Eee Atom CPU control - testing

[rhadon]

Hi,

I've tested the new eee-cpucontrol-0.3.pet.

I can't see any difference to old .pet (meaning the Celeron part). To be exactly, /var/log/eee-fan.log appeard with the first run. The rest seems to be the same:

After reboot it starts with the CPU speed 900 MHz, no matter I selected before.

Changing fan speed takes only effect after reboot, by temp < min. than reaching temp.max. or by running pinstall.sh manually.

~ Rolf

[01micko]

Ok, Thanks for reports.

I think then I will change the gui button to exit.

It's time for a script in /root/Startup to execute the last remembered state..

Cheers

[tempestuous]

After reboot it starts with the CPU speed 900 MHz, no matter I selected before.

A word of caution guys;
I wouldn't assume that rhadon's CPU speed is actually 900 MHz. The gui might be lying!

Rolf, immediately after booting, I suggest you run this command -

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cat /proc/eee/fsb

If you see "100 24 1" then yes, your CPU speed is 900MHz.
But if you see "70 24 1" then your CPU speed is 630MHz.

Now run the gui to check what CPU speed it reports.

It's time for a script in /root/Startup to execute the last remembered state.

Yes, that's what the Ubuntu Eee packages do ... but it's not necessarily the best approach.
Having your Eee boot up with the default CPU speed (as defined by ASUS) is not a bad thing.

[rhadon]

Rolf, immediately after booting, I suggest you run this command -

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cat /proc/eee/fsb

Yes, I always did since I started reading this thread

~ Rolf

[01micko]

Hmmmmm...

I have had an error on reboot and can't fix it. (701SD)

When I "cat /proc/eee/fsb" it returns "30 15 0" .. very strange, and I can't get away from it... even using small increments, no good. I can do "echo 30 15 1 > /proc/eee/fsb" and that's about it. (I understand the 3rd field is for voltage). If I change the 15 for 24 the machine crashes, if I increase 30 to 35 the machine crashes. I can't find any pertinent info either.

A small script in /root/Startup or even a line in etc/rc.d/rc.local (I favour the script) could tell the gui to be in default mode on boot. But.. what is the default on an Atom? I expect "Normal" but I can't assume this.

I have the fan showing up in 'Pwidgets', but what do we want to display? I would favour "rpm" (cat /proc/eee/fan_rpm). I can also mod it for plain 'conky' too. In fact I can make a "eee widget" with fsb info too. Ideas anyone?

[tempestuous]

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cat /proc/eee/fsb

Yes, I always did since I started reading this thread

Rolf, are you saying that your CPU is truly running at 900MHz at bootup, as reported by

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cat /proc/eee/fsb

?
Or that the CPU is running at its default 630MHz, but the gui reports 900MHz?

[tempestuous]

When I "cat /proc/eee/fsb" it returns "30 15 0"

As dawnsboy reported on page 4 of this thread, there's an updated version of the Celeron processor which runs at a higher FSB speed of 400MHz.
I think that the "eee" kernel module only supports the older Celerons with 70/100MHz FSB speed. So reading/writing /proc/eee/fsb will only work with these older Celerons.

It appears that new Celerons work by reading/writing to /sys/devices/platform/eeepc/cpufv
same as Atom CPU's.

01micko, does your "cat /proc/cpuinfo" report "... Celeron M 353 ..."?
I can only search the web for this information, but it seems that "353" indicates the new Celeron.
If true, your post-install script will need to enable the eeecontrol-atom script for Atoms and "353" Celerons, and enable the eeecontrol-cel only for non-"353" Celerons.

[01micko]

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# cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor	: 0
vendor_id	: GenuineIntel
cpu family	: 6
model		: 13
model name	: Intel(R) Celeron(R) M processor          900MHz
stepping	: 8
cpu MHz		: 897.647
cache size	: 512 KB
fdiv_bug	: no
hlt_bug		: no
f00f_bug	: no
coma_bug	: no
fpu		: yes
fpu_exception	: yes
cpuid level	: 2
wp		: yes
flags		: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss tm pbe nx up bts
bogomips	: 1795.29
clflush size	: 64
power management:

I can't see it... Perhaps rhadon could post the out put of "cat /proc/cpuinfo" so I can compare and draft a reasonable command to differentiate the two. Perhaps other Celeron owners could try this too.

Cheers

(I'm posting from a different install now, until I sort out my little issue, It doesn't seem to affect the speed of the machine at all. I will have to do some benchmarking with the Atom commands on this machine to see if there are differences. The alternative is to offer the 2 separate pets triggered by the same command. That command will just work differently)

[tempestuous]

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model name   : Intel(R) Celeron(R) M processor          900MHz

Oh dear.
It seems that the appropriate FSB adjustment command for various Eee models with Celerons cannot easily be determined.

I now suspect that different bios versions may have a major impact on this issue.

[prehistoric]

I'm also wondering exactly what change is taking place on the Atom processor when we change the settings. When I put it in 'powersave' mode, I get the number 770 back to confirm this, as I posted above. It is possible to change both fsb frequency and multiplier to get essentially the same processor speed, at least for programs small enough to stay in cache.

I'm familiar with tweaking fsb, multiplier and voltage on older processors, though I admit the codes for doing so are not things I keep in my head. I got this information from overclockers although I was mainly interested in underclocking. I haven't noticed people overclocking netbooks. It sounds like a bad idea.

There is no /proc/eee directory for my Atom installation. Is there another way to discover the details of processor clock, voltage and fsb setting?

Off-topic:

My (prehistoric) memory brought forth a rhyme from the cold war era.

To smash the mighty Atom, all mankind was intent,
and now, it seems the Atom means to return the compliment.

[01micko]

Hi prehistoric

You can poke around in /sys/devices/platform/eepc directory and see what you come up with. For monitoring look in /sys/class/hwmon/hwmon0.

Cheers

[tempestuous]

There is no /proc/eee directory for my Atom installation.

The /proc/eee directory should appear once you have installed and loaded the "eee" kernel module, from -
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 452#346452
... but for Atom-based Eee's this is only useful for fanspeed control.

For CPU FSB control Atom models require the eeepc-laptop module, which creates files in /sys/devices/platform/eeepc
as explained on the first page of this thread.

[dawnsboy]

@tempestuous

The chipset in the Eeepc 701SD is in fact the Intel Celeron M 353. The cpu on these models defaults to 900MHz. The 701SD cannot be "overclocked" using the methods and software available to users of the older 701's however it appears that the 701SD outperforms the 701 out of the box anyway.

Users on the forum at eeeuser.com report that they have been unsuccessful in overclocking it with the exception of those who have tried the Super Hybrid Engine (701SD apparently came with it installed) report being able to adjust clock speeds to 630MHz (underclock), 900MHz (default) and 960MHz (overclock).

[rhadon]

Rolf, are you saying that your CPU is truly running at 900MHz at bootup, as reported by Code:

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cat /proc/eee/fsb

?

YES, everytime at bootup I get

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# cat /proc/eee/fsb
100 24 1

During session I can change the speed with Mick's GUI to

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# cat /proc/eee/fsb
70 24 1

but after reboot I get

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100 24 1

again. Really.

@ Mick
If it's still of interest:

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# cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor       : 0
vendor_id       : GenuineIntel
cpu family      : 6
model           : 13
model name      : Intel(R) Celeron(R) M processor          900MHz
stepping        : 8
cpu MHz         : 900.137
cache size      : 512 KB
fdiv_bug        : no
hlt_bug         : no
f00f_bug        : no
coma_bug        : no
fpu             : yes
fpu_exception   : yes
cpuid level     : 2
wp              : yes
flags           : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss tm pbe nx up bts
bogomips        : 1800.27
clflush size    : 64
power management:

I hope you can solve that problem.

~ Rolf

Edit: Mick, if you have solved your problem and you can laugh again: Hey, my CPU runs faster than yours

[prehistoric]

@tempestuous,

O.K., bear with me here. I've been through the sequence of installs described in that post of yours before. I got a fault and stack trace during boot. Just tried again. Attached are the boot kernel and boot sysinit logs from the boot following that. The fan control script complains that the proc/eee directory does not exist.

One tantalizing note is the statement about the number of options for CPU throttling.

ACPI: Processor [P001] (supports 8 throttling states)

[jemimah]

eeecontrol .3 now works for me. I think it would be helpful to somehow specify that this isn't changing the cpu frequency scaling algorithm but rather the fsb speed. Setting it to powersave seems to save about a Watt on my machine. Might be nice to have the tool change both the fsb and the scaling algorithm in the same window.

[01micko]

Edit: Mick, if you have solved your problem and you can laugh again: Hey, my CPU runs faster than yours

a whole 2.49MHz! But that just may be the key I need Rolf. Because they are different I can differentiate. Thankyou

Jemimah, thanks for your report.

I'm not out of the woods yet though. Celeron owners, especially 700, 701 owners: I need your output from

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#cat /proc/eee/fsb

and

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#cat /proc/cpuinfo 

The first command must be run immediately after you have booted

Going by Rolf's results there maybe 4 cases to cater for, if not more.

(Atom, Celeron in Eee 900, 701, 701SD)

Thanks in anticipation.

[rhadon]

MHz Mick, Millions of Hz
Although I write this with a big smile I don't mean it serious.

~ Rollf

[01micko]

Atom testers,

On the first page of this thread mawebb88 and hokal reported that their Atoms, without any outside help, ie before we started playing with commands to alter the fsb, that their result of running "cat /sys/devices/platform/eeepc/cpufv" were "768". From that, we deduce that the Atoms start from boot in Performance mode. I'd like to see some tests after the gui is installed and the fsb altered to see if the Atoms still boot in Performance mode by default . I suspect this will be the case.

Help please

[01micko]

MHz Mick, Millions of Hz
Although I write this with a big smile I don't mean it serious.

~ Rollf

Thanks Rolf! (edited post)