Processor Speed

[Dropkickmurphys]

hey, i just wanna know why in my System Properties window it shows 2 speeds for my processor. (2.00GHz and 800MHz)
my problem is that games always seem to show the lower of the 2 and for a lot of games it doesnt reach the minimum spec.
why does it do this?
and is there any way of stopping it running at the lower speed?

 

[Shady]

2.00 Ghz is the maximum processor speed, 800 Mhz is the speed it's currently running at, This is usually for saving battery and not wasting power for nothing... it should be dynamically allocated according to application needs.
Read the manual of your Laptop or google a little bit to know how you can change that.
Usually you can find that in the power management profiles.

 

[Dropkickmurphys]

cool thanks, i dont really need to to power save etc as its always plugged in.

 

[Martingale00]

It's not just laptops, it's desktops too. When I'm running a program/game my processor speed reads 2.41Ghz. I just checked it during routine web surfing and it was reading 1.8GHz. When you're playing a game it should be at full max though. Go to Control Panel - Performance & Maintenance - System - hit the Advanced tab - then performance settings - Advanced tab again. Under processor settings make sure it's set to "optimize for best performance of programs" and not "background services". If it is already set for optimized program performance I don't know where the problem lies, someone who's more knowledgeable then I am should help out. Here's Microsoft's run down on power management settings....

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/setup/learnmore/russel_02march25.mspx

 

[Geoff]

If you dont need it to save power, disable SpeedStep in the BIOS.

But as Shady said, the 2.0Ghz is telling you the rated speed, and the 800Mhz is telling you the current speed.

 

[Dropkickmurphys]

i downlaoded a program called SpeedSwitchXP which allows you to set the CPU speed in Windows, its easier to set it up than using the Windows own option imo...