CPU Capped at 0.75->0.8GHz on battery

Even after reboot and bios factory reset (1.1.19)

Latest BIOS and all the latest Dell drivers (this morning I installed the latest 11 march 2016 drivers - audio + TB firmware).

When I get home and plugin I have a horrible feeling it will be capped even when plugged in (as the machine did seem slow this morning).



(I kicked off an 8 core compile job to stress it, as you can see)...

Edit: I also reset all the power options to defaults and there is no diff between power save, balanced and max perf.

 

Looks like it's being locked to the lowest multiplier.

Try Throttlestop - should allow you to get full power back. Not sure what's causing it but should treat the symptom at least. Needs to be run when starting Windows but otherwise can be hidden away.

Hopefully someone can suggest a better solution but this should help for now.

 

Am plugged in now - and the CPU is still capped at 30% (800Mhz)...

Edit: I am seeing the same in linux, which would leave me to believe that throttlestop won't help (I will be trying anyway).

 

You probably have your Power Options set to keep the CPU multiplier down when running on battery.

Go to Control Panel --> Power Options --> Change Plan Settings (for whatever power plan you're currently using. e.g. Balanced, Power Saver, etc) --> Change Advanced Power Settings.

Go to Processor Power Management --> Maximum Processor State. Change this to 100% (or whatever you want it to be).

 

They already reset the power profiles so it seems unlikely to be that (Although always worth making sure).

I have a similar issue with my Dell system - it doesn't like the genuine and fairly new Dell charger and locks the CPU to the lowest multiplier. Throttlestop sorted this out - although I only run Linux through a virtual machine so never tested whether the issue presents itself with Linux as the client OS. It doesn't happen when running OSX but lots of things function differently when running as a hackintosh - no sleep and different CPU steppings, for instance.

 

SInce it seemingly isn't OS dependent, have you tried resetting your BIOS back to defaults and seeing what happens?

In Windows, make sure your Power Plan is on Maximum Performance when checking speeds. Also, try using HWINFO64 to monitor actual core speeds.

 

Not to derail the thread, but could you elaborate on how you're running OSX? VM or native via bootloader?

 

I have Yosemite running through a virtual machine on Windows and I also run El Capitan natively through the Chameleon Enoch bootloader (in El Capitan, System Integrity Protection must be disabled and kexts loaded via kext loader but otherwise it's not any different from previous OSX versions). There's a rather neat UEFI bootloader called Clover that I've always wanted to try but Chameleon works well enough for me - really must try it some day. Yosemite is simpler but El Capitan has been rock stable for me. To avoid derailing this thread, you're welcome to send a PM if there's anything further you wish to know - I'm far from an expert but have a couple of years of experience in running OSX on non Apple hardware.

 

My power plans were set to defaults (and matched the above balanced screenshot).

Interesting, I had used an older XPS 13 power supply during the week (just borrowed it at a meeting). But I have subsequently charged the laptop fully with my charger and I noticed this while booting on battery...

Further: I just rebooted with speedstep and turbo disabled in the bios and am running locked at 2.59GHz, will try each one on their own next.

 

I had the same issue - disabling speedstep in the BIOS let it run at full power... but the system became very hot after two hours of usage, locked at 2.9GHz... I'm not keen on being slowly roasted by my system.

It's a bit beyond my knowledge really - I found Throttlestop to fix the issue so didn't really look too much further. I quite like reducing CPU speed for general tasks with Throttlestop (Runs cooler and longer with the fan off and performance difference is negligible) so I run it at startup anyway.

 

Looks like this is another one for the hardware issues thread: http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/19666086 (will test later).

 

It's been an issue since before 2010 - slightly depressing to see that it still seems to be an issue. Research suggests that it is either a result of an insufficient PSU being used or a minor heat event that the system overreacts to - either way it seems to be applied by the BIOS. In my case, the BIOS announced that my 90W power supply was insufficient despite it previously being fine. A few online posts suggest that the chargers have components in them that the BIOS interacts with - however, they are easily susceptible to damage and make it appears that the charger is defective (It's not - checked it myself and the values are all in order). This then causes a perma throttle of death, rending your CPU into a crippled waste.

Apparently removing the battery (BIOS?) can fix it - I may try tomorrow and see whether it works.

Numerous articles online, found this one...

http://triplescomputers.com/blog/ca...ltrabooks-e7440-e7240-after-power-exceptions/

 

I can confirm that http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/19666086 fixed the issue for me (disconnecting the battery for 30secs).

 

Me too! Sadly the BIOS still doesn't like the charger and the CPU throttling came straight back, once plugged in. Ah well, Throttlestop works OK.

Glad it worked out for you

 

@Schmoo2k and @bennni -- you both are using 130W power supplies? The newer rounded-edge ones or the older rectangle ones?

 

I do have a lower powered targus power supply (part of a DisplayLink docking hub) which had been working fine (slower to charge but kept it at 100% fine) - I have decided to not use it from now on and stick with the offical power supply.

FYI I had been using the 90w power supply for the last month without issue - I _think_ this time I plugged the power in while the dock was off and then flicked the switch to turn it on, which may have caused the laptop to trip into this "safe mode". My only concern at this point is what I will do if this happens while I am travelling... (granted it should give me better battery life!)