Reduce PIII Mobile CPU Speed in DOS?

Is there any way to slow down or throttle back the CPU speed of a Mobile
PIII with Speed Step in DOS or DOS Mode?

I just upgraded the CPU in my old IBM T20 from 650 to 850MHz. I also
upgraded the fan to a later model. It's working fine with Win98SE and XP
but the fan runs continually in DOS or MS DOS Mode.

I used a little program called MobileMeter to check the temperature in
WinXP. The idle temp is 46°C at 20°C (68°F) ambient. The fan doesn't
kick in until the temp gets to 73°C. It took a SpyBot system scan to get
the CPU temperature that high.

The fan puts out a lot of heat in DOS which indicates the CPU is running
full speed even at idle. I never noticed this with the older PIII 650
CPU.

I do regular backups with Ghost running in DOS so I would like to find a
way to slow down the CPU.

--
Chas. (Drop spamski to E-mail me)

In comp.sys.laptops * * Chas <> wrote:
: Is there any way to slow down or throttle back the CPU speed of a Mobile
: PIII with Speed Step in DOS or DOS Mode?

: I just upgraded the CPU in my old IBM T20 from 650 to 850MHz. I also
: upgraded the fan to a later model. It's working fine with Win98SE and XP
: but the fan runs continually in DOS or MS DOS Mode.

: I used a little program called MobileMeter to check the temperature in
: WinXP. The idle temp is 46?C at 20?C (68?F) ambient. The fan doesn't
: kick in until the temp gets to 73?C. It took a SpyBot system scan to get
: the CPU temperature that high.

73C is extraordinary hot. For a P3 850MHZ, 46C at idle seems high,
too. I have a P4 Prescott desktop running at 2.4GHZ, and this CPU -
known to run very very hot - idles at 44C and under extreme CPU load
will hit 60C, which I consider hot, though that is probably OK for
brief periods. I have the BIOS set in my CPU to throttle the CPU
above 65C so it will not get hotter than that.

I suggest that when you installed the new CPU you may have not
properly installed the fan/heat sync? Did you put some new thermal
goo on top of the new CPU before seating the heat sync?

Anyway, if you get that fixed, your CPU will probably just run a lot
cooler and running full-speed in DOS will probably no longer be an
issue.

Andrew
--
----> Portland, Oregon, USA <----
************************************************** *****************
----> http://www.bizave.com <---- Photo Albums and Portland Info
----> To Email me remove "MYSHOES" from email address
************************************************** *****************

"Andrew" <> wrote in message
news:...
| In comp.sys.laptops * * Chas <> wrote:
| : Is there any way to slow down or throttle back the CPU speed of a
Mobile
| : PIII with Speed Step in DOS or DOS Mode?
|
| : I just upgraded the CPU in my old IBM T20 from 650 to 850MHz. I also
| : upgraded the fan to a later model. It's working fine with Win98SE
and XP
| : but the fan runs continually in DOS or MS DOS Mode.
|
| : I used a little program called MobileMeter to check the temperature
in
| : WinXP. The idle temp is 46?C at 20?C (68?F) ambient. The fan doesn't
| : kick in until the temp gets to 73?C. It took a SpyBot system scan to
get
| : the CPU temperature that high.
|
| 73C is extraordinary hot. For a P3 850MHZ, 46C at idle seems high,
| too. I have a P4 Prescott desktop running at 2.4GHZ, and this CPU -
| known to run very very hot - idles at 44C and under extreme CPU load
| will hit 60C, which I consider hot, though that is probably OK for
| brief periods. I have the BIOS set in my CPU to throttle the CPU
| above 65C so it will not get hotter than that.
|
| I suggest that when you installed the new CPU you may have not
| properly installed the fan/heat sync? Did you put some new thermal
| goo on top of the new CPU before seating the heat sync?
|
| Anyway, if you get that fixed, your CPU will probably just run a lot
| cooler and running full-speed in DOS will probably no longer be an
| issue.
|
| Andrew

Thanks for the input. I thought that the temps were high too but from
what I've read the older PIII Ms ran hot. According to IBM and Intel the
automatic throttle point is 97°C for these CPUs! That's hot!

I've put together a lot of PCs and changed out lots of CPUs so I was
very careful installing the CPU and fan, used the right amount of Radio
Shack silicone goop too. The way this system is built, it's hard to get
the assembly wrong.

The newer, faster CPUs run cooler. They use a 9 micron architecture
which uses a lot less current and produces less heat.
--
Chas. (Drop spamski to E-mail me)

In comp.sys.laptops * * Chas <> wrote:
: Thanks for the input. I thought that the temps were high too but from
: what I've read the older PIII Ms ran hot. According to IBM and Intel the
: automatic throttle point is 97?C for these CPUs! That's hot!

Yeah, but that's like the drop-dead "must throttle NOW" point. You
really REALLY do not want your CPU running at 97C! Remember, 100C is
boiling water!!!

: I've put together a lot of PCs and changed out lots of CPUs so I was
: very careful installing the CPU and fan, used the right amount of Radio
: Shack silicone goop too. The way this system is built, it's hard to get
: the assembly wrong.

Well, I too have put together many systems, and when I first put my
Prescott system together, I had the heat sync put on wrong. My system
ran about 20C hotter than it did once I fixed the problem! Anyway, it
just goes to show that even an experienced computer person can make
simple mistakes. :-) So, you might look again to make sure it's on
correctly.

: The newer, faster CPUs run cooler. They use a 9 micron architecture
: which uses a lot less current and produces less heat.

If you look into the modern CPUs more carefully, you'll find that is
completely not true. Intel abandoned its plans for a 4GHZ Pentium 4 this
year because they could not produce a CPU that would run cool enough.
AMD is having the same problems. Both companies are now moving to
dual-core CPU technology because they've hit a wall cranking up the
clock speed even on the latest manufacturing processes. The wall is
really power consumption. To get more performance, they're being
forced to go parallel.

Take a gander at http://www.tomshardware.com to see what I'm talking
about.

Intel's low-power Pentium M CPU is actually a modification of the
Pentium Pro archiecture (on which the Pentium III is based), with some
Pentium 4 stuff thrown in. Pentium 4 was designed to run at higher
frequencies, but that causes power problems.

I don't think an 850MHZ P3 should be running as hot/hotter than my
Prescott P4 2.4GHZ!!!

(There's also the chance that the temp sensors are in fact incorrect
on your system by the way.)

Andrew
--
----> Portland, Oregon, USA <----
************************************************** *****************
----> http://www.bizave.com <---- Photo Albums and Portland Info
----> To Email me remove "MYSHOES" from email address
************************************************** *****************

In comp.sys.laptops Andrew <> wrote:
: I don't think an 850MHZ P3 should be running as hot/hotter than my
: Prescott P4 2.4GHZ!!!

As an added thought - have you considered whether you are able to
reduce the voltage on your motherboard? Perhaps your previous CPU
wasn't designed to run at the lower voltage? If so, and your
motherboard allows it, you might be able to lower the voltage and get
the CPU to use less power and thus run cooler. Laptop motherboards
are usually not so richly featured, but it's worth a try.

Andrew
--
----> Portland, Oregon, USA <----
************************************************** *****************
----> http://www.bizave.com <---- Photo Albums and Portland Info
----> To Email me remove "MYSHOES" from email address
************************************************** *****************

You can adjust the SpeedStep and speed settings in the BIOS. This
affects DOS, as XP has it's own power settings.
If you upgraded the CPUin a T20, what you REALLY need to do is fix the
heat sink.
This is done in one of two ways:
Obtain a fan from a T21 or above. It is totally compatible, but the
stud on the heat sink makes better contact with the CPU and will stop
overheat problems
or
Put a small strip of something heat conductive, like copper or brass,
between the fan heat sink area and the stud on the CPU, and use a good
thermal paste like Arctic Silver. The T20 fan has too big of a gap.
They used a thermal pad which is not adequte for even the heat of a
700, and it deteriorates over time.
Fix this and your problem with go away.

On Sun, 10 Jul 2005 12:52:16 -0700, "* * Chas" <>
wrote:

>Is there any way to slow down or throttle back the CPU speed of a Mobile
>PIII with Speed Step in DOS or DOS Mode?
>
>I just upgraded the CPU in my old IBM T20 from 650 to 850MHz. I also
>upgraded the fan to a later model. It's working fine with Win98SE and XP
>but the fan runs continually in DOS or MS DOS Mode.
>
>I used a little program called MobileMeter to check the temperature in
>WinXP. The idle temp is 46°C at 20°C (68°F) ambient. The fan doesn't
>kick in until the temp gets to 73°C. It took a SpyBot system scan to get
>the CPU temperature that high.
>
>The fan puts out a lot of heat in DOS which indicates the CPU is running
>full speed even at idle. I never noticed this with the older PIII 650
>CPU.
>
>I do regular backups with Ghost running in DOS so I would like to find a
>way to slow down the CPU.
>
>--
>Chas. (Drop spamski to E-mail me)
>
>
>
>
>

on Sun, 10 Jul 2005 15:15:26 -0700, "* * Chas" <>
wrote:

>Thanks for the input. I thought that the temps were high too but from
>what I've read the older PIII Ms ran hot. According to IBM and Intel the
>automatic throttle point is 97°C for these CPUs! That's hot!

These temperatures are way too high. I would be suspicious of the
monitoring software reporting these values. Something is wrong
somewhere.

>I've put together a lot of PCs and changed out lots of CPUs so I was
>very careful installing the CPU and fan, used the right amount of Radio
>Shack silicone goop too. The way this system is built, it's hard to get
>the assembly wrong.

Silicone is the wrong stuff to use. You should use thermal compound
made specifically for this purpose; e.g., Arctic Silver.

>The newer, faster CPUs run cooler. They use a 9 micron architecture
>which uses a lot less current and produces less heat.

That's 0.09 microns, or 90 nanometers. But the newest CPUs are clocked
much higher, so they actually generate more heat. To make matters
worse, the heat is concentrated in a smaller area. Newer ThinkPads
(such as my T42) use larger heat sinks and fans to deal with the added
heat, as compared to my old T21.

"Bruce Markowitz" <> wrote in message
news:...
| You can adjust the SpeedStep and speed settings in the BIOS. This
| affects DOS, as XP has it's own power settings.
| If you upgraded the CPUin a T20, what you REALLY need to do is fix the
| heat sink.
| This is done in one of two ways:
| Obtain a fan from a T21 or above. It is totally compatible, but the
| stud on the heat sink makes better contact with the CPU and will stop
| overheat problems
| or
| Put a small strip of something heat conductive, like copper or brass,
| between the fan heat sink area and the stud on the CPU, and use a good
| thermal paste like Arctic Silver. The T20 fan has too big of a gap.
| They used a thermal pad which is not adequte for even the heat of a
| 700, and it deteriorates over time.
| Fix this and your problem with go away.
|
| On Sun, 10 Jul 2005 12:52:16 -0700, "* * Chas" <>
| wrote:
|

Thanks for the suggestions. I set AC Power from Maximum to Auto Slow in
the BIOS. It fixed the problem of running hot in DOS. I'm making a Ghost
backup and it's running very cool now.

It seems to be working OK. What I was looking for was a software
solution like I'd seen for AMD CPUs number of years ago to slow down the
faster K2, K3 and early Athlons for use with DOS. I was wondering if
something existed for Intel CPUs.

It's not a hardware problem, it's not really even a problem. If it burns
up, it's no big loss. The mainboard failed last fall (with the stock 650
CPU) and it'd been sitting around until I decided to tear into it last
month. I bought this in 2000 when they first came out. The PIII 650
always ran like a slug until I put in a 7200 RPM Hitachi HDD. It was
like a 200MHz speed boost over the original HDD.

I put a little over a $100 in the mainboard, CPU and fan, now it usable
again.

BTW, I used a heat sink from a T21/T22. It's spring loaded to make good
contact with the top of the chip on the CPU. I have a brand new
mainboard from IBM that's rated as a replacement for T20s and T21s. PIII
M 850 T21s came with the fan I'm using. We can argue over the merits of
Arctic Silver Vs Radio Shack's Dow silicone heat sink paste all day
long. I didn't have any handy but I did have the white goo. I read a
test that showed plain old tooth paste was the best for heat transfer -
until the water evaporated - no kidding.

As I said, I was surprised at how hot the CPU was running then I did
some research and found that the temperatures were in the normal range
for this CPU. I researched this project for a long time over the past
month or so. The system runs fine in XP and Win98SE.

I just started the T20 and checked the temperature. It was 30°C at idle,
21.6°C (71°F) ambient temperature. It briefly got up to 80°C after
running a SpyBot scan, a PowerPoint presentation and Acrobat at the same
time. after several minutes it cooled back down to 40~°C.

Chas.

DOSIDLE is the program that I was looking for.

On Sun, 10 Jul 2005 12:52:16 -0700, "* * Chas"
<> wrote:

>Is there any way to slow down or throttle back the CPU speed of a Mobile
>PIII with Speed Step in DOS or DOS Mode?
>
>I just upgraded the CPU in my old IBM T20 from 650 to 850MHz. I also
>upgraded the fan to a later model. It's working fine with Win98SE and XP
>but the fan runs continually in DOS or MS DOS Mode.
>
>I used a little program called MobileMeter to check the temperature in
>WinXP. The idle temp is 46°C at 20°C (68°F) ambient. The fan doesn't
>kick in until the temp gets to 73°C. It took a SpyBot system scan to get
>the CPU temperature that high.
>
>The fan puts out a lot of heat in DOS which indicates the CPU is running
>full speed even at idle. I never noticed this with the older PIII 650
>CPU.
>
>I do regular backups with Ghost running in DOS so I would like to find a
>way to slow down the CPU.

Setting the CPU to a speed in Win should stick into a DOS boot
since SpeedStep is actually supported by the BIOS -internal power
supply.