X220 throttling....

So my X220 (i5 2520m) is throttling....

Also add backlight bleed / VERY hot 65W power adapter, fingerprint issues, I AM VERY DISSAPOINTED....

How do I fix the throttling issue atleast ???

I called lenovo, they won't give me a 90W adapter.

Also, the CPU hits 91C

 

What do you mean by throttling? Have you updated to the latest BIOS 1.19?

What is the fingerprint issue? Is the reader randomly going missing? My fingerprint reader works perfectly though.

Backlight bleeding = negligible on mine. 65W adapter = cooler than those of my VAIOs.

 

Setting it to maximum performance, CPU-Z shows it keeps dropping to 800mhz when running OCCT. Framerate drops when playing starcraft 2.

It came with 1.20 BIOS.

No option to disable fingerprint when machine is turned off. I am using UEFI only and am using a fix which lenovo confirmed worked. The downside it seems is, some options go missing.

Also, the CPU is hitting 91C (probably more if I run it for longer)
Room temp is 25C and lots of space for airflow.

 

I don't have your problem of throttling (which is stuck at 800MHz) with my i7, after I updated my BIOS to 1.19.

91C temperature is not bad at all. Both my T420s and X220 hit 93C running WOW for 30 minutes, and 97C after running LinX for several hours. The good point is, the ThinkPads seem to be doing a good job keeping the keyboard from getting hot. If it was a VAIO i'd imagine the keyboard scorching.

 

Are you using a 90W or 65W adapter ???

The temp isn't so bad. Actually less now that I enable lenovo Turbo+ (fan speed boost)

But the throttling is just wrong. My framerate keeps dropping.

 

I use 65W adapter for both X220 and T420s.

What do you mean by throttling exactly? The clock frequency just keeps dropping down to 800MHz then goes up again automatically without having to do a hard reboot?

 

Under normal usage the i5-2520M in my T420s starts to throttle at 95C but only drops from 3 GHz to 2.8 GHz. Make sure that the fan control is set in Power Manager to maximize performance.

John

 

Yea. It sits at 3ghz, then drops to 800mhz, then back to 3ghz, keeps repeating.

Its not doing it with CPU stress tests.

It IS doing it when gaming or running OCCT GPU test.

 

Perhaps you can try using TPFanControl (link in my signature) to set the fans to a higher speed at a given temperature. See if that'll help keep temperatures down and prevent throttling. If not, then the issue you're seeing may not be temperature-related.

 

So you don't get any throttling down to 800MHz if you stress it with LinX? You mean if the GPU is stressed then the CPU is likely to throttle down to 800MHz intermittently?

Actually the performance of the Intel HD 3000 is crap, so if I felt choppy in WOW I wouldn't have blamed the CPU...

 

If your CPU can go to 3Ghz, then swithcing between 3Ghz and 800Mhz repeatedly is not throttling. That's Intel's speedstep at work. If you don't want to see 800Mhz, disable speedstep in the BIOS.

 

When a 2520M is loaded, its default rated speed is 2500 MHz.

Intel® Core? i5-2520M Processor (3M Cache, 2.50 GHz))

If this CPU drops down to 800 MHz when loaded, that's throttling. Turning SpeedStep off is the wrong thing to do. Getting a 90W adapter so this CPU can run at its rated speed is a good place to start. After that, if it overheats, contact Lenovo and ask them why the cooling solution is inadequate.

 

This clarification may explain what is happening. In fact there are two scenarios: (i) the CPU has some idle periods when the GPU is doing all the work and (ii) the combined CPU + GPU power has reached the 35W limit for the whole package so something has to slow down. It's a design feature of the Sandybridge hardware that you can't have all the components of the package running at full speed at the same time. However, since the greater part of real life usage is that only one component is fully loaded then users can benefit from the higher component speeds.

This is assuming that you have the Intel graphics version in which case
I also don't think that a 90W will make any difference. If you have Optimus then the power management rules should be different.

I would also suggest that you use HWiNFO32 to monitor the CPU speed, temperature and power (use the Sensors option).

John

 

The OP has an X220, which only has Intel integrated graphics, so what you wrote should apply to his situation.

 

Thanks. I was assuming that if an i7 CPU was an option then so might be Optimus.

John