CPU speed

[MadHatter]

Hi, Guys any help or explanations would be appreciated:

 

My processor appears (as far as i can tell) to be running at a slower clock speed than is rated by the manufacturer. The processor is the "AMD Phenom II X4 955" which in theory is a quad core processor clocked at 3.2 GHz. however on all the checks i have done it appears that it is running at 800MHz. Am i just be ignorant of how a processor works, and what each number actually means, or is the processor running at a slower speed than rated?

 

I have checked several sources and as far as i can tell they all point toward it running at 800MHz, despite the PC overall running at normal speeds for Vista:

 

Dxdiag: AMD Phenom2 X4 955 Processor (4 CPU's), ~800MHz

 

Belarc adviser:

 

800 megahertz AMD Phenom II X4 955

256 kilobyte primary memory cache

1024 kilobyte secondary memory cache

64-bit ready

Multi-core (4 total)

Not hyper-threaded

 

CPU-Z:

 

Core speed: 800MHz

Multiplier: x4

Bus speed: 200 MHz

HT link: 2000 MHz

 

System Properties: AMD Phenom2 X4 955 Processor (4 CPU's), 800MHz

 

As far as i can tell, these show that the CPU is running at 800MHz, 1/4 the rated speed. Can anyone help

Thanks, MadHatter

[JoeDirt]

Multicore processors are design to throttle down, use cpuz program and leave it running you will see the cpu throttle up to max speed and then down every few seconds this is designed because of few things, energy saving, extending the lifetime of cpu, producing less thermal heat from cpu hence being able to run fan at lower speed and making the computer more quiet.

[MadHatter]

ok thanks for the info. i was slightly worried whether it running at a slow speed was a problem or just due to power management