How to underclock or throttle down the Q6600?

[shangshang]

I have the Q6600 & Asus P5k mb combo. I've been trying to find for a way to underclock or throttle down the CPU when I'm not gaming, and I would like to do this on the fly (not having to reboot). Asus has a software tool that you can use to adjust the CPU clock, but it requires a reboot everytime.

Many laptops can throttle down the CPU when it's idling to save energy. I would also like to do the same for my PC. Can this be done for a desktop PC?

(It's such a waste of electricity leaving the CPU running full throttle all it's running is Windows, not to mention the heat in my room)

 

[Drsignguy]

It automatically throttles down if EIST and C1E is set to enabled in Bios. Throttles from 9x multi to 6x.

Get CPU-Z as this will help you see whats going on with the throttling as well as other things like voltages and memory timings.

 

[shangshang]

Thanks for the tips. But can you underclock the CPU and keep it underclocked until you manually raise the speed back up? Most of my computing can be done when the Q6600 is running at 1.6 Ghz.

With your method, doesn't the CPU still kick into higher clock the minute I open an application? However, I would like to just pin the CPU at 1.6 Ghz, and clocker it higer (eg, at 2.4 Ghz) when I need to.

So is there anyway to accomplish this?

(oh btw, I notice you have a Q6600 in your sig. What's the default voltage on it? And what's the lowest voltage (and the speed which is set at) that you have seen people set it at?)

 

[OCGuy]

Just wondering what the reason would be to do so? Its not going to save you any real amount of money on power if you have EIST and CIE on anyway... 2.4ghz isnt exactly blazing fast, even for a quad.

 

[dajeepster]

and edited cause I told a fib :Q

 

[shangshang]

Originally posted by: Ocguy31
Just wondering what the reason would be to do so? Its not going to save you any real amount of money on power if you have EIST and CIE on anyway... 2.4ghz isnt exactly blazing fast, even for a quad.

It's more than just saving money on electricity for me, but also heat. I would like to be able to run my whole system with only one desktop fan blowing into it, and so far, I've managed to do this when the Q6600 runs at 1.6 Ghz, because at this speed, my heatsink is big enough to cool the CPU passive with a table fan blowing into the whole PC. Then when I want to run the Q6600 at 2.4 Ghz or 3.0 Ghz, I would just manually turn the fan on its heatsink.

Most of my work is just running a browser, VMware, SQL, Visual studio, and the Q6600 @ 1.6 Ghz very adequate. It's only when I game would I crank up the CPU.

Now you may ask why am I using a table fan to blow into the side of my PC? Well, I use a table fan to cool my graphic card (passive cooling when underclocking it), CPU (passive cooling if underclocking, and my 2 WD Raptors (which do get hot without an active airflow over them), and the chipset (which does get hot without active airflow). So in my system, the only other fan that is running constantly is the 120mm fan from the power supply, which is so quite that I've left it alone.

The other reason I would like a "fanless" system is that it make the whole room quite, and it leaves the PC a lot less dusty inside.

 

[krnmastersgt]

Mind telling us your load temps at 1.6 and 2.4?

 

[Binky]

You can use RMclock to lock the multi down to its lowest available, so if your cpu runs from 6.0 to 9.0 normally, you can tell RMclock to stick at 6.0 no matter what. A right-click on the system tray Rmclock app will allow you to change back to 9.0 or dynamic based on load. RMclock also allows you to use the throttling features.

You could go a step further and underlock and undervolt in the bios. Some motherboards are limited when undervolting, but you should be able to lower the bus speed if you wish.

 

[Ratman6161]

Originally posted by: shangshang

...only one desktop fan blowing into it..

Now you may ask why am I using a table fan to blow into the side of my PC? ...

The other reason I would like a "fanless" system is that it make the whole room quite, and it leaves the PC a lot less dusty inside.

Sorry, but this seems like such a terrible kludge of a setup that despite your explanation I'm having a real hard time understanding. You don't have cats or kids right? Cause if you do sooner or later that fan is going to get knocked over when you aren't around. Or you will knock it over without realizing it while getting up from the desk.

As to keeping out dust, this has got to be about the worst solution I've heard of.

For noise, all you need is a couple of low speed 120MM fans which will run nearly silently - and much more quietly than any table fan.

I don't mean to be insulting, but this is just a bad idea all the way around.

 

[shangshang]

I'm going to answer everybody in one post, so if I miss something, then I didn't mean to ignore your point.

First off all, i don't have kids nor pets. I've been running a mini table fan for 4 years now, but was under different PCs. And after mucking with all sort of fancy cases, eg, Antec P180, Coolmaster 9000 (something like that), all sort of case fans,... to cool everything in my system, I've found that the most convient and elegant solution for me is to just forget the case fans all together and use a mini table fan about 7" in diameter. I've been running like this for 4 years, and am very happy with it. And yes, it does cut down the dust. When I used 2 fans too cool my scsi drives, dust would collect around the crevices of the drives and fans in about 3 months, but with a table fan, I can go 6-8 months before I have to blow out the dust.

Right now, with the weather at about 85F outside, the Q6600 @ 1.6 Ghz without fan shows up at 37-39C, and at 2.4 Ghz, it's at 43-47C and prolly go higher on hotter days. But when I run it at 2.4 Ghz, I always turn the heatsink fan on (manually).

So it looks like there isn't a way to pin the Q6600 at 1.6 Ghz without rebooting huh?

 

[Binky]

Uhh, did you read my post at all?

 

[shangshang]

Originally posted by: Binky
Uhh, did you read my post at all?

LOL I sure didn't! Sorry I was about to leave work and just rushed my response.

But I've tried the RMclock prog and it's pretty good! Not bad.

But... (and this may be not do-able at all) ..I would like to see a couple features added
1) change the FSB on the fly
2) allow the user to use less than 4 cores (eg, use only cores 1 & 2, leave cores 3 & 4 OFF)

(#1 may not be possible to do unless in Bios; #2 may not be possible at all, but would be cool to be able to shut down a couple cores!).

Thanks, you're my hero.

 

[IGBT]

..the last gigabite MOB I used came with a program that did just that. Don't most MOB mfgr's include such a program?

 

[o1die]

If your board permits it, you can underclock your q6600, but you won't save that much energy. Amd has the new 9100e quad core, which uses only 65 watts and 19 at idle. You can read about it at toms hardware guide today. It runs at 1800 hertz. Newegg may get a few of them, but they will probably be scarce.

 

[shangshang]

Originally posted by: IGBT
..the last gigabite MOB I used came with a program that did just that. Don't most MOB mfgr's include such a program?

I had a chance to check Asus and it looks like Asus does have a utility that will allow you to change multiplier on the fly in Windows, but changing FSB would still require a reboot. So this is Asus.

 

[shangshang]

Originally posted by: o1die
If your board permits it, you can underclock your q6600, but you won't save that much energy. Amd has the new 9100e quad core, which uses only 65 watts and 19 at idle. You can read about it at toms hardware guide today. It runs at 1800 hertz. Newegg may get a few of them, but they will probably be scarce.

I haven't read much into AMD quads so I can't say I know anything about it. I got the Q6600 as a gift so I'll just stick with it for now. Thing is when the heatsink fan is turned off and I use only the table fan, then every little bit of wattage increase will impact CPU temp more than if the heatsink fan was running. With hotter days ahead, this will become more important.