Thinkpads Forum

Today I went to the service with my laptop (the third time with the same problem) andsaid I have this high pitch noise that should not be there.

At first I was told this noise is normal and I should just get used to. Really? Are you kidding me?

I was not happy. Then the women said that they have a fix, this is just something they have to adjust in the settings.

I said no problem, lets see what they got. She came back and I asked if they had just turend it off in the BIOS. She said yes, thats exactly what we did.

I told her that this is a joke. The problem hasnt been fixed by turning it off in the settings. The noise is still there when running on battery, but when connected it is not as loud.

Also this will make my battery last shorter. I have had the SSD changed and the fan. Then the motherboard. I have lost a lot of time, have been without a computer, have had to drive to the service, additional stress, arguing with people.

THE PROBLEM IS STILL THERE

Admin edit: Subject adjusted to conform with the Rules of the Road here

Are you referring to the High-pitch CPU whine?

almost all Intel Core series products suffer from this 'feature', which enables the CPU to go to sleep in C3 state when not required. the noise is generated when the CPU wakes up, which can be several hundred times a second. its just electronics doing their thing.

Apple has been able to contain this, but only because they configure the CPU to run far below spec (and all we know about the chips going into macbooks is model type and base frequency, no word of model number, etc.)

I have a similar problem, not related to CPU whine, but general electronic noise from the motherboard being picked up by the right speaker. my machine is with easyserv right now, and i've demanded a replacement.

Hey, don't worry!
If you get a 430-series replacement you'll get an X1/Edge-type Chiclet keyboard!
With no option to replace it with a standard keyboard (as of yet or maybe ever)!
Isn't advancement great?

Anyways.

The problem is definitely connected to power management. Turning it off in the BIOS will get rid of the noise but on the T410s that's fatal to battery life.

There are two programs you can use to somewhat mask the sound. The first one is ThrottleStop (download link is at the end of the first post, grab the latest version which should be 4.10).

One interesting tidbit that I found was that Lenovo has locked a certain area of the power management settings in this program. So we can't actually lock the CPU to only go to a certain C-state (i.e. to stop it from jumping back and forth millions of times a second which has been reported by some users to fix the whine). I don't know if we can get a BIOS mod that changes that unfortunate situation; there may be a site that does that work.

You might also try changing the "PowerSaver C0%" field- adjust the number to something like, I don't know... 80, then press OK and turn the program off and on again. That may lower the sensitivity on the switch that brings the CPU down to a lower power state; it might reduce the volume of the whine.

By the way- any Intel book you get can suffer from this. I believe it started with either the Core 2 or even the Pentium M- but I can't remember.
It's a problem you expect from 500-dollar Acer machines, not 1200-dollar ones, at any rate.

The 420-series doesn't do it as badly but the whine is still there on battery power (lower power gives more whine because of an inadequate capacitor).

Q-Ball wrote: By the way- any Intel book you get can suffer from this. I believe it started with either the Core 2 or even the Pentium M- but I can't remember.

Banias introduced SpeedStep 3, and I recall hearing the whine on laptops with Pentium Ms about that time.

My T61 whines in C3, but not C1/C2. <shrug> So be it.