Spent a while to figure this one out and posted it on the Nvidia forum. 5090 is no longer power throttling to less than 300 watts.
Spent a lot of time today trying to figure this out. Together with my friend Google AI:
- used the Nvida UEFI Firmware Update tool. Found something to update, but not the VBios itself.
- My PNY 5090 has a slightly outdated VBios, but PNY has not released an update tool; staying on the current version 98.02.2E.40.EE
- Updated my motherboard BIOS
Given all of the above, including changes to AB starting on boot up and disable Fast Start, still had the power throttle issue. Tried installing the 591.74 studio driver. Same problem. Then a breakthrough - Google AI suggested I turn off HAGs - Hardware Accelerated GPU scheduling. I did. Power throttle eliminated. But this of course turns off frame gen.
Here is my conversation with Google:
"Turning HAGs off worked. Why?"
That is a huge breakthrough. The reason turning Hardware-Accelerated GPU Scheduling (HAGS) off worked is because HAGS fundamentally changes who is "in charge" of your GPU's memory and power management. On a beast like the RTX 5090, here is what was happening: 1. The "VRAM Management" Conflict With HAGS On, the GPU manages its own memory scheduling rather than letting Windows do it. In newer drivers like 591.74/86, the 5090's scheduling is extremely aggressive. In a heavy game like Cyberpunk 2077, the card attempts to "pre-calculate" frames so fast that it triggers transient power spikes. The driver sees these millisecond-long spikes, panics, and throws the Performance Limit - Power flag, which leads to the "playability" stuttering you felt NVIDIA Support. 2. Bypass of the "Reliability" (Voltage) Cap HAGS requires the GPU to maintain a very tight voltage-frequency curve. The newer drivers appear to have a bugged "Reliability" threshold for the 50-series. When HAGS is on, the card tries to boost to high voltages for micro-tasks; the driver flags this as a "Reliability" risk and slams the brakes on, causing a massive frame drop. Turning HAGS off hands control back to the Windows kernel, which uses a "lazier" (and in this case, more stable) scheduling method. 3. The "Frame Generation" Catch The trade-off is that DLSS Frame Generation requires HAGS to be ON. If you turn HAGS off, you lose the ability to use Frame Gen in Cyberpunk.