AOpen XCCube MZ855-II

[velis]

I have recently purchased the mentioned SFF together with 1.73 Dothan.

Installed is only WinXP SP2, the MB drivers and UD agent.

The processor is running at 1.2 GHz all the time even though I tried setting "Power settings" to "Always on" / "Home/Office desktop".
Well, not all the time. When comp is restarted it will stay at full frequency for a while but later it will throttle to 1.2.

Any ideas why this might be so and more importantly - how to make the processor work at full speed when loaded 100%?

Thanks

 

[IlllI]

just a guess, but did you try updating the bios?

 

[hmsrolst]

It seems odd that it would throttle to 1.2 (9 x 133). Normally wouldn't this CPU go to .8 (6 x 133)? It does the latter in my D610. Is there any chance you're getting a faulty reading? Have you tried different tools for measuring the CPU speed?

I have the same barebones on its way from Newegg, so I'll see what mine does when I set it up this weekend.

 

[ND40oz]

According to Aopens site, this box supports the 533 fsb pentium m but according to intels site, the 855gme chipset only supports 400 fsb pentium ms. I had also always thought you had to run the 915gme chipset for 533 fsb support. Have you tried a 400 fsb pentium m?

Also, download the centrino hardware control program and set it to max performance within the program.

 

[hmsrolst]

Originally posted by: ND40oz
According to Aopens site, this box supports the 533 fsb pentium m but according to intels site, the 855gme chipset only supports 400 fsb pentium ms. I had also always thought you had to run the 915gme chipset for 533 fsb support.

Officially, the 855 only supports 400 MHz FSB, but it's typical to be able to run at 533 with it, including in this box.

 

[velis]

Thanks guys for this input.
I noticed that I saw numbers badly
CPU-Z reported 1,3 GHz while My Computer / Properties / General said 1,2 GHz. This is exactly what has been mentioned: The FSB gets dropped from 533 to 400 for some reason yet unknown to me. That's why I wondered about this. 1,73 could not yield 1,2 if only the FSB would drop.
I noticed the FSB drop in CPU-Z before, but didn't pay too much attention to it since I thought the real issume must be somewhere else.

I will re-check the BIOS to see what might be going on. I'm suspecting a setting which states that thermal monitoring should only start after 15 mins of uptime.

 

[hmsrolst]

Are you sure you have the jumper on the board set to 533?

 

[velis]

Well, I checked the BIOS again. It seems the BIOS detects the CPU as FSB100, multi 13.
I tried setting it to 133 / 13 (1.73), but it took me another 20 minutes to revert that setting back since the POST would freeze almost immediately
Will try to manually change the jumper now. Darn suppliers, they don't check anything at all when assembling (flexes muscles).

 

[velis]

OK, done. It works like a charm.
I feel so stupid. It's been a long time since I had to move jumpers to set clock and it never occurred to me that my supplier might give me a badly setup computer.
As for my initial problem description, I sincerely apologize to you guys. I was fooled by BIOS POST report that the proc is 1.73 into thinking that the CPU is initially at full frequency. I should have verified the figures more before wasting your time.

Anyway, problem solved. Thanks again. If it weren't for hmsrolst's posts, I'd still be wondering what I'm doing wrong.

 

[hmsrolst]

Glad you have it solved. I was surprised when I opened mine up yesterday to see that the FSB was controlled by jumpers, so but for the coincidence of mine arriving, it would have been hard for you to diagnose the problem.