Date: Thu, 26 Feb 2009 12:10:03 -0800 From: Daniel Duerr <dd@gizmocreative.com> To: freebsd-acpi@freebsd.org Subject: Re: EST SpeedStep with E2140 shows wrong frequencies Message-ID: <609FE2E5-2C6B-4F60-BCBB-B8DC6980098E@gizmocreative.com> In-Reply-To: <200902260816.49474.jhb@freebsd.org> References: <03537785-1D9B-4482-939F-318580227167@gizmocreative.com> <200902260816.49474.jhb@freebsd.org>
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Thanks for the reply, John. I did look into the Cx states as well and I'm only offered C1 (which I've switched to C1E through the BIOS). I'm running on a relatively new Supermicro server motherboard which, if price/features were any indicator, would support the multiple Cx states offered by today's CPUs. So, I'm wondering if the reason why I am only seeing one state is a limitation of my CPU or a limitation of the motherboard. I did do some research on Intel's site yesterday and it appears that my CPU only supports C1/C1E. Do you have any thoughts on this and/or any ideas how I might go about figuring out where the limiting factor is here? If I can confirm that my motherboard/BIOS supports the full range of Cx states then I'll focus on finding a better CPU with more options. Also, do you have any recommended approaches for generating test CPU load (say 90-100%) so that I can compare the system power consumption to when it's idle? If I'm already indeed idling (in C1E state) at the 8W consumption Intel suggests then I don't need any more Cx states because that is low enough for me. Thanks again for your help! Cheers, Daniel On Feb 26, 2009, at 5:16 AM, John Baldwin wrote: > On Wednesday 25 February 2009 7:45:35 pm Daniel Duerr wrote: >> Hello, >> >> I have been following the developments (or lack thereof) around EST >> and the more recent Intel Dual-core CPUs and was very happy to >> discover some new results with the latest FreeBSD 7.1 versions, >> specifically Gabriel Lavoie's recent posts about his success with the >> E5200 CPU. My CPU is an Intel Pentium Dual 65nm E2140 @ 1.6GHz which >> is supposed to use under 8W of power when idled down with EST. Since >> this server is always on, this power savings would be wonderful. >> >> Today, I decided to give it another shot and updated my 7.1-STABLE >> amd64 system to the current sources. I re-enabled the cpufreq driver >> in my /boot/loader.conf and now, upon bootup, no longer get the >> message about EST not recognizing my CPU which seems like a great >> step >> forward. Furthermore, EST is actually attaching to the cpufreq >> subsystem and populating frequency information as it should. >> Unfortunately I am experiencing two issues though: >> 1) the resulting frequency information picked up by EST don't seem >> complete/accurate for my CPU >> 2) the behavior changes further if I disable the multiple cores in my >> BIOS > > We rely on the BIOS to tell us the available speed settings via > ACPI. Also, > for idle consumption the bigger gain will come from using higher Cx > states > rather than using throttling. > > -- > John Baldwin -- daniel duerr | president | gizmo creative dd@gizmocreative.com | +1 (831) 621-1710 x103
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