Re: acpicpu slowing down computer [was Re: firefox slowness -- X server problem?]

[Jukka Ruohonen <jruohonen%iki.fi@localhost>]

On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 03:53:58AM +1000, matthew green wrote:
> it won't happen very much with netbsd today because there's usually only
> a very limited boost when all cores are in C1 or higher (and we don't do
> anything lower yet.)  eg, my i7 will only boost upto 8% when 3 or 4 (all)
> cores are active, 50% when 2 cores are active, and 75% if only 1 core is
> active.  however, even if this were happening, it wouldn't explain why

That is of course very much true.

> firefox is taking a lot of cpu and being very slow.  if the cpu was turbo
> boosting it would be *better* not worse, right?

While I haven't seen any of these Nehalems in action, I would say this is
still an open question (if we pretend for a moment that C-states would be
fully functional in NetBSD).

But what prompted the reply is that for instance Sverre Froyen saw some
errors because Turbo Boost violates the specification(s). As is being noted
in the white paper I posted, Intel flat out decided to violate its own ACPI
standard. Ironic.

- Jukka.