I am having problems with my Dell Laptop and Sonar 7PE. I used DPC Checker and LatencyMon to narrow it down to my cpu power management. So after some research I disabled Speedstep. Wow, what an epic failure. It actually got worse, to the point that the change made it difficult to do anything. I had immediate failures with any monitoring programs like LatencyMon, DPC Checker and even Window Reliability Performance Monitor. I was not able to control fan cooling either, which I saw online in the Power Management section of Windows. So it looks like I am going to dig a little deeper for my specific system to determine if there is anyone or anything out there that can help me to optimize my Dell 1720 Inspiron. It has an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, which is a T9300 2.5Ghz 2 Core 2 Logical Processor CPU. The Dell BIOS is an A06, whatever that means. If you know of any way I can upgrade the BIOS, as it appears this is the only solution, please let me know, meanwhile I will search online for this, thanks.

I'm not sure a BIOS update will fix your problems.  Dell only supports Windows XP and Vista 32 bit on this machine.  So, if you are using 64 bit its not (officially) supported by Dell.  May be part of your problems.

HERE is the link to the A09 BIOS update.  Follow the Dell installation instructions EXACTLY when installing.  If the BIOS does not install properly and corrupts the BIOS the ONLY option is to replace the motherboard.  Dell does not have any BIOS recovery feature.

http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/19/DriverDetails/Product/inspiron-1720?driverId=DDMJT&osCode=WLH&fileId=2731105441

  Do you suggest reinstalling everything at 32Bit? Is there a hi enough percentage of success that it is worth it? Thanks Brother.

I don't want to tell you to fall back to 32 bit.   If you can work with it some more, maybe it will work at 64 bit.  I looked at a couple of the Dell drivers (SigmaTel and Intel chipset driver) and both will support Vista 64 bit.  Thus, even though Dell officially does not support 64 bit it appears the drivers (or some) are 64 bit compatible.   I used to do user support on the Dell forums (for 10 years) and It was hit or miss on whether users could make 64 bit work on systems that Dell did not officially support (same way with usupported Operating Systems).   

First thing to do is make sure you are using all the Dell drivers.  Windows will install some device drivers but they may not be right or the best drivers.  On a new install the correct and required install sequence for a Dell is (1) Install Windows (2) Install Dell Desktop or Laptop System Software (3) Install motherboard chipset drivers (4) Install device drivers including Video, Dell Sound Driver, Touchpad, Ethernet and Wi-Fi, etc.

The Wi-Fi brings up another point.  Wi-Fi is known to cause latency and sounds popping and crackling in many systems.  Disable the Wi-Fi in the Device Manager and then run the DPC latency checker

With laptops, if power-management is causing large DPC latency spikes, there's often little to nothing you can do to resolve the issue.  Especially running an unsupported OS...
If you were doing fine under the 32Bit version of Windows, I'd reinstall...

  Thanks Fireberd, here is what I have disabled for almost a month now. MS Security Essential, Win Defender, Wireless Card, Modem, and internal audio card. LatencyMon suggests the BIOS power management. I have found on Dell's website a BIOS upgrade "A09", but it is for Vista 32 Bit. I don't know what to do.

  Jim, I have never run under 32 Bit, so I am unsure of what to expect. I do agree that an unsupported OS is not a good thing. I did not know this at the time and am only discovering these problems now. I know it has been a long time since 2008, but I did not have time to even start using the system until last year. An unexpected three year project came up and all the band activity stopped completely. We had not even finished the studio and am still in progress with that. Money is tight all over, even in the home studio market. Anyway I am into now and not impressed with my lack of knowledge in 2008. If necessary, I will reinstall everything, or try the BIOS upgrade, as it is a flash from the desktop and seems easy enough. Let me know. I just need to stop the damn CPU from throttling.

Looking at the listed "fixes" in the latest A09 (2008) BIOS update and previous updates, I don't see anything listed that would affect your problems.  

The A09 update:
Fixes/Enhancements ------------------ 1. Update GM965 Graphics VBIOS from 1466 to 1588. 2. Update Intel CPU family name

The Previous A07 update (which is included in A09):
Fixes/Enhancements ------------------ 1. Updated Intel uCode. 2. Added support for New optical drives. 3. Support new CPUs. 4. Added enhancement for thermal control. 5. Added enhancement for MediaDirect control.

The next previous BIOS version listed is A04, not the A06 that you list.

  I too noticed the jump from 4 to 7 and wondered about 6. I will double check this when I get to the pc. I also did not see any real enhancements that looked like they added value, except maybe the thermal upgrade...to keep the chip set cool..I don't know. So what are my choices? Does 32 bit offer value for Vista? Does Win7 offer value, as it is supposed to have 70% less crap running in the background and taxing the cpu? If Win7, then 32 or 64 bit? What can, if anything, I do? This sucks, because this crap is not necessary. This stuff should work just fine. Why can't these idiots work together and make **** work? Why all the behind the scenes stuff that only causes the core of customers who need it most, more money? Damn I am mad...at myself, for not knowing this in 2008.

Although not supported, Windows 7 is basically "Vista Improved".  All the Vista drivers work on Windows 7. 

32 bit or 64 bit??  The biggest plus for 64 bit OS is that it will address more than 4GB of RAM.  If you only have 4GB or less there is no real reason for a 64 bit OS.  The maximum memory, according to the Dell manual, is 4GB, thus I would stick with 32 bit OS.   You can't use the Dell recovery partition (F8 at power on) to restore to the original factory condition as a different OS has been installed.  The only way you can can install is to do a complete clean install (reformat the hard drive).