Weird: Duron cooling by itself !!!

[Nixxon]

Well today I switched my old Duron 700 for a brand new Duron 750 (major upgrade :) ). Nothing to write home about, but when I boot into Windows 98 (first edition) I notice something unbelievable: the new CPU seems to have some sort of cooling integrated. I mean, it looks like I have CPUIdle installed, but I've changed nothing but the CPU... As I write this the processor stays at about 33 degrees C (100MHz @ 1.91V) with a ****ty HSF I found in Romania, whereas the old CPU was about 44 - 45 degrees when idle (the same 1GHz @ 1.91V).
Now in more detail: with the old CPU, when I used CPUidle 5.8 there was a variation on +5V rail of the PSU e.g. 5.15V when idle, dropping to 4.88 at full load. Now with this new CPU I notice EXACTLY the same thing, only that I don't use CPUidle nor any other cooling program. What the hell is going on ? Did AMD include something weird in their processors or what ? Has anybody heard of something similar ?
PS: mobo is Abit KT7 (no RAID, no KT7A)

[William]

you may have gotten much better attachment with your heatsink. i have not heard anything aobut this integrated cooling.

[kat]

did you delete the cpu idle program from your hdd ? or are you using a hole new setup ?? ;D

[kat]

did you delete the cpu idle program from your hdd ? or are you using a hole new setup ?? ;D

man i hate it when i double post :o

[Nixxon]

I'm using the same HSF, it was perfectly attached to the first CPU as well - using silicone goo. There is no trace of CPUidle on my system, only there is something strange with this CPU... it also overclocks easily to 1150...

And the simple fact that the voltage on the +5v is raising so much without load means that the CPU is drawing MUCH less current when it has nothing to do. I noticed minutes ago that the Vcore is also rising from 1.91v (load) to 1.92v when idle, something which happened in the past only when I used CPUidle. *** I DON'T USE CPUIDLE NOW ! As a matter of fact, i've not used it since re-installing Win98 some weeks ago !!! ***

[kat]

well there is an old saying that ive heard a number of time`s, which should apply here "never look a gift horse in the mouth" hehe

[JaY_III]

or could it be as simple as this....
you just got lucky and a better core.
as you all know no 2 CPU's are exactly the same

[Hoot]

This is an interesting development in Durons. I say this because my old 600 does not invoke a halt-on-idle routine, whereas my Tbird does. Now, you are saying yours doe. I wonder if they changed some hard-coded register value in the Duron to enable it to envoke halt-on-idle. I think the amd bios hack that was being discussed the past few days is a way to force this to happen. Just my informed opinion.

Hoot

[Nixxon]

Thank you Hoot for clearing this up !!! I heard from somebody today that all modern CPUs like Duron, Athlon, Piii, Celeron 2 have built-in suspend-on-idle but I can't believe this (yet). I've tested this "wonder" Duron 750 on a MSI K7T Pro2A today and it worked just like a regular Duron, no self-cooling. Switched back to my KT7, tried several BIOS versions and the self-cooling worked with all of them. Only God knows why this works only with certain mobos...

[Fiz]

I think it may be something in the BIOS, that would account for why it's only doing it on certain mobos. The bios may turn on the halt on idle, perhaps the BIOS and proc must both have it to work.

Fiz