I have an MSI Vector 17HX with an RTX 4080, and I’m trying to figure out whether this sounds like a thermal issue, bad paste/contact, VRM/VRAM overheating, or something else.
The laptop will shut down within about 5 minutes of gaming if I don’t use a cooling pad, regardless of what game I’m playing or what settings I use. This happens even in something as light as Roblox, but the strange part is that the laptop is still clearly capable of running much heavier games at 120+ FPS with high graphics.
The shutdown does not feel like normal throttling. Performance stays high and then the laptop just suddenly powers off. I don’t really get a warning or obvious performance drop before it happens.
However, if I use a cooling pad, even at only around 400 fan speed, the laptop stays cool enough and does not shut down. So the cooling pad makes the difference between the laptop being unusable for gaming and completely stable.
In MSI Center, I’m currently running:
- Performance mode
- Discrete graphics mode
Does this sound more like CPU/GPU overheating, VRM/VRAM thermal pad/contact issues, dust blockage, bad thermal paste, or some kind of power/EC protection shutdown? Has anyone seen this on the MSI Vector 17HX or similar MSI gaming laptops?