Thinkpads Forum

So I'm in the process of setting up my new X61 (2 GHz Core 2 Duo) ... very pleased so far, I have the memory bumped to 3 GB, the 7K200 installed and Vista running on the new drive(finally followed instructions on my third cloning attempt!).

But it does seem to run hotter than I expected, even in Maximum Battery mode. The palmrest is actually only warm (Intel 4965AGN at full powersave settings) but the CPU tempts are hovering around 47-49C with light usage.

So looking at the data that RMClock shows, CPU load is bouncing between 5% and 15%. I would have expected that to drop the clock wpeed well down, but in fact it's mostly sitting at 1.81 GHz, with occasional drops to 1.09/1.33/1.45 GHz.

So the question ... is this normal behaviour that I should expect from the combination of a Core 2 Duo and Vista? Or can I somehow get the clock speed to stay at the lower end of the range, especially while on batteries? Looking for less heat and longer battery life ...

It's kind of embarrassing to answer my own question ... but it seems that I have done something to make things right. At least now, on battery, RMClock is showing the CPU throttled to 798 MHz. And my CPU temperature is down to 39C.

Now just gotta figure out why TPFanControl is refusing to run ...

Do you know what it is that you ended up doing? I may run into the same issue as you.

Anyways, I'm glad you got the processor to throttle down properly.

Well, err, I was stumbling around in Vista, and then ... at some point when I unplugged the power cord, I noticed that I was running at 800 MHz. What I did, I don't know. I just know not to change it now!

tomh009 wrote:Now just gotta figure out why TPFanControl is refusing to run ...

You must run TPFancontrol as "administrator" (right click to run)

You are better off disabling "user account control" since you are obviously a power user Then you won't need to run programs as admin any more to get them to work.

Does anyone know how to get this to work?

I can't get my CPU to run at anything other than 1.6GHz (max) although I have seen it dip to 1.2GHz for a split second.

This is frustrating, in XP it just works. In Vista it doesn't.

Please help!!

Even on maximum battery life the CPU sits at 1.6GHz with less than 5% system load...

edit: It seems that one core is sitting at 800MHz while the other is at 1.6GHz -- and both are idle.

Anyone?

I've set my max CPU to 5% and I'm still sitting at 1.6GHz. Help!!

Ok, I know someone will kill me for this, but I'm not a "power" user so forgive my ignorance here...Can you tell me how to look and see what speed my CPU is running at? Thanks

Try RM Clock

Tom, which of the two meters was it that fell to 800MHz? The CPU core meter, or the throttle meter?

My throttle meter falls to 800MHz (On EnergyStar setting) but the core still sits at 1.6GHz.

If you can tell me HOW to access the information that you are using that would be great. Thank you.

Click the button that says "monitoring" in the list of items on the left.

Antioch wrote:Click the button that says "monitoring" in the list of items on the left.

I guess I'm just an idiot because I'm not sure what you are looking at. What monitoring option? From the beginning....

Run RM Clock, on the left side of the main program window (which you may have to manually open by clicking on the tray icon) is a list. In this list is the word "monitoring" - if you click it it will change the right half of the window to display a number of graphs.

Please check that you are using RM Clock, not some other program (it's a bit confusing, I know).

Antioch wrote:Run RM Clock, on the left side of the main program window (which you may have to manually open by clicking on the tray icon) is a list. In this list is the word "monitoring" - if you click it it will change the right half of the window to display a number of graphs.

Please check that you are using RM Clock, not some other program (it's a bit confusing, I know).

I must not be using it because I have absolutely zero idea what you just said. There is no icon on my system tray or program designated with RM Clock. How would I get said program to check this all out?

Oh my gosh....

This thread has been hijacked....

http://cpu.rightmark.org/products/rmclock.shtml

Look at those pictures, there is a small button in the upper left that looks like "<<" try clicking that, maybe it will show the menu.

Antioch wrote:Oh my gosh....

This thread has been hijacked....

http://cpu.rightmark.org/products/rmclock.shtml

Look at those pictures, there is a small button in the upper left that looks like "<<" try clicking that, maybe it will show the menu.

The issue here is that I don't have the program installed to begin with...I thought it was just something available on my x61 that came installed.