M6600 Owners Thread

Not for optimus, though it is a useful feature, but for using nvidia-only gpu acceleration in adobe premiere. It makes a huge difference.

So any suggestions guys?

For selling the m8900 on ebay and replacing it with a gtx 560m? Both appear to be mxm 3 compatible. Can it work, as in will the bios/drivers allow it? Can't afford or need the quadros.

 

Don't think a GTX 560m is made for the m6600. Without any mods and voiding your warranty. 560m is also not worth the effort to replace a ATI Firepro m8900 in the first place. Unless you need cuda's within Nvidia Quadro 4000m or 5010m.

 

Hi guys - just a quick question if people have time, I've just bought a Lenovo W520 with the "pimped out" spec and since having it for a couple of days I must say I really like it.... HOWEVER.... the mandatory CPU throttling while on battery power is just killing me.

The Lenovo has the 2.4ghz Quad core and when it is plugged in it is great, but unplug it and it has a mandatory throttle down to 1.47Ghz.... nothing you can do about it. I'm a consultant and when I want to do things on trains, planes.... hell even just for a 1 hour meeting when I want to do Virtual Machine demos I really cba to dig around under desks to plug the power supply in. Why they can't just let me make my own decisions and take the hit on the batter life I just don't know...

Anyway.... my question is does the M6600 have any throttling of CPU while on battery? I need to be 100% sure. I would rather the GPU didn't throttle, but tbh thats not really a concern for me, its just the CPU throttling that kills me, when I want to play games I will only ever be at home at my desk.

Cheers all

(I have 24 hours to decide if I am sending the Lenovo back... so if possible could you reply asap thanks)

 

Thanks for the reply sargent. I basically want something with atleast 96 CUDA cores, and 1 gb of ddr5 memory as well as an expresscard slot. You would be surprised how limited my choices there are. Was thinking of getting a m6600 from dell outlet and switching out parts. Do not wish to pay for an insane quadro that I have no need for.

 

And thought you guys might enjoy this

Dell Precision M6600 vs M6400 Hardware (Overview & Disassembly) - Darwin Mach

 

It's the bios. Seems like an easy find on the problem from google. I don't have a Lenovo w520. The throttling on the m6600 is ok. Didn't bother too much.

Try updating the bios.
BIOS 1.33 Posted - Page 2 - Lenovo Community

The throttling is also the intel speet step feature. Maybe try to disable the "Intel Speed Step" from the bios. Just got to keep a good watch on your batt, unless you got the Lenovo 9-cell batt.

Sad sad thing, the cult ThinkPad is no longer IBM.

 

Hi, thanks for the reply but sadly you are mistaken. Latest BIOS is 1.35 and no matter what setting you configure it is still mandatory limited when running on battery - this bad been confirmed by Lenovo themselves. It is because the battery cannot cope with the draw from both TurboBoosted CPU and the discrete graphics at the same time. Changing BIOS settings or releasing new BIOS versions won't change that

 

thinkpad throttling is bios thing and not intel speed step.
intel no where says throttle when running on battery.
when i set my laptop on high performance plan,it runs the processor at rated speed.
I have seen my core i5 doing 3 ghz as claimed with turbo boost on single thread usage while second core is at 800mhz.

Its lenovo BIOS thing.

I suggest , use high performance plan and also go through advanced power options which is their in control panel.
it has settings about cpu speed when on battery and when on ac power.

 

chaps - I don't want to derail the thread because this isn't relevant to this thread, believe me I know what you guys are saying and it would be the same advice I would offer someone. I'm always willing to learn and if I have missed somethign obvious I will be the first to thank someone for the education - but I'm also an IT consultant so not a newbie

As I have previously said, it *is* limited in the BIOS but they *can't* change it because the battery cannot cope with the draw when both the CPU and GPU are running full speed. So without

a) loading a custom BIOS that doesn't care
b) installing a program such as ThrottleStop to override the BIOS values and force it to run at full speed
c) an up-rated battery that can cope

it isn't going to change

Lenovo admit to this on their forums at: W520 TurboBOOST not working on battery or after up... - Page 38 - Lenovo Community

With all respect, I've just sat testing this system for the past 24 hours trying everything from BIOS settings, previous BIOS versions, forcing discrete only graphics, changing all the power management options in existance, etc, etc. I can verify it *does* throttle and there isn't a dam thing you can do about it

 

Ah, pardon my ignorance. I wasn't aware there was non-Quadro acceleration.

The two issues you will have is heatsink and BIOS. unfortunately I don't know if any of the available heatsinks line up or if the BIOS will allow it :/ Maybe someone else will chime in as I would like to know for curiosities sake. There was someone a bit back in this thread that put in a GTX 580 but I was unclear as to how the laptop saw the card (Quadro 5010 or GTX 580).