I just got myself a ThinkPad R61 laptop and I’m trying to turn it into my dedicated audio machine. What troubles my, though, is that sometimes as the audio goes the sound suddenly becomes choppy, as if the latency is set too low. I suspect that’s when the CPU switches clock multipliers.
Am I on the right track here? Do any of you guys have experienced this? Should I switch SpeedStep off?
yes, disable it.
I’m still waiting for an Echo Indigo, so I’m using the built-in audio for now.
speedstep technology is used for powersaving mode and lowers cpu consumption/speed whenever the laptop seems idle or when an application seems to demand less cpu power at a longer measured period.
Technically a chipset does not understand that time critical applications require full cpu power even if the keyboard or mouse is not being controlled for a long time or when suddenly a cpu hungry vst plugin is being called into action. The speed is raised by the need but the audio device responds inadequate on the action because the cpu-level it needed was not there on the time critical moment.
In easier words:if you can turn it off, you will suffer less audio glitches using time-critical applications like Renoise.