XP recognizes only half of CPU clock?

Hey everyone.

I recently formated my HP Pavilion ZV6253EA laptop. It's already quite a few years old and naturally not so fast. However, even after installing all the drivers (except for some SM Bus thing which I couldn't find), it felt really slow.

I checked dxdiag and some other things and noticed that my WinXP Pro only shows the CPU clock speed to be something like 997 Mhz even thou it's supposed to be 2,0 Ghz.

I found some CPU drivers/support programs on the manufacturer's driver site, but installing those didn't change anything. This is what I downloaded: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/...9-1&lc=en&dlc=fi&cc=fi&product=1152595&os=228

Now that I read the description again, it looks like it could have actually just made things worse. But I believe the CPU clock speed was at ~1 Ghz before installing it as well. Anyways, the thing is, BIOS still shows the clock speed to be 2 Ghz. The processor is AMD Athlon 64 3200+. The system has 1 GB of RAM and ATI X200 mobile graphics card if those help.

So, any ideas what could be wrong?

 

I'm not sure that there is anything actually wrong. just things being reported a bit randomly in windows
its probably explained a little better here:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316965

Depending on what power profile you have active, windows can scale back the processor speed in an attempt to save power. Its usually a dynamic thing, as system load increases then your processor should speed up again.
Power profiles usually change whether you are plugged in or running on batteries, chances are there will be a small icon for HP's power manager (or even the default windows one) sitting in the system tray next to the clock.
Clicking (or right clicking) on that should bring up some different configuration options you can play with. You might even find a help file relating to your machine specifically that could help explain things a little more clearly

 

Oh, okay. That makes sense. Thanks for help

 

As to what is slowing your machine down, I'm going to make the grand assumption that you're running XP.
Is process explorer showing any processes which are using a lot of CPU time?

Otherwise, you could give Advanced System Care a try, it seems to do a pretty good job of tweaking a lot of hidden settings which can help speed things up. Especially good for inexperienced users as I've yet to see it 'break' anything

http://majorgeeks.com/Advanced_SystemCare_3_d5927.html

 

use cpuz to get the actual values of ur systems' clock.. it'll show low values wen system is idle.. start up a game or somethng and run cpuz gain.. you should see the processor back at its normal clock Also make sure you update ur windows and also get the new AMD cool and quiet drivers.. i cant give you a link rite now bt iirc there was somethng abt a bug in cool and quiet..

 

Nah, there's nothing odd going on in the processes. Btw, any idea what the missing "SM Bus Controller" driver could be?

 

no no.. tht's not wt i meant.. i told cpuz so tht u can see tht the clock throttles itself wen it needs to.. it shows the clock speed..
and win7 requires u to update the drivers frm the intel site.. i think the smbus drivers are nt there in win7 fr some reason.. dn't knw why though.. get the latest drivers frm intel fr your mobo.. and install them.. the problem will go away..

 

The OP is running XP not windows 7. HP runs its own board so it is best not to install anything from Intel. Certain manufacturers change things on the motherboards to their own specifications. So all drivers should be downloaded form the manufacturer's site.

 

Hello dhruv!

As you have recently begun participating in threads it seems that you are not yet real familiar with MG's as a whole.. Please keep in mind that this is an English speaking forum, not a 1337 forum. The spell checker shown in the upper right corner of the reply box may be quite helpful to you.

Additionally, please take time to actually read all the posts in a thread you are considering responding to so that you actually have a good idea of what is going on and what others have said in reply. Here at MG's we pride ourselves on having a top notch tech support forum so our standards are pretty high, which I'm sure you can fully understand and appreciate. :major

I would suggest you take the time to read and learn. By this I mean simply reading through threads in the tech forums that are of interest to you or read up on replies by some of our long standing members to get a better idea of how replies should be done. I think you will find this quite helpful and educational. In turn, this would make you much more likely to be taken seriously, which you aren't now as your posts are so difficult to follow.

Thank you for your understanding and cooperation!
AbbySue

 

This is a definition of the SMBus: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System_Management_Bus BTW, I saw no HP drivers for it. Try the HP forums for help: http://h30434.www3.hp.com/psg/board?board.id=Hardware

This may have some bearing on your predicament. From the AMD Processor Update page you posted:

Also, as greasemonkey pointed out, XP will throttle back the CPU in low demand situations to save power on a laptop in certain power option settings.

 

hi Calade,

it's the bios settings. Windows is reporting what it detects on POST boot. go back into the bios and find the option to set default values or optimized values.

also, on one machine I had (with a AMD cpu installed) a few years back, I had to set the clock speed (up/down arrow) to 133 (which was the max value). the AMD cpu firmware detected this value limitation and adjusted the cpu speed correctly thus windows read it correctly.

Techsent