About Overclocking (How to overclock?)

[pp4mnklinux]

Hello everybody:

I think in puppy overclocking is not as "efficient" as in windows, but....

... Can we do in puppy something similar to this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rbq-XpeNckY

Have a nice day u all.- CHEERS.

[mikewalsh]

Not being "funny", but.......why would you WANT to? I have never understood this whole business of trying to force hardware into doing what it was never designed for....

Fastest route to instability I can think of. Still, if that's what "floats your boat".....

(*shrug*)

Mike.

[pp4mnklinux]

Hi, @mikewalsh :

I asked this because puppy includes an uses an utility which acts as overclocking (CPU Frequency scaling) and I want to know more about it (because if it could damage your computer I can't understand what is the reason to include it)

SOME users have the idea that some cpu have the same chatacteristics but are límited for marketing reasons.

have a nice day

[one]

Hi, @mikewalsh :

I asked this because puppy includes an uses an utility which acts as overclocking (CPU Frequency scaling) and I want to know more about it (because if it could damage your computer I can't understand what is the reason to include it)
[...]

The mentioned cpu frequency scaling tool has nothing to do with "overclocking" - and especially not with overclocking a GPU like your picture shows.

peace

[pp4mnklinux]

@one

Thanks a lot for your "answer", but, please, can we take advantage of your so high knowledge and ask you to explain us what is tehe function of that utility.

Don't worry if you teach us other day, what is important is that you share this información with all puppy users.

Thanks a lot and peace for you too.

[Fossil]

If the computer works without any problems why induce some? 'Back-in-the-day' when most comp's were very low powered machines (by comparison with today) it was fun to tinker and push the processor and other components to their uppermost limits; this usually ended in both overheating and many different forms of instability. Not a good idea if a stable working environment is required. If you have a spare machine and like spending time sourcing various problems it's a good learning exercise, but not recommended.

[Chelsea80]

@ pp4mnklinux

This can be quite a contentious subject -

I provide this link for an insight -

https://www.howtogeek.com/165064/what-i ... their-pcs/

These are the screen shots from my OS: BionicPup32-8.0+28 (UPupBB-19.03) - Frugal Install Internal HDD

FST_01.jpg (36.03 KiB) Viewed 426 times

FST_02.jpg (53.83 KiB) Viewed 426 times

FST_03.jpg (54.61 KiB) Viewed 426 times

As for this Puppy utility, personally I wouldn't go near it as in my early days of Windows taught me not to try this hack -

For overclock read overcook -

Best regards

Chelsea80

[mikewalsh]

@pp4mnklinux :-

Mm...yah. Heh. Okay; I believe there's some misunderstanding here as to just what the Scaling Frequency utility actually does? I'll see if I can shed some light on the issue.

Going back many years, Intel introduced the "SpeedStep" functionality into their CPUs. This premiered with the mobile P4s/Pentium Ds, and the principle behind it was quite simple. When maximum performance was called for by the OS/software, the CPU would kick the frequency up to maximum speed, thereby allowing everything to run that much faster. The Pentium 4s missed out on this, and the 'CPUFrequencyScaling' tool won't have any effect on them.....because for them, 'SpeedStep' did not exist.

AMD introduced similar functionality into their CPUs, and I believe this first appeared on the original Athlon 64s. AMD's brandname for this was called "Cool'n'Quiet", but it worked exactly the same as Intel's implementation; when called-for, the CPU kicked up into high gear. When system demand was low, the processor then drops down to a much lower frequency, thereby consuming far less power & generating a lot less heat.

Early implementations usually only had two states, flat-out and quite slow. Later versions introduced multiple intermediate frequencies/power-states.

Years ago, when Moore's Law still ruled the roost, and before multi-core CPUs became the norm, standard procedure was to make your CPU run as fast as possible. Only thus could you generate the performance.....and power consumption was of distinctly secondary consideration!

--------------------------------

Fast-forward to today. The 'rule-of-thumb' now is usually to run CPUs in as low a power state as you can get away with - modern instruction sets can do far more work with lower resources - and only to kick into high gear when it's actually needed. This is why most modern CPUs have some version of a built-in 'Turbo' function.

We've gone full circle; instead of running flat-out as standard, and only running slow when not needed, we now run slow as standard, and only run fast when required. But this is nothing to do with 'overclocking'; that's a mysterious 'black art' all on its own, and best left to those who possess not only expert knowledge, but also have deep enough pockets to keep replacing CPUs as & when they get fried. Which is NOT an uncommon occurrence in the world of overclocking.

CPU frequency scaling is all about managing power resources & heat generation to try and make your machine run as efficiently, AND as cool as possible. Which of course depends to a large degree on the individual user's 'use-case'.

Mike.

[pp4mnklinux]

@mikewalsh , perfectly explained, no doubt but...

What happend when you choose the option to run your cpu at PERFORMANCE LEVEL and all the time at its maximum speed?

This way is like configure your cpu to never relax, all the time working at its maximum power, doesn't it?

Now I never play with this options, but years ago, I must recognice I did it ocassionally....

[Chelsea80]

@ mikewalsh

Thank you kind sir -

"Mm...yah. Heh. Okay; I believe there's some misunderstanding here as to just what the Scaling Frequency utility actually does? I'll see if I can shed some light on the issue."

A very comprehensive presentation of the facts -

That has increased my knowledge base and I can now differentiate between my (error) understanding of the two completely different terms -

Although it doesn't alter the fact that I messed up big time with overclocking in my 'youth' -

Best regards

Chelsea80

[mikewalsh]

@Chelsea80 :-

If it helped you, that's great. I've always been more of a hardware nut than anything else, so I used to read up about everything I possibly could!

I'd never describe myself as any kind of expert on CPUs, but I like to think I have a fairly good layman's understanding of the ins-and-outs of processor operation. If I can help others by passing that information on, I will.

------------------------------------------

@pp4mnklinux :-

What happend when you choose the option to run your cpu at PERFORMANCE LEVEL and all the time at its maximum speed?

TBH, I never have. Not with this new desktop rig.

With the old Compaq rig, I used to run in 'on-demand' mode. What 'tweaks' I performed were made at the BIOS level - like finding out the Athlon64 X2's HyperTransport on-die memory controller was only running at 50% of capability - so I maxed that out. Made a BIG difference!

Shortly after acquiring this Intel Pentium "Gold" G5400-powered HP Pavilion at the start of the pandemic, I found out that other folks with recent Intel CPUs actually experienced worse performance when using the CPU Frequency Scaling utility. Apparently, these Intel chips run far better when allowing the kernel speed-controller module - provided BY Intel, so I understand - to control things. And so it's proved.

Mike.

[Phoenix]

@mikewalsh , perfectly explained, no doubt but...

What happend when you choose the option to run your cpu at PERFORMANCE LEVEL and all the time at its maximum speed?

This way is like configure your cpu to never relax, all the time working at its maximum power, doesn't it?

Now I never play with this options, but years ago, I must recognice I did it ocassionally....

Performance governor may back off due to thermal throttling, however it runs at the highest clock specified as the maximum. This however only applies to drivers that are not intel-pstate, if it is intel-pstate, then it'll be extremely aggressive, picking the highest 'p-state' and racing back to idle.

[geo_c]

What happend when you choose the option to run your cpu at PERFORMANCE LEVEL and all the time at its maximum speed?

I have a bit of experience with CPU frequency scaling as my @puddlemoon's audio remaster of fossapup called "jackalpup" runs on a real time kernel at performance level scaling out of the box.

Bottom line, the cpu runs hot, computers prone to overheating will shut down to protect themselves. That's when it's necessary to go to a mixed frequency scaling. KLV seems to have a sane scaling scheme in place some where, as it runs cool and is always quite snappy.

I have one particluar 15 year old machine, an early Dell intel i5 that has shut down on me running jackalpup about 20 times at least, that is until I put it on a cooling pad and scaled down the CPU frequency.

In fact I have that machine set to never run full speed.