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I just viewed the Chinese Engadget photo gallery link that reo posted in General Discussion, and the below photograph caught my attention:
Observation:
The reported 630Mhz CPU frequency in the above photo means that one of the below statements is true:
A) The Intel Celeron M CPU used in the eeePC incorporates Intel's SpeedStep technology
B) Asus has downlclocked the Front-Side Bus from 100 Mhz to 70 Mhz (translating into the effective FSB and RAM speeds being 280 Mhz instead of 400 Mhz).
Analysis:
Option "A" is highly unlikely due to the fact that there are no Celeron M chips that support SpeedStep or Enhanced SpeedStep.
Option "B" is very plausible. One of the CPU-Z screenshots from a russian 2G/700 eeePC contained a 800Mhz Celeron M which ran at 570Mhz which was also derived from an approx. 70 Mhz FSB. I have no doubt that this is primary reason as to why Asus has not disclosed any information regarding the CPU specifications or operating frequency. This way, no one on this site (or anywhere else for that matter) can be succesful in legally forcing Asus to release a BIOS update which unlocks the processors full potenial by way of a 100 Mhz FSB. I know that some of the "tech geeks" here will get riled up on this one for sure 
, but keep in mind that there are many consumer devices which feature downclocked processors and ICs; If i remember correctly the PSP is/used to be one of them. Another thing to note is that there are no Non-Embedded Dothan based Celeron M's which operate at anything lower than 800 Mhz.
So, that being said the 2Gs possibly feature 800 Mhz Intel Celeron M chips downclocked to 570 Mhz, while the 4Gs possibly feature 900 Mhz Intel Celeron M chips downclocked to 630 Mhz.
Conclusion:
All things considered, I think the 4G model will offer a marginally to greatly perceivable difference in speed in various applications, but not because of the 60 Mhz difference. Why then? If the finalized 2G models come with the SL8XT Celeron M pictured in the russian review, then it has ZERO L2 cache. I would gather that it would be about as fast as the PIII 733 EB in my minature HP evectra dev server PC. Hopefully someone in Taiwan with a retail 2G can verify whether or not it has L2 cache.
L2 cache aside, I do not have any issue with the 230-270 Mhz decrease in processor frequency, since it will not have any detrimental impact on the usability of the applications and multimedia that I plan to make use of. The downclock is likely responsible for the above average battery life, and hopefully it has spawned a cool to mildly warm operating eeePC.
Sarcasm:
Now for those of you who do not agree with my theoretically derived inconclusive conclusion...
Let the unwaranted eeePC CPU frequency petitions begin 
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i'll take a guess and it's for power consumption and heat out put reason.
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It is already confirmed that FSB is locked to 70 instead of 100. If you want to get the 100 back, you have to do some hard cracking(adjustment is not provided in BIOS). It is reported that even the CPU is cracked to run at 900MHz instead of 630MHz, performance is not improved but battery life(5200mAH) degrades to 2.5 hours.
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I am sure that I am not the only user on this forum who did not know that the 70Mhz FSB/630Mhz CPU has been "confirmed" or even noticed by an eeePC end-user , since no one has ever mentioned it on this site and none of the 4G/701 reviews that have been posted here (translated or otherwise) have mentioned it. Nevertheless, in a twisted way I am glad to see that one of the main aspects of my theory can now be considered fact 
As mentioned earlier, the apparent FSB lock would be implemented at the BIOS level in which ASUS undoubtedly *could* (if the thermal design allowed) provide an update which adjusted the FSB back to 100 mhz. Though, l know that they would not do so, as there had to be a reason, justifiable or not, for the downclock. Do I personally care whether its running at 570, 630 or 900 mhz?...nope, but I am sure that others here do possibly for reasons like the scenario I present below.
There would definitely be a performance difference between a 630 Mhz Celeron M running on a 280 Mhz FSB with 280 Mhz RAM, and a 900 Mhz Celeron M running on a 400 Mhz FSB with 400 Mhz RAM. Will there be a difference in basic Open Office functions/calculations or browsing most web sites , or watching a typical 'pirated' divx file? When comparing the above CPU frequencies and FSBs...nope. However, load up a couple of those intesive flash web sites (eg. 2 Youtube videos playing at the same time) and the difference will be apparent.
Whoever reported the supposed 1.3 hour battery loss (2.5hrs instead of 3.8hrs) by going to 900 Mhz by just altering the FSB must have been making that up, or smoking some strong stuff 
as that's definitely not possible. Remember that the voltage to the CPU would not have been increased. I would gather that the battery loss could be no more than 15 minutes at max load, and MUCH less at average use loads with idle states.
Last edited by NoeeePC4MeWellMaybe... (2007-10-17 5:35:19 am)
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There is another possiblity you have not mentioned. It could be their agreement with Intel. This is not as crazy as it sounds. I am sure VIA would have been happy to provide a low power processor for the Eee. This may have been Intels way of meeting the criteria Asus set in it's RFP. They might have even been able to sell some processors that failed at full speed, but ran fine when downclocked. I am sure the price reflected the downclock also. This is not uncommon practice.
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Great points bolomkxxviii.
Since the eeePC falls under Intel'sClassmate PC brand, I wouldn't doubt that you are 100% correct in assuming that certain power consumption / battery life requirements and thermal thresholds (don't want little kids getting burned by it) had to be met. Lowering the clock speed could definitely have been a cost-effective way to meet one or several of the criteria.
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I really hope if this is the case you can adjust it the BIOS, otherwise I'm going to reconsider purchasing one. 900Mhz was pushing it a bit in performance terms, but 630Mhz? My old Gateway P3 laptop is 750Mhz and thats slow enough.
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What worries me about that picture is the fact that you can't access the OK/Cancel/Apply buttons!
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ridestp wrote:
What worries me about that picture is the fact that you can't access the OK/Cancel/Apply buttons!
Makes you wonder what Microsoft will do to sort these display problems out on windows. Its one of the reason I'm planning on sticking with the EEE OS.
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Haha, nice one ridestep
cheesemp, the user interface issues will also be present in dialog boxes of various Linux apps that you may run on the eeePC. The 480 pixels in height will lead to more than a few headaches in either OS, however reducing the window title bar size and font size, or dragging the bottom of title bar upwards will allow you to see those hidden dialog buttons. This really isn't a Microsoft or Linux/Xandros issue, it's just that both Linux and Windows eeePC users will have to make use of apps whose user interface is better suited for low resolution screens, and/or make several window manager/theme modifications.
I gotta go to work, but hopefully owners of 2G and 4G retail eeePCs will be able to shed some light on the issues that have been mentioned in this topic by the time I get back 
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cheesemp wrote:
I really hope if this is the case you can adjust it the BIOS, otherwise I'm going to reconsider purchasing one. 900Mhz was pushing it a bit in performance terms, but 630Mhz? My old Gateway P3 laptop is 750Mhz and thats slow enough.
Agreed! Hopefully even if this doesn't happen, once the Eee has been out for awhile someone will figure out a way to patch the system to overclock\downclock like we've seen with so many other portable devices. Perhaps even by someone replacing the ASUS bios with LinuxBios?
Personally I'd like to know if there would be any significant battery life savings in being able to further downclock this puppy?
--bornagainpenguin
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Interesting link to support your theory NoeeePC.
http://www.google.com/translate?u=http% … mp;ie=UTF8
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NoeeePC4MeWellMaybe... wrote:
cheesemp, the user interface issues will also be present in dialog boxes of various Linux apps that you may run on the eeePC. The 480 pixels in height will lead to more than a few headaches in either OS, however reducing the window title bar size and font size, or dragging the bottom of title bar upwards will allow you to see those hidden dialog buttons. This really isn't a Microsoft or Linux/Xandros issue, it's just that both Linux and Windows eeePC users will have to make use of apps whose user interface is better suited for low resolution screens, and/or make several window manager/theme modifications.
I understand that but at least the default Xandros software will have been chosen to work at that resolution. Window on the other hand, I don't see working as well. 99% of users don't know you can drag a dialog box of the top of the screen using the 'move' command (right click on a titlebar, select move then use arrow keys), there by making windows almost impossible to user for a Joe public user.
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one term: FRIKKIN CPU FREQUENCY SCALING
idiots :-/
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Did you read the OP?
NoeeePC4MeWellMaybe... wrote:
A) The Intel Celeron M CPU used in the eeePC incorporates Intel's SpeedStep technology
...
Analysis:
Option "A" is highly unlikely due to the fact that there are no Celeron M chips that support SpeedStep or Enhanced SpeedStep.
I'd like to see it if you have evidence he's wrong.
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This processor speed pretty much decides what I am buying this year and it is not an Asus EEE. I have heard (I am sure everyone else has) that there is a second version coming out next year using the Memrom processor.
The second version should get a better battery life anyway and after my current laptop I value that above anything else.
Quite honestly I have always hated the Celron line by Intel. They are just handicapped versions of the regular processors.
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bbloldd wrote:
It is already confirmed that FSB is locked to 70 instead of 100.
Link?
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Invisiblemoose wrote:
bbloldd wrote:
It is already confirmed that FSB is locked to 70 instead of 100.
Link?
Interesting link to support your theory NoeeePC.
http://www.google.com/translate?u=http% … mp;ie=UTF8
This person has confirmed it at least. Not sure about who else has.
Last edited by reo (2007-10-17 4:40:20 pm)
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Thanks for the link reo, Can you translate the below text (Big5 encoding) taken from the link provided:
---
改不是改主機板，所以不用擔心。
目前的BIOS版本是無法調整外頻的，期待後續的BIOS版本吧~~
我的BIOS版本，是隨手可得的，就看大家怎麼去發掘了~ ^^
---
The google and bablefish translations are a little rough, but the author seems to state that the current BIOS version does not allow for overclocking (should be called 'Standard Clocking' ), however the next BIOS update which is the same BIOS that he/she is using, allows for the ability to run the processor at 900 Mhz. If true, this is good news for those of you who want the 'extra' 270 Mhz back.
The author's screenshot that displays the 900 Mhz frequency in the XP System Properties tab.
http://attach1.mobile01.com/attach/2007 … f11de3.jpg
Last edited by NoeeePC4MeWellMaybe... (2007-10-17 11:13:10 pm)
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i think he's saying the bios version he got can do that
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NoeeePC4MeWellMaybe... wrote:
Thanks for the link reo, Can you translate the below text (Big5 encoding) taken from the link provided:
---
改不是改主機板，所以不用擔心。
目前的BIOS版本是無法調整外頻的，期待後續的BIOS版本吧~~
我的BIOS版本，是隨手可得的，就看大家怎麼去發掘了~ ^^
---
Here is the translation:
"no need to mod the motherboard. Don't worry.
The current BIOS version cannot adjust the clock speed. Better wait for the future BIOS versions. My BIOS version is available everywhere, just see how you can find it."
Basically, the guy said with a right version of BIOS, which is available somewhere and everybody should be able to find it, you can change the clock back to 100Hz.
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Urban wrote:
This processor speed pretty much decides what I am buying this year and it is not an Asus EEE. I have heard (I am sure everyone else has) that there is a second version coming out next year using the Memrom processor.
The second version should get a better battery life anyway and after my current laptop I value that above anything else.
Quite honestly I have always hated the Celron line by Intel. They are just handicapped versions of the regular processors.
I don't mean to cause offence but you seem to have the knack of misspelling intel's processors. It's merom and celeron (well, merom is in fact a code name). Anyway, I somehow doubt ASUS's statement of "we will be releasing the 2nd gen eee pc in April 2008" will come true when the 1st gen was supposed to be released in the beginning of September. It will be more like end of 2008.
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My Local Electronics Store Website had the 701 Preorder Specs, it had 900mhz posted as the CPU Spec and then today it suddenly was just changed to 'Intel Celeron'... no Speed rating etc.
Also what's up with that buggy bios that people have been commenting on that enables the 100mhz fsb..
I'm not too worried about it but I would like to squeeze all the performance I can get out of this little thing when I eventually get it.
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Just found a link that says that there is an official bios release fro the FSB change
http://www.eeeuser.com/2007/10/27/eee-p … -unstable/
still yet to be fine tuned it says
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Not sure I'd want 900Mhz - The side vent already blasts out hot air like a car heater at default speed. Its great for warming a cold nose.
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