*HP dv6z AMD Llano (6XXX series) Owners Lounge*

Did you bring your cooling mod with you ?

 

Just to be clear, I found TEN CAP's:

11.9 CAP 1
11.9 CAP 2
11.9 CAP 3
11.9 CAP 4
11.11 CAP 1
11.11 CAP 2
11.11 CAP 3
11.12 CAP 1
11.12 CAP 2
11.12 CAP 3

Just want to make sure you didn't omit one for some reason?

 

I just notice if you disable the touchpad via double clicking left corner, you get a orange light in the middle top. Omg, HP, why you brother with all the light with the touchpad.....

 

Nah i didn't bring my cooler, wish i did though. I ended up sitting the back of the laptop on some water bottle caps =)

Is the 12.1 drivers better than 12.1a? where are you guys downloading the caps?

 

I said a wrong number but all those caps are the ones that I installed

 

Thanks, doing it right now. There must just be one of those CAPs that work. I don't know that I'm willing to test each one though.

Yeah. I don't mind the orange indicator light to know if it's on or off. But the white ring is dumb, imho. Really? And the HP light on the LCD lid is ok, but they need to have an option to switch it off.

Here through 11.12 CAP 1: http://www.rage3d.com/cap/

11.12 CAP 3: http://sites.amd.com/us/game/downloads/pages/crossfirex-app-profiles.aspx

Looking for 11.12 CAP 2 (although I already had it).

 

Here you go amd_catalyst_11.12_cap2.exe

 

Out of curiosity, did you restart after each CAP install or install them all then restart? I don't know that it matters.

 

No, I just installed them with the option "restart later" and then at the very last put the "restart" button but I doubt that has any different effect on the caps.

 

11.12 CAP2 Found it using google. Hope this helps.

I see that each CAP has a change log indicating what game it improves. Wouldn't it be easier to find the game that your playing on the Specific CAP to see if it works or not?

EDIT:
Just looked at each release Notes and realized that not all games are included.

 

Well, I just did the CAP dance, and while I can say BF3 is improved it still is far from smooth. Adds about 5-7 FPS to BF3 @ 1080p but I can play without Xfire at 1080p at 28-35 fps on average and feels a lot smoother. However, I will add your recommendation to "the guide" because it clearly helps and sounds like moreso in some games than others.

 

For the E-450 I do not understand what you mean by "1.65/2.10". AMD literature indicates the GPU can increase its clock by about 20% but there is no mention of increasing the CPU clock by a similar amount although it would be nice if it could.

Your post is very valuable for people wanting to run difficult software like Skyrim but do not have a lot of money to spend. Thank you for posting it.

One thing I am curious about is if adding another 4Gig SODIMM improved the sustainable bandwidth on your machine? One DDR3 1333 MHz memory module gives about 6400 MB/s sustainable bandwidth under ideal conditions where a continuous data stream is written to contiguous memory locations. [For random reads and writes it is much lower than that.] Adding another module can improve performance by 40% if it is added to a second channel or about 20% if added to the same channel. Sometimes, however, there is no speed increase because the memory controller cannot deliver enough current to drive both modules and must decrease the memory clock to a lower value. From what I have read the E-450 has a single channel memory controller but there is nothing to indicate if there would be a significant improvement in sustainable bandwidth by adding a second memory module. Did you notice a significant improvement in frame rate while running Skyrim after adding the second SODIMM?

There may be no way to overclock the E-series. Tests have shown that even when utilities indicate a higher clock speed the hardware limits it to the original design maximum. That is a good thing as far as I am concerned because every rise of 7 degrees Celsius in the temperature of a semi-conductor cuts its remaining life expectancy in half.

Benchmarking is difficult especially when most of them test other systems as well. Most graphics benchmarks also test the disk subsytem and low-power systems have slower low-power drives. Going to 8GB of RAM should minimize the need to go to disk but that is not how the machines are usually tested. There is also the problem if the CPU is very involved with GPU functionality. In this case the machine can have great CPU benchmark results and great GPU results but with real software their overall performance is only mediocre.

 

As far as I know, the CPU is 1.65GHz with no turbo beyond that and GPU is 500MHz with turbo to 600MHz.

Curious about that too, but I think he was just saying that he's got plenty of RAM. Bobcat has single channel memory controller.

But the benefits of the E-450 over the E-350 from a graphics standpoint are fairly significant now that I look at it. 600MHz vs 500MHz for the GPU core and 1333MHz vs 1066MHz DDR3 memory. That's a 20% improvement over the GPU core and 25% memory improvement. As we've seen from our DV6z's that kind of overclock can reap some significant benefits. For example my system runs 780 GPU / 880 RAM over stock 600/800? sot that's 30%/10% and RAM usually has more significant improvement in performance clock for clock.

I am able to overclock my E-series, but it requires a fixed BIOS to do so. And the benefits are minimal. Since the voltage cannot be raised, the required voltage goes up exponentially. I was able to get 1.76GHz and required max voltage of 1.300v, where stock 1.60GHz I only need 1.1875v. Temps weren't much of an issue, but it did affect battery life, and wasn't 100% stable. I could have gone to 1.7GHz, but then what's the point? 100MHz won't help much and required 1.2825v, so again battery life with little noticeable benefit from the slight overclock.

I wanted a machine with the E-450 but the cheapest system I could find was the HP DM1z for $425, the Lenovo X120e with E-450 was $475 I believe (I don't think they offer it anymore for some reason ). I landed on the Asus Eee 1215b during an online sale for $279, so I was sold and satisfied with my purchase. Would I like more performance? Always. But for the price I got the machine I'm really satisfied.

 

This has probably been mentioned earlier, but if you are running patch 1.4 of Skyrim or up, you do not need TESV acceleration layer or Skyboost. The latest patch makes the game more optimized.

 

Yeah, I saw that note too on the accel layer page, and my testing showed no improvement. It's definitely better optimized now. Before I could barely run 15 fps at 800x480 on my E-350 now I can run 15+ at 1024x576, average about 18, so its playable.

 

The CPU itself does not Turbo on E450? Okay, so the data in that linked article was not accurate. Thanks for clarifying.

 

for some reason my bf3 no longer launches.. after i did that cap install lastnight and than tried teh game today.. neither campaign or multiplayer.. or maybe its a game problem.

 

Are you using 12.1 or 12.1a? Coz I'm curious if the cap installations work on 12.1a or it works better on 12.1.

 

12.1a

message length

 

No turbo. it does have three P-states, P0, P1, P2 but no B0 state. My E-350 is set to 600Mhz, 1200MHz and 1600MHz. You can adjust as you wish, as long as speed does not exceed 1600MHz and voltage does not exceed 1.3V. So it's good for improving battery life, but no real overclock opportunities with either E-350 or E-450. And usually in the case of a CPU like this, battery life is more important than performance.

 

Opened up my 6135dx yesterday to unplug logo light and fix a keyboard flex

Just a note for people doing those:
1.After take of screen brezel, there is no need to remove the screen to unplug it (Yes,stupid me, I removed then find out I dont need to.. cuz manual does not include how to replace a defective logo light ~~)
2. If you have keyboard flex just pop it out, either roll some scotch tape to some thickness or use those thick double sided tape and support where it flex. ( these 6135dx have some horrible keyboard mount job)

 

amd catalyst 12.3 RC drivers, i might try them.. AMD Catalyst 12.3 RC (8.950.0 January 31) [Win7/Vista - All Cards Mod] Unofficial - Guru3D.com Forums

EDIT: Horrible texture problem in skyrim, will revert back.

 

unplugging the logo would probably save a little battery juice huh??

 

Care to mark up a photo or something to show how / where this is located? As many times as I've disassembled my laptop I never looked for it, but never saw it either. I'd like to disable mine as well. No need for it to be on, and can only help with battery life even if a little bit.

 

I had a keyboard flex problem too, but was lucky. All I had to do was press it down along the edges and it snapped right in. No disassembly required.

 

ok so I am on 12.1 preview drivers now.. So far had 1 BSOD and that was when I was turning off verabright. But so far ok, though i havent played any games yet.. Don't feel like bothering with caps though since the last install I had a hard time uninstalling them.

 

I was thinking what did I miss when snapping it back in, and now you remind me. Here is a paint job off the manual, the thing is pretty easy to spot on. Don't think it will save much battery though ~~ mainly cause of the brightness at night is insane.

 

I know this is old news, but I just now installed camolil's bios.

First thing was disabled CnQ and Thermal. Then I disabled dynamic and enabled fixed. Saved and Restarted.

I'm using 12.1's and WEI gives me a 7.0 for both graphics running fixed, where before it was 6.4/6.5.

CINEBENCH 11.5 gives me 45fps on the OGL test. Not sure where this sits with the rest of you.

Finally can play DOOM3 with sikkmod and HR textures and get a decent frame rate, with OGL! I seriously thought there was just an Intel bios fix for this. Ugh!

There is a huge difference in performance overall going fixed over "high performance" on the switchable.


Ha, so ridiculous that this bios has been in the postings since the 300's and find that out now thanks to Wing's Guide.

Still idles around 35°C with CnQ disabled at 3Ghz. I just switch to the 6620G when doing any desktop work.

 

nice, maybe ill give it a go again, I just get a higher clock from musho's bios, currently on 770/950. I wouldn't mind those speeds on camolil's bios

 

Good to know. Will give it a run! It's funny because I was a bit disappointed with this laptop when I first got it. I couldn't play BF3 at 1080p at all, crossfire was a disaster, and performance was overall dismal. With the many driver updates and tuning this thing keeps getting better and better. I can run BF3 at 1080p mix of high, med, low at 30+ FPS. maybe can get more with this fixed mode. And Crossfire is more or less a non-factor now.

 

Yeah,

You'll probably have to do the battery thing after the flash. Best spot to pop it out is from sides (closest to the top)

I had those plastic edge tools you get when you take apart phones, that worked super quick there.


Anyway, that bios has got a lot to tinker around with. I'm just glad that CCC knew what was changed and gave me different menu right after loading it up.

 

you can change the setting then flash to musho, setting stays.

The dual GPU switchable graphic does not have a hugh market share and get little to no support other than from AMD itself.

 

Oh yeah, didn't think about that. So didn't even have to reinstall drivers?

The sad thing is that the BIOS was fixed/changed by a dude in his spare time, and found out by people like you with a little bit of tinkering, yet HP doesn't take any time to implement it themselves, even though they did on the Intel ones... quite sad and pathetic of HP if you think about it.

 

Nope.

PowerXpress™ comes up.

AND

Crossfire still does work even though you don't see the symbol (since I kept the logo on for mine.) I noticed this during BF3 when the clocks for the 6620G starting running at 444, let alone in Kombustor before Camolil's bios, in dx11 gpu burn-in, I got 131 fps max.
Now with Camolil's bios, 204 fps max. Can't just be that simple...


In the bios, MUXed or MUXless, we are MUXless but it doesn't matter which one you choose. Either selection will still allow you to boot up so.....

 

So i Decide to jump on this fixed boat (late) to test it out, You can actually let fix and dynamic both on in bios , then you can change what you want in CCC. WHY HP, WHY you gimp the damn laptop..

 

To each their own, but if you are trying to conserve battery power you might as well do away with dynamic imho...

Besides, one click and you run pure dGPU power and drain that battery


Oh and BTW,

If you want the fan to spin sooner, and still keep high core clocks.

Disable CnQ, disable Thermal, pick a high clock that is stable (3GHz is mine) and then run CoolSense and choose "Coolest Mode." Heh heh, now you got a faster spinning fan sooner and you got a higher clock with no throttling.

 

In CCC, there is a option for me that say switch to iGPU when on battery power.

All you get for dynamic is x-fire?

What happen if we do not use the powerXpress thing in bios?

 

I haven't been able to successfully boot back after switching PowerXpress to the other 2. I think the other 2 are for iGPU only, so basically, won't need any software to control it. I prefer buttons

And yes, dynamic is just for the ease of choosing applications for which adapter you want to use, and the ability to enable Xfire for a boost (lol) that all it did for some people was give higher 3DMark11 scores, but stuttered more than an inebriated auctioneer.

 

honestly, picking app to specific adapter can be painful.
battery -> iGPU
plug in - > dgpu seem more reasonable ne ways ~~

Just tried my old HD playback setup, definitely more stable using fixed mode. DXVA vai ATI mpeg decoder +madVR ( not sure actually, gonan check other videos )is working, what a miracle as well

 

When I set it to coolest mode with CnQ and thermal disabled it still throttled last time I messed with the modded bios, but I'm back to the Musho one for now. I'll try again though. Won't get a chance until tomorrow most likely.

 

I'm using FusionTweaker with Turbo disabled, Camolil Bios - CnQ disabled, Thermal disabled - and make sure you are running on "High Performance" (not sure it matters since there is no core% adjustment) Power Plan and check your power options to see if you have anything else under "Processor Power Management" besides System Cooling Policy.

If you do, chances are something didn't take.


But I can with certainty, conclude that Coolest Mode does not throttle down the cores with these settings.

 

Going above 1366x768 on kombustor will crash. Although kombustor is showing 444 on iGPU, but hwinfo show 200mhz.

Let me get a AMD system monitor to check

 

Interesting, because both show the iGPU on load and clock for me.

Kombustor gets 20% for iGPU with System Monitor.


Also if it's 200Mhz then you might have PowerPlay Off, it should be 276Mhz with it On.

 

Make sure PowerPlay is ON otherwise you end up with your iGPU clocked at 200MHz. GPU-z has been accurate for me with clock speeds.

 

Power play is on, used to have 275 when dynamic, let me check

edit : ok got it back, switch to iGPU enable it then switch back.

 

I think it's just AMD's way of standing behind their technology. Not HP's fault. If AMD simply gave the option to change what they implemented, it not only shows their inability to work with a design, but that they can't manage with one for very long either. Even if it fails miserably under our expectations of how much BETTER this product could be. But that's my take on it.

 

It just not worth their effort for these low-mid range consumer level laptop. I guess i gonna stick with fixed for a bit. The fact that so little software support except games for the switchable graphic is just annoying. Hopefully, AMD have a new set of driver when they get trinity out.

But, with both bios option enabled(meh CCC fixed to dynamic seem not working~~) , I can switchable around probably .

 

Just trying to understand the need to want dynamic now?

If you are on the go, or on battery. Switch to iGPU only. The problem with dynamic for that part is sometimes you forget which one you selected for what or you told the pop-up window to stop appearing and now all the newly opened programs are not assigned so you gotta do more work to assign them to power savings when you can just use fixed only and select which one you want (less work.) Plus there is an option to use the iGPU when on battery if ticked - automatic switching.

If you are at home, gaming with this thing, really no need to use dynamic at all because you aren't saving yourself from extra heat if you leave it idle or even use it a bit if left on fixed. Plus this method is faster not just in selection. I'm just saying that's how I differentiate the 2. I don't know how you use your laptop so nothing against your personal choice.

 

I just testing out which work better, and "hope" they will release something impressive.

 

Fixed seems to be the way to go. And if there is a command line way to make it switch would be nice. An icon for it to switch would be awesome.