From owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Jan 12 03:21:38 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: stable@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id E230816A41F for ; Thu, 12 Jan 2006 03:21:38 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from mikej@rogers.com) Received: from smtp105.rog.mail.re2.yahoo.com (smtp105.rog.mail.re2.yahoo.com [206.190.36.83]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 34C1343D5D for ; Thu, 12 Jan 2006 03:21:37 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from mikej@rogers.com) Received: (qmail 40449 invoked from network); 12 Jan 2006 03:21:34 -0000 DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; q=dns; c=nofws; s=s1024; d=rogers.com; h=Received:Message-ID:Date:From:User-Agent:MIME-Version:To:CC:Subject:References:In-Reply-To:Content-Type:Content-Transfer-Encoding; b=vWA0foalMMtfBg45767PyNpm1d12GlxgA7gIXZ40Xar1ZhiTRCy21uSlR+KT9OI4Z6mUmMHKPBP7sNIzyCtbizrmh2nLLPwuiNKnuc/Nk5dafvVHosFOdilm/UpUEre71b9gQ+/du356rJ/m5KbGT9AycDPclvSlVl5noI+LvKs= ; Received: from unknown (HELO ?70.30.133.184?) (mikej@rogers.com@70.30.133.184 with plain) by smtp105.rog.mail.re2.yahoo.com with SMTP; 12 Jan 2006 03:21:34 -0000 Message-ID: <43C5CB63.7060202@rogers.com> Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 22:22:11 -0500 From: Mike Jakubik User-Agent: Thunderbird 1.5 (Windows/20051201) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Daniel O'Connor References: <43C5A261.1020407@rogers.com> <200601121326.18384.doconnor@gsoft.com.au> In-Reply-To: <200601121326.18384.doconnor@gsoft.com.au> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: stable@freebsd.org, freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Subject: Re: powerd effectiveness X-BeenThere: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Production branch of FreeBSD source code List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 03:21:39 -0000 Daniel O'Connor wrote: > On Thu, 12 Jan 2006 10:57, Mike Jakubik wrote: > >> It seems that powerd does very little in terms of reducing heat, and >> sacrifices performance while doing so. Am i wrong to assume that >> lowering the cpu's frequency should reduce consumed power, and therefore >> reduce the amount of heat produced? I have tested with mbmon and i see >> no difference between an idle system running with powerd at 75mhz, and >> at full rate without. Also, while testing the speed of a php script, i >> > > If you want to test how much heat your system draws for a given clock speed > you should dispense with powerd and just set the frequency by hand, ie.. > > sysctl dev.cpu.0.freq=XXX > > powerd won't run your CPU at a specific clock frequency - it varies the CPU > frequency based on current load conditions. > > The load was 0, only thing that was running was mbmon. > Do you have thermally controlled fans? If so I wouldn't expect the temperature > to vary with clock speed very much at all. > > No, i do not. > The powerd defaults do not change frequency that quickly - every 500ms by > default. I run it with '-p 200' and it seems fine although you do notice it > 'stick' sometimes (where the CPU change doesn't happen quickly enough). > > You could try what I do but there are some systems which are very slow to > change clock speed so this could be an impediment. > What was part of my question, is it the hardware or the software thats at fault here. I.e. would a cool n quiet system be better.