I recently bought a used gaming laptop, and everything was running smoothly for a few weeks. I mainly played games like GTA 5, but just two days ago, I noticed a dramatic drop in frames per second (FPS). For instance, GTA 5 used to run at around 50 FPS but has now fallen to about 25. Similarly, Red Dead Redemption 2 has dropped from 30 FPS to around 10 FPS. Other games, like People Playground, have also seen a decline in FPS, going from 140 to 80. My laptop runs on Windows 11, and I suspect that recent OS updates might be the culprit. Is there a known problematic update, or could this issue indicate a virus? The only recent changes I made were downloading a Rick and Morty map on Teardown and playing on a random server in DayZ.
3 Answers
If you got the laptop used, it's worth asking if it came with Windows pre-installed or if you did a fresh install. A clean install can fix a lot of problems. After that, go to the manufacturer’s website and update all your drivers there. As for Windows updates affecting performance, those could usually be resolved with the latest GPU driver updates.
You might want to consider if your laptop is running on battery power. Performance can throttle when it's not plugged in. Also, have you updated your graphics drivers recently? Often, Windows updates trigger a need for newer driver versions, especially for gaming.
I tried checking for updates through Windows, but is there a better way to find the latest graphics drivers?
It sounds like you've got a performance issue on your hands. First off, have you checked your Task Manager while gaming? It might show you what's taking up your resources, like RAM or CPU usage. Sometimes it could be a background app hogging resources or even a potential malware issue. Definitely look into running a malware scan just to be safe.
I checked Task Manager and noticed some RAM usage that seemed off. Not sure what else to look for—any suggestions?
Good idea to monitor that! Other steps include checking for any background applications as well, and definitely run a malware scan to rule that out.
Would reinstalling Windows help after I've been using it for two weeks without any issues?