Scotty_80's questions

I've got an older laptop that I use as a media center on my TV and I'm usually installing/reinstalling/uninstalling different OS' and Apps to get it to run as smoothly as possible.

One thing I noticed was very strange. My laptop is a HP Pavilion G62 which has a triple core AMD processor running at 1800mhz. When I launch XBMC from in Windows 7 and look at the processor speeds, it clearly says 1800mhz. However, when I launch it from Ubuntu either from the launcher or as a session, it says the processor is only 800mhz.

I wanted to investigate further so I loaded up DXDIAG in Windows to see what the speed was. Sure enough, it indicates that it's 1800mhz. However, when launching HardInfo in Ubuntu, it tells me that the speed of each core is as follows: 1500mhz, 1500mhz, and 800mhz.

Does this mean that both the advertised processor speed and the speed detected by Windows are lying or rounded off? Or is there a problem with Ubuntu detecting my processor speeds and my system isn't running as optimally as it should? I'd be inclined to say the latter... mainly because it appears that Windows runs far smoother than Ubuntu does.

I've setup my laptop on my TV via HDMI and have XBMC installed as a media center. The laptop is closed next to my entertainment unit, and I control it using a wireless keyboard. I noticed that on the odd occasion when I open the lid, I see the same stuff on the laptop screen that I see on my TV screen... meaning XBMC is rendering both screens at once.

Now, my laptop isn't the most powerful in the world, and I like squeezing every bit of juice out of it that I can... Seeing that the display is being rendered on 2 different displays, is this taking up additional system resources that could be better used elsewhere?

I'd really like to know if there's any way to disable the laptop screen altogether, and only use the HDMI port.

I know this can be done directly in the Ubuntu display properties, where you can chose to turn a particular display on or off. However, it still seems to be active when running solely in an XBMC session.