- Windows 11 Pro
- Framework Laptop 16
Hi, my Framework keeps freezing when it opens processes like games or adobe applications. It freezes for a few seconds, then its supposed to unfreeze. I searched up why it does this (I have no knowledge in how computers work) and found that this is expected because of some sort of swap with the gpus or something.
My problem is that this swap keeps getting stuck and doesn’t unfreeze. When I open a game, it will freeze and I have to hold the power button down and reboot it.
I currently can not open any games or applications right now because of this. I have also had some applications now spit out errors at me and close themselves when I tab out (or sometimes randomly theyll break on their own). This never happened to me before on my previous laptops, this is my first time with an amd laptop.
How do I stop the screen from staying frozen when I open a game/application?
(further information:
32g ram
amd rhyzen 9 7940hs w/ radeon 780m graphics 8 cores
amd rhyzen 7040 series
Do you have the dGPU? If yes, this “freezing” occurs when the system switches between the iGPU and dGPU. This is done to allow you to utilize the dGPU for intensive tasks then switch back to the iGPU for reduced power consumption and better battery life. You can adjust this behaviour in AMD Adrenalin and the relevant setting should be AMD Smartaccess Graphics. Windows settings should also allow you to configure which GPU should be used for specific programs.
What BIOS and Drivers are you on? I believe this was a known issue on an earlier BIOS/Driver bundle but iirc, it was fixed.
If you have the dGPU are you able to get it to output anything over the port in the back (before starting any graphically-intensive process)? The port supports USB-C displayport alt mode, so use a cable or adapter that supports this (in a pinch you can have a displayport or hdmi expansion card hanging out the back of the laptop).
Note that “displaylink” adapters and docks would not give a useful result for this test (since they stream data rendered on another gpu over usb using a proprietary protocol, and then use a very barebones gpu on the adapter to convert it into a display output using a displaylink adapter would bypass the dgpu in this case)
If output works with a displayport alt-mode adapter then this will rule out a problem with the dgpu. If it doesn’t, try connecting the adapter and cable in a different order (especially with the expansion cards, these are a bit finicky with the dgpus output) or try booting with the adapter and cable already connected to a monitor. Sometimes it just doesnt want to work right, so although it could indicate a problem with your dgpu if you cant get its output working its unlikely.
Try also disabling MUX switching from the amd control panel (bear in mind its only a workaround not a real fix) to see if you can load the dgpu at all (using the igpu to handle final output)