SpeedStep ... please go away!

[InsanelyOne]

I've got a Dell Latitude D630 running 10.5.8 (Initially installed from iATKOS 10.5.x) running the voodoo-based XNU 9.8.0 kernel.

 

I find that SpeedStep is degrading the performance of my computer. It is always plugged in and I would prefer SpeedStep being totally disabled. I do a lot of video encoding and I need as much horse-power as I can get.

 

I've tried using the SpeedStep GUI app to force the CPU to the max speed but that doesn't seem to make a difference.

 

I have a strange symptom where occasionally when I boot the machine, the SpeedStep GUI is not running and in those cases the computer is very Snappy™. The problem is that I can't consistently make this happen.

 

Another strange power management related symptom is that if the computer is connected to AC power when it boots, and I leave the computer alone for a few minutes it will go to sleep... even though all of the energy saving settings are shut off. If, however, after I boot the machine I unplug the AC adapter for a few seconds and then plug it back in, it will not do the sleep. The battery meter shows it's plugged in to AC when the computer first boots. Just thought I mention it in case it's relevant to my problem.

 

I used this guide to install Leopard and overall it's been a very stable system. I just need to get rid of SpeedStep.

 

If I try to shut off SpeedStep in the BIOS, it locks the CPU to 800Mhz. That's not an option. Is it just a matter of deleting a Kext file?

 

Any help is appreciated.... and yes, I've scoured the forums but I may just be searching the wrong keywords. Most things I found either recommending disabling in the BIOS (which isn't an option for me) or the post is about trying to enable SpeedStep, not disable it.