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Dell Defect Turning 2.2GHz CPU Into 100MHz CPU?
jtavares2 writes "In what is being dubbed Throttlegate, scores of users on many message boards have been complaining about nexplicably aggressive throttling policies on their Dell Latitude E6500 and E6400 laptops which cause their CPUs to be throttled to less than 5% of their theoretical maximums even while at room temperatures. In many cases, the issue can be triggered just by playing a video or performing some other trivial, but CPU intensive, task. After being banned [PDF] from the Dell Forums for revealing 'non-public information,' one user went so far as to write and publish a 59-page report [PDF] explaining and diagnosing the throttling problem in incredible detail. Dell seems to be silent on the issue, but many users are hoping for a formal recall."
Comes a bit slower at 100 MHz. I'll probably get second or third, damn Dell laptop.
Hope they're scourged thoroughly.
:-)
I'd happily scour a user.
If I had an Ass, I'd call it Fanny Bottom, then I could slap my Ass; Fanny Bottom, on the Arse.
I don't mean to rub it in, but I think the word is 'scores'.
I click on the link and well, I think it's being hosted by one of these Dells
It's NOT me! It's the meds! I'm on 1000mg of Fukitol.
They love these class action kind of stuff.
-Alex. http://bit.ly/1iVPtfA
Seriously, just STFU.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
I hear Dell is planning to issue a complimentary turbo button for any user experiencing the problem.
Energy Star Compliance at it's Best.
Here is a mirror of the PDF: mirror. It was put up by the guy who discovered this, I'm just copying the link.
User/password is "guest" and "guest".
Be warned, it's about 25MB.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
I had a pre-release e-series machine from Dell on my desk last year. It's like they built the thing from the outside-in. Even on a 'release' E6500, Ubuntu seems to halt and die on full-screen video, Windows AHCI drivers that work everywhere else cause BSODs, and the power management firmware seems like it was written by a roomful of meth-addicted monkeys.
I've never been more disappointed with Dell as I was with the E6500. At least when the Optiplex GX260 power supplies all failed a few years ago, it was easy enough to fix them. These things are abhorrent.
"Sometimes, I think Trent just needs a cup of hot chocolate and a blankie." -Tori Amos on Nine Inch Nails
At least the batteries will last for 50 hours.
Better known as 318230.
That would be "scores of users", assuming submitter meant to indicate a number equaling or greater than a multiple of twenty. Of course it's hard to say really, as the link provided (the "many message boards" link which links to a single message board) doesn't say anything remotely resembling the claims of the submitter -- it's people complaining about "freeze/lockup".
Caveat Utilitor
you just have to hit the turbo button! Duh!
Monstar L
choose one
Windows 7 on a blazing fast 100mhz CPU. Suck on that /.ers. And hey it does Aero too! At least I think it does, bought mine last week and just got to the login screen.
I called their Pro Tech support to help diagnose a very similar issue. The CPU's were running at 6-700Mhz. I spent 45 min on the phone with them until I finally found a forum explaining it had to do with the Intel SpeedStep feature. When you go into the BIOS, go to Performance, SpeedStep, and disable it. They said thanks, added to their Knowledge Base and gave us one more reason to get away from them.
My E6400 C2D 2.8 has done this a couple times. (Almost unresponsive with 100% CPU usage for no reason) Haven't had the problem since BIOS update; It's nice to see this problem being more and more acknowledged .
Here's a post on Dell's forums describing the issue
From the link:
Some key points from the report (keep in mind this is specifically for the E6500 with the NVIDIA graphics option, but much of this likely applies to the E6400 and/or the Intel integrated graphics option):
1. The problem is NOT an overheating problem - the system simply does not overheat. It is due to premature and overly aggressive attempts at thermal control, invoked at what are NORMAL processor operating temperatures (65-80 Celsius), possibly due to faulty ACPI "passive cooling" parameter definitions and/or control methods.
2. The problem is substantially more pronounced when the system is docked.
3. The problem is aggravated somewhat by the use of dual monitors when docked as opposed to a single monitor.
4. Since the problem is all about temperature, the higher the surrounding ambient temperature in the room, the sooner and the greater the performance loss.
5. The symptoms are much more highly correlated to elevated NVIDIA GPU temperature than elevated CPU core temperatures.
Some miscellaneous corollaries:
1. Any blockage of air inlets or outlets (including, of course, dust) will aggravate the problem.
2. The reason people report shockingly high percent CPU utilization statistics when their system slows down is that the overall capacity of their processor is degraded by the throttling mechanisms. The same processes running on a CPU that is subsequently throttled necessarily will demand a higher percentage of the processor's remaining capacity.
3. The reason some folks report persistent slowness even after installing software to prevent CPU downclocking is that more than one throttling mechanism is in play here. In particular, Software-controlled Clock Modulation (also called On-Demand Clock Modulation) occurs in an almost completely invisible manner, as opposed to performance state changes (which are usually monitored by common utilities). Another often-invisible throttling mechanism is Dynamic FSB Frequency Switching (where the FSB frequency is slashed in half), though if you prevent performance state changes, that takes care of preventing this too (since it's part of state P3).
4. The reason there aren't more complaints (though many are accumulating these days) is that users who experience this problem simply have no way of knowing what the cause is and are likely to blame the wrong thing (Windows, recently installed software, cooling hardware, etc.). Untold masses may be adversely affected by this problem, but nearly all of them wouldn't know it because there's no way for them to tell. Also, the problem is at its worst only when in a docked configuration, which may not be common.
5. The reason complaints are escalating now more than before is that this is the first summer that people have had this system (in the Northern Hemisphere, anyway). I think it's safe to say that ambient temperatures are higher for most E6400/E6500 users now.
6. The problem can be substantially mitigated by pointing an external fan at the system.
7. The problem can also be mitigated by software, such as RMClock, that can override the throttling mechanisms in question, at the expense of negating all passive thermal management (though critical temperature shutdown mechanisms may remain in place).
Actually this used to happen to me on my old Inspiron (think, 4 years old). It has a 1.6 Ghz 1st gen. Pentium M, but most of the time my sys info would report it running at only 800 mhz, even though the processor was maxed out, and the system was completely cold, etc. The only way to get back to full performance was to plug in, and even that wasn't foolproof. Really pissed me off that there was no setting for "don't regulate my damn processor when I need it most, even if you are just saving my battery."
Step one: speak to class action lawyers
Step two: subpoena contact info for everyone who bought these
Step three: contact a subset of the owners to see if the failure rate is high enough to justify a suit
Step four: profit?
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
The third link: http://en.community.dell.com/forums/p/19256129/19427660.aspx Appears to discuss a different issue. Yes freeze/lockups, but not due to throttling. Rather it's pointing to bad RAM as the eventual culprit. The other two links discuss throttling.
They must have connected the turbo button backward. Happens sometimes.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
Coral Cache links to the PDFs:
1. http://imsahp.chambana.net.nyud.net/~randall/dell/throttlegate.pdf
2. http://imsahp.chambana.net.nyud.net:8090/~randall/dell/Dell%20E6X00%20downclock%20problem%20high%20compatibility.pdf
Cory Doctorow talking about cloud computing makes as much sense as George W Bush talking about electrical engineering.
I have seen this issue before with Dell's e6500. I am building a website which collects hardware information from the windows user's WMI database and displays it in a user-friendly display which records when upgrades are made, lets users recommend upgrades for other users, etc.
anyway, during testing, i found one of my e6500 test tops was running 797mhz during the windows install (when wmi data about the system is loaded).
http://www.hardwarearmory.com/ShowSystem.aspx?id=19
click the picture of the processor and look at clock.
either a bad wmi entry, or it was really clocked at 797. i couldn't explain it and spend a few hours debugging my wmi implementation. it has been a few months, but this post points me to a conclusion i can accept.
Wow, so they're just like Apple!
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
So do I get this right? As soon as I actually need my CPU to do some work, it starts to slow down? While it's quite able to run at full speed as long as it's idle and not doing anything sensible?
Computers get more and more human every day.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Non-public information? How can such a thing exist on a commodity good that has already been released to the public, and especially when they are trying to cover up a defect which renders their product offering as fraudulent (because it doesn't work as advertised) and not fit for sale? Did they expect this to NOT blow up publicly when they ignored user complaints?
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
I have an E6400 with the Nvidia option; how can I test to see if my laptop is throttling the CPU too low? (I run linux)
Is just the perceived speed of Windows Vista running at 2.2Ghz
I tried to fix a client's laptop with this problem, and eventually gave up in disgust. Glad to see it's recognize, I'll try the RMClock workaround. Hopefully Dell releases something for it soon.
Sorry, I didn't notice, See, my operating system is BLAZINGLY fast. :P
At least they saved hundreds of dollars over a comparably equipped MacBook Pro. Who wants to pay all that extra money for a shinny case? That is where all those extra engineering dollars go, right?
I will not mourn that which I never had to lose. - Unknown
I've had similar issues with my Dell Studio 1555 laptop. Even in maximum performance mode and everything in windows power management settings tweaked to the max my CPU constantly is running at 25-50% max. Even when running cpu intensive tasks like video encoding it will rarely jump to the actual frequency. I have a Core 2 Duo T9600 6MB cache 2.8ghz max but likes to run around 1.1ghz.
I have a similar problem on my dell laptop, if it's doing CPU intensive tasks and overheats - it will go into slow mode - fair enough. But it will stay there - no matter what I do - except restart.
People get too excited about product recalls. It just means the manufacturer has to eliminate or at least mitigate the failure. In this case, Dell will issue Firmware A.02 or whatever and the problem will vanish. Not a big deal.
I've had a lot of product recalls in my life because I drive a car and I have a baby. Apart from a few rare instances from Kodak and Honda, this doesn't mean the consumer gets a full refund and all of the products wind up in a landfill.
Often in Error, Never in Doubt.
was there an anon tip dropped by a person only known as throttle throat?
Now- how many more posts before this thread gets Godwined?
Python: 'And then suddenly you have a language which says "we're all stuck with whatever the whiniest coder wants".'
Now where do I shop for a PC? This is a serious question. For all the faults of Dell, I've had nothing but positive experiences with them, and, if nothing else, they at least warranty your computer for a year. Even so, they do seem to be at the end of the line as far as putting out quality product.
I've never had any luck with computers out of a box and I lack the skillset to put a PC together myself. Since the reviews online often are conflicting from site to site (and half of them read more like paid advertisements), I find myself kind of lost at this point. Where can I go to find a quality Windows PC?
PS. Your jokes are all very funny. Quality Windows PCs don't exist, buy a Mac, run Linux. I'm laughing in anticipation so you don't even have to show off your incredible wit.
But then I realized the cable was blue, so I only gave it one star. I hate blue.
Here's a mirror of the files. I only have the first file so far, but I will add the other one once it works: http://www.sigmirror.com/browse/admin/4438_NOr20
http://www.tuxguides.com
In my 15+ year history of dealing with Dell, getting them to admit fault is near impossible. I've been through quite a few such incidents and I have to say, I may never forgive Dell for the Optiplex GX270 SFF. If they would just be a responsible company and fix their mistakes openly I might consider doing business with them again some day.
"To err is human, to mod Funny divine."
Just as fast, twice as bulky.....
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
I've got one of these notebooks. They've replaced my motherboard twice as well as all the cooling system (fan/heat pipe/etc). I'm confident it's a BIOS level issue, that said, after my third (including orig) motherboard the problem went away. I can play 10+ YouTube videos simultaneously now with no issues, before I couldn't get through a single video. I posted this on my blog including a screen shot of the throttle taking place in Windows Resource Monitor. Nice to hear I wasn't alone.
http://randommusingsofp.wordpress.com/2009/11/30/dell-latitude-e65006400-performance-issues/
Dell has aggressive CPU throttling in the BIOS. I have an Inspiron 6400 w/ Core 2 Duo 1.83ghz. In XP, Vista, and 7, it would throttle way the heck down and not turn the fan all the way up. Because the fan was annoying. It would go down to around 200mhz.
I fixed it in software by installing RMClock and i8kspeedfan. But my computer was usually around 55 and went up to 65 playing HD video, and the fan would kick in, and suddenly it's really loud.
Also helped to get one of those cooling pads with a fan in it.
So I took apart my laptop. There were 1" thick sheets of dust between the processor and graphics coolers and then between them and the output duct.
Cleaning them out, put it back together, now at full speed it rarely goes over 55. The BIOS throttling that kicks in at 70C or 75C or so hasn't come on since the software fix. Don't even need the Targus cool-pad anymore.
So basically, Dell builds a system with inadequate cooling, that is disabled from maximum speed even when system policy is set that way, and instead throttles you down in the BIOS 'til you can't even move the mouse until it cools down. No option to allow the fan to go to full-speed, no way to do it except 3rd-party software, and really darned loud when it happens.
It must've sucked to have a 2.3GHz in this thing...
I must be getting tired, because I read that as "Dell Defect Turning 2.2GHz CPU Into 1000GHz CPU?"! I thought wow I want one of those, then I read on and thought it was some bug working out the processor usage as a percentage of 1000GHz even though it was running at full speed, then I realised what an idiot I was being!
Your ad here.
I wonder how many a "diarrhea" of users is? Maybe close to 144 - that would be pretty gross, or 288? that would be "too" gross [rim-shot].
I use to own a Dell Inspiron 5150 that had to have a motherboard replaced out of warranty. (I've since given it to my wife as she is a lighter user and it'll probably last longer with her). The most likely cause is a known but never acknowledged issue where with normal use the case wears against a component on the motherboard severing it. It's not the first such issue I've heard of.
My current laptop is a Dell Inspiron 9400. I got it when they were giving away 3 years warranty for no extra cost. I'm so glad I did. I have had 2 hard disks replaced. (Issue finally fixed when I insisted on a different brand). I have had a hinge fixed after it broke (no misuse or abnormal use). I've had 2 screens replaced because they developed large dust bunnies behind the screen. I've had the CPU fan jam. It also has a habit of randomly taking 2 minutes to progress through the boot screen. No idea why. Dealing with warranty has been a hassle - worst experience was when they didn't show up for 3 appointments in a row. My wife or I had to be home to deal with it and then they wouldn't show up. The 3rd time they tried to arrange a technician that was 6 hours away at around 8pm. Well that wasn't going to work. But at least I didn't have to pay for parts for this machine. It's still my last Dell though.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
As a newly hired Dell Tech support employee starting his 2nd day at work in about 9 hours, I have a feeling tomorrow is going to be a looong day.
My MacBook Pro can melt the skin off my legs AND boil a pot of water, all without the slightest dip in performance.
I'd rather let a thousand guilty men go free than chase after them.
I have a Dell XPS M1210 on which the service technician didn't make the connection between the heatsink and the GPU when replacing the motherboard.
Once I found out that the overheating GPU was causing the CPU to throttle down, I added a giant blob of silver paste and everything has been happier.
This had especially been a problem when playing flash videos (of Bible stories of course), which quickly overheated the GPU and sent the whole system to 100 MHz. Without having RTFPDF, this sounds suspiciously familiar.
I have an Inspiron E1505 laptop with an out of control fan. The speeds are hardwired into the BIOS and cannot be changed. (And yes, i8kutils does not solve this)
Think of it this way, by throttling down the CPU (or keeping the fan running on high in my case) it would seem they are trying to keep warranty repairs down and save themselves some money. However, in this case, it seems they screwed up with their throttling attempt.
Out of interest why did you change to Win 7?
Because applications will stop being made available for Windows XP. System requirements will likely change soon from "Windows XP Service Pack 2 or newer" to "Windows Vista Service Pack 1 or newer" as apps begin to take advantage of new Windows Vista APIs at the same time they take advantage of the processing power in the multicore CPUs in the PCs sold alongside Windows Vista.
I click on the link and well, I think it's being hosted by one of these Dells
At the end of one of the forums, someone links to a mirror. You can find the report here:
http://www.sigmirror.com/files/44490_iweoz/throttlegate.pdf
Sounds like their spokesman switched to something a little slower...
My E6500 suffers from this issue exactly as described... unfortunately I bought a refurbished machine that no longer has any warranty so i have no leverage with Dell to get it fixed. The machine is basically unusable in the dock in a room with an ambient temperature over 25deg C. I've tried all the suggested fixes to no avail. Running a hacked up CPU tool isn't something I'm particularly keen on. I see no reason for Dell not to re-design the BIOS so that it runs the machine much, much hotter before it throttles, particularly when docked.
I have the same with a D600, machine from 2001. Disabling Speedstep in the bios locks the CPU down to 600MHz, i.e. unusable.
For those that don't get the reference, a theremin is an instrument that senses movement through electric fields. Interestingly, the principle is similar to what happens during random computer failures when the electronics are being influenced by complex thermal noise and electrostatic effects. Thus, showing that new computers can still suffer from the same old problems.
"Our competition's servers run so hot, no wonder their name rhymes with Hell."
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Don't fucking buy Dell. I thought everyone knew that.
In before corporate purchase. Fire the guy who OK'd it!
I want my Cowboyneal
I know everyone, I'm sorry.. I noticed my spelling mistake right after hitting 'submit' but it was too late. The right word must have been missing from my head... SCORES SCORES SCORES SCORES
In my day we were glad to get 10 MHz! And we paid plenty for it, I can tell you! And that was when the dollar was worth something! We would have sold your brother for 100MHz! And we had to put the bits in by hand, one at a time! And take them out again, too! 100MHz? You kids don't deserve 100MHz!
Now, get off my lawn!
A lot of good comments on the overuse of gate, and corporate censorship (evil).
But am I the only one sitting here thinking you shouldn't have bought a fucking Dell? Seriously!
Well - you won't forget it now! Anyhow - the article was green lit as is - so you don't get all the blame
I'm quite certain this happens to me.. on my Dell XPS laptop. It seems to describe exactly what I've found. My laptop has the specs to run most games, but craps up on simple video and runs everything only at minimum settings, even right out of the box.
If you have an HP DV or Compaq C7xx series laptop they've got 12 cell batteries available. I'd assume other manufacturers do as well. While a little ugly and cumbersome (they stick out below the normal battery acting as a 'foot' on the bottom of the laptop) they DO double the battery life, even on the low end models that won't register a larger capacity battery than stock.
Really came in handy for me overcoming the 2.5 hour max life on my original battery, which has been collecting dust ever since.
It's a dell, what did ou expect?
I hear that helps.
We had a saying at my old work - all processors idle at approximately the same speed. Seems like they're taking this to the extreme
Even though I first started figuring this out 5 months ago (and others have been complaining about it online since late 2008) this is STILL an unresolved problem, at least for the E6500 (I don’t have an E6400 I can test with).
New information since my report:
1. Not only is the CPU deliberately throttled, but if it’s warm enough, even the GPU is severely throttled (for the E6500 systems that have the optional discrete NVIDIA Quadro NVS 160M - I don’t have an integrated Intel graphics model to test).
2. It’s definitely a BIOS issue – if they would just unhoark the ACPI code that (secretly) cripples the system so easily, it would save incalculable frustration (and resentment) among Dell’s users.
3. I’ve been relentlessly trying to work with Dell to get this fixed. No dice so far. I’m currently working with a Team Lead at Dell’s Round Rock, TX “Resolution Expert Center” (REC). I had to go through 2 of their staff before I even got someone who understood the problem (they weren’t very “expert”). Before that, I probably talked to about 15 various tech support folks before they would even escalate to the REC.
Nailing this thing down and trying to get it fixed has been an epic journey so far. It’s fascinating to me how far Dell has fallen (that’s part of why I’m so interested in following up on this). I used to be a huge Dell fan back in the day when they kicked butt. These days they’ve lost their way. They continue to lose market share (they’ve given up their #2 spot in worldwide PC sales to Acer recently, having already given up the #1 spot to HP). Meanwhile they’re selling corporate-class desktop-replacement “performance” laptops that will deliberately and secretly cripple themselves into utter uselessness at warmish room temperatures. And they can’t/won’t fix the problem even months after it’s pointed out to them in excruciating clinical detail. No wonder they’re losing their core business. Instead they idly ponder selling mobile phones in China. Sheesh.
Here's a couple snippets from recent communication with my contact at Dell:
“I'd like draw your attention to how Dell portrays this system in its
printed catalog: "pure business performance designed for the most
demanding applications" (p. 27, October 2009, key code 65051).
I'm not sure whether the same verbiage was used back when I bought the
system last year, but it was clear that this was not a "budget" model - it
was the new, top-of-the-line dockable executive desktop replacement system
with a price tag of about $2000 including the dock. I still hold the
conviction that a "performance" system "designed for the most demanding
applications" should not ever cripple its own processing power within its
specified operating environment (and in particular should not do so
secretly). But can we at least get to the point where it throttles the
same way docked as it does undocked and sitting on a table?”
“In my last two positions in IT management, going back to 1995, Dell was
pretty much all I would buy and I was a big fan. I always gave my bosses
dockable Dell laptops. But if I was an IT manager and found out that my
boss's $2000 executive performance laptop slowed to a crawl when he tried
to work from his porch at home, and I went through the long hours of
tracking this well-hidden problem down only to discover that Dell was
doing this on purpose and, effectively, in secret, you can be damn sure I
would never make the mistake of buying a Dell laptop again and I would
look with a wary sideways glance at any other Dell system as well.
Honestly.”
We buy all our dells with Prosupport. I had the slowdown for ages - drove me crazy. Everyone at work blamed Linux (which it is running). Eventually phoned Dell up and told them to replace stuff until it worked. Next day they came in, replaced motherboard, cpu's and memory and it worked just like a new machine (strangely enough). Never had the problem again. Wished they'd replaced the case too - that scratch is bugging me. Maybe should drop it in a bucket of water and try again.
"In many cases, the issue can be triggered just by playing a video"
I bought this laptop to watch porn. Now what am I supposed to do with it, read slashdot or update my facebook with "no porn for me today :("
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
shouldn't have got a Dell!
Yeah, don't feel too bad. If slashdot had staff that actually gave a fuck about this place and proofread/edited once in a while, we wouldn't have people complaining about typos... Linking to a 59-page PDF on the main page? Come on!
We’re aware of concerns raised in this thread. At this point, our teams are looking into the details. When we have more information to share, we’ll update customers via a post on Dell’s blog, Direct2Dell. Thanks, Bill B. Dell Social Media and Community
The spelling is very nexplicable.
As of last night, http://ftp.us.dell.com/bios/E6400A19.EXE
No release notes yet on Dell's main website though.
Dell did respond to the question with what they call a fix. They say the "issues arose under more extreme thermal and usage models" Not sre what that means - perhaps it occurs where people are actually using the laptop. They also claim not to have banned anyone. Tinkerdude responds with more data, see the Dell blog (Direct2Dell) at http://bit.ly/6IsqaF
new bios posted yesterday for both e6400 & e6500 series laptops:
ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/bios/E6400A19.EXE
ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/bios/E6500A18.EXE
Response on the Direct2Dell community blog.
http://en.community.dell.com/blogs/direct2dell/archive/2009/12/02/dell-on-laptops-and-throttling.aspx
/^([Ss]ame [Bb]at (time, |channel.)){2}$/