Dell Inspiron 15 7567 CPU drops from 3.6 GHz to 0.4–0.9 GHz under load — BD PROCHOT issue?
Hi everyone,
I have a Dell Inspiron 15 7567 Gaming with an Intel Core i7-7700HQ, and I'm having a strange CPU throttling problem.
When I turn on the laptop, the CPU runs normally at around 3.4–3.6 GHz. However, as soon as I launch even a very lightweight game, the CPU frequency suddenly drops to around 0.90 GHz, and sometimes even 0.4 GHz. This causes extremely low FPS and makes the laptop almost unusable for gaming.
The strange part is that temperatures are completely normal:
CPU/GPU temperatures stay around 60–70°C or lower
HWiNFO does not show thermal throttling
The CPU is not overheating
The laptop has the original 130W Dell power adapter
The battery is also original
The BIOS correctly recognizes the 130W AC adapter
I found a temporary workaround using ThrottleStop.
If I disable BD PROCHOT in ThrottleStop and press Turn On while the CPU is already throttled, the CPU immediately returns to normal frequencies (~3.4 GHz) and stays there, even while gaming.
However, this only works until I restart the laptop. After every reboot, the problem comes back and I have to manually enable the BD PROCHOT workaround again.
I don't want to rely on ThrottleStop or any other workaround permanently. I want to find and fix the actual hardware/firmware problem causing BD PROCHOT to trigger.
What could cause BD PROCHOT to be triggered on this laptop when CPU temperatures are completely normal?
Could it be related to:
the VRM?
the GPU power circuitry?
the DC-in/power circuit?
the motherboard?
the 130W adapter?
a faulty sensor?
BIOS/EC firmware?
And is there a way to diagnose which component is actually asserting BD PROCHOT?
Any advice on how to permanently fix this would be appreciated.