Infamous "CPU Whine" now affecting AMD based Toshiba's. EXTREMELY annoying for my M305D-S4828 with Turion X2 Ultra.

I'm just so sick and tired now of what my Toshiba M305D-S4828 is doing, extremely high pitch noise, constantly squealing and whining. Sound corresponds and changes along with the processor load (if I use IE and scroll up and down extremely fast it loads the processor and the sound temporarily goes away, then comes right back instantly after done scrolling) and what is most annoying is the amount of people unable to help me in any way shape or form. Toshiba's customer support has completely denied the problem, told me to 'deal with it', and refuses to switch my laptop out for a Core 2 Duo based one that doesn't ring my skull bones. (I put my ears up to several toshiba laptops at local electronic stores, the problem affects all of them except the intel based ones) Anyway basically the sound my laptop is making is IDENTICAL to this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5xwSJJPoVY

and this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuTRp2F0zRI

the only difference being is my laptop makes this sound coupled with a slightly louder VERY HIGH PITCH ringing right behind it.

I have been desperately studying the problem for about a month now, I know it has something to do with the Turion X2 Ultra entering C3 and C4 power state modes. Putting vista on high performance mode SLIGHTLY alleviates the noise level, and my computer is completely unusable for me in balanced and power saver modes from the high pitch ringing. The sound itself is not actually coming from the processor, but very close to the processor, and I'm fairly certain it has to do with capacitors (or some other motherboard part) resonating at certain frequencies when a certain amount of electricity is flowing through it. (yeah I know, very specific haha)



There are 2 solutions I've found, both of which aren't practical for me in the least, but have helped me from going insane in the mean time

1- Running Ubuntu and DISABLING the onboard ATI RADEON 3100 graphics drivers. Not practical for me at all, but was very pleased that I was at least getting somewhere with fixing the issue. When doing this I found the sound COMPLETELY went away, the only thing I could hear on the laptop was the cooling fan. Disabling the ATI drivers in Vista did not have the same effect.

2- Plugging in my V3m Razr into the USB port to charge it. Doing that gets rid of MOST of the sound, and certainly makes the computer usable for me. But again, it's not exactly practical, nor should I need to always have my phone plugged into my computer just to make it usable. Plugging in any other USB device other than my Razr does not have the same effect.



I've called up toshiba, taken it to a toshiba service center, and all the guy did was replace the cooling fans. Did absolutely nothing for the sound. Also talked to toshiba's customer relations department, the guy said they had absolutely no program for exchanging laptops, and expressed little to no empathy or sorrow at all when I explained the defect in their product line. He literally told me to DEAL WITH IT when I asked "well what can I do to my laptop to make it not have a noise that makes my brains want to explode" Completely refused to switch out my notebook and claimed the Core 2 Duo based M305-S4848 was an upgrade, and they "couldn't just go around upgrading people's computers". Financially, it actually ISN'T an upgrade as both models are the exact same price, just one has a turion and one has a core 2 duo. For me it's actually a downgrade as the S4848 has a much worse integrated graphics (the intel 4500mhd) solution than my current Ati Radeon 3100.



So, does ANYONE know of a way to resolve the issue!? Disabling C3 and C4 power states could possibly work except theres no way to do it through the BIOS. Also I've tried running the program Rightmark CPU clock utility and using the "run hlt command" option to load the processor at 100% which has helped other people with the problem, but for me it doesn't fix it at all. Another fix I found presented was disabling power saving modes on the USB ports themselves through the device manager, though again for me didn't work.


So far the only company I've seen that has even publicly acknowledged the sound is HP:

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?lc=en&cc=us&docname=c00965412&dlc=en

So ANYONE! Who else is completely annoyed by the noise and does anyone know of a solution specifically for an M305D-S4828!? Mega thanks in advance to any support offered.

 

I've this problem on my Hp 6510B.
Under win xp I've solved disabling the "popup mode" via rmclock but under linux (xubuntu) the whine is still present.
If You can try to disable (Via BIOS) the C4 (Or C5/C6) mode.

 

Unfortunately both of those solutions don't work. Until RMclock is updated, the program doesn't recognize the turion x2 ultra and doesn't give me any of those options (it does give the "run hlt while idle" command, but it doesn't do anything for the whine), and the bios includes no options for disabling any CPU modes. Thanks anyway though!

 

I have found another temporary solution! (at least on my toshiba)

anyway all you do is right click the sound icon, select "recording devices"... within about 2 seconds the whine goes away, and stays away as long as you keep the "sound" window open (since it's un-minimizable, I just drag it away from the screen)

I'm thinking this works for the same reason plugging in my RAZR to charge it works, because it drains a tiny bit of power from the laptop, just enough to get the sound to stop. When you click "recording devices" it automatically activates the embedded microphone, and as long as the microphone stays on, the whine is gone.

Anyway although this is the best solution I've found so far, it still doesn't make a lot of sense and I still plan on getting rid of the horrible noise my computer makes without having to have a program open at all times. If I find anything else I'll post here.

 

Thanks so much for posting that little trick about the "Recording Devices". It totally works. I just got a new Toshiba M305D and had discovered the whine on day 1! Unfortunately, I hadn't heard it at the store...

Anyway, if you ever figure out a long-term fix, please post it here. I'm not technically competent enough to figure anything out on my own...

 

Glad I was able to help!

Since I last posted, still the best solution I've found has been opening up the sound recorder or the "recording devices" screen. Other than that I've just totally gotten used to always having an extra window open for the mic.

I'm guessing somewhere out there is a small simple program that can turn on the microphone (without recording), can run in the background, and can start up with windows. When I find it, first thing I'll do is post here!

 

I put "Sound Recorder" in the the startup folder, and changed the properties so that it loads up minimized. The button is always on the taskbar, but as long as I don't click it, the window itself never appears. That's the best fix I've been able to come up with, and it works sufficiently well for me that I haven't felt the need to try anything else.

 

I have the Toshiba L300D. I got it on christmas day and and it also has the AMD Turion X2 '64

The whine only happens for me if I put the battery on High Performance. Personally, I never use High Performance mode. As soon as I put my computer onto Balanced mode which is use, I find that the whine stops.

 

i think this is ridiculous...unless i ONLY use power saver, which still has it a bit occasionally, i have that sound. my sister does not have that sound and has the same laptop. i also have a clicking sound in my hdd that she does not, its driving me nuts.

i will return this laptop yet again (for good).

 

Yeah, the problem is definitely ridiculous, and horribly widespread. When I actually put my ears up to display laptops at any computer store I notice the majority of laptops have some degree of high pitch ringing. Computer companies need to get on this ASAP. How does such an annoying noise escape the testers? Maybe I should just be a tester. I'd be good at telling a company annoyances I have with their products haha.

 

wow i never even knew this problem existed it seems really annoying especially for people who use notebooks in quiet areas.