I recently got my T61, and I really do love it. Works great, is fast. It has the T7500 and Quadro in it.
However, when on battery power, there's a constant "hiss" type of noise coming from the computer. It's not a high-pitched whine as I expected when hearing about this problem, but rather it sounds like rapid hard drive access, even though the hard drive isn't doing anything at the time.
I've heard of a couple fixes, such as disabling this or that power saving feature, but I'd really like to avoid that. I thought I remembered reading about an updated driver I could download to fix this problem, but I can't find it anywhere.
Can anyone help me out? Thanks.
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Try the 163.44 nVidia drivers, I had a hiss/whine/weird sound that stopped after installing those drivers. You can get them here: http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/
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Thanks for the quick reply. Unfortunately, I already have those drivers installed from that web site. I was wondering if there was something more along the lines of a CPU driver update?
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Disable USB power management
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Didn't help. I checked the box for "enable always-on USB" and disabled whatever usb power saving I could find. The noise is still there.
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i read somewhere on this forum that it can be solved by turning off a sleep mode..
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Hmm...as far as I know, it is related to the CPU itself and some deeper sleep states it has.
I think people have talked about some software to fix it. For some reason, the program RMClock Utility sticks in mind.
If I were you, just google something like "CPU whine + Core 2 Duo". I am sure there will be plenty of info as this is common to all Core 2 notebooks I believe.
Hope this helps. -
Disable CPU power management in the BIOS. I guarantee this will stop the whine.
Jeff -
Ah, in the BIOS you say. I'll give that a shot.
Just wondering though, won't that seriously cut down on battery life? I have the "max CPU speed" on battery power set to "lowest" and I get a good 3-4 hours out of it on a full charge. I'd hate for that to drastically decrease simply so I can get rid of a hiss.
Or is that CPU speed limitation a different form of battery saving than the stuff that would be disabled in the BIOS? -
If you are running the processor at full power you won't be likely to encounter the issue. If you disable the power management in bios then it will always run at full speed so yes it will cut down battery life
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You can keep your BIOS CPU Management setting enabled.
Download "RMClock". In "Advanced CPU Settings" -> "Platform #1" you have two choices:
1) Enable the "Disable C4" option or
2) Disable either the "Enable popdown" or "Enable popup" (can't remember which it is).
Doing either of these 100% eliminates the whine. The program needs to be running to set the option, so you need to have it run on startup. Try them out and see if they cause problems. Before when I had XP on my PC, doing the C4 one would crash my laptop after a while. They have since released a new version, and I moved to Vista. Hasn't crashed since. -
Here is another method, depending on what you do, it can help or make things slower. try going to power management and switch from Performance to Power Saver, the hiss should go away.
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I don't think this one is CPU related. I am very sensitive to this noise, I hear it on HP, Dell and Apple computers, but on my T61, nothing, unless I put my ear to my keyboard. I have one with Intel graphics.
Oops...didn't read page 2 before posting this. I don't know why mine is so much quieter by default. -
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I just wanted to follow up here:
-Checking the "Disable C4 mode" fixed the problem, but caused hard freezes in my computer multiple times over only a day or two.
-Un-checking "Enable Popup mode" also fixed the problem, and I'm running on a week or so, so far, without a single crash.
Also, un-checking "enable popup mode" doesn't seem to hurt battery life nearly as badly as disabling C4 mode. -
I kinda like the noise, it sounds cool. It keeps me company while I'm studying in the library or workin from home. It's like white noise, I don't even need an Ipod I can just listen to the laptop sounds. It even impresses the ladies, they ask "what is that noise?" and I tell them it's a very hip new form of techno music. I can tell from their impressed silence and walking away that they think it's hot.
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Why the heck do they even sell laptops with the Core 2 Duo architecture if Intel can't fix their own chips to work right?
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I think I may have this problem, but not sure it's the same thing.
My symptoms are:
* a hiss/hum that seems to be coming from the right side of the machine (sounds like white noise, or a much quieter version of a modem after the handshake)
* pretty constant, although sometimes I'll hear changes in pitch or sudden shifts in the sound, or very quiet "beats". not only during HD reads/writes
* happens whether or not on battery - can't detect any different battery vs. AC power
* tried the recommending settings in RMClock, and no noticeable difference (should just have to click Apply after changing the settings to hear the difference, yes?)
* tried disabling "USB Selective Susupend" in power mgmt, no dice
It's not that bad a noise, but it's definitely the loudest thing about the machine, louder than the fan (at low spin) or what I think is the HD (although I can hear HD reads/writes behind this other noise).
I suppose it's possible I got a loud HD and I'm just hearing the HD spin? I guess I could test that by removing it and booting up.
Any further suggestions are appreciated. -
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does any of the solutions here works for T42P ? mine started to give the same sound from the fan on the side too!
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My inspiron 1520 is definitely affected. I think part of the problem is the rest of the laptop runs so quietly this whistling high frequency noise is audible.
My previous inspiron 1520 was not affected so it may only be some. I took that back due to hard drive racket (it made a grinding noise that didn't sound healthy and PC world agreed and replaced it). Interestingly enough this one has a different make of hard drive which runs very quietly but it suffers from this CPU whine.
Its a very strange sound this. Reminds me of a ZX spectrum loading from a tape!
Its not particularly loud but like others say its a bit like an annoying clock, once you hear it you get fixated on it! Intitially I thought it was interference playing through the speakers. But when I searched for inspiron whistling sound I found exactly what it was.
Infact it can even be heard over moderately loud music!
The fix is to disable C4 mode in a program called RMclock.
This virtually eliminates the sound. I say virtually because it can still be heard when you scroll up and down with a mouse and put your ear to the base of the PC and its still there, only quieter. This is perfectly acceptable though, not really annoying. The noise with C4 enabled most certainly isn't. So disable it. Does run warmer, fan cuts in every now and then but that noise isn't of a frequency to be irritating even though its far louder.
If you can still hear it, and I can imagine some can then download l8kfangui and set fan speed to minimum. The quietly running fan at minimum speed will drown it out and the laptop will run cooler too! This fix does increase temperatures but only into safe ranges. Far lower than in a game for example -
I have the same hiss - not really bothering though. Usually the noise goes away after the laptop finishes booting into Vista. Makes no difference if I'm on AC or battery.
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Un-checking either "Enable popdown mode" or "Enable popup mode" doesn't seem to do a thing.
R61
XP Pro
T8100 - 2.1Ghz -
I had the same problem but it went away when i installed the power manager software.
Running a clean install of vista business x64 SP1. -
I have the same problem. From what I've heard it is due to a component on the motherboard (probably an inductor) near the CPU resonating when the CPU changes power states.
If you plug in a USB device to any USB port it stops apparently; it does for me at least. Using this RMClock utility like others have said also solves the problem. A permanent fix is to disable CPU power management in the BIOS, although this will negatively affect battery life.
I don't see why we should have to run third party software or cut battery life to have a system that isn't making annoying buzzing sounds, but it happens with every manufacturer and no one has bothered to make the vendors aware that it's a problem, so that's just the way it's going to stay I suppose. -
I sent mine in, they upgraded the bios and shipped it back... something I could have easily done. I don't event think they read my note that it only happens on battery. On the phone with them once again
Edit, its going back once again, but to a higher level department. -
DD -
have the same problem on my x200, under RM CLock, Advanced CPU Settings, what settings do i need to change from defualt to make the whining go away?
Eliminating the CPU "hiss" (whine?) from the T61?
Discussion in 'Lenovo' started by LMN8R, Sep 26, 2007.