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iBunny

macrumors 65816
Original poster
I have a 20 inch intel iMac. I just noticed in the Energy Screen of prefs that I can no longer change if my CPU is on reduced / automatic / highest state anymore? Any info?
 
iBunny said:
I have a 20 inch intel iMac. I just noticed in the Energy Screen of prefs that I can no longer change if my CPU is on reduced / automatic / highest state anymore? Any info?
That was a feature of the PPC chip, Intels do not have it.
 
I can confirm that this is also true for the Core Solo Mini. I guess Apple/Intel either haven't implemented this or don't think its necessary when running on a AC powered machine.
 
Benjamindaines said:
That was a feature of the PPC chip, Intels do not have it.
Intel chips do have the same thing actually. Intel used to call it "Speedstep", they may still do.
 
On the PPC, you could pick Highest, Reduced, or Automatic. I'm pretty sure the Core Duo is always on Automatic (so to speak).
 
A little looking into this reveals that the Intel Core chips apparently now do the power saving CPU speed throttling fully automatically, so I guess Intel Macs are now fixed in the "Automatic" setting.
 
Yeah, I know the Intel Processors have speedstep. I was just wondering if you could force the issue. I want to make sure my iMac is running at the highest possible setting all the time. Its not like I have to worry about battery life or anything like that. But whatever. Just wondering if it was my machine or all intel macs. Thanks
 
iBunny said:
Yeah, I know the Intel Processors have speedstep. I was just wondering if you could force the issue. I want to make sure my iMac is running at the highest possible setting all the time. Its not like I have to worry about battery life or anything like that. But whatever. Just wondering if it was my machine or all intel macs. Thanks
Looks like the answer to your question right now is: No.

Kind of annoying really, I'm sure that Apple could implement this feature.
 
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