Very Low 3DMark Vantage Score for CPU w/ W520 [ Edited ]

[KongMD]

Hi, all. I'm wondering if my fellow W series owners with i7s are getting similar scores as I in the free version of the benchmarking program 3DMark Vantage. Please note that results are online-only with the free version, so make sure you've got an internet connection.

My Results

Normally I don't care too much for benchmarks, but I became concerned when my score was much lower than others that I'd seen after running a Google search. I have an i7 2720QM and am getting around 5200-5300 for the CPU score. I looked at several results from similar builds, and the CPU scores for the same proc are in the 19,000-20,000 range for CPU score. It thinks my processor clock is at 797MHz, for some bizarre reason.

Just to be sure it wasn't my power settings, I ran it again on the Maximum Performance power profile, but received the same craptastic score. All of these scores are with the laptop plugged in. I have the latest graphics drivers from Nvidia (downloaded today) and the 1.30 BIOS with ver. 3.62 of the Power Manager. TurboBoost is up and running, and my system routinely hits over 3.1GHz. I'm stumped. Would anybody mind posting their results?

[crypticsorr0w · Accepted solution]

I had similar situation, on battery though, and CMOS reset seemed to do it

I followed the steps here by harrisb

http://forum.lenovo.com/t5/W-Series-ThinkPad-Laptops/W520-Speedstep-not-working-properly-on-battery-...

3dmark cpu result: 19214

http://3dmark.com/3dmv/3467052

[KongMD]

The CMOS reset did the trick! Here's my new score. Thanks, crypticsorr0w

[crypticsorr0w]

I'm glad it did, but remember to give kudos to harrisb!

I reran the test with GPU in discrete mode and my cpu score is

20641

still i wonder why my turboboost is lower than yours both times 

http://3dmark.com/3dmv/3468100?show_ads=true&page=%2F3dmv%2F3468100%3Fkey%3DkZCUe5FxR9tbZR6zUTefzBuJ...

[Jimbo]

Nice site, KongMD.

[robustm]

Hi All,

My CPU speed is always locked at 2.2 ghz (confirmed thru intel turbo booster tool) on AC and i am running super_pi program to kick in the turbo boost as that runs on single core. 

I tried CMOS reset couple of times with no luck and my power manager shows that  its set to max performance with the max turbo set. At this point, I am out of options. Please, guide me to get my turbo boost to ~3.1 on AC (atleast). I am least bothered abt the max turbo on battery.

Thanks in advance,

Robust

[eos]

Ive just run it and get a lower CPU score for some reason (18812).  I notice that its only clocking the CPU to 2990MHz.  Results are here: http://3dmark.com/3dmv/3470015.

I also notices its saying the RAM is running at 667.  I dont know if this is normal (should be 1333MHz).

I have the 2000M, so get a higher 3D score of 6533

The 3DMark says: "Graphics driver is not approved"

 I have the Lenovo power settings in Bios and Power manger set to the maximum possible. Nothing else was running at the time.

[KongMD]

I fixed the link to my results in the original post.

@robustm What BIOS version do you have? I'm running BIOS revision 1.30 with Power Manager v3.62. Previous BIOS versions had problems detecting AC power and turning on TurboBoost, so that's probably what you're running into. NOTE: Create a Restore Point before upgrading your BIOS! Version 1.30 changes some boot settings that may corrupt your bootloader, so just be aware of that. Here's a thread with more info.

@eos The RAM running at 667MHz is perfectly normal. Manufacturers give misleading information when they promote their products. In this case, the RAM is "advertised" to run at 1333MHz. In actuality, DDR3 modules can transfer data on the rising and falling edge of the clock signal, giving a 667MHz DDR3 SDRAM chip 1333MT/s (Megatransfers/sec).

If that didn't make any sense to you, just look at your RAM in the freeware program Speccy. If you see PC3-10700 (667MHz) listed for Max Bandwidth, you're doing fine. I'd suggest exiting out of all running programs before re-running the test.

EDIT: Just as a footnote - I've been running NVIDIA's latest drivers for the Quadro 1000 without any issues. They're much more current than the ones Lenovo has for my gpu, so I'd suggest trying out NVIDIA's latest drivers.