Could my CPU be Bad???

[hackerman22]

Hi Everyone,

I have been working on this laptop (Acer Aspire 5742z-4601) all day and I am completely stumped. The laptop is running Windows 7 Premium Home and will be running great for 2-3 minutes at a time then BAM!! I will be slowed down to such a slow speed that it gives me a headache just trying to casually browse the net. At first I thought it might be virus or malware but I have run countless scans (avira, combofix, malwarebytes) with no problems detected. I then thought it might be the ram or hard drive but both diagnostics tools (memtest and WD Diagnostic tool) showed no problems. I thought maybe the processor or integrated graphics were overheating but HWMonitor shows them at decent temps. Last thing I tried was just to see what CPU-Z showed about my processor (p6100) and during the random slowdowns my cpu clock reduces from 2000MHz to almost 900MHz. There are no options in bios for anything remotely advanced like setting clock speed. Should I just toss this thing out the window?

 

[loneninja]

Have you watched HWMonitor to view temps while it slows down or is under load?

I just ask because dropping from 2000-900 like that would either be speedstep dropping it because it's idle(shouldn't effect performance), or it's getting hot and throttling back to prevent damage.

 

[rolli59]

Yep really sounds like thermal throttling. Start by cleaning all air vents!

 

[hackerman22]

Thanks for the replies!

Yeah that was one of my thoughts and I have checked all the vents and they are clean. HWMonitor shows my high cpu temp at 51 C. That shouldn't initiate throttling right?

 

[rolli59]

No it should, not check your settings and temps in BIOS though! HW monitor could be wrong.

 

[hackerman22]

This piece of $%7# does not even show temp in bios.