A8-3520M, Not reaching full potential?

[teconmoon]

I recently got a Laptop with the following specs:

CPU: AMD A8-3520 Quad-Core 1.60 GHz
GPU: AMD Radeon HD 6620G
RAM: 6.00 GB

But when I run a simple game like Animal Crossing, I can't run at full speed most of the time, and my CPU/GPU monitors say that my computer isn't even close to being maxed out.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

[scummos]

Your CPU is clocked at 1.6 GHz. That's not enough, I think.

Greetings

[DefenderX]

AMD CPU with 1.6 Ghz?

no way...

[Starscream]

That CPU should overclock itself over 2.4GHz, but they don't seem to do that with Dolphin. I forced mine to 2.3GHz and got much better results. Windwaker full speed, NSMBW full speed, etc.

[teconmoon]

(02-21-2012, 07:27 AM)Starscream Wrote: That CPU should overclock itself over 2.4GHz, but they don't seem to do that with Dolphin. I forced mine to 2.3GHz and got much better results. Windwaker full speed, NSMBW full speed, etc.

Oh interesting, any advice on overclocking my CPU? I am relatively inexperienced in overclocking CPUs.

Edit: Also thanks everyone for the speedy replies!

[Starscream]

Read this thread. Don't worry if the thread title doesn't apply to you or if the first few posts don't either, it will make sense as you read.

http://forums.dolphin-emu.org/showthread.php?tid=21491&highlight=llano

Edit: Post 13 is the start of it.

[teconmoon]

Alright, I was able to solve the problem.

Thanks! You guys certainly raise the bar on user satisfaction!

[dannzen]

(02-01-2012, 03:19 AM)Starscream Wrote: These are just some reminders:

1) Check your temperatures
2) Check your temperatures
3) Check your temperatures
4) Keep the laptop plugged in and set the power options to high performance
5) Don't change anything else outside of the P0 area (if you don't know, don't touch it)
6) When you're done, set the P0 back to where it was originally (1500)

[Starscream]

Technically it's not overclocking since all you're doing is forcing it to do what it's supposed to be doing anyway. You still need to keep a very close eye on the temps, though. 2.0GHz shouldn't be an issue, 2.3GHz or over will be, though. These CPU's do surprisingly well at only 2.0GHz.

[NaturalViolence]

Quote:Technically it's not overclocking since all you're doing is forcing it to do what it's supposed to be doing anyway.

No it shouldn't. It MAY reach 2.3 GHz under a light single core workload but if 2 or more cores are active it probably won't. You are overclocking it in the most literal sense of the word. It's doing exactly what it was designed to do, nothing is wrong with turbocore right now.

Please read up on turbocore: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4444/amd-llano-notebook-review-a-series-fusion-apu-a8-3500m/4