Mysterious Win 7 Pro 64 Slowdown - Maybe Underclocking Itself?

Hi Folks. Here’s a minor update. MSI does have a Customer Support phone #, but I have to wait till Monday to call as they’re closed weekends. We’ll see what happens; I’ll keep you posted. Just in case, I also Googled the motherboard and they are still available, so I’m good there if I have to buy another.

I’ve lost count but it’s been around 3 days now it’s been running at 800 MHz. Now knowing what EIST is, yesterday I set it to 100%, but it didn’t make a difference.

Just a short while ago I figured I’d switch the Slow switch back to its original position since the middle position wasn’t working, with the hopes that I’d at least get my On button light back on. And that’s when things got scary. It wouldn’t start!! Oh great, now it died I thought.

Turns out that the front panel header is so insecure that just very lightly brushing against it (I didn’t even realized I did and I was being super careful) that it comes loose enough to not be connected. It uses, for lack of a better term, a header plug where you hook up all your front panel connections to it, then the plug onto the motherboard.

Now the good news! It fired up at 4.2 GHz! It sure was nice loading this Web page almost instantly instead of having time to go get a cup of coffee and hope it’s loaded by the time I get back, LOL.

So, other than the monitor, or course, I’m not turning this thing off, and hope that keeps me running ‘fast’ until I get this fixed for real.

Thanks for that idea, Jack.

I downloaded your link on the Extreme Tuning Utility, johnhoh. If this box messes up again, I’ll give it a shot. I’m just real shy right now to try anything… while it’s running fast, I don’t want to touch it, LOL.
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johnhoh said:

Download Intel® Extreme Tuning Utility (Intel® XTU)

The ‘fast’ mode was short lived. It started fluctuating last night, and it was a steady 800 MHz this morning without turning off the system last night.

Short version: I finally got ETU to start and no joy, even while running the stress test it stayed at 800 MHz. But I think I discovered a huge clue.

As you know, sometimes it will bounce between fast/slow. I noticed in ETU, near the bottom, “Thermal Throttling” was Yellow, and said ‘Yes’ (see screenshot) even at idle. I figured that meant it was just turned on. But then, the system when into ‘fast’ mode per HWiNFO64! (at 4 GHz, not 4.2 GHz). I looked back at ETU and “Thermal Throttling” was now blue, and said ‘No.’

As a test, I loaded a Web page and it loaded just about instantaneous instead of taking 15-20 seconds. But while typing this and the above paragraphs, HWiNFO64 dropped back to 800 GHz, and ETU’s “Thermal Throttling” was Yellow, and said ‘Yes’ again.

So for whatever reason, this system does appear to be Thermal Throttling down. Since I haven’t touched the Slow switch, I’m thinking it may be its related circuitry, or maybe something else wrong with the motherboard; a cracked trace somewhere?

Any ideas on this?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Long version (this may help others): I installed Intel ETU but things aren’t going well. I rebooted as requested, tried to fire it up, and got the error:

"Unable to start Intel Extreme Tuning Utility. If there is another performance tuning application running, you must close it before trying to start this application." (See Screenshot)

It took so long to load (a real couple of minutes) that I did start Task Manager to see what’s going on. ETU was not even showing as running, yet it’s right there on my screen. So I logged off, thinking maybe TM goofed things up. No change. Full reboot, also no change.

Did some Googling on the issue and tried the un/reinstall trick. I ran CCleaner in between and nothing related found.

Same error after un/reinstall. So this time I rebooted and reset the BIOS yet again. Note that a BIOS reset turns off XMP. This time ETU got a little further, but I still got an error:

“The application exited unexpectedly” (See screenshot for addition error details.)

I clicked on “Continue” and got in, finally… So I can only guess that having XMP turned on throws off ETU.

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Layback Bear said:

Well your gaining on it. Sometimes it is the simple things that count.
Proper connections is surly one of the simple things.

My rules of the thumb.
1. Make sure the basics are correct first.
2. Don't assume their is only one problem.


Keep us informed.

Jack

Oh yeah, I fully agree. I can't count the times over the years on how many things I've "fixed" for people by simply making sure the device was plugged in! Or things like switching the remote from DVD back to TV. LOL

Layback Bear said:

It's about a detective and a case about helping a cop that is being set up and accused of stealing.

I have no idea on how one gets a book published. I will work on that later.
I bought a book on how to wright a book and all it did was confuse me.
I knew what I wanted to wright about so I just sat in front of the keyboard and typed like I talk and think.
I don't want it to read like a owners manual but more like real people talking and their thoughts. I want the reader to know the detectives thought. Why something is done. More detail of things, places and ideas that steer the detective to the solutions. Every time I proof read I change things a little. If I just let my thought come out using the keyboard it is not hard for me. I do get times I have to stop for a couple of days and just think where the book should go next. Two day later I'm typing and there are the things I was thinking on for the last 2 days. It's not hard for me for whatever reason. I have a lady friend reading my book but she is well behind now so I haven't got a updated opinion. Her last comments were very nice. She likes the book and it is easy to read. Easy to read is what I want. I don't want my book to be work for someone to read it.

I'm on page 373 at the present time.
The case is about solved.

Jack

Sounds intriguing and captivating, Jack. I’m not a writer but it sure seems like you’re on the right track! I like the ‘easy to read’ concept, too.

Let us know when it’s published. I’m very interested in it. (Warning: it takes me ‘forever’ to read a book as I do all my physical reading while on the ‘head’, so it’s just a few minutes at a time here and there…)

"Since I haven’t touched the Slow switch, I’m thinking it may be its related circuitry, or maybe something else wrong with the motherboard; a cracked trace somewhere?"

Slow mode works by forcing thermal throttling to an ON state and making the system believe its overheating, so this new information reinforces that you are somehow being forced into slow mode no matter what you do with bios settings. But how is that happening? The fact that this happens even when you don't touch the switch, plus the fact that the switch sometimes does indeed have an impact, is exactly why I think the switch is the nexus of the problem and must be faulty. Now the issue might have nothing to do with the switch because its really due to a bad trace on the board, but in that case you would expect the slow mode switch to have no impact at all. Did you learn anything from the MSI forum posts?

A few pages back you tried disabling thermal throttling in bios but it had no effect. However there is a program called throttlestop, which might be something to check out. Caveat - using this program eliminates thermal throttling, which is something that protects your system from overheating. Probably not an issue, but have to point it out.

Download ThrottleStop | techPowerUp

you know, what if that funky power led light is a cause of problems instead of an effect? Probably a good idea to try unplugging it from your motherboard and rebooting. We're assuming it went out because of the motherboard, but its also possible it is shorting out on its own and that short is affecting the motherboard.