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I have a Dell Latitude D520 that lives in my car all the time. Please don't ask about that part, or suggest that the laptop should live indoors. I know this, and I would if I could. Anyhow...
I find that if the outside temperature is below freezing, when I bring the laptop indoors and start it, the laptop runs very slowly. It behaves this way until it is restarted, but only if the restart is after the laptop has warmed to room temperature.
If I start the laptop while it's cold and let it run all day, it still runs as slow as the minute I turned it on. If I restart it at any time after it's warmed up, then it runs like new again.
What causes this? Why does it have to be started or restarted once it's warm? Why doesn't the gradual warming process gradually increase speed?
Edit
The following are proposed answers that I have tried, but to no avail:
- Turning off SpeedStep to keep the CPU from scaling back its clock rate.
- Starting the laptop using wall current instead of the cold battery.
I had a truck like this once, it would not start when it was cold. I installed a block heater, and it worked much better. I think the theory could apply here, but I don't think they make block heaters for laptops. – Tester101 – 2009-12-04T14:59:35.520
This used to happen to me with a Dell Latitude circa 2000-2002. I'm curious to know the answer. – Nathan DeWitt – 2009-12-04T15:10:19.717
@tester101: in laptops the CPU is the block heater... – quack quixote – 2009-12-10T14:11:40.807
Sorry, the CPU is the engine, there is no block heater. – eleven81 – 2009-12-11T13:55:27.123