Windows 10 Power Management question - possible Feature Request

I recently upgraded to the latest version of Windows 10 (Windows 10 Pro 2004 release), and Microsoft has (again) changed the power management options. The techniques used in prior Windows releases to be able to maximize performance (for example, to select a High Performance scheme, or change settings to ensure that the CPUs are running at 100%) do not work with this release. There may be powercfg commands, registry settings, or group policies that might help, but I have not been able to figure that out.

Sorry for the verbose context setting, but it leads to a question and possible feature request:

Question: Are there ways to once again expose the advanced settings for a High Performance power scheme, such the Processor settings mentioned above? For example, PS scripts, powercfg commands, registry tweaks that will work in this new version of Windows.

Possible Feature Request: In reading documentation about the powercfg.exe command, there appears to an option /REQUESTSOVERRIDE to set a Power Request override for a particular process or service. Is this something that Cantabile could leverage to request (demand) a particular power management profile, regardless of the active Power Management Scheme?

NOTE: No comments needed about how staying on older versions might be safer, but I tend to stay current on Windows versions. So I would really prefer solutions that apply to the most current versions.

Hi Roland,

Not sure if it will help but there is a setting in the Tools>Options>Audio Engine>Audio Engine where there is a drop down for power plan. It may have been affected by the update so if it doesn’t work Brad would probably want to know about this new issue with Win 10.

Thanks for the heads up and if i can find a way to get to the settings I will let you know. The DOS powercfg.exe command line interface from C3’s command line utility is the option I have used in the past for weirdness like this but it’s kind of clunky till you get your command line configured correctly.

Cheers,

Dave

Hi Roland

I updated three of my pc (not the music one) to 2004 W10 release. I didn’t see any variation on power management, at least using the old classic control panel. There is the high performance plan, with all the advanced settings.
Using the modern W10 settings (Power & Sleep), you should be able to click the blue “Additional Power Settings” to switch to the old-fashion control panel

Paolo

That’s interesting because after upgrading, I only see the Balanced plan, and even if I create a custom plan, all I can do is clone the Balanced plan but without any access to the advanced options. Needless to say, I will keep looking.

Being curios, I checked better. Nothing changed in my desktop PCs. The thing you’re talking happened on laptops only. Anyway I was able to create a custom power plan and access the advanced settings, including the processor speed, as you can see below

Ugh, Microsoft make things so complicated sometimes. My machine currently isn’t eligible for the 2004 update right now so I can’t check it easily.

Interested to hear if anyone else is having these issues.

On a Surface device, you need to go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Power
and change CsEnabled from 1 to 0 then restart to expose the additional power profiles.

Doing so disables “Connected Standby”, read about it here:https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/forum/all/disabling-connected-standby-on-a-surface-book-2/df3b4992-406d-4bc0-b14a-89de89f6bf3b

@Robb_Fesig, I had used that solution before on previous versions of Windows 10, but it appears to no longer have an effect with Version 2004.

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I did some more checking, and it was both interesting and frustrating.

I found a registry hack that allows me to add a context menu to the Desktop (I suppose anywhere that can accept a “shell” command) to allow me to choose one of the 3 power schemes (Balanced, High Performance, Power Saver) and it does work. So this works as a workaround for me for now.

What’s frustrating is that if I use this to change to a different power scheme, then any power schemes in the Control Panel dialog disappear. I’m still able to use this context menu to change schemes, but I cannot use the Cantabile feature to switch when the Audio Engine is running, because it will indicate that the High Performance scheme is missing.

Add a context menu? What’s the reghack?

I just found this on internet and do not claim any credit or reliability, but it seems to work for me.
Usual disclaimers: do not try this at home, backup your system before modifying the registry, etc.

https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/6039-choose-power-plan-context-menu-add-windows-10-a.html

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Brad

I can confirm that the issue happened only in my laptops. At the begin, I saw the balanced (default) plan only. Creating a new plan, there was all three options (Power saver, Balanced, High Performance). So I created a high performance plan named My Custom plan. If that helps, I installed Cantabile and I’m now able to send you any log and the windows registry entries you need as well

Paolo

Yuk - another example of Microsoft thinks they know best (like them resetting all of my carefully tuned settings and turning windows sound back on after an update? Or to be fair, is it some green legislation compliance which forces their hand? E.g. why most keyboards have an auto power off these days due to EU legislation and the first thing I go hunting for to turn the wretched feature off!

Checkout Process Lasso.Works a charm.

https://bitsum.com

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I’d like @Brad opinion before install invasive programs

Absolutely.

I’ve been running Process Lasso for about 6 months. I haven’t subscribed yet but I’m thinking about it.

I’ve been running Process Lasso for quite some time on several different computers. Never had a problem.

Ditto with Process Lasso. Was recommended here and I run it on my gig PC.

I just got a new PC, and went throught the Glitch free setup - and struggled a lot with options not being available. Very late in the process I stumbled on the Microsoft documentation: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/customize/power-settings/configure-power-settings, which lists the various settings, including those not visible. Most of them have a GUID, which can be used to find the setting in the registry, and for me it worked to make sure to have a DWORD variable named ‘Attributes’, and if it had a value of 2 then the feature became visible. 1 seems to be ‘hide’, and 0 apparently undefined, but I did not spend a lot of time investigating, as I found this when I was almost done.

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