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stupid BIOS default
... what i learned today
wed 2004-sep-08 15:13:16 pdt
... permalink
Turns out that my work laptop (an IBM ThinkPad T20), is supposed to
run at 750 MHz, not the sluggish 200 MHz at which I've been using it
for over three years now. Apparently, the default settings in the
BIOS were to have it step down the CPU speed after some period of
inactivity, and it never then steps it back up again (until reboot).
Clever.
To be fair, I would guess that the failure to step back up is a linux
kernel issue, not the BIOS' fault (and so presumably, the majority of
ThinkPad users don't have this problem since they run Windows), and I
haven't all that often maxed out the CPU anyway... But still, over
three years, I've executed only about a quarter the number of clock
cycles I could have had. That's a lot of missed cycles!
mail me
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