0
I have a Dell laptop and last few days it has been really slow and laggy. I was investigating this issue and found out, that CPU speed is somehow reduced to 30%. I know that the computer has a feature which prevents overheating by reducing the speed of the CPU and I have seen in it before. It has done exactly this - reduced speed to 30% max. But there's the problem. Now it runs at maximum 30% all the time and it's not overheated at all. Actually, I don't remember when it was so cold like now. It looks like that overheating prevention is triggered on permanently and I can't turn it off. I have checked advanced power settings and Maximum CPU speed is set to 100%.
Any other ideas what could be causing this?
Could the heat sink compound have dried out? – Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams – 2017-12-11T23:13:31.183
I recommend using AIDA64 Extreme's System stability test (under the tools menu of the program). It will identify when the CPU is throttling and to what extent, You can also monitor the clock speed directly from within the program. There is a Zip file available on the download page so no installation is required, a free trial is also included. This will at least give you more details on how the CPU is behaving, and hopefully if you report back the details we can help a bit more.
– Sam3000 – 2017-12-11T23:14:38.557You're talking about the max cpu frequency? You've got reliable programs telling you the current temps & cpu frequency? On Linux you'd pick a governor & max/min options in a terminal... are you running a Linux or Windows or MacOS? Oh, and how's the battery? – Xen2050 – 2017-12-12T01:47:09.820