The ThrottleStop Guide

I've been using a clean install Win 10 Insider preview with TS successfully for a few months now on a i7 4700HQ, and yesterday I also upgraded a i7 4510U machine to Win 10, also running TS with no problems.

There may be some issues with starting TS automatically via Task Scheduler, in the sense of inconsistent behavior, if that is the case I'll report back when I have more/better info. (might be an isolated occurrence after upgrade).

 

Then you might be interested in this.

 

Ah yes, I saw some of those. I'm already annoyed at it.

But it seems like there's another issue. Apparentlyyyyy windows has been updating behind my back?
https://hostr.co/file/h0wh6t29I780/Screenshot1839.jpg

 

In Windows 10, is it possible to go into Computer Management and Disable Windows Updates that way?

http://i.imgur.com/Mq7tbJ4.png

No worries. I have not lost any sleep over ThrottleStop and Windows 10 compatibility. When I was using the Windows 10 preview editions, ThrottleStop worked exactly the same as in Windows 7 or 8 or Vista, etc. I didn't see or hear about any issues during Windows 10 beta testing. Maybe next month I will have a look at those bugs you found when overclocking your CPUs well beyond the Intel specs.

 

I don't believe it is. The best you can do is "defer" updates or deny "3rd party" updates like GPU drivers (I THINK). You MUST at some point install all Microsoft updates.

And you only get the option to defer/delay on Windows 10 Pro. Windows 10 home MUST update automatically. There is no option to stop this.

 

Home versions were always something to steer clear from, but this makes them outright toxic. Ah ... that blissful day; ' Windows update kills x million devices'. The 'kills' bit will, mostly, mean 'bricked', but that's synonymous for most.

 

@unclewebb Doesn't seem to be much of an interest on the mobile side, only one other person tried it as far as I know. If the desktop chips were unlocked then it most probably would have been huge.

The VCCIN override was very handy at 4.8GHz and not only helped stability but reduced power consumption by ~8% so might be worth adding in TS if not already there.

 

I'm having the same issue. I upgraded to Windows 10 Pro, have TS 8.00b2 running at startup. It worked perfectly, now it doesn't run at startup even though it's set and shows it should be..i'm baffled..

 

I decided to go from Windows 8.1 to Windows 10 last night so I could better understand any issues that people are having with ThrottleStop. I originally had ThrottleStop 8.00 b2 starting up with Windows 8.1 using the Task Scheduler. After the upgrade, the first time Windows 10 started up, the ThrottleStop icon automatically appeared at the lower right Notification Area / System Tray just like it always has for me in Windows 8.1. I haven't found a single issue so far. ThrottleStop seems to work in Windows 10 exactly the same as it worked in Windows 8.1, Windows 7 or Windows Vista.

The ThrottleStop task I created is in the Task Scheduler Library folder. This folder also contains some additional tasks like GoogleUpdateTaskMachineCore and GoogleUpdateTaskMachineUA. ThrottleStop is still compiled with a very old version of Visual C++ so I have the task set to Configure for Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008. I will try to post a series of pictures that show the settings that I use.

I also have an icon for ThrottleStop at the lower left part of the screen. If I exit ThrottleStop, clicking once on this icon starts ThrottleStop up without any issues.

If you are having problems maybe mention what antivirus program you are running. Some of these nanny programs are a pain. I like using Avast Antivirus. If you stick with just the basic program and disable the 101 additional features that have been added over the years, Avast is still a very light weight app. When set up correctly, Avast does not get in the way of running ThrottleStop.

I originally had some Nvidia driver issues but the usual uninstall / install a few times seems to have fixed that.

The other Windows 10 problem I have is a MS app called Runtime Broker that is gobbling up a pile of CPU cycles. I am hoping it settles down in a while. There were some issues with this .exe and Windows 8 so I will wait and see. Perhaps it doesn't like the Windows update disable job I did. I was curious to see how that works.

After killing RuntimeBroker.exe, reported C0% is very similar to Windows 8.1 and perhaps a hair better. It is just this one rogue task that is keeping me from giving Win 10 the thumbs up.

I am definitely interested in that one but last time I looked at this, I couldn't figure it out. If you have any helpful hints, send them my way.

 

@unclewebb
Cmd 0x12 read VCCIN override

Cmd 0x13 write VCCIN Override
Override = Volts / 1.024 - ie 2.000V = 0x800
Disable SVID comm's = bit 31 - Also acts as a lockbit requiring power down to clear.

 

@Dufus - I thought about buying a Gigabyte desktop board to learn more about VCCIN. The info you posted just saved me some money. Thanks.

VCCIN is definitely a feature that is on the things to add to ThrottleStop list. Being able to reduce power consumption could be very useful for Intel's modern lineup of power limited CPUs.

My Windows 10 testing is kind of a mixed bag so far. The new OS has my laptop sucking 23 Watts continuously today while I am not doing anything. After half an hour of this, my lap is not impressed. If I released software like that, I would get roasted in the forums. No pun intended. I might try doing a clean install next week to a new hard drive to see if that fixes some issues. If you are happy with W7 or W8, I would recommend waiting. There might be a reason why this new and improved operating system is being distributed by Microsoft for free.

 

Believe me, clean install is the only way to go. The only problem is that "upgrading" is required to change your key into a win 10 key, or you need to buy a win 10 key fresh. So you'd need to upgrade --> clean install.

Oh there is a reason all right. They want control. Forced updates, locked down user settings, making it more and more difficult to change default programs in the system... all sorts of crap. Also Solitaire requires monthly or yearly subscriptions to avoid ads. On an OS you paid for. When Win 10 fixes its issues and allows more user control back to the user, I'll get it, and I'll be using Start 10 on it just like I use Start 8 on Win 8.1.

If you're on win 10 though Unclewebb, can you test the CPU load differences? Win 8.1 has an issue where when task manager says "100%" it's only using ~78% CPU power via real load (throttlestop, HWiNFO64, etc monitoring). Some programs like OBS/Handbrake/TSBench can bypass that limit, but most games like BF4 and GTA V etc can't, and will limit themselves to 100% according to Task Manager. I know Sony Vegas rendering seems to lock itself to 100% task manager. Could you tell me if win 10 exhibits such an issue?

 

@unclewebb I hear you, especially with Skylake imminent.

BTW that override does not need disabling SVID comm's to work, not sure why disabling comm's is useful unless it somehow helps when coming out of package idle states.

 

Any way to really stretch battery life with a i7 920XM? I get <3 hours of battery life.. Like, lock it to a really low speed/voltage like I could with my Core 2 laptop.

 

As always, early adopters have to fix Win 10 issues by themselves. Tonight I found a way to tame the Runtime Broker app that was gobbling up CPU cycles and leaking memory. This issue has been around for a long time but it is still not fixed in Windows 10.

http://www.tenforums.com/general-discussion/7907-runtime-broker-process.html

A good old registry edit killed this offensive task. Killing the Time Broker also killed the Live Tiles feature but I never liked that feature anyhow. If I want to know the weather, I will go outside. I don't need to be constantly spoon fed useless information in the new Start menu.

The problem with CPU usage in Windows 8 and Windows 10 is that this information is based off of the default CPU speed. For the 4700MQ, the default multi is 24 and the max turbo multi is 36 so the Windows Resource Monitor tells me that the Max Frequency is up near 150% (36/24) at times.



How is it possible to go beyond the Maximum Frequency?

This same sort of misleading info shows up in the Task Manager Performance graph but I think the max data there gets clipped at 100% so not many people have noticed this bug. ThrottleStop uses high performance timers in the CPU and gives you some very accurate C0% information which tells you exactly what the CPU is doing. When I run 4 threads of the TS Bench on a 4700MQ, I am fully using 4 out of a possible 8 threads so ThrottleStop reports C0% at about 51%. 50% for the TS bench plus another percent for Windows background stuff. During this test, the Task Manger graph is showing something like 73% (half of 146%). This is very misleading unless you understand the math it is doing.

Yes. That bug (feature) is still present in Windows 10.

Edit - Now that Windows 10 has been fixed, idle CPU usage is back to normal. At 0.2% in the C0 state at idle, I think it is a hair more efficient than Windows 8.1 so it should be competitive with previous versions of Windows for benching.

http://i.imgur.com/RMShAdQ.png

 

So basically, because the default clockspeeds of our machines are so low, when windows caps programs to 100% it means that we'd see no difference unless multitasking if we turned on or off turbo boost?

That's what kind of new level of retarded cow goat? *sigh* and I suppose there's no way to fix this stupid "feature" in Windows, is there? Because Microsoft is SO SMART.

 

I have two machines with a 4720HQ (see sig), I'm curious if anyone else has this chipset and what settings do they use to limit temps?

 

Maybe "maximum frequency" should be named HFM or base frequency. Seems to work similar to what you'll see if you used i7Turbo to monitor.

Interesting that you are seeing a software cap. Never seen the OS do that, is it the software running that is the culprit?

@Eason best way to limit temperatures is to have something with a decent cooling system at the expense of extra cost and weight. Given that TIM and heatsink is applied properly and airflow is max all you can do is undervolt and limit power if the machine is not up to removing the heat .

 

Sure, I understand that. Referring more to profile tweaks, etc.

For example, I set profile 1 at x26 (100% non-turbo speed) with an alarm for a x20 profile at CPU 90C and a second alarm for x18 as a failsafe for GPU 90C. Don't think the GPU has ever gotten that hot on either machine, but the gigabyte has gotten close (like 88-89) a few times.

If you allow turbo, both of these machines quickly get into 90C+ territory. If you disable turbo, though, the blade runs pretty comfortably at 80-85C CPU and 75-80C GPU. The gigabyte runs about 5C hotter across the board but, likely due to construction materials, remains cooler on the surface.

Undervolting the core to -50mv is about the limit, past that and I get BSOD's. I couldn't prove it but I think undervolting the IGP was leading to more instability, though I'm not sure why it might be so.

 

What happens is this, basically.
Games/programs will use up to "100%" of the CPU according to windows. This 100% is less than the actual 100% that is capable. For reasons previously unknown, some programs would simply refuse to pass that limit. So let's say my system uses 20% of my CPU aside from gaming, and the game uses say 80% of my CPU (seems to be the point when many games will stop benefitting/drawing power). This 20% and 80% limit the programs are working with are with Task Manager's 100% limit. Another good example is with Sony Vegas. As you know rendering programs tend to take 100% of a processor, but Vegas takes only 100% as dictated by Windows 8's task manager. There's still leftover power, and it doesn't use a true 100%, which means it's inefficient. And the games are the same way. When GTA V uses a full 80% of my CPU and doesn't allow itself to take anymore, it's in reality only using 60-66% of my CPU, and thus wasting a lot of power that it shouldn't.

Some programs and benchmarks don't use that limit; like TSBench and most CPU stress tests like XTU Stress and Prime95, etc. But since most programs don't, it results in a large wastage of CPU power for games that would honestly truly benefit from it, like high FPS titles and BF4 and GTA V etc. Here's a couple pictures showing the difference between a Sony Vegas 13 render and TSBench:

Spoiler

 

If your unit was plugged in, then it may have been the anti malware service: it starts when unit is idle and plugged in and uses a lot of CPU time, hence the power usage. If unit was not plugged in, then the only culprit I can think of is dGPU driver not working properly, if you have a dGPU. Just until recently I've had this very issue with Optimus, but somewhere down the road a driver update finally fixed it.

A note for everyone trying out Win 10: automatic driver updates are enabled by default and in some cases this can results in some very unfortunate side effects. If you want more control over this, one easy way is to disable automatic driver updates (in Devices and Printers right click on Computer icon and select Device Installation Settings). One can also use a tool from MS.

PS: also, regarding TS not starting with Windows, after using the device more I would call it an isolated incident. No issues so far.

 

Can anyone tell me why under any load, my computer is going down to non-turbo speeds? Limit reasons says EDP for PL1-2. Power maxes at 27W.

This is with TS off/on, and XTU uninstalled. High perf.

 

@D2 Ultima Tried SV13 after reg :/ and with the dual core HT (4 threads) and 1.33x HFM to turbo ratio highest render load c0% was 99.7%, mostly bouncing around mid 90's. I suspect there is something else amiss.

@Eason EDP, PL1 and PL2 are separate entities, were any of them red? What column(s) were they under? Were you running of battery and/or AC? How hot was the machine?

 

@Dufus they were yellow, does that not mean that was the throttle reason? They were under all 3 columns. Running under AC power, core temps 50-70C.

edit: Also I wasn't able to get TS to actually limit my clocks.

edit2: strangely when I installed XTU and opened it, I saw that although 1 core was set to x36, 2-4 cores were set to x26, despite this not being the default setting. I set it back to defaults in XTU and my processor speed went to 3.6ghz. Ok I thought, then I tried running TS bench-- immediately back to 2.6ghz. TS still only monitoring.

edit 3: did a clean install of all razer win 10 drivers and it seems to have fixed the turbo BUT I can't get TS itself to control any of the clocks. I can set them to whatever I like, but it has no effect.

 

This is very strange. "Disable turbo" will work to limit my clocks EVEN WHEN TS IS OFF but no multiplier settings work

Xtu will work to limit clocks but the whole point was I wanted to use TS instead of XTU .

 

Hi dufus,
I try to render in 3dsmax that uses %100 cpu (Y50 with 4720HQ). Multipliers are as follows 1core 36T 2cores 35T and 3-4cores at 34T, locked multiplier at 36T and BDProchot is unchecked. CPU frequency is around 32T,33.5T while rendering without cooler. Limit reasons are PL1, PL2 sometimes they are red. I undervolted about -80mV cpu core, -60mV intel GPU and cpu cache. What should I do about PL1,PL2 warnings?

And I've one more question intel XTU is not working like Throttlestop. It works only 5-6 seconds then frequency drops to 2.6ghz to default value... Do I have to uninstall XTU?

 

Eason, I've a similar problem but the opposite. XTU is not limiting my frequencies as TS does. We have both have the same CPU 4720Hq. Maybe you can try to uninstall XTU and restart then start with a fresh TS folder...

 

I just want to '+1' this. I noticed huge CPU spikes during idle and finally narrowed it down to Windows Defender that was set to scan when the computer has been sat at idle for ten minutes. The process shows up in the task manager as 'MsMpEng' and chews through CPU.

Navigate to '\Microsoft\Windows Defender\Windows Defender Scheduled Scan' in the task scheduler. Right click this and select 'properties' to open a pop-up window. Click the 'Conditions' sub menu on the pop up window. Deselect 'Start this task only if the computer is idle for:' box. Alternatively set it for a longer period or only on AC power, as you prefer. Profit.

Hope this helps.

 

This is actually something I've done, though I can try again. I noticed before that ts didn't work but xtu did, and then suddenly ts was limiting my clocks correctly. Only then, I couldn't un-limit lol.

 

Turbo ratio limits work in FIVR, but not the profile limits. And turbo limits works while TS is turned off, supposedly.

 

This is how it's been since I got the PC. Every time Win Task Manager says "ayy 100%" other monitoring software (Playclaw 4 and Playclaw 5, and then Throttlestop 7 and then 8, as well as HWiNFO64) would inform me that it in fact was not 100%. I've never been able to fix it. If you could try with your 4700MQ, that'd be better; I remember reading somewhere that dual core + HT is seen and used as if it were a regular quadcore by many programs, and I wouldn't put it past Windows 8 to be limited for only quadcore + HT or higher setups. Also, if you have a way to adjust HFM to turbo ratio that I can try without a sBIOS mod (if it fixes it for you) let me know.

How many watts are you using? If I'm right, when you're being limited to 32x or so, you should be drawing 47W constantly. If that's the case, you can't fix that on any HQ processor no matter what you do (well maybe Dufus can; with a system BIOS mod... but he hasn't one of those machines to try). It's a limit imposed by microsoft, and the main reason why the MQ chips in good laptops are better. The Y50 isn't really a good laptop for anyone who requires good, stable performance.

 

Eason - If you are having problems with ThrottleStop, can you post some pictures that show how you have ThrottleStop setup and explain what sort of problem that you are having. If Limit Reasons is showing something in red like EDP or PL1 or PL2 or TEMP, etc., your CPU is going to be throttling and that throttling is going to supersede various other settings in ThrottleStop. I wish ThrottleStop could completely take charge of a CPU like it used to do in the Core i7-920XM days but some throttling in the HQ processors is beyond what ThrottleStop can fix. The bios in some laptops can set various power limits significantly lower than what Intel recommends. This means that a 4720HQ in one laptop model can end up running completely different than the exact same CPU in a different laptop model and ThrottleStop or Intel XTU will not be able to do anything about that.

If you select Disable Turbo in ThrottleStop, that is going to disable Turbo Boost and it will probably remain disabled even after you exit ThrottleStop. Values are being written to and saved to registers within the CPU and most of these values are left in the CPU as is after you exit ThrottleStop. The Turn On / Turn Off feature or exiting ThrottleStop does not reset your CPU to its default specs. Maybe it should do that but it doesn't.

Another thing you need to know is that if you are using ThrottleStop and XTU at the same time or one after the other, some settings that Intel XTU reports might not be accurate. Both programs are writing information to the exact same CPU registers but in some situations, Intel XTU assumes that it is the one and only program that is changing these registers so it doesn't update itself. XTU will report whatever it last set these registers to which might be completely wrong if ThrottleStop was used and changed them. This can be confusing.

Choose whatever program you like. When setup correctly, I think most laptops will perform better when using only ThrottleStop compared to if they are only using Intel XTU.

Thanks for posting your tests. I have known about this Windows bug for a long time but I didn't realize that there is software being limited because of it. Unfortunately, I doubt Microsoft or Sony will ever admit to this or do anything to fix this problem.

Here is a simple test that clearly shows this issue. When running 4 out of 8 threads in the TS Bench test, the Task Manager - Details tab reports CPU usage at 50%.



While at the exact same time with the exact same TS Bench load, the Task Manager - Performance tab shows 72% to 73%.



How does stuff like this go unnoticed for years? Maybe someone can ask the Windows 10 team to fix or at least explain that discrepancy.

The RuntimeBroker.exe program that was causing excessive CPU usage on my Windows 10 laptop is in charge of managing permissions for Metro apps and the Live Tiles. This program that some times goes rogue is another issue that has been around for years. After killing that app, CPU usage in Windows 10 is back to normal. RuntimeBroker likes to blame a bad Live Tile for its issues but it is up to RuntimeBroker not to get stuck in an infinite loop, chewing up CPU cycles, if it discovers a bad Live Tile.

 

Had to drop by to say thanks Unclewebb for TS. I have tried it on various PC's, but was pleasantly surprised by the temps and the finally the ability to UV Digital, Analog, and Sys Agent. The max temp might seem high, but I did a few runs of Geekbench 3 to see if it would break 80C or throttle to under its base freq. Instead it managed to hold the turbo clocks for most (if not the entire) benchmark.

 

Thanks for the reply @unclewebb, take a look at the screenshot for my problem in a nutshell:

TS doesn't limit my clocks. The only thing I can get to work is limiting turbo, which functions whether or not TS is turned on or off. I just want TS to be able to limit my CPU to something below x26.

edit: sorry you can't see it because of the window-- only "set multiplier" is checked.

The strange thing is that TS did used to work. It didn't work at first, then it started working seemingly randomly. Then I wanted to unlock the turbo frequencies again and it stopped working entirely.

 

@Eason - Your screenshot shows that ThrottleStop is only in Monitoring mode. In this mode, the Set Multiplier feature and the two Clock Modulation features do not do anything. Your CPU will be left in some undefined random state. If you are using ThrottleStop and you want it to try and control your CPU then you need SpeedStep enabled, you need to click on the Turn On button and you also need to be using the Windows High Performance power profile with the Minimum processor state set to 100%. Those are the basics. I would also leave BD PROCHOT unchecked.

My Lenovo Y510P disables Intel Turbo Boost when the CPU and Nvidia GPU are being used. This can be completely fixed by using the ThrottleStop - Set Multiplier feature, with ThrottleStop turned on of course. On some laptops, the Set Multiplier feature might be needed while on other laptops, adjusting the Turbo Ratio Limits might be enough or perhaps you will need to use both features. It all depends on the laptop and what throttling method the manufacturer decided to use. Post some more pics and remember to include the entire ThrottleStop window.

You are welcome. Thanks for the feedback and thanks to Dufus for showing me where all these different voltages are hiding. I am looking forward to adding VCCIN reporting and adjustment to ThrottleStop as well. I like having a few unique features that the competition doesn't have.

 

I left it "off" in that photo to demonstrate that it still disables turbo, but even with TS "ON" it still doesn't limit the clocks.

edit: got home, doubled checked settings-- and found that TS was actually working. Then I ran a benchmark, and literally halfway through it went from working to going crazy.

Whether TS is on or off it is still governing my PC. I can see TS switching profiles as the temps reach the alarms, it's just the profiles have no effect on the clocks-- only "disable turbo".

To be clear: I'm on high performance profile. XTU is uninstalled, no service running. The downclocking functions of TS below 100% speed do not work. Limiting turbo to less than x36 does. And it works the same whether ts is "on" or "off".

 

Can you post a screenshot or better yet, a ThrottleStop log of your testing so I can see what you are seeing? You need to keep an eye on Limit Reasons while you are testing to see if your CPU is throttling due to power consumption or heat. If your CPU is hitting one of these limits, ThrottleStop will lose control of your CPU.

You have setup different profiles in ThrottleStop so why not test them first to see if they work or not. Use something simple like a single thread of the TS Bench test for testing purposes. This way you can see how or if ThrottleStop works without running into a power or thermal limit.

The screenshot that @ Fujikido posted shows that ThrottleStop is able to limit the multiplier in his 4720HQ to 8 without any problems so the Set Multiplier feature is definitely working on this CPU model. Here is a screenshot of my 4700MQ running a single thread TS Bench test using a reduced Turbo multiplier of 30.

http://i.imgur.com/vVdbOCd.png

Here is another screenshot with my 4700MQ being limited to the 18 multiplier which is less than the default 24 multiplier.

http://i.imgur.com/TszmdvS.png

ThrottleStop allows me to fully control the speed of this CPU. In 100 MHz steps, I can set any speed from 800 MHz to 3400 MHz and the CPU will use that speed as long as it is not thermal throttling or reaching a power limit.

 

I have 2 laptops with this processor, so yes I agree it's very strange that it works fine on my p34 but not my razer.

Ok, so this is a log showing me running the TS bench on a profile set to x18 with turbo disabled, normally this profile is triggered if the GPU would ever hit 90. During the bench, I was turning TS on/off, just so you can see that the "disable turbo" function is the only one that works as well as that there is no difference between TS being on or off.



This ss shows the test setup. I've got it set to x18, disabled turbo. However, it will simply stay at x26, which is not a low enough multiplier for me as a failsafe. If "disable turbo" was not checked, it would simply max at x36. I've tried ticking/unticking every box, but nothing makes the clocks stick.

 

Here is a log of a single-threaded TS bench run with only "set multiplier" at x 26 but not disabling turbo. As you can see, the clocks are definitely not at x26.

 

GOT IT! I had to force shut down my computer. It seems that despite defaulting my XTU settings, then uninstalling it and the intel ME, it was still somehow setting things on boot. I guessed this might be the case so I shut it down improperly to trigger the intel watchdog. Now TS is behaving as it should (although it is still governing the CPU despite being set to "off", so I think that's a bug on its own)

 

Wonder if the problem here is the locked down Razer rather than TS or XTU itself... XD

 

I have been dealing with throttling issue since years and I decided to post a topic. I read many answers though couldn't find a way to fix it. I am using Macbook Pro with Windows 10 installed. I am using Throttlestop to disable turboboost and using nvidiaInspector to overclock GPU. Can you check if I am missing something? Thanks.

PS: Its not turned on in screenshot

 

The only way I can think of to do that would be to use a BCLK strap of say 167MHz, that way you should be covered up to 4.5GHz with a multi of 27 or 22x for ~3.7GHz.

Remember the power reporting problem with SNB? Well you might find a similar problem with HSW where increasing VCCIN will reduce current to the CPU thereby estimating lower power and vice-versa. Something to keep in mind.

@Eason that can happen if MSR 0x64C is set, maybe you can check? If that is the case and you are not able to change it then you can always use the maximum performance override setting, not a part of TS as it's memory mapped.

 

Sorry, MSR 0x64C? What's that?

 

Haha if I could be nearly stable like that >__<
Or have the heat be manage-able XD.

 

@D2 Ultima you can limit your multi to 22x or maybe even use the 125MHz strap, don't need to run flat out. Trick is getting it to work, is there an option in your BIOS for it?

@Eason please run the following and post back Dump.txt

 

I am glad you finally got this figured out. I was starting to run out of ideas.

I have always hated the ThrottleStop - Turn On / Turn Off feature. That button only controls 3 things. When ThrottleStop is in Monitoring mode it immediately stops updating the Set Multiplier value in the CPU as well as the two different Clock Modulation values. When you switch from active mode to Monitoring mode, the CPU will use whatever values are presently stored in those registers. This allows Windows to take over control of these registers. During the early days of development, some people were literally scared of what ThrottleStop was capable of doing to their laptop. I had to add in some sort of safety feature to try and encourage more users to give ThrottleStop a try without worrying so much that their laptop would go up in smoke.

On many modern laptops, neither type of Clock Modulation is being used for throttling purposes and often times the Set Multiplier register is not used either. Maybe it is time to ditch the misleading Turn On / Turn Off button. I have also thought about moving this button so it is clear that this only applies to Set Multiplier, Clock Modulation and Chipset Clock Modulation.

If I remove that button or move it, there would be complaints so I have just left it. If you have decided to use ThrottleStop on a regular basis then leave ThrottleStop in Active mode 24/7. This allows ThrottleStop to control your CPU as best as it can.

@dannyterrazza - Your screenshot shows that your CPU is barely above an idle yet it is running at nearly 80°C. That is a sign of an inadequate cooling solution or your heatsink and fan are filthy and could use some maintenance.

Here are the specs for a Core i7-3615QM.

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Core_i7/Intel-Core i7-3615QM Mobile processor.html

CPU World shows that the 3615QM has a default frequency of 2300 MHz. The Disable Turbo feature works in Monitoring mode. As soon as you click on Disable Turbo, that should limit your CPU to a maximum speed of 2300 MHz and that seems to be what it is doing. When using ThrottleStop I recommend using the Windows High Performance profile with the Minimum processor state set to 100%. This allows ThrottleStop to control your CPU without having to fight with Windows over control of your CPU.

The real problem is that your CPU is a 45 Watt processor but the cooling solution that Apple is using is probably not capable of dissipating this much heat. The result is sky high temperatures and thermal throttling. Instead of using Disable Turbo to limit the heat output of your CPU, another thing you might want to try is the PP0 option in the TPL - Turbo Power Limits window.



That setting will turn your 45 Watt processor into a 35 Watt processor. The advantage of limiting your CPU based on power is that when it is lightly loaded, it will still be able to reach full speed. It will only start to throttle back when it is working very hard. This setting should let the CPU reach the full 45 Watts or higher for 1 second and then it will be reduced after that to keep temperatures from going sky high. You can also combine this with the Clamp option. With Clamp you could turn your CPU into a low power slug if you had to.

http://i.imgur.com/JOcQ2SC.png

The TS Bench usually runs at full speed on my laptop and will use the 34 multiplier continuously. In the above example I have turned my 47 Watt processor into a 22.7 Watt processor. The CPU automatically throttles itself just enough so it doesn't exceed this power limit. That keeps the temperatures in check. With this exact same setting, if I was only running 1 or 2 threads of the TS Bench test, the CPU would still be able to run at its maximum speed. This is an easy way to create the ultimate low power UM processor. I rarely hear about anyone using this ThrottleStop feature.

@Dufus - Thanks for Dumper. I should have wrote a tool like that for myself years ago! That makes it easy to see if the bios has set up the important registers consistently across all threads and cores.

General question - How many man hours of development time did it take the Windows 10 team to come up with those funky new blue sliders. Don't blame me. That is a Windows 10 feature.

 

Unfortunately I don't. I'd need a full Prema BIOS for it, which I'm only gonna use when I upgrade my GPUs (whenever that is) due to it breaking my warranty to flash it. But consumer chipsets like ours don't usually like such high base clock multis as far as I remember.

 

I will run that when I get home. I'm not sure why but ts suddenly stopped working again so I force shut down the computer and it started working again.

@unclewebb I've set the TPL to 23 w (22.7 results in "please enter a positive number") but the package power will stabilize at 31.1W during the bench.

Also I clicked the "lock" button to see what it did and now, strangely enough, it's locked how do I undo my stupidness?

 

What? Don't you have a Razer and Gigabyte? You have no Prema BIOS to use. Prema only mods GPU vBIOSes and Clevo system BIOSes as far as I know.