CPU Frequency Governor Linux
After reading and configureing scaling in linux and reading about how scaling and really mess with applications I disabled it on systems that I can. I wanted the systems fast anyways.
Debian and Archlinux use: cpufrequtils
Contents
Archlinux
You want cpufrequtils
cpufreq-info
I had to manually configure:
Options:
cpufreq_ondemand (default and recommended)
Dynamically switches between the CPU(s) available clock speeds based on system load
cpufreq_performance
The performance governor runs the CPU(s) at maximum clock speed
cpufreq_conservative
Similar to ondemand, but the CPU(s) clock speed switches gradually through all its available frequencies based on system load
cpufreq_powersave
Runs the CPU(s) at minimum speed
cpufreq_userspace
Manually configured clock speeds by user
Add to rc.conf:
MODULES=(... cpufreq_powersave cpufreq_userspace ...)
I have a new kernel as most archlinux users do and did not need to have the system autoload the modules because they already are.
I use this laptop like a desktop but just in case I created some aliases to switch back and forth:
alias cpu.performance='sudo cpufreq-set -r -g performance' alias cpu.ondemand='sudo cpufreq-set -r -g ondemand'
/etc/conf.d/cpufreq
#configuration for cpufreq control # valid governors: # ondemand, performance, powersave, # conservative, userspace governor="performance" # limit frequency range (optional) # valid suffixes: Hz, kHz (default), MHz, GHz, THz #min_freq="2.25GHz" #max_freq="3GHz" # use freq to set up the exact cpu frequency using it with userspace governor #freq=
Notes
Debian
Debian was different. It uses an old kernel but I already had cpufrequtils installed and it was configured to be up and running. It may be because on install I selected laptop utils. I do not remember.
I wanted performance and I did:
echo performance > /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_governor
I still had to keep the change perm across reboots so I edited /etc/sysfs.conf with:
devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_governor = performance
