Do you allow your CPU to slow down?

Forums › Home Theatre (including HTPC and EPG Collector) › Do you allow your CPU to slow down?

Nety

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#54428 17-Dec-2009 14:29

In the past I have always set first Vista and now Windows 7 to run the processor at 100% speed. This was mainly because the hardware was only just powerful enough to run Blurays and I found issues if I did not have both Min + Max set to 100% with micropauses in bluray playback.
However now I have a better mobo and CPU I am wondering if I should allow windows to slow down the CPU and save some heat, noise and power.
So the question is do people allow the CPU in their media center's to slow down and if so do you use the Windows power settings or the hardware manufactures software to control the speed?

I already have the media centre set to go to sleep after 20 mins.

Media centre PC - Case Silverstone LC16M with 2 X 80mm AcoustiFan DustPROOF, MOBO Gigabyte MA785GT-UD3H, CPU AMD X2 240 under volted, RAM 4 Gig DDR3 1033, HDD 120Gig System/512Gig data, Tuners 2 X Hauppauge HVR-3000, 1 X HVR-2200, Video Palit GT 220, Sound Realtek 886A HD (onboard), Optical LiteOn DH-401S Blue-ray using TotalMedia Theatre Power Corsair VX Series, 450W ATX PSU OS Windows 7 x64

nathan

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#283454 17-Dec-2009 14:45

yes, I just use the defaults - let Windows 7 manage the power, no need for your CPU core frequency to be constantly running at 100%

garvani

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#283466 17-Dec-2009 15:33

Holly hell.. Didnt realise your frequent these forums Nathan! Find your Technical Preview events etc in chch really informative.. Plus the box of speights you hand around on arrival helps too

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Meanwhile back to the question. Ive just recently started throttling my cpu in the last couple of weeks. I used to run it in high perofrmance mode (100% cpu) all the time. I have a phenom2 955 and on warmer days it was reaching 56~ degrees just idling, it sounded like a jet engine! So ive changed my cpu power down to 10% Minimum and 60% maximum, this has been more than enough to do everything. If im firing up modern waefare 2 or whatever ill change it back to high performance.
But the change in audible noise from the box is great.

nathan

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#283468 17-Dec-2009 15:48

im very surprised you even need to adjust the defaults at all

if you're on the default of "Balanced" if you startup something like COD:MW2 and it needs some more horsepower Windows will just automatically adjust the cpu frequency, even up toto 100% if it needs