bios 1.06 drain more power than 1.04 ?

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MIB · #1 Post by **MIB** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 3:04 am

Hello friends,

I was using my X60s happily for about 2 months now, when I first got the laptop I can use it for around 8 hrs and with 0% CPU utilization the lappy was drawing about 8.5 W , and thats with 1.04 bios.

I have recently upgrade the bios to 1.06, but I noticed the lappy is drawing around 11~12 W for 0% CPU, so the battery run time is decreased to around 6 hrs.

Is that just me or 1.06 causing the power drain ?

snife · #2 Post by **snife** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 6:26 am

do you have USB devices attached?

smvp6459 · #3 Post by **smvp6459** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 9:22 am

That hasn't been my experience with 1.06. On battery I find that depending on what I'm doing, it fluctuates between 7.5 and 8.5. When the HD spins down it has gone down as low as 5.95

MIB · #4 Post by **MIB** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 1:08 pm

Thanks for the replies, no I dont have any usb device attached, actually I have installed the MS patch for USB power drain bug recently too., and I am starting to think probably it is the patch causing the power drain! as I just just downgrade to Bios 1.05 and power usage is about the same. So... it is not the bios but must be some software( patch/program) i have installed is stealing power.

lucas · #5 Post by **lucas** » Mon Jul 17, 2006 9:49 pm

sorry to hear that.

thanks for the info about your battery life and wattage, though!

MIB · #6 Post by **MIB** » Thu Jul 20, 2006 1:24 am

to my lastest attempt, I further downgraded the bios to 1.04, and the power consumption is back to 8.5 W!!!! so this indeed seem to cause by bios. In my case both 1.05 and 1.06 bios consumes around 1 ~ 1.5 W more power than 1.04!!!

jimmyz · #7 Post by **jimmyz** » Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:29 pm

MIB wrote:to my lastest attempt, I further downgraded the bios to 1.04, and the power consumption is back to 8.5 W!!!! so this indeed seem to cause by bios. In my case both 1.05 and 1.06 bios consumes around 1 ~ 1.5 W more power than 1.04!!!

I had the exact same experience with my x60s- upgraded to 1.06 to try to fix my flakey wifi and immediately noticed decreased battery life with wattages about 2 higher. I saw this thread and went back to 1.04 and my wattages went down and battery life increased
however.... now on battery I hear a high pitch noise
later jz

MIB · #8 Post by **MIB** » Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:56 pm

thanks Jimmy for the confirmation, i was thinking possibly only me as no one else seems to hit this issue.

sugo · #9 Post by **sugo** » Fri Jul 21, 2006 2:23 am

jimmyz wrote: however.... now on battery I hear a high pitch noise
later jz

When the high pitch noise can be heard, did you have any USB device attached to the X60s?

jimmyz · #10 Post by **jimmyz** » Fri Jul 21, 2006 7:20 pm

sugo wrote:
jimmyz wrote: however.... now on battery I hear a high pitch noise
later jz
When the high pitch noise can be heard, did you have any USB device attached to the X60s?

no- nothing needs to be attached- the noise seems to come and go

smvp6459 · #11 Post by **smvp6459** » Fri Jul 21, 2006 10:54 pm

jimmyz wrote: no- nothing needs to be attached- the noise seems to come and go

I just noticed this and I too have 1.06 with no USB devices attached. It seems louder/to ramp up when I use the trackpoint in battery mode. The second you plug the laptop in or the harddrive spins up (briefly drawing more power than normal I suppose) the sound goes away.

surg · #12 Post by **surg** » Sat Jul 22, 2006 3:31 am

Where did you find 1.04? I want to downgrade too but I only can find version 1.06.

sugo · #13 Post by **sugo** » Sat Jul 22, 2006 6:05 am

surg wrote:Where did you find 1.04? I want to downgrade too but I only can find version 1.06.

Search for "1.04" on this page.
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-63144

surg · #14 Post by **surg** » Sat Jul 22, 2006 6:15 am

pdudas · #15 Post by **pdudas** » Sat Jul 22, 2006 2:47 pm

Isnt dangerous to flash back the bios and the Embedded controller to an older version?

sugo · #16 Post by **sugo** » Sat Jul 22, 2006 2:56 pm

Not really. Lenovo provides old BIOS/EC for roll back purpose.

Saml01 · #17 Post by **Saml01** » Wed Jul 26, 2006 2:17 pm

smvp6459 wrote:
jimmyz wrote: no- nothing needs to be attached- the noise seems to come and go
I just noticed this and I too have 1.06 with no USB devices attached. It seems louder/to ramp up when I use the trackpoint in battery mode. The second you plug the laptop in or the harddrive spins up (briefly drawing more power than normal I suppose) the sound goes away.

Early macbooks had this same exact issue. Its the power supply with these new processors. Increase the current draw on the processor hense pulling more juice through the circuitry and the noise goes away. I beleive its an inherent flaw with a poorly designed digital powersupply.

People on the apple forums devised aprogram that ran the processor 3% above idle all the time to eliminate the noise. IBM just made the processor draw more power to make it go away.

Its a run around to a manufacturing problem.

edit:

Example. You know how some people can hear the squeel of a TV when its on? well thats the powersupply they are hearing, its the frequency produced by the traveling electricity, some people can pick it up and some cant.

jamieacura · #18 Post by **jamieacura** » Thu Aug 24, 2006 12:41 pm

Did anyone find a solution to this besides dropping back to 1.04 BIOS?

I just got my x60s yesterday and did all the updates including the BIOS update to 1.09 and I'm running around 12W at idle with WiFi on.

I'd like to at least have the option of trying out the "high-pitched whine" in exchange for longer battery life.

Saml01 · #19 Post by **Saml01** » Thu Aug 24, 2006 3:19 pm

jamieacura wrote:Did anyone find a solution to this besides dropping back to 1.04 BIOS?

I just got my x60s yesterday and did all the updates including the BIOS update to 1.09 and I'm running around 12W at idle with WiFi on.

I'd like to at least have the option of trying out the "high-pitched whine" in exchange for longer battery life.

The solution is to replace the powersupply.

Otherwise just roll it back to 1.04 and test it out.

When I get home today, im definetley going to try out 1.04 after my fresh xp install. If its to much ill upgrade it back to the latest.

Also im going to take into account the issues the bios corrects.

I wonder if its possible to edit the bios file 1.04. Do a comparison of strings with say 1.05 and figure out what data they add that makes it consume more power. tThen extract that from the latest bios 1.09.

bios 1.06 drain more power than 1.04 ?

bios 1.06 drain more power than 1.04 ?

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