Why I like certain XP-era Dell laptops (RE: Overheating issues)

The XP era laptops from Dell saw a certain setting in the BIOS that allows you to adjust the CPU multiplier for CPUs with Intel Speedstep technology.

Basically what Speedstep does is that if your CPU is not using its full processing power during idle states, will it lower the CPU's clock speed to save power.

My Dell laptop experienced overheating after 7 years into service. It would often self-power down when the laptop got really hot. I had been thinking of re-applying thermal paste to the CPU, which can be a very messy job, until I saw that I could tell the CPU to permanently operate at the lowest CPU multiplier in the BIOS.

Basically my original 2.0Ghz machine is now a 1.0Ghz machine with two cores. I don't notice any performance degradation other than the occasional video stutter in a bloated OS like Win7, but never in XP which I can't tell from the original configuration of 2.0Ghz. Plus, my laptop had never experienced any overheating since.

So, ppl with XP-era laptops who have overheating issues, perhaps there is a setting in the BIOS that allows you to effectively underclock your CPU. Do that and the overheating issue will go away with minimum performance loss since this is XP were talking about, the speed demon of the OSes!

 

Btw, does anyone know what a C2D (or later) laptop underclocked to 1.0GHz w 2GB of RAM can get you in modern times? Not the Atom processors btw b/c IMO not even a quad core Atom at the same clockspeed can outperform their Core counterpart with only two cores.

Anyways, here is what you can/can't do with just 1.0GHz/2GB RAM Intel Core system:

1. Win7 32-bit is significantly loads more bloated than XP, so everything you can do in Win7, you can do in XP and then some.

2. Can play 1080p files very smoothly in Win7 32-bit.

3. Can play YT videos very smoothly w good quality in Firefox (not IE11 nor Opera b/c they both are loads slower than FF)

4. Can't play HD YT videos w/o stutter. But who needs HD streaming videos anyways? Unless you have internet speeds of > 1TB/sec, HD streaming videos will stutter even if you have a Core i7 9234 CPU clocked a 9.3GHz!

5. Above applies only to 32-bit version of Win7 as the 64-bit version is loads slower b/c the 32-bit mode has to be emulated.

 

I wish I could use my old laptop. I mean, batteries are good, fires up...but on a trip, 20 minutes to get it on and connected to the WiFi.
Dell Inspiron 5000e, came with 256mb of ram, upgraded to 500mb, and you can't go no more.
Slow is not even the word for it.
I just hate to get rid of it.
Never ran too hot, so that's a plus, I guess.
Dave

 

I've never been fond of Win7 and later. All of the PC's in our home are XP capable, meaning the manufacturers have XP drivers for them...

If there is one feature that would make me abandon Win7 completely and bask in the glory of XP for eternity, it would be virtual surround and bass boost found natively in MS's Win Vista and later audio drivers. Just like DirectX 10/11, I wonder if anyone has back-ported those features to WinXP before... It's just a little matrix/algo that the sound signals pass thru on their way to the speakers...

 

i'll never forget how I used Windows XP on my PC with only 128mb RAM. And I used that for a couple of years without almost any problems. That's how light XP is.

 

Ha! I have an ooold Hitachi laptop that came with W-95 installed on it! It works still, but is pretty much worthless.

I liked Win 2, 3, 3.x, tried, but didnt like 'Chicago' (<- 17 hi-cap floppies!) 95, really liked 98, XP, XP-Pro, both 32 & 64, Do not like Vista, 7, 8, etc. I hang on to old computers if they have XPP on them.

I donno, XP just works, , , , most of the time, anyways

-c-

 

I'm quad-booting XP on an elderly, 2002-era Dell Inspiron 1100 lappie (the little brother of the 5100, which was the subject of that class-action lawsuit over the exploding batteries..!); 2.6 GHz P4, 1 GB RAM, and a 64 GB IDE SSD, alongside three variants of Puppy Linux.

This same machine came with XP originally.....when it had a 2.0 GHz Celeron, 128 MB of RAM, and a 20 GB Hitachi Travelstar. It was slow, no doubt about it.....and also loaded down with tons of crap. I'm older and wiser, now; the hardware upgrades have made a big difference, and I'm running a fairly lean'n'mean XP these days; just essentials, and nothing more.

But it's built like a brick outhouse, and has loads of space inside for when you need to carry out maintenance tasks, and perform upgrades, etc. Everything's very easy to access, that's for sure.

We live & learn, don't we?


Mike.

 

I like the Pentium M era Dells the best like the Latitude D800 i'm typing from right now. The fans in these can be controlled 100% with SpeedFan, but when i do so with a Core 2 Duo Dell when i put SpeedFan at 100% (When the CPU is around 145f) it's on full blast for a few second, then it slows down. They seem to want to cook themselves. I just applied Arctic Silver thermal paste too, and the heatsink had no dust.

 

Perfect win 98se/win2k machine.