From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Bruno Ducrot Subject: Re: writing a cpufreq driver Date: Fri, 22 Sep 2006 17:48:21 +0200 Message-ID: <20060922154821.GP4945@poupinou.org> References: <20060921184833.GC1216@dbz.icequake.net> <20060921193141.GE17065@redhat.com> <20060921200851.GF2364@dbz.icequake.net> <20060921204402.GA26683@redhat.com> <20060921210329.GA16590@dbz.icequake.net> <20060921211343.GG26683@redhat.com> <20060922141318.GE24439@dbz.icequake.net> <20060922143954.GF24439@dbz.icequake.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Return-path: Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20060922143954.GF24439@dbz.icequake.net> List-Id: List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Sender: cpufreq-bounces@lists.linux.org.uk Errors-To: cpufreq-bounces+glkc-cpufreq=gmane.org+glkc-cpufreq=gmane.org@lists.linux.org.uk Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To: nemesis@icequake.net Cc: Dave Jones , Cpufreq@lists.linux.org.uk On Fri, Sep 22, 2006 at 09:39:54AM -0500, Ryan Underwood wrote: > > On Fri, Sep 22, 2006 at 09:13:18AM -0500, Ryan Underwood wrote: > > > > I have a question, how critical is it that I have exactly the correct > > CPU MHz for the scaling to work properly? Unfortunately, for the slow > > speed there is no way for me to know what it actually is on a particular > > system due to limitations of the firmware, so the best I could do is a > > RDTSC timing to try to figure it out. I wonder if skew between the > > actual CPU speed and what cpufreq thinks it is would be the source of > > the problem. > > Hmm, this might have been the problem. On my machine, the fast and slow > MHz (as measured by my TSC routine) are the same. However, the machine > is noticeably slower at the 'slow' firmware setting. I thought maybe > they were disabling L1 cache, but that is not the case. The CPU is a > Pentium VRT 120MHZ so I'm not sure what is going on.... maybe down > clocking the system bus or memory or inserting wait states somewhere. > > In any case, since the fast and slow MHZ are the same, cpufreq does > nothing. But cpufreq should still do "something" in this case, since > something else that my driver does is to disable the L2 cache when going > to the slow state, which is a decent power savings even on my laptop > that doesn't have an actual slow MHZ. But since the fast and slow mhz > are the same, cpufreq performs no actions. > I've seen toshiba laptop using throttling when HCI is used. If you have the datasheet of the southbridge I think we should be able to verify this hypothesis. -- Bruno Ducrot -- Which is worse: ignorance or apathy? -- Don't know. Don't care.