Battery Saving Options: Which to Choose?

Hey people
I got my A8Ja a couple of days ago (review coming soon), and I still can't decide what hardware control program I should choose. I am choosing out of the main 3: Power4gear, RM CPU Clock Utility, and NHC.

I just can't decide which to use:
Power4gear is good because it has the hotkey up top of the laptop, also good because I think it changes the video card settings when on Battery Saving mode. But it isn't good because it can't undervolt the cpu. Correct me if i'm wrong.

NHC is good because it can undervolt the cpu, but i'm not sure exactly how it does it. It has no options to change the gpu settings (can't change core speeds for the X1600 anyway). Also has nice temperature monitoring software. It can't throttle the cpu though?

RM Clock Utility undervolts and throttles the cpu nicely. Also has good graphs for monitoring cpu use. But no temperature monitoring.

Going without a utility will not provide any undervolting utilties. But I believe the Intel SpeedStep might be able to dynamically change the clock speed?

I don't know what to go with. My thoughts are so jumbled about all of this. Could anyone help with my decision. Also what is throttling anyway?

 

Right now I'm using NHC, and it can throttle the CPU as well.

Side note: Undervolting is limited on Core Duo processors, as Intel has limited the minimum voltage at 0.95v, unlike the Pentium M that can go to 0.70 something..

 

Uhm, let see, if i were to have a laptop here's what i would do.

use NHC, because i know what it can do for a Pent-M so therefore what it can do for Yonah should be nice, i know the Yonah is limited in terms of undervolting. So no point looking into that. (sorta)

NHC can throttle the CPU, so create 3 profile. One should be called School, which puts the CPU at the lowest speed and puts the GPU at the lowest speeds.

The GPU can be throttled using ATI Tools, NOT ATI Tray Tools! make sure, so here's what you do, just keep on bringing down both bars so low that the video card can still handle video display. Also remember your stock settings.

So 1) School Profile: CPU-800mhz GPU-50/100 WIFI-On Screen Brightness-30%

The second profile is for mobile medium performance, for example you wanted to do some photoshop on the go or something, or light gaming, meaning old games that are easy to run. something like that.

So call it Business: and set the CPU to something like 1.3 ghz, the cpu should be around 250/300, something like that.

Business: CPU-1.3ghz GPU-250/300 WIFI-ON Screen Brightness-60%

THen the last setting should be Gaming or whatever you wanna call it, HOME?

This is where you will plug in or take your laptop home and use it.

So use the ideal settings, for example many overclock the GPU because they get more performance outta the GPU. They may also have a cooling pad so that the machine doesn't over heat.

HOME/GAMING: CPU-MAX GPU-Overclocked Passed Stock Settings WIFI-ON Screen Brightness 100%.

I hope u understand.

Thanks,

MysticGolem

 

Thanks the only problem with that is you can't create profiles without buying NHC Professional Edition. Also, I just downloaded the latest Omega Drivers and where is ATI Tools? There is ATI Tray Tools and ATI 3D Control Panel but no ATI Tools.

Furthermore, I just ran some 3DMarks. Power4gear gets a 3DMark05 of 3851 on 'Super Performance'. NHC gets a 3DMark05 of 3664 on 'Max Performance'. Both tests using updated drivers and on AC power supply.

Help.

 

I've done heaps of 3DMarks 05 and 06. I repeatedly get lower scores while using NHC or RM Clock instead of Power4Gear or nothing.

 

Personally i use p4g its so simple and it works well...did use nhc for a bit, but to be honest, the only way I could see a difference was if I monitored the graphs, run lots of test etc...I ended up spending more/all my time tring to optimise my laptop, insead of actually using it for its real purpose....so my advice is be careful you may loose alot of sleep and time for what is essentially a few degrees or slightly longer batter life! Besides buttons are cool and nice to touch shame to waste one.
a

 

My thoughts exactly. Power4Gear it is then!

 

I am not sure if power4gear lowers the voltage, but it defnitely clocks the cpu down, i guess using multipliers. Now if the voltage doesn't reduce I am not sure where the battery savings come from, other than the fan spinning less :S

Also NHC cannot take the cpu down to 385Mhz as pwr4gear can. I am not sure if this is a bug but i did bunch of tests and they all seemed to confirm that the cpu had indeed clocked down to 385 or 386 something like that.

Furthermore, pwer4gear can also speed up and slow down the cpu based on usage. So i see no need to use NHC and besides, you've got the cool button so why not use it

 

Zydus, yes P4G is a great program, but i thot 800mhz was the lowest the CPU could go down to. How is the CPU going in the mid 300mhz range?

Yes the P4G button is nice

Besides that, NHC does allow for undervolting, but we know the Yonah is extremely limited in undervolting, hence NHZ may not be needed. So stick with P4G.

The way the Pent-M worked was that P4G allowed the CPU to underclock, so that was fine, now, NHC came out and allowed undervolting, giving an extra 30 mins of batterylife , this is not possible with Yonah, unless someone can report otherwise.

There has been alot of discussion of how to tweak and get the most outta your Pent-M, but very little about Yonah. ohwell

Thanks,

MysticGolem

 

im not sure either, ill see if i can take a few screen shots and ill show u

 

The thing that bothered me the most about NHC and RM Clock is that they lowered my 3DMark score even if their settings were on 'Max Performance'.

And I think that P4G throttles the cpu down to 25%. Or does it actually underclock it?

 

I've used NHC before and just like underpantman said I found myself wasting time messing with that tool. It's still a great tool, but it's so slow in loading that I'm sick of it.

I've decided to forego the undervolting and just went with Power4Gear and I'm happy now. I may not be getting the extra battery life from undervolting, but I'm getting less problems.

Cheers,
Mike