Pentium M Speedstep Broken?

Having recently been laid off, and given the large issue of GeForce laptop videocards lately, I'm forced to keep using my Dell Inspiron 6000 that I've had for the past three years for another half a year or more. In the process of ownership I've upgraded my 1.4Ghz Celeron to a 1.73Ghz Pentium M Dothan, RAM from 128MB (ouch) to 2GB and a variety of other things.



I've come accross a problem, though, with my Pentium M. Speedstep, you see, appears broken.



The 1.73Ghz Pentium M is SUPPOSED to run at 13x133 (533 FSB) at 1.308VCore... I've played with RightMark CPU Clock Utility, Speedwitch XP, Notebook Hardware Control and CrystalCPUID, and just when I think it's fixed, and at 1.73Ghz, it breaks again and falls as low as 333Mhz (!!) and usually anywhere between the 800Mhz SpeedStep "floor" and 1.33Ghz, keeping the multiplier the same and messing with my FSB.



Eerily, the system seems to keep at 1.73Ghz in Windows, and when I go to do something USING my process (games, such as World of Warcraft, Age of Empires 3, Rise of Nations 2, etc, nothing too hardcore given my crappy system specs and lack of dedicated video card), it messes around with itself.



I have SpeedStep ENABLED in the BIOS, and for those uninitiated - SpeedStep disabled forces the CPU to run at 800Mhz 24/7 (the supposed lowest level of SpeedStep control) and having it enabled allows for it to be switched around with various software programs.



I also have played with Power Options, trying "Always On" (the one every other forum post has suggested essentially disables Speed Stepping) as well as "Home/Office Desk" and "Minimal Power Management."



Nothing, and I repeat nothing seems to work - even entering the Power Options Command Prompt editor (an option which shows you in a command line window whether thermal throttling - clocking down your processor - is enabled or not) and it's shown as disabled - yet it underclocks itself, in the picture shown, to 1327Mhz/102Mhz FSB (408Mhz).



I've Googled this for hours and spent countless time dicking around, hoping to maybe fix this and gotten no where, does anybody have any kind of suggestion as to make my processor run at 1.73Ghz constantly? None of these programs work, and honestly a Celeron M at 1.4Ghz with 1MB Cache is faster than this Pentium M 1.73Ghz running often at 800Mhz, even with double the cache, and I almost feel like cutting the $80 loss of buying this CPU last year and just putting the Celly in, although I don't want to.



I want to enjoy WoW in peace!

 

The Pentium M 735 is quite a gem. Especially when undervolted and/or overclocked

Firstly, uninstall all the power management programs youve installed and revert back to the default settings. Having multiple programs on can have adverse effects.

i) Install RMclock again > Go to the RMclock folder and run RMwipeout.reg

ii) Follow Step 1 2 and 3 of this guide. (no need to undervolt)

-Step 1 is to make sure your cpu isnt overheating or have errors
-Step 2,3 is to setup the CPU management properly

iii) Download and run CPU-z aswell (you FSB should be 99mhz)

I will show you how to lock the CPU to a specific speed after you have done the following.

 

Thanks, that actually worked. Really well!

 

Oh, now it'll let me post. Before it didn't.

The first thing I did, after noticing that it was running full load at around 84c (a new development, as far as I know), was take her apart just an hour or two ago, and saw this huge film of dust, perfectly obstructing 95% of the exhaust from the CPU. I also noticed she needs a new application of AS5, although I don't have any around, so the pathetic remainder of the previous application will have to do.

Then I messed around with RM Clock, as you had suggested. I "got" RM Clock, but it was kind've confusing, given the sheer amount of options available. After reading your guide, I was able to understand a few more things, and actually enabled under-volting. Before I had messed with undervolting (just for the heck of it) but it never actually enabled.

Now I've topped her out full load at just under 60c, having the speed range from 1.45 to the full 1.73Ghz of the processor, although I almost always game, so the full speed of the Dothan is almost always activated. I will say that the slight drop in speed (and resulting drop in vcore) does help cool her down, give her a "break" if you will. Needless to say that's a huge improvement. Thanks a bunch!

 

don't take it the wrong way but 1.73 Ghz is an M 740 not 735 because the Dell inspiron 6000 has an intel i915 chipset.

Matt Woller you can undervolt to reduce the heat. At 1.73 ghz (multiplier x13) the vcore should easily go below 1.100v and 0.700v or there about for the lowest multiplier (i.e. 800 Mhz).

Did you think about pin modding to boost the performance?
Pin Mod Guide Here
The procedure is safe and easy to perform.

 

Always good to see people keeping the old'uns alive!

Is that the mobility radeon 9700 in there?

 

No problem Matt. Welcome to NBR

I see, thanks for that. Honest mistake.

I had a feeling it wasnt a 735 either due to 1.7 3ghz

 

Oh wow, I wasn't aware the VCore would go THAT low. To be honest I haven't messed with a mobile Dothan much (until now) because I didn't feel it would matter as much. That was before my proccy was throttling back to 800Mhz, however! But yeah, I was under the impression it would go down maybe .1v on the VCore, but I'm not toying with much lower VCores, and that seems to run fine. Thanks for the tip, and lowering the VCore even more just netted me an additional... 9c, for the record.

Also, I would pin-mod, happily, but she's a 533Mhz FSB already. (13x133)

I've found about 41c idle (at 1.46Ghz throttled down and 1.068v) and 54c (at 1.73Ghz and 1.116v). That 1.116 is down from 1.308, so I'm wondering if there's more headroom there, but so far I'm happy with the results.

 

LOOOOOOL @ people still using Pentium M

 

Anyhooooow,
Right now im using a Toshiba laptop with
CPU: Pentium III 700 MHZ
RAM: 376 MB (dont ask me the speed lol)
GPU: Trident cyberblade AGP
OS: Windows ME Worst piece of junk EVER

Its pretty 1337

 

Nice. If SD-RAM weren't so expensive, I'd say go for a gig and put XP on her, but SD-RAM is ridiculously expensive.

And yeah, I was going to pick up a Core2Duo Dell (long story short I worked my way up in Dell to speaking with one of their Senior VPs, and getting a sweet discount on a new Inspiron 17xx - either 1705 or 1720, I forget what the model number is) but then got laid off, so that's setting my plans back a few months. But I can't wait to get a new lappy, the Intel GMA 900 is SO old in the tooth.

And the only reason I'm even taking a chance on the GeForce 8600GT Mobile in the new Inspiron is because the Senior VP is throwing in a free 3 year warranty, so when it invariably dies (as the reports are suggesting it will) in a year or two, I'll be covered.

 

You might be able to go lower. My Pentium M 725 1.6ghz had a default voltage of .988v - 1.340v

Undervolted: .700v - .988v

Fans dont even need to run anymore. Very awesome notebook to use for your lap.

 

My W3V with a 735 does .716v on 6x. And it's been pin-modded and runs at 2.26Ghz . But it needs 1.324v at the highest multiplier.

LOL what?? Seriously, Pentium M systems are still great notebooks. Yes, they are slow by today's standard in gaming or playing high def content, but they are fast enough for daily tasks. Infact, the slowest part of between a computer and the user is the user itself and the CPU is waiting for the user's input 90% of the time...

I still use my W3V, and to be honest it's still looks great and I'll pick it over alot of crap notebooks out there.

 

My P M 745 voltages were 0.716 V & 1.084V at full load. Honestly I think despite undervolting still the laptop was still hot, this was because of the GPU FireGL T2 my T42p came with. Comparing that against a new T61 with integrated graphics the latter is a joy to use on your lap. It also plays the majority of games I played on my T42p with the benefit of extended battery life.

After all a C2D processor is a Pentium M with 2 cores and newer manufacturing technology.

 

I've gotten her rounded out at 1.02v at 13x (1.73Ghz) stable, with a top recorded temp of 57c load, which is nearly 30c lower than what it was previously at. Before it would literally almost burn my leg, and now I can barely tell it's on. What a great difference!

Again, I'm only stuck with this system given I was recently laid off. I was, ironically, about two weeks out from ordering my new system, but that has obviously been delayed for a while, now.

I must say, upping the RAM to 2GB and putting the 1.73Ghz Dothan (in place of my 1.4Ghz Celeron M/1MB Cache) has made a huge performance difference, and really extended the life of this 3 1/2 year old laptop.

 

could you post up the instructions you gave him? i seem to be having similar issues here.

 

Those are the instructions. Which are you talking about?

 

You can still overclock with clockgen, I think I posted a how-to on this a while ago. To bad you didn't opt for a 7X5 chip you could easily get into the 2.1-2.3ghz range with those chips.

 

^ i was interested in this part right here. i wanted to know how to lock the cpu to it's optimal speed, rather than have it variable.

 

In any of the 3 profiles, check a single PST Index, and then activate that profile. And disable C1E in the advanced cpu settings. (In RMClock)

 

Use the Maximal performance profile in RMclock. It will only let you tick 1 multiplier, use the highest multiplier of course.

In the main profile page, make sure you use maximal performance in the drop down boxes

If sucessful, the RMclock wheel on the bottom should be completely red

 

ok, got it. thanks. seems as though i'm having some slight overheating problems too, so i'll go and try that undervolting tutorial.

 

Did you see the post he made immediatly after that one? He was obviously joking, since he is running a PIII.

My P M 745 voltages were 0.716 V & 1.084V at full load. Honestly I think despite undervolting still the laptop was still hot, this was because of the GPU FireGL T2 my T42p came with. Comparing that against a new T61 with integrated graphics the latter is a joy to use on your lap. It also plays the majority of games I played on my T42p with the benefit of extended battery life.

Incorrect, Core and Core 2 are both new designs. It was built off of the P-M, but certainly not that closely linked.

Greg