XPS L502X Turbo Boost 2.0

Ok, so the most common problem while gaming on the L502X (or any Sandy Bridge Laptop) is that of temperatures exceeding 90°C. If you're planning to hold on to the laptop for a few years at least, these high temperatures for extended periods can easily kill it. I was facing the same issues and I tried everything, using a laptop cooler, keeping ambient room temperature at 24°C, making sure the vents are clean; but still temps would reach high as 98°C, and then the CPU would start throttling!

I was about to give up, but then it struck me that Turbo Boost 2.0 might be the main culprit. Now, Dell doesn't give the option of disabling it via the BIOS and since Turbo Boost relies on Processor States there's no such option in Windows 7 to just switch it off. But what you can do is this:

Go into Power options (Control panel -> Hardware and Sound -> Power Options) and click Change plan settings. Then click on Change advanced power settings. Scroll down to Processor power management and expand it. Expand Maximum processor state and modify both On battery and Plugged in to 99%. Then simply click Apply and OK. And that’s it, no more Turbo Boost, no more overheating and if there is a need – these changes are very easy to revert.

That's it, problem solved! Temperatures don't exceed 80°C even after 30 minutes of heavy gaming.
This is a great method for those who don't know how/want to re-paste the processor!

 

Wow great find if 99% disables turbo boost without BIOS (not available in XPS 15) or third party options.

i7 Sandy Bridge has more power than needed anyways.

edit: Fantastic find. I monitored my CPU during Prime95 stress test. The cores are indeed limited to 2 GHZ (2630qm)

 

Are you guys sure that there is no "Intel Speed Step Technology" option in your bios???
Because i have this option in my XPS 17 and disabling that option simply disables turbo boost on my i7-2630QM.
And i just thought to give it a try after looking at this post.
Here are the results (using intel burn test 5 rounds to stress cpu):

Turbo ON: Temperatures (83,82,83,80) with fan kicked in quite loud
Turbo OFF:Temperatures (71,69,70,69) and fan turned on only at mild speed

With Turbo ON cpu was at 2.60~2.80GHz in test and with Turbo OFF it was solid at 2.00GHz.

And turning tubo off caused processor speed (showed by intel burn test) to drop from 30GRops to 21GRops, and WEI only changed from 7.4 to 7.3.
No change in normal usage....

 

And therein lies the problem.

Intel Speed Step Technology dynamically changes the operating frequency of the CPU, thus the multipliers are changed on the fly according to the load conditions. Disabling it, locks the multiplier to 20 and causes the CPU to run at 2 GHz constantly, even on idle conditions. Of course this is not a problem if the laptop is on AC power, but it will reduce battery life (dunno how much though)

I've tried using ThrottleStop to disable Turbo Boost, but it gets re-enabled when the system restarts. If you find a better solution, you are more than welcome to share

 

There is much more to Intel Speedstep than just Turbo Boost. That is at least Intel's claim.

edit: my CPU is either locked at 800 mhz or 2 ghz with Speed Step disabled.

 

well i said it was solid at 2.00GHz in test, otherwise it still idles at 800MHz...

So it idles at 800MHz, kicked to 2.00GHz only when needed, what else u want ?????

EDIT: ok i guess may be one or two speed steps are lost between 800MHz and 2.00GHz by disabling Speed Step....
but i have no idea how much it matters in term of battery life.....

 

With Speed Step on, your processor can change into intermediate multipliers. Besides, Intel claims that it does other things such as changing voltage and frequency independently. Supposedly, it does other things mentioned below, which I don't frankly completely understand.

Processors — Frequently asked questions for Enhanced Intel SpeedStep® Technology on Mobile

OP's method works perfectly fine. I have created 4 power profiles, and I use Launchy to switch between them instantly. This way I can turn on Turbo Mode on demand while maintaining Intel Speed Step battey saving features.

Battery Saver (Turbo Off)
Balanced (Turbo Off)
High Performance (Turbo Off)
Turbo Mode (High Performance with Turbo Boost turned on)

 

Ok..... gonna try OP's method now....

 

well now with speed step enabled
all i can see is idle at 800MHz and when doing simple stuff as light browsing or even refreshing the page causes direct jump to 2.60GHz....no intermediate multipliers..... so i guess even speed step enabled is not going to add intermediate multipliers for light workload. Can't say anything about voltage management behind the scene......

 

Whats the performance like when disabling turbo boost? Anything noticeable?

 

Tried OP's method by modifying "High Performance" profile but failed to work.
Then tried to edit "Balanced" profile and applied it , it worked... and yes now in "Balanced" profile i can also see processor using multiple speeds between 800MHz to 2.00GHz. Superb

 

I don't even notice any slow down locking the processor at 800 MHz

 

yea..... no slow down at all

 

None whatsoever. I guess Turbo Boost is only useful when you're doing CPU intensive stuff, for gaming it just unnecessarily heats up the processor, even when the game doesn't need that extra 'boost'

 

Excellent thread. I was wary about purchasing the L502x because of the internal temps, but this nice and easy fix has sold me on it.

 

Does it work on L501X i5 processor?
edit: Also put minimum processor state to 99, worked for me.

 

it is necessary to put 99% to disable the turbo boost or you can put 50% in Expand Maximum processor state ?
It's better put 50% for less temperature ?

 

This might be a question for the XPS 7 forum, but would the larger laptop have less of a problem with the heat? I mean, more space between components, probably slightly larger vents to put the air out thru. Just wondering.

 

This is great, thanks! I just finished a good hour of Borderlands, and for the first time my wristwrest wasn't cooking. This allows my cooler to do a much better job of maintaining a constant temp.

Also, it seemed to actually smooth the gameplay out a bit, but I'm not sure if that was placebo. There was definitely no drop in performance.

Great fix!

 

Yeah, a 2 GHz throttled 2630/2720 will run anything fine. Most people don't realize how obscenely powerful the sandy bridge i7's are. They blow any AMD chip out of the water in terms of CPU performance, and are 3x more powerful than the medium/high-end second generation Core 2 Duo like the P8600.

 

Update: I've added a Temperature vs Time graph while playing The Witcher 2 for more than 2 hours. Notice how the temperatures are in between the lower and higher eighties

 

Could anybody explain, how to create a powerprofile with launchy?
I´m trying since one hour without any success.
Thanks!

 

I couldn't get Launchy's Runner plugin to pass command line to either cmd.exe or powercfg.exe

So I have to create a bat file that the Runner plugin would run.

For example, if I typed in "high", it would run the following .bat file.

The GUID following -setactive is from doing "powercfg.exe -l"

 

Did somebody try to disable Turbo Boost 2.0 in Services?

 

great work, rep+.

 

That's the MONITOR (gadget), not the technology... or isn't it?
Thanks, great job, so now my XPS can work cooler

 

Sorry guys but I dont get it, someone can explain me how to create the powerprofile with lunchy? With this the heat problem will be resolve?... finally, sorry if I seems stupid, but how I can turn off/on the turbo boost? is on BIOS or how? ty a lot dudes

 

For me, the procedure that Alvord12 posted definitely helped to lower my CPU temps during load. In Dragon Age: Origins (very CPU intensive game) temps easily reached high 90s, and one of the cores even hit 100C. After setting the Max. processor state to 99%, though, they went down to an average of mid-80s. The problem with some applications like Dragon Age is that they hog the CPU resource even if they don't need it. Indeed, my performance didn't go down one bit, and I managed to play 2 hours straight without any slowdowns whatsoever.

I don't know where you are lost, though. If you follow Alvord12's instructions to the letter, you'll be on your way in no time

EDIT: sorry, didn't quite catch your question until now. I don't know if Turbo Boost is toggle-able (is that a word?) via shortcuts. Really, though, you don't really need the Turbo Boost unless you're doing intensive stuff like media encoding/decoding.

 

Nice guide, got my temps down from high 80's to mid 70s on ~2.4GHz load. Left speed step just so anyone wants to know. Not a drop in performance.

 

TY canofspam, I was talking about this, how can u do this? the Lauchy that was talking about BobTHeSpiner... and about u "EDIT", u never OCed with games? I mean the turbo boost is not needed withsome games? ty

 

Awesome thanks man! Great find!! +Rep