a CPU is. When an Intel CPU has tasks to perform, it is supposed to run at full speed.

If I experience this problem again, I'll make sure to do this and attach the log file.

Razer laptops look great but many of them have barely adequate cooling. They tend to run at high temperatures.

Yep, this is my second laptop from them and I'm used to it. But after 4 years of Razer laptops, this problem was entirely new to me which is why I panicked.

Your screenshot and ThrottleStop both show that VBS is not enabled. That is good.

Yes, I disabled it through BIOS. None of the options listed in your guides worked except for disabling it in BIOS. gpedit.msc doesn't exist. I don't know if this means anything?
Anyway, figured it was worth telling you in case you're going to meet another Razer laptop user who can't turn off their VBS. For my Razer Blade, it was only available to do so through BIOS - no other method worked.

Maybe your power plan is not lost. It is just hiding.

What I meant is that it disappeared from "Power and sleep settings". However, it's now back again after turning it on after yesterday.

Maybe you can find an older BIOS version for your computer that is not locked.

THIS IS WHERE IT GETS WEIRD, UNCLEWEBB. Please trust me when I say I'm absolutely clueless when it comes to this but that I've also spend countless of hours reading threads and replies from you.
My previous Razer Blade was locked out of ThrottleStop. The only way around it was to modify the BIOS. I unfortunately bricked it entirely which lead me to this laptop.
Sidenote: do you have an idea to unbrick a Razer Blade? I'll gladly try it. I couldn't find any answers online. Or is it just done with? For context, it turns on but the screen is just black. If I plug in an external display, it continues to be black.
Now, again, please trust me on this because it's not going to sound believable. Before I made this thread, I reset this laptop for the 3rd time like stated previously. BEFORE I reset it the 3rd time, ThrottleStop was fully unlocked for me. I know this because in FIVR it showed the correct offset I put it at (-100 MHz to begin with) which also gave me BSOD.
I'm so confused as to what happened between 2nd and 3rd reset for the laptop to be locked out of ThrottleStop.
Worth noting:
- 2nd and 3rd reset happened 1 week from each other so I doubt it was a Windows update.
- I initially thought it was an older BIOS version causing the original problem of this thread so I checked the latest BIOS and turns out that I already have that one installed. So I also doubt it's BIOS.

The only thing I can think of, which is weird, would be Synapse 4. I'll try downloading that now, see what happens and report back.

Feel free to reply to anything I've said whenever you have time; you might have something helpful I can try.

Thank you very much again for taking your time to reply!