PCA Forums

One of the skyhawk machines that PCA reviewed. Pretty cool box. Only one problem.... I bought it with a new 3.4Ghz prescott chip. The mobo sees the label as 3.4, but will only run it at 2.8. I have the newest BIOS, and I sent email to the mobo guys, but it sucks waiting.

Anyone else buy one, and have this problem?

Might I have a bad CPU? I read the top of the chip, and it says what I expect it to say.

Ideas?

what's telling you that it's running at 2.8? Does this chip have the new enhanced speedstep feature? If so, it may just be idling at 2.8 GHz.

when the bios posts, I get a display saying

Genuine Pentuim 2.8Ghz 200mhz x 14
Processor Label Genuine Pentium4 3.4Ghz

try running CPUID or CPUZ to confirm the actual running speed

cpuid tells me the same thing as the BIOS.

Specification Pentium 4 3.4Ghz CodeName Prescott
Core Speed 2806.4 Mhz
Multiplier x14
FSB 200.5Mhz
Bus Speed 801.8Mhz

Have not heard back from the mobo guys yet.

Do a google search on your machine as odds are good that others have also noticed that and that you're simply reading an incorrect cpu speed or at idle.
Mobile AMD 64 cpu machines have the same seemingly "underclocked" readings in both the bios and Windows but they are actually running at normal clock speeds. CPU-Z reads mine correctly.

You have the same setup, and are good? I am worried that I have a bad proc.

No, I have an ABS G3 which uses a Mobile AMD 64 3200+ cpu and when I first got it, I too noticed that it was reading cpu speed incorrectly (800mhz vs 2.2ghz). At first I was concerned but after searching it out I found that this is a common complaint with any laptop running a mobile AMD 64 cpu. People are even returning their new laptops over this. There's something weird about how both the bios and thus Windows sees these cpus. There's also a program that powers down the cpu speed when at idle to conserve battery power when running on battery power.
I know that my laptops cpu is running correctly however, cpu-z says that it's running at normal clock speed and it plays all games perfectly at high res, which it couldn't do if it was running as slow as the bios says it is.

mk888, i had that box, but the fastest i ran in it was a 2.9, the guy i traded it too says he has a 3 gig p4 in it now

is it not the "Cool n Quiet" technology? the CPU underclocks its self to prevent unessecary heat when it isnt doing anything, but soon as you load up a game or such the processor steps up the fsb and runs at the speed its rated at... this has caused problems with certain games recognising the processor as a new bit of hardware everytime the game is run.

but this is for AMD im pretty sure pentium had a simialar method of keeping the heat down in there new range of processors.