Microsoft Surface Pro 6 and Surface Book 2 hit with CPU throttling issues

Microsoft is trying to fix a mysterious issue with Surface Pro 6 and Surface Book 2 devices which is causing CPU speeds to be throttled to a painfully slow 400 MHz.

At the moment it is not clear what is causing the problem, but it appears to be related to an Intel CPU flag -- BD PROCHOT which throttles processor speeds in a bid to reduce temperature.

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There are numerous complaints about the issue on Reddit and support forums, and some have been able to stop the slowdown by disabling the BD PROCHOT flag using the ThrottleStop utility.

In addition to the CPU throttling, some users are experiencing Wi-Fi problems, but it does not appear that the two issues are related.

In a statement issued to TechRepublic, Microsoft says:

We are aware of some customers reporting a scenario with their Surface Books where CPU speeds are slowed. We are quickly working to address via a firmware update.

This is far from the first problem to have blighted the Surface Book 2 or other devices in the Surface range. There were a variety of issues with the Surface Pro 4 and first generation Surface Book, and Microsoft recently stopped the rollout of the Windows 10 May 2019 Update to the Surface Book 2 because of issues with the Nvidia GPU.