x201 high pitch whine

[barium]

greetings everyone

I received my x201 a few weeks ago, and by and large I am pleased with it, except for the fact that at random times there will be a high pitch whine coming from the back left of the computer.  I've done a fair bit of research on the problem, and I know it has to do with the power states of the processor (which is the core i7-620m on mine), and I have found no general solution to the problem.  I found the only thing that stops this whine from occurring on my laptop is disabling the cpu power management in the BIOS and setting the cpu power level in the power manager to its lowest setting.  This is really inconvenient as it kills the battery life and really restricts the capabilities of the processor.  I was wondering if anyone else was having this problem on the x201, or if it is a problem lenovo can fix?

[heretohelp]

My advice would be to record the noise on a microphone and send it to Lenovo technical support they should be able to find some sort of solution they might even replace the mainboard.

If they decide to do this backup your important documents you might be without your laptop for a while if you don't have onsite warranty repair support.

[bluetiger]

Had same problem... called Lenovo Support and they worte me back, that the phenomen is normal and refered me to the folling websites:

---------------------

Laptop is working as designed!!! I should check the following website:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piezoelectricity

and other forums

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=107064

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/kernel-bugs/2006-May/014484.html

http://forum.tabletpcreview.com/showthread.php?t=3516

http://forums.cnet.com/5208-7587_102-0.html?threadID=176899

 Morover, I update my BIOS

 http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc/pccbbs/mobiles/6quj09uc.iso

http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc/pccbbs/mobiles/6quj09uc.txt

And TURN OFF all Powermanagement SETTINGS (- which will lead to a BATTERY Loss of 10%!!!, according to Lenovo)

 BIOS

Config-->Power-->CPU Power Management: Disbale

Config->Power->PCI Bus Power Management: Disable PCI Express Power

Config->Power->Management: Disable

----

All these instructions did not turned off the HIGH PITCH Noise, which is causing me head ache!

Paying almost 2000 US$ for a business notebook to produce myself headache is not really productive!!!

However Lenovo says - WORK AS DESIGNED!!!

[Edkrimmer]

Several of our new X201 users reported this whining. I could not hear it but my boss could. He eventually traced it to the larger 95W power brick. Try swapping that out. Only certain ones exhibited the behavior.

[henrikb]

See thread 'X201 CPU Chirping Sound. Annoying!' started April 1, 2010:

http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/X-Series-ThinkPad-Laptops/X201-CPU-Chirping-Sound-Annoying/m-p/219773

I just (2010-12-05) posted my findings relating the problem to one of my power adapters.

/Henrik

[johny12fingers]

For the noise located in the upper left corner - Just look at the solution I found here (at the bottom of the page):

http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-envy-hdx/501749-hp-envy-14-cpu-whine-poll-24.html



It turns out that in my case, the majority of whining was caused by Firefox!!! I applied the tweak described above and now there no whining when I'm using firefox! In my case it solves the problem because the most annoying thing for me was the whining when browsing late at night!



Check this out, maybe it may help you as well!

EDIT: unofrtunately, the whine is back... suppose there is no software fix for it, as its the hradware issue :-(

[bluetiger]

Power adapter has NO problem.

My high pitch sound comes from the areas of WINDOWS and left ALT Key (English Keyboard).

Firefox Setting applied - NO changes...

Finally local Lenovo Account Manager will induce a change the CPU.

Lets see.

[johny12fingers]

it seems that only a motherboard change may set us free from the whine.. unless the new motheboard would have the same issue (which is probable - I read a thread of Mac users - one of them had 3 different laptops in row and each one one them had the whine problem... He just gave up).

Next time I but thinkpad, I will listen to it carefully before paying...

[bluetiger]

my whine comes from where the left ALT AND X Key s located.

will CPU change not stop the whine?

[johny12fingers]

frankly, I doubt it - it has something to do with coils on the motherboard - the CPU uses different ammounts of power in different power schemes and this makes the coils vibrate - thus emit the noise..

Is it really loud? I can get used to it - it is annoying, but to be honest once when I forget about it - I don't hear it anymore...

I wonder whether there are any laptops with SSDs and LED that do not produce any sound at all?