Lenovo Y50-70 i7-4720HQ underclocking.

Hello everyone,



I was looking though the web and came across a program called: Intel Extreme Tuning Utility.



I was wondering if anyone had any experience with this program and under-clocking their CPU. The reason I want to under-clock my cpu is that my laptop lasts max around 2.3 hours on a full battery charge, which compared to the websites description should last up to 5 hours. My cpu is always burning through my applications with ease 16GB RAM is just overkill when paired with this overkill CPU. I want to lower my laptop temperature, hence the under clocking. I tried fooling around with the software: decreasing the multipliers, and the cpu dynamic voltage. But it doesn’t seem to have any affect or as a matter of fact any "DESIRED" effects that I am hoping for. Is this program just "a waste of time"? Can anyone help me with this?



I did try to make a makeshift laptop fan cooling pad:

https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/Lenovo-P-Y-and-Z-series/y50-cooling-pad/m-p/2130354#M127862

However my results seem inconclusive since they are not constant throughout testing.

 

If you're fed up with your temps, I advise you to clean your fans and repaste your CPU&GPU, the notebook is not that hard to open up. However, if you're not willing to do so and willing to sacrifice performance, you may turn off Turbo boost, use ThrottleStop or Intel XTU for that matter.

 

I used the wrong word. I don't want to UNDERCLOCK... I want to UNDERVOLT. Maybe that might change the process?

 

That's a whole different thing. Using Intel XTU, decrease your "Dynamic CPU Voltage Offset", I'd start with -60mv and then -5mv depending on stability, which you can test it using any kind of benchmark or gaming. Mine can reach -70mv maximum, crashed on -75mv while playing GTA V, others can reach up to -100mv, it all depends on your chip.

Good luck!

 

Also, how do I know if my chips unlockable. Does that even matter in this case of undervolting? Also Is this the right thing I should be doing? Dont want to be mislead by other forum. I want the same performance except with less temps. Is this right?

I did what you said, but the effects aren't there. My CPU temp stays at 47C. When I click apply it Jumps to 50C but then comes back down to 47C

 

Intel Haswell mobile chips voltage can be modified, you can also overclock it and underclock it. What you're looking for is undervolting, same performance with less temps. Simply, less voltage means less heat produced by the chip and yes it will improve your battery life. Just make sure it's sable enough.

 

I did what you said, but the effects aren't there. My CPU temp stays at 47C. When I click apply it Jumps to 50C but then comes back down to 47C

 

I am too trying to undervolt with xtu. But having problems. I've 4720hq and undervolted about -80 and while stress testing stays at 3.4 only for 10 seconds then drops to 2.6 default value. I tried undervolt it with throttlestop and it wotks fine but xtu is not working... can you help? There is also no thermal throttling...

 

Don't expect drastic improvement in idle temps, they depend more on room temperature than on notebook cooling. Your stress temps should be better though.

Lenovo uses a crappy way to cool down our processors, when the CPU hits 65C, it automatically turns off turbo boost, leading the CPU to stay at 2.6GHz which is the base clock. However, this can be solved using ThrottleStop which is made for this purpose, you'll find it at Hardware Components subforum along with a guide.

 

So where do I expect the changes to show? I change my dynamic cpu voltage to negative 50, dont see any change

 

The changes to temp won't be too noticeable, but you should be able to at least sustain the turbo range longer with marginally better temps. Personally I prefer Throttlestop, XTU feels buggy in comparison.

 

With these CPUs, you might not see any significant difference when you lower the voltage. When a CPU is idle, it should be spending the vast majority of its time in the C7 C State where it is disconnected from the voltage rail. Under volting is not going to make any noticeable difference because the CPU core is not getting any voltage anyhow.

If you are doing some full load testing, lowering your voltage will reduce power consumption. If you were running a stress testing program like Prime95 and your CPU was throttling before then lowering the voltage will allow the CPU to run a little faster but in either case, it is being throttled by the exact same 47 Watt TDP limit so it will be putting out the exact same amount of heat.

Under volting is definitely a good thing but don't expect to see any significant difference in your idle or full load temperatures.

I am of course biased but on a laptop, I would not recommend Intel XTU. It causes a significant decrease in C State residency time which means it will force your CPU to spend less time in the deeper C States so your CPU will consume more power and it will run hotter. Even when XTU is minimized to the System Tray, it is still interfering with the low power C States. That is not what you want when running a laptop on battery power. ThrottleStop is significantly more efficient so you should see better performance and less power consumption compared to XTU. Each ThrottleStop feature was added with efficiency in mind.

Use the ThrottleStop C State data to find and eliminate crappy software on your laptop. When my laptop is idle, the individual cores are spending almost 99% of their time in C7 and the entire CPU package can spend over 85% of the time in C6. There is no way you will see numbers like that if you are using Intel XTU so your battery run time will suffer.

Edit - Here are some numbers to shoot for.

http://i.imgur.com/6UUUnaO.png

 

Well that's "sh1t". I went to Microcenter and the tech there told me that idle standing laptops should average from 30-40C with no loads. Is this something I should have Lenovo look at?

 

What are your idle temps? Mine are 40s with a quite high room temperature.

 

What program do I use to check that? Sorry but I read on this that XTU is bad, so I uninstalled it.

 

http://openhardwaremonitor.org/

 

Maybe in the old days they did but not anymore. 47°C is a normal idle temperature for a 4th Generation Intel Core i7 Quad core CPU. My Lenovo Y510P which uses a 4700MQ is at the exact same temperature as your CPU when idle.

The idle temperature of a laptop can vary widely depending on the laptop model as well as the room temperature. Some laptop models use more fan speed at idle while other laptops are designed for quietness so they use less fan speed which will result in higher idle temperatures. Even different bios versions can use different fan speed profiles so comparisons to other laptops in different environments is completely meaningless. I saw data today from an Apple Macbook and its idle temperatures were well into the mid 70°C range. To me that is ridiculous but for an Apple, that is probably the norm.

I have never bothered to clean my heatsink. Sure I could probably lower the temps by a few degrees but that would not change performance one bit. As long as a CPU is not over heating and throttling then there is no reason to be concerned about its temperature.