Question One Core Throttling

[pyro226]

I have an i5-2520m in my laptop. One core won't go above 1300mhz. The other one bounces between 2.9ghz (turbo) and then thermal throttles.

At idle, the machine is 60C, (probably a bit warm). I clean dust twice a year, so it shouldn't be too bad, though I'm probably due. I tried telling OS (linux) to use peprformance mode rather than balanced. I disabled both powersaving features and speedstep technology through the bios.

Under heavy load, the processor goes to 81 on one core and 94 on the other, so it does appear thermal throttling is an issue under load (hotter when speedstep allows the good core to turbo to 2.9ghz).

However, thermal throttling doesn't explain why when power saving is disabled that one core is sitting at 2.5 ghz while the other is stuck as 1.3 ghz, despite temps being low.

I do have access to Windows 7 if more testing is needed.

 

[Phaaze88]

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Core_...5-2520M FF8062700840017 (BX80627I52520M).html
2.5ghz is your cpu's base clock speed. That 1.3ghz 'core' is actually the integrated gpu, of which 1.3ghz is the max speed.

 

[pyro226]

http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Core_i5/Intel-Core i5 Mobile I5-2520M FF8062700840017 (BX80627I52520M).html
2.5ghz is your cpu's base clock speed. That 1.3ghz 'core' is actually the integrated gpu, of which 1.3ghz is the max speed.

That explains it. Thanks.