CPU speed on laptop detected incorrectly

[pstj]

So I bought a Toshiba laptop recently (U300-BB9), and it came preloaded with Windows Vista. After doing a backup of the original install, I decided I would rather keep on using XP. I had a copy of XP sitting around, so I started what I thought would be a fairly simple process (it wasn't). Anyway, after spending a fairly frustrating time installing the thing, I finally boot up into XP, go to check system settings... and notice that my CPU speed is detected incorrectly. Fantastic.

The laptop has a 1.66 intel core 2 duo. It is identified correctly as a T5450 @ 1.66ghz. However, immediately underneath, it shows the speed as being 980mhz, with 1.99 gb of ram. What gives? I checked the bios settings, and the cpu is correctly shown to be running at 1.666 ghz. So what's going on here? Does it matter, and if so, how does one goes about fixing the thing?

Thank you in advance!

[shadowpr]

It probably has something like speedstep enabled. This will lower the cpu when not needed, but it will go back up to it's max once an application needs it.