RMClock settings to tame your Core2Duo T6x

[icantux]

Since I received my T61, I've been searching for a nice utility that would manage my CPU and power settings - at least something that would show me the CPU frequency as an applet in the taskbar!!

I tried SpeedswitchXP but quickly realized that it doesn't support the 2 CPUs in my system. Shucks! It was a great program with a tiny footprint consuming almost no resources, but it's a no go.

Then tried the touted Notebook Hardware Control and, although it's a nice-looking program, I had much trouble configuring this thing to work nicely with the installed Lenovo Power Manager. For some reason I found the PM to be much easier to configure than NHC. Reading up on NHC in various forums on the Net, I realized that it too doesn't quite fully support 2CPUs without some "tweaking". I [wasn't ready to do that - I read reports how people fubared their systems by playing around with the .ini files trying to "tweak" the fan or CPU (undervolting). Revolting - I'll have none of that on my new T61!

Then I found this utility called RMClock (this post is not a plug for this utility) and I was very pleased that it does what it's mean to do and how so!.... Finally something that works great to throttle my CPUs (as required). Easy settings, on-demand power when you need it, otherwise keep the CPU running slower, cooler and much less need for the fan to kick in... i.e. cooler, quieter machine.

Some have asked me for my settings, so I made some screen grabs of the utility's different settings to share with you all - well, anyone that's interested, that is.

Here we go.

First thing I did was to keep the ThinkVantage Power Manager installed on my machine, not just for posterity either. I created a new profile called "Dynamic" and made the appropriate settings for this profile - you can control both "battery" and "plugged-in" settings in one profile. Then I disabled the big green battery in the tray (there's a setting for that clicking the "options" button on the main PM screen). I'd prefer to use the RMClock battery applet that shows up in the tray rather than having the big green thing in front of me.

Right, next the settings for RMClock - everything in the images is rather self explanatory, so hardly any more comments.... in order of side tabs:

- Program Settings
- CPU Info - just gives you info on your CPU - no settings
- Monitoring - look below for screenshot of my desktop for the nice graph
- Management
- Profiles - set-up how & what you want RMClock to do when the system starts up plugged-in or on battery power.
-- No Management - OS Settings tab: I chose no management (full power) controlled by Thinkpad Power Manager - or you decide how to use no power management. (I didn't bother with the CPU tab)
-- Power Saving - OS Settings Tab: I used the Thinkvantage Power Manager's "Maximum Power Savings" setting here ... well I tweaked it a bit more. (I didn't bother with the CPU tab)
-- Maximum Performance - OS Settings Tab: used the Thinkvantage Power Manager's setting for Max Performance. (I didn't bother with the CPU tab)
-- Performance on Demand - OS Settings Tab: here's where I used my tweaked profile I created in Thinkvantage Power Manager mentioned above. (I didn't bother with the CPU tab)
- Battery Info - No settings there. Just some useful info about your battery (batteries)
- Advanced CPU Settings - Processor Tab - some settings for mobile use in particular.
- Advanced CPU Settings - Chipset Tab - didn't change anything - default settings
- Advanced CPU Settings - Throttling Tab - check the "enable normal throttling" to the default to make your processor run at half speed. Nice feature if you're on battery power and wish to really conserve power. Otherwise I leave it off.
- Updates - checks for updates.
- Professional Features - I don't have the Pro version.... just the freebie, so nothing to change there.

So there we have it. The laptop's happy - I conserve quite a bit of power using these settings (even more so when throttling the CPU to half the speed). I now get around 3hrs 48 minutes of battery time when using the "Power Saving" setting and when I throttle the CPU to half speed, I get an extra 15 minutes. That includes some 20 minutes of WIFI use (at full power), screen at 3/4 brightness. Not bad for a 6-cell battery!!

Here's a screenshot of how the graphs look while on "Performance on Demand" setting - shows 0.80GHz as clock speed on my 2.5Ghz CPU (Penryn T9300). If I change the CPU throttling to 50% (as described above), the clock speed indicates 0.3 while on "Performance on Demand". Fantastic for mobility when CPU power is not a huge requirement (browsing, e-mail, etc).
(note the colour of the "gear" for RMClock in the tray - it changes colour depending on the power scheme )
- pink-ish indicates "Performance on Demand",
- red-ish "Max Power",
- green-ish for "Power Savings" and
- slate-grey-ish for "no management":

- click me to see screeny


So there we have it. I dunno if this was a mini-review or just a post showing you peeps the settings for RMClock. I suppose a bit of both. This is a great little program which doesn't use up a lot of system resources, yet is very powerful in controlling the system on demand.

Cheers!

[mgo]

Then I found this utility called RMClock !

Hey, many thanks for going to the trouble of creating your article on RMClock usage!

I always get bewildered by all the options on programs like this, so your info is a big help.

Now, I have to get past my usual brain blocking learning curve and get to know this app!

Thanks again!

[bri]

Seems really useful in eeking out more battery life. Don't have the time to look into all the settings right now, is there any tangible benefit in just using the default settings?

[icantux]

Well, yes and no. If you don't have Power Manager installed, the default settings of RMClock will revert to using the Windows power management. ... and considering it only has limited features for "laptop" profile, RMClock will make use of that but it's not really in your best interest if you're seeking to get the most out of the battery life on your system.

However, having said that, by using RMClock, at least you can see if your processor is actually throttling down in a dynamic way and not just running full tilt all the time. You really don't need 2+GHz to play Solitaire - right?

[Esben]

Very good information, thanks for sharing! I also have a Penryn CPU in my main computer - very good CPU

Is your 4 hr run time with Vista or XP?

What is the maximal run time you can achieve while the laptop is still usable (no WiFi/Bluetooth, minimum display brightness)?

Which VIDs can you select with your CPU, and are you using integrated graphics?

[icantux]

Oops. Sorry, I neglected to mention the OS and other details. Thanks for bringing that up.

The details of my machine are as follows:
T61 w/ T9300 (2.5GHz) Penryn CPU
14.1" 4:3 standard screen
NVidia NVS 140M video card
3GB RAM
200GB 7200rpm Hitachi SATA HDD

The 4+ hrs of runtime I get is using WinXP (SP2), with brightness levels set to incrementally decrease as the power level runs down (using NVidia brightness control panel). Thus at full power (100%) battery, I set the brightness at around 75% when on battery, then once the battery reaches 75%, the brightness automatically scales down to 60%, when battery is at 50%, the brightness slips to 40%, etc...

As mentioned, with WIFI (Atheros) turned on (full power), I used it for approximately 20 minutes altogether throughout the tests, bluetooth was turned off.

I should mention also that I disable certain background services (indexing, auto updates, anti-virus) and keep the HDD spinned up for 10 minutes (it spins down after 10 minutes).

Indeed, there's a bit of tweaking involved, but for me the most important battery-hungry elements are the CPU - I do not want that to constantly run at full power when there's no need - and second is the video card. Using PowerMizer, I set it to dynamically clock as well to reduce power consumption.

Thus, overall, I've extended the expected runtime on battery from just over 2.5 hrs (using the standard preloaded Lenovo software) to over 4 hrs!! That's a big difference!

Hope that helps.

[RaysMD]

hmm, I don't seem to get any benefit from this. I'm running vista 64-bit and my average power used is 16.34 to 17.50 watts according to the Thinkpad battery guage. With RMClock running at 50% throttle the system is a little less responsive and the power usage goes up to almost 19-20 watts.