[SOLVED] Intel Celeron 900 Lacks CPU Throttling?

schivmeister · 2011-05-06 16:50:50

Guys, I've had this laptop for many months, and the first time I tried loading a frequency driver, nothing worked. These days I've been getting lots of heat and shutdowns due to overheating. This is a borrowed machine, and it has Windows 7 (which I never use). I tried to boot into the Windows and stay on it for a couple hours to see whether the heat issues could be reproduced - they could not. However, just like how in Linux no frequency driver wants to load, I don't see anything about frequency scaling in the power settings of Windows. Something bad must be going on.

Issue: Apparent lack of throttling support, but Linux overheats, Windows does not.

For all the frequency drivers:

No such device

This is a Compaq CQ60-615DX with standard Intel graphics (4500M):

processor       : 0
vendor_id       : GenuineIntel
cpu family      : 6
model           : 23
model name      : Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU          900  @ 2.20GHz
stepping        : 10
cpu MHz         : 2194.355
cache size      : 1024 KB
fdiv_bug        : no
hlt_bug         : no
f00f_bug        : no
coma_bug        : no
fpu             : yes
fpu_exception   : yes
cpuid level     : 13
wp              : yes
flags           : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss tm pbe nx lm constant_tsc up arch_perfmon pebs bts aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm xsave lahf_lm dts
bogomips        : 4390.57
clflush size    : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes   : 36 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

Last edited by schivmeister (2011-05-07 12:11:52)

ewaller · 2011-05-06 17:18:13

schivmeister wrote:

,,,and the first time I tried loading a frequency driver, nothing worked.

Could you elaborate?
I'm taking a shot in the dark here but...

modprobing kernel modules acpi_cpufreq, cpufreq_ondemand (+plus all the stuff they pull in) should do it for you.
cpufreq-info and cpufreq-set are the user land tools.

schivmeister · 2011-05-06 19:58:27

You can only load the scaling governors after loading an appropriate frequency driver. All the frequency drivers fail to load on this laptop. Tools such as cpufrequtils (cpufreq-info) cannot be used if there is no driver registering the proper information in kernelspace. Normally, at least one driver works for a certain processor. If nothing works, the assumption is that there is no support for frequency scaling (either in hardware or Linux for the particular CPU). I've updated the first post to make this clear.

Even if I do take it for granted (that there is no throttling ability), I cannot explain why on Linux the laptop overheats. The workload for the Windows test was definitely lighter (just browsing), but on Linux being idle or just downloading a torrent (with KTorrent) unattended will result in me coming back later to find the laptop is off or severely steaming.

But first, I need to really confirm whether this laptop/processor does some sort of hardware throttling (nothing about this in BIOS) or has no such feature. And only then can I move on to the OS troubleshooting. I'll send out e-mails to the relevant parties in the meantime (Intel, Linux/ACPI).

TigTex · 2011-05-06 20:15:43

According to http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=41498 celeron 900 doesn't have the intel speedstep technology, so it will always run at 2.2ghz. Most celerons work that way. That cpu can handle 105ºC, but if you are having problems, it's time to clean the heatsink and replace the thermal compound.

einhard · 2011-05-06 20:30:20

Intel Celeron 900 doesn't support Speedstep (always runs on the highest mutliplier) so yes, no hardware CPU throttling on any system. You can try laptop-tools method of throttling. Try CONTROL_CPU_THROTTLING=1 in /etc/laptop-mode/conf.d/cpufreq.conf, enable it in laptop-mode.conf and add laptop-mode to daemons in rc.conf or #rc start laptop-mode.

You can also search what burdens your cpu the most with powertop. Kernel from 2.6.35 have really big power regressions so it can also be this.
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=a … ess2&num=1

Checking/cleaning your cooler is also good way for start.

Last edited by einhard (2011-05-06 20:32:48)

schivmeister · 2011-05-07 12:11:23

Yeah, that was staring at my face all along and somehow "no enhanced speedstep" did not register as "no kind of throttling". Maybe I was just hoping that not to be the case. Stupid.

Anyway, my laptops are always power-optimised (as far as powertop is concerned). I have all settings which I carry around and set up on anything I might have for a prolonged period. Only the CPU scaling for this machine has been bugging me since the start.

Thanks guys, especially for the laptop-tools tip and power regressions' heads-up. I'll take a look and see if I can work something out.

Last edited by schivmeister (2011-05-07 12:12:27)

Arch Linux

#1 2011-05-06 16:50:50

[SOLVED] Intel Celeron 900 Lacks CPU Throttling?

#2 2011-05-06 17:18:13

Re: [SOLVED] Intel Celeron 900 Lacks CPU Throttling?

#3 2011-05-06 19:58:27

Re: [SOLVED] Intel Celeron 900 Lacks CPU Throttling?

#4 2011-05-06 20:15:43

Re: [SOLVED] Intel Celeron 900 Lacks CPU Throttling?

#5 2011-05-06 20:30:20

Re: [SOLVED] Intel Celeron 900 Lacks CPU Throttling?

#6 2011-05-07 12:11:23

Re: [SOLVED] Intel Celeron 900 Lacks CPU Throttling?

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