The Definitive Guide to Acer Aspire Gemstone Blue Throttling Issues

The Definitive Guide to Acer Aspire Gemstone Blue Throttling Issues v2.0
Credit Due to DarkSilver, ATG, Sgogeta4, and Unclewebb


This thread is specifically designed to put an end to the multitude of threads about people asking why their Aspire 6920G, 6930G, 6935G, 8920G, or 8930G is experiencing lackluster performance in gaming.

What Causes It

We’re not 100% certain, but through a process of elimination, we believe there are two possible causes:
• That a sensor on the motherboard is going haywire, reading internal temperatures entirely wrong.
As a result, the system’s BIOS believes the CPU’s temperature is reaching dangerous levels when it’s really well within operating limits, and causes a thermal throttle to be activated.
This halves the CPU’s performance until the temperatures are returned to what the system perceives as safe levels.
• It could also be potentially linked to a ridiculously low setting in the BIOS and not the fault of a motherboard sensor – this was refuted by my travel to Acer’s Canadian headquarters, where a stock 6920G was shown to operate just fine, with no throttling whatsoever.
That being said, given the large number of users affected, it's still a possibility.

All we know for certain is that the chipset has reason to force the CPU to throttle, running it at a lower clock speed and thus ruining your performance.

“But TehSuigi!” I hear you say.
“Why does my GPU downclock as well? Isn’t that the reason why my system slows down?” You’ve got the order of events mixed up if you think the GPU downclocking is the problem.
Because the CPU can’t process the physics of the games as fast or send frames to the GPU as often, the GPU requires less power to render what frames manage to get to it.
As a result, it drops into a lower power state using Nvidia’s PowerMizer or ATi’s PowerPlay technology.
Even if you disable these power saving measures, game performance will still suffer because the CPU will still be throttling.

How to Diagnose It

Thankfully, diagnosing the problem is relatively easy to do.
First off, download and run ThrottleStop.
Unzip it and open it up, clicking OK on the rather frightening warning window (feel free to read it, but it's more concerned with Dells and Alienwares whose throttling issues are related to power supplies - Acers are unaffected).
You'll be presented with the window below (minus the red box - I added that).

The next step is to try and trigger that throttling through normal use.
Open up your favourite game (windowed, if possible) and begin playing.
When the game performance drops, check the ThrottleStop window – if the numbers in the red boxes show less than 100, your system is throttling.
If not, your performance issue lies elsewhere.
If you want to see if your system throttles in a hurry, just run ORTHOS for a while – mine usually throttles in under 5 minutes.

How to Live With It FIX IT FOR GOOD

Thankfully, since the first edition of this post, an enterprising user named unclewebb has developed software to end this blight upon our systems.
It's called ThrottleStop - if you didn't download it during the diagnosis step, do so now.
To not only stop your system from throttling, but prevent it from occurring again, simply tick the box I've marked in green in the screenshot below (and change the % number beside it to 100% if it's anything else).

And that's it! You should no longer be throttling, and your system can now be used to the fullest of its potential.
This is the one-size-fits all solution we've been waiting for, until proven otherwise.
Some helpful options are detailed below:
• Minimize on Close means that it'll be sent to your notification area when you click Close on the window.
It can then be restored or exited from there.
• Log File will write your CPU speed, load, and temperature to a file to be examined later.
• More Data will increase the frequency of data refreshing.
This means that your monitoring data will be more accurate, but change rapidly.
• You can set up a Task through Windows Task Scheduler to automatically start ThrottleStop whenever you log in, or whenever a certain program/game opens up.
Use Google for a guide, because it can be a little confusing.

For more discussion of ThrottleStop, check out its thread here on the Acer forum.

The Alternative - Undervolting
It still works to solve throttling issues, but by different means - dropping your CPU's temperature below the trigger point, instead of disabling the throttle altogether.
There are better guides for undervolting elsewhere on NBR, so I won't duplicate their content here.
Advanced users might want to give this a spin, especially since it will also result in a cooler-running CPU and longer battery life.
I personally use RMClock to undervolt (64-bit users will need the signed drivers from here).

There's one last thing I recommend - call Acer and tell them that you're experiencing this problem! The only way we can get them to release a patched BIOS (if that's the problem) or repair your motherboard's thermal sensors (if that's the problem) is by informing them in large numbers.
I know that I've got a commitment from Acer to diagnose and repair my system's thermal issue whenever I please, but then again, I'm still covered under warranty.
Please call them before yours expires!

If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to post here.