How to Supercharge the M11x with Core i5/i7 UM CPUs

What are the chances that this trick with ThrottleStop works on an M11x with Sandy Bridge when it arrives? I think it is absolutely essential to be able to raise the TDP/TDC, since I think there will be no overclock options on a M11x with Sandy Bridge.

 

Hmmmm before I change my motherboard even if the temperature is too hot I cannot hear the fan kicking in.......
After I replace my motherboard I can hear some fan noise, is the prev motherboard a faulty one?

 

Sandy Bridge CPUs look great but Intel has added a variety of lock bits to them so it is dead simple for manufacturers like Dell to lock them at the bios level. If that happens, ThrottleStop will still be an accurate monitoring tool but it won't be able to increase TDP/TDC anymore. It's the end of an era so enjoy your M11x-R2.

iclicku: I was just joking. I know how much users appreciate the extra performance. The percent increase in wPrime performance exceeded all of my expectations. Your core temperatures are well within the normal operating range as specified by Intel so there's no need to worry about that.

DivineAura: Maybe your fan failed on your old board which was causing the high temperatures.

 

HAHA owned. R3's are going to blow!!

 

The sad part is that SetFSB is fairly useless on Sandy Bridge too. You're lucky if you can increase performance by 1% to 5% by increasing the base clock of a Sandy Bridge system since you will be overclocking everything on the board when you try to do this.

 

Just ordered mine m11x .
Is this R2 ??

Intel Core i7-680UM 1.46 GHz, 4 MB L2
Mobile Intel GS45 Chipset
6144 MB (1 x 2048 MB + 1 x 4096 MB) 800 MHz DDR3 Dual Channel
640 GB Serial ATA 7.2 krpm


Should be the fastest CPU for this machine for the moment ?

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-Core-i7-680UM-Notebook-Processor.37096.0.html

 

Seems only solution would be a bios mod then.

 

Interesting. Didn't know the Alienware offered the 680UM on the m11x. I'm a little jealous...

 

I just ordered the same proc with 8GB RAM and 320GB drive. Can't wait!!! I would also like to know if that is an R2. i think all coreI processors are R2 and the C2D are R1

 

Spot on. The I range are R2 and core 2 duo are R1. I have the I5/ 8GB RAM myself and its pretty good

 

WOW! This thread was so much to absorb! I'm fairly tech savvy but haven't done much OC'ing before. Going through all the m11x settings even with the guide was a bear!

My TS Bench mark is now in acceptable levels of i5 performance, right around 46s average on the 32m. It fluctuates up and down, but I'm not going to tweak it for the last milisecond of performance. Temps are stable, and I'm at 166/7 on the BCLK. To this end, I owe much appreciation and as soon as it's light out on the west coast again I'll shoot you a doughnut Unclwebb. Powerful stuff, really the best use out of the box takes Throttlestop. I couldn't imagine owning this machine without this program.

And... please... please help the noobs. I followed your guide, but there are much sweeter tips as it stands in the thread for specific details.

Maybe throw in some bold text in the OP or in the guide that read:

"Do this for an i5"

Set the BIOS to 166 (or work your way up...)

Set TDP/TDC @ 30 (brief explanation, one sentence more to follow in the guide)

Temps should be stable at no higher than 74/75C

Set the Force TDP @ 5 (? I just put 5 cause it seemed common and after going up and down that gave me the best time. I'm still not clear on this one)

Check Bench TS to see if it's working.



----- again, thank you, champion of NBR forum and m11x owners everywhere

I just posted the above because even understanding general things like typical proc voltages, bos' and etc... it took me quite a while to narrow down the optimum settings.


Can't wait to see what you do with SB. I did read some early reviews while BCLK is essentially no longer valid the proc itself is so liberal to overclocking performance will increase a tremendous amount regardless. And I have faith because something better always comes out.

 

I am running i7, and have it overclocked to 166 with TS enabled. It's great to squeeze out as much performance as possible. My only worry is the temp. My cpu temp hovers around 50C-65C. Is that safe?

 

Super safe. Max gaming isn't going to push it past the 74/75C mark. Which it can totally handle for hours on end... the emergency shutdown temp is something like 130C but man your legs would be on fire! There's plenty of people who know a lot more than I do. Just started tweaking out on this in the last few hours.

your well within the limit... now if someone could direct me to an OC GPU thread I'd be grateful.

 

Tekshow: I think the first post in this thread covers everything a user needs to know to significantly improve the performance of their R2. It tells you where the ThrottleStop TDP adjustment is and what value to set it to. It also explains the Force TDP/TDC option after that.

Following the first post will get your laptop running at over 95% of its potential. After that, you're on your own. When overclocking a CPU, they are all unique and the best ThrottleStop settings can vary depending on how much you are able to increase the base clock speed, what type of applications you typically run, etc. The only way to maximize performance is for users to roll up their sleeves and do some benchmark testing. For me, that's the fun part of this hobby.



According to Intel, PROCHOT# is the signal in the processor that lets you know that you have reached the "maximum safe operating temperature." In these Core i7/i5 UM CPUs, PROCHOT# does not go active until the CPU core temperature reaches 105C. Your lap will complain long before your CPU will. As long as your heatsink isn't falling off, an M11x-R2 will never be hitting that temperature, even while using ThrottleStop and playing games for as many hours as you like. For this model, you should be able to ignore the core temperature. A maximum core temperature of 75C is nothing for an Intel Core i CPU.

 

Mine does the same, no problems there. Good to keep an eye on it over time since some folks have seen temps creep up over time with bad paste, etc.

 

will this be applicable to my i7 ?
i just did OC my M11xr2 on the bios to 160 and it gives me BSOD
if i do install the ThrottleStop do i have todo the 166?

 

What effect does the overclocking in the bios have on battery life, before using throttlestop?

 

No, what OC setting your system will be stable at has nothing to do with ThrottleStop. The first thing you need to do is determine which setting is stable for you. If it BSODs at 160 then keep dropping it down a notch and test it with something like Prime95 for a few hours. Play some games, if it crashes, locks up or shows any other signs of instability then drop it again and repeat.

Once you've found what your system's stable OC is, then you can use ThrottleStop to ensure that it won't throttle down when under full load.

 

Very little in most scenarios due to the fact that most people aren't taxing their CPU when on battery. They're typically running a web browser, office applications, etc. - none of which are going to utilize the CPU fully.

 

Is there any significant improvement in performance overall when using the bios overclock or is it mostly encoding or cpu intensive game related improvements?

 

ThrottleStop is a revelation... I set the overclock to 166 in the BIOS, and set TPL to 40/40 and my benchmarks in every game/program went up 20+%. Seems very stable too.

I'd like to setup a more conservative "battery" profile. I know leaving TPL to 10/30 is a part of making that happen. But now that I'm overclocked to 166, I'm wondering what settings I need to pick to maximize battery life.

Should I just disable turbo?
Uncheck "Set Multiplier"?
Or set the multiplier to something like 5 or 6?


On another note, what the heck does the C1/C3/C6/C7/MAX button actually do? When I click through the choices, my multiplier seems to go way up when set to CL6. I thought that was supposed to lower it?

 

Hi All i just got my M11x r2 with i7 and was looking for ways to increase performance when i stumbled upon this thread... after playing with TC i am running at 167 OC, tdp/tdc 100 m11x=4 and force tdp/tdc=4 with a wprime 32m score of 21.992s

 

Isn't that i7 680 UM is developer's version?

 

All I'm saying is you've got folks who are a little lost by those technical instructions. A really easy breakdown could be more simplified. People new to OC'ing especially are going to be nervous and have trouble getting confidence in all the settings. The program you've written is incredible, it works great, and satisfies every precaution.


Can't thank you enough, (although I hope this small donation helps)

 

Tekshow: Donations are a taboo subject on NBR but thanks for your support.

When I get the chance, I'll try to simplify the first post some more.
When programmers write documentation, it makes perfect sense to them but it doesn't always make perfect sense to the rest of the world.

DivineAura: Intel released the Core i7-680UM last fall.

Intel® Core? i7-680UM Processor (4M Cache, 1.46 GHz)with SPEC Code(s)SLBST

The Dell U.S. site still shows the Core i7-640UM as the top option available in the M11x-R2.

mosaic: Setting that magic button to C6 or C7 or MAX will maximize your battery run time. The average multiplier will go higher and jump around a lot when using these settings but don't let that discourage you from using this. This button determines the maximum C sleep state that the CPU package will be allowed to use. If you set it to C1 then it blocks the CPU package from turning itself off when it is idle. This will increase power consumption and the idle core temperature will likely increase a few degrees too. The C1 setting might improve mechanical hard drive performance so this could be a useful setting when plugged in.

In the ThrottleStop options window you can select Battery Monitoring and then there will be a battery button on the main screen that you can click on that can be switched to tell you real time battery power consumption. Windows only updates this data about every 10 seconds but it should give you some indication of what settings affect power consumption. You have to be running on battery power for this to work. You can also use the Windows Performance Monitor if you would like it to draw a graph of your battery power consumption data. It graphs the same data as ThrottleStop is showing. You can also use ThrottleStop to log this data so you can have a look at it after a game or whatever when running on battery power.

Core i CPUs are designed to use the C6 sleep state and mostly turn themselves off when idle or lightly loaded so some settings in ThrottleStop are not going to make any significant difference to power consumption when idle at the Desktop. You could try a battery profile with Disable Turbo checked to see if that gives you enough performance to surf the net or whatever you like to do. If you try that, you don't need to worry about the turbo TDP/TDC values since you won't be using turbo boost in that profile. If you do any testing, start a new thread and let others know how to improve battery run time by using ThrottleStop. I'll include a link in the first post of the Guide thread.

 

Thanks for the description.

My "normal" profile has TDP/TDC set to 60/60 now. C1 on the "magic C" button.

My "battery" profile has default TDP/TDC, the Set Multiplier set to "7," and the C button set to C6.

My "max battery" profile has TDP/TDC at default, "Set Multiplier" at "5," C button set to C6, and Turbo Disabled.


Here is what I see just using the battery monitor included with ThrottleStop at idle:

Normal: 4h 35m
Battery: 5h 08m
Max: 5h 19m

And, just for kicks, I selected my "max" throttlestop profile and then change my "power saver" Windows power management profile to reflect 40% screen brightness, CPU's set to minimum, and Alien FX off. The result with that: 6h 16m

My hunch is that the TDP/TDC settings are the biggest factor, followed by the higher turbo steps (And display brightness--hah!).

FYI, Core i5 with 8GB RAM and SSD, overclocked to 166. I know I could get even more battery at 133Mhz clock, but... heh... where's the fun in that?

 

Hey all,
Im new to this forum, but ive been using Throttlestop 2.99 for a while now.
Ive overclocked in the bios to 150Mhz, and i have Throttlestop running at boot.
Eventhough, sometimes if i look at Throttlestop its saying (multiplier) x 150.7Mhz, and sometimes its saying (multiplier) x 133.0Mhz. I am sure i overclocked in the bios to 150Mhz, and if i re-enter the bios its still saying overclocked to 150Mhz.
So is it normal that Throttlestop showing different speeds there?
(with the M11x R2 i7 4gb ram SSD)

Thanks

 

I have to agree with Tekshow here.

I'm lost (sorry). I just got my new i5 M11x-R2 and want to start the whole OC'ing process but its very new and totally foreign to me.

88+ pages is head splitting and by the end its hard to tell up from down.


I can gather that you should be able to OC (thats the whole take it up to 166 or start low and step it up by 2) via the bios but I fail to find a real good "simple guide" to walk a newb through the process.

It seems that TS is the bomb but where does it fall in the process? Should I download it prior to OC'ing in the bios or after. I would assume that you tweak TS after you get a stable OC via the bios?

Or is TS a one stop shop, does it all and you no longer OC via the bios but do it through settings in TS?

Thanks in advance and sorry to all those "OCing in mah sleep" types for my basic fears of bricking my new machine.

 

This is a short of weird observation for me - On my original installation of Windows, I was able to follow the guide with no deviation to acheive a stable 167 x 12. Stable in this case meaning that the processor itself was stable, and also that the multiplier, 12, never fluctuated.

Due to some complications (I attempted to use whole disk encryption, which causes the laptop to fail POST), I had to reformat. After that, with the exact same settings, my multiplier now fluctuates between 11 and 12.

Any ideas what happened?

 

Sh33b44n: When you are booting up and the bios detects a problem with your overclock settings, it is designed to ignore your choice in the bios and use the 133 MHz default base clock speed instead. That is probably what is happening. Some users never have this problem while other users aren't so lucky. Double check your base clock speed with CPU-Z just to make sure.

Have you done any stress testing like running Prime95 to make sure your overclocked settings are stable? If your laptop is not 100% stable then you are more likely to have the problem you are seeing but unfortunately, this can happen to anyone at anytime. It's random.

minnus: What TDP/TDC values are you using and what is Force TDP/TDC set to? With those settings and with wPrime running, what multiplier does ThrottleStop show? Use the ThrottleStop version in my signature. Post a screen shot of this so I can have a look. If you don't know how to do that, just ask. Was ThrottleStop showing 4 lines of information before in the table on the right hand side? Some users have accidentally disabled one of their cores in msconfig. If you only had 1 core enabled before and now you are using both of them, that would make a difference.

Overclocking the M11x-R2 for Newbies
-------------------------------------
1) Go to the bios and increase the base clock speed from 133 MHz to 150 MHz and then boot up and run ThrottleStop.

2) Read the first post in this thread a couple of times. There are only two ThrottleStop settings that need to be adjusted. Increase the default TDP value from 10 to 30 and set the Force TDP/TDC value in the Options window to 8. The Force TDP/TDC setting is at the bottom of the column on the right hand side in the Options window so it isn't too hard to find. Click on OK to save your settings and then click on the Turn On button so ThrottleStop goes from Monitoring Mode to Active Mode.

3) Play some games and do some stress testing to make sure your computer is stable. Prime95 has recently been updated and is an excellent program to test basic stability.

Prime95

When you first run Prime95, tell the program that you are just stress testing.

During the early stages of an overclocking experiment, 5 or 10 minutes of Prime95 stability is good enough for me. Test as long as you like. When I get closer to my final overclock settings, I usually run Prime95 for a couple of hours.

4) Most M11x computers will be 100% stable at a base clock speed of 150 MHz. If you are stable, reboot go into the bios and go up in steps of 5 MHz and repeat step 3 as many times as necessary. If you reach a speed where you are not stable, you will have to reboot, go into the bios and decrease your overclock base clock speed until you are stable.

This is optional but it's always a good idea to run a benchmark program like wPrime before you run ThrottleStop for the first time or make any adjustments. This will give you a baseline that you can compare to as you overclock your computer. There is an example in the first post that shows the change in performance from overclocking while running ThrottleStop.

wPrime Multithreaded Benchmark

Advanced users can go back and adjust the recommended values in step 2 to try and improve their wPrime times further.


That's all there is to it. This is not rocket science by any stretch. There are not hundreds of settings that need to be adjusted like most desktop motherboards have. Some users will be fully stable with the maximum bios setting of 166 MHz but the average seems to be in the high 150 MHz range. Every CPU is unique so the only way to find out what your CPU is capable of is to do some stress testing.

 

I remember the settings off the top of my head - TDP/TDC were 30/30, Force TDP/TDC was default (16). Both cores and all threads were active. The only difference between your screenshot and my configuration was that I never unlocked BD PROCHOT, so it was never checked off. With these settings, wPrime and Prime95 would bump the multiplier to a non-fluctuating 12. Infact, after this, I had started tweaking more in regards to TDP/TDC (never less than 30/30) as well as Forced TDP/TDC (never over 16). The multipler remained unchanging.

After reformatting and reinstalling Windows, the same settings would not yield the same result.

I am not that much of a performance Nazi to be bothered by it, but am just curious as to potential causes.

 

Is the Windows image you are using now identical to what you had before? Most users don't get the full multiplier during a stress test unless they play around with the Force TDP/TDC option. It almost seems like before you reinstalled Windows, your laptop was not constantly resetting the TDP/TDC values so it didn't matter too much what you had the Force option set to in ThrottleStop.

The only other thing I can think of is that the new version of Prime95 might be causing an increased load so there could be more turbo multiplier throttling because of it. Beyond that, I really can't think of anything that might have changed.

 

@UW

So you would recommend using Prime95 or wPrime as a test for true stability?

I have run the TS Bench 32M (44.9 sec) and 1024M (1479 sec) without a hitch and its running my i5 at 2004MHz. It is odd that right before the test ends the MHz may jump up to 2200 or 2300.

Also when should we start to really care about the core temps? Running Prime95 for about 10 mins and hitting max 77C so far at 2004Mhz i5

EDIT* Put the M11x-R2 on my Zalman (on) and it dropped it down to about 66C (at 20 mins of Prime95)

 

Also my assumption is when it shows 12.00 x 167MHz = 2004.01 MHz this is what I am getting on all 4 cores (2 real 2 virtual)?

Is there a way to determine what MHz it would get when the i5 goes into single core mode?


If Im getting 2.0 out of the i5 with my current TS settings is there a point to mess with them any further ?

 

This post on page 87 talks about core temperatures.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/7201752-post864.html

During the TS Bench, it is common for some of the threads to finish sooner than the others. You are more likely to see this during the longer 1024M test. When this happens, it lets one of your two cores go to sleep and turbo boost increases on the core that is still awake processing the remaining threads. That's why it is not unusual to see an increase in total MHz just before the TS Bench test ends. Watch the C0% number. That will decrease from 100% as soon as some of the threads have finished their part of the calculation.

Try testing with wPrime too. I like that benchmark more than TS Bench. I just included the TS Bench as a quick test for users that don't have time to figure out wPrime which sometimes has a quirk or two when trying to discover your hardware.

There is no single test you can pass that can guarantee 100% stability so use a combination of tests. I like Prime95 to give me an idea if the CPU is more or less stable. After that, it's good to run some 3DMark type benchmarks to see if your computer can handle the CPU and GPU being stressed at the same time. Also play some games or run whatever programs are important to you.

It sounds like your i5 is running great. I told you this wasn't rocket science.

All active threads run at the same speed. Run a single thread of TS Bench, wPrime or Prime95 and you will see your average multiplier and total MHz go higher. You will never see the full single core multiplier that your CPU is rated at because in a Windows system, there are always background tasks that will wake up the second core which immediately reduces the amount of turbo boost you are getting. If you use the Task Manager, Set Affinity... function, you can lock a single thread of Prime 95 to a single thread of your CPU. This trick might show you the highest possible average multiplier since it prevents Prime95 from jumping around from core to core or from thread to thread. If you can reduce the number of background tasks on your computer, there will be less tasks needing to wake up the second core. As soon as both cores are active, your maximum multiplier gets reduced to 12.00. Cores waking up and going back to sleep is happening hundreds of times a second which is why reporting an accurate average multiplier like ThrottleStop does is a good thing. It shows you exactly how fast your CPU is working.

 

Hey I just noticed that I am getting a problem regarding changing my power management and my aero. This has happen to me twice and I think I know what the problem is now. Last time when I force TDP to 8 this happened: whenever I change my power plan from high performance back to power saver my windows aero effects stay on... I think throttlestop is causing this does anyone else have this problem?

 

I only recommend using ThrottleStop with the High Performance Windows setting and with the Minimum processor state set to 100%. If you don't do that, ThrottleStop will fight with Windows over control of your CPU. ThrottleStop is designed to help you guys game at full speed. If you want to save power, turn ThrottleStop off.

 

thanks for the reply
so its a motherboard issue? or what kind of issue would cause ignoring overclock settings .. I can run at the max 166mhz stable.. i dont understand why its lowering itself through bios.
And i have another question , is it normal that Throttlestop just dissapears after a few hours using the laptop?
sometimes when i boot i have Throttlestop up, and when i look again an hour later or so, its just dissapeared..

 

It's impossible to say what the issue is. It might be the motherboard, a bug in the bios or memory or a CPU that is not 100% stable until after it warms up a little or who knows. These kind of random issues are very difficult to trace. I've heard of other users with this same problem so you are not alone.

When ThrottleStop disappears, is it still showing in the Task Manager? In Windows 7, I use the show all icons system tray option and I've never had this problem. Make sure the DC Exit Time isn't selected in the ThrottleStop Options window. This is designed to exit ThrottleStop when you switch to battery power so maybe that is what's happening. I'll have a look for any bugs that might be causing this.

 

I fixed the problem it I just needed a reboot I guess... I also wanted to say that I am going to try lowering of the TDP/TDC for trying to get power consumption when non-gaming...
I am going to try 10/10 and Ill post back my results.

 

What exactly have you done in terms of establishing that your system is stable at 166?

Have you tried lowering the BCLK to 160 to see if the resetting issue persists?

 

Unclewebb, when its stopped, it doesnt show in Task Manager, and I dont have DC Exit Time selected. I first thought that it might be an taskscheduler thing, but I tried alot options there as well, without luck.. so Im not sure what to do.
(the only options i have selected in TS are: "do not reset FID/VID on exit" and "Start minimized" (on the main screen, "EIST" and "C1E"))

And Slickie, ive been playing games at 166Mhz, like Dirt2 and Battlefield bad company 2, For hours without overheating or bluescreens.. I guess i might say than its a bit stable then?
Normally i dont overclock to 166Mhz, I dont wanna push the laptop to its max, normally im at 150Mhz.. And then its lowering itself to 133Mhz for some reason.. Maybe the 150Mhz is just the magic bad number for my laptop.. ill try to check if it happens when Im at a bit higher or lower overclock speeds

 

Found out that no matter whereto i overclock, its going back to default 133Mhz after 2 reboots.. (i tried it at almost every overclock setting, and all showing the default 133Mhz after 2 reboots)..

 

I would contact Dell, sounds like motherboard or BIOS problems. What BIOS revision are you running? Have you tried a different BIOS revision? sorry if asked already, just jumped in thread

 

My laptop came with bios A03, i upgraded to A04, downgraded again to A03 cuz it was causing me videolockups, and yesterday i upgraded again to A04 because i thought it might been resolved in A04.. so yeahhhh.. i tried two of the bios versions,, eventhough there doesnt seem to be any difference.
yeah.. I guess i have to contact Dell again.

 

"Dell doesnt support overclocking in their systems".. they cant help me.. lol.. >.<

 

But Alienware systems are designed to be overclocked
Overclocking CPU won't void the warranty @@

 

i guess so .. eventhough they are saying "the system works fine on factory settings, if the overclocked settings aren't working properly, we don't replace parts due to this problem"

 

There are a couple of items in the Task Scheduler that could be causing the problem you are having.



There is also the "Stop the task if it runs longer than x days" option in the Settings tab that should be unchecked.

I haven't noticed TS randomly disappearing but I'm usually starting it up from the desktop when programming / testing.

Task Scheduler Method

 

Sh33b44n, how long have you had the laptop? If within 21 days of purchase return and order again. Hopefully you will have more luck with the next one