Not sure where to put this exactly so I’ll put it on r/archlinux and r/overclocking. I’m running into some issues when I attempt to undervolt the cpu on my XPS 9510, which is almost exactly 2 years old now. Specs are i9-11900H, 3050ti, 32gb ram, fhd display, 2tb gen 4 ssd and 1tb gen 3 ssd. It’s currently setup with Arch on the 1tb with storage on the 2tb, both encrypted with luks. I have gpu passthrough setup and working properly, so arch uses the intel igpu, and a Windows 10 vm uses 6 cores and the 3050ti. I’m trying to get Arch to run as lightweight as possible to maximize my battery life. With a windows host I get 2.5-3 hours. With Arch as my single host I currently get about 5-6ish hours with 1/3ish brightness but still have to plug in in the middle of the day or afternoon. I really want to see how much I can improve my battery life, and I figure an undervolt on the cpu might be a good move. From my understanding, overclocking isn’t an option for an H-series cpu. Hoping to be able to go a whole day of general usage (not running any vms) without plugging in, while still performing normally if not better.
I’m using intel-undervolt that was developed by kitsunyan on [github](https://github.com/kitsunyan/intel-undervolt). I’m starting with a 50mhz undervolt on both cpu and cpu cache, but keep getting the “Values do not equal error” as see in this [issue](https://github.com/kitsunyan/intel-undervolt/issues/43). I’ve attempted to follow the instructions in that thread, as well as the instructions [here](https://www.ultrabookreview.com/37095-dells-disabling-undervolting-on-their-laptops-heres-how-to-re-enable-it/). Turning off the Enable UEFI Capsule Firmware Update didn’t fix the issue with intel-undervolt. I turned it back on so fwupdmgr would still work. The settings Intel SpeedStep, C-States Control, Turbo Boost, Hyper-Threading, and GNA Accelerator are all on in my bios.
As I write this cpu-x (linux equivilent of cpu-z) says that I’m idling at about 50 degrees, with lows of 47. During a unix-bench test, I saw individual threads get up to 98 and all cores get to 100 deg maxed out. With the vm running autodesk software it gets in the mid 90s easily. On the unix bench test it scored 2557.8 and 9839.6.
I do have some NT-H1 thermal compound. Is it worth doing fresh compound? What kind of a difference will I see?
I’m wondering if anyone has any input on how to fix the issue with undervolting, and if there are any other ideas on things I can do to extend my battery life.