On 02/12/2012 01:12 PM, gene heskett wrote:
>> Gene,
>>
>> About tracking that occasional blip on the isolcpu, have you used atop?
>> Consider it a "top" on steroids.  It shows processes running much like
>> top, but also displays what cpu they are running on.  Here's the atop
>> web site:  http://www.atoptool.nl
>>
>> Click on the screen shots and take a peek at what atop has over the top
>> utility.  I use it at work.
>>
>> Mark
>>
>>      
> This prompted me to do a little more experimenting between running it as
> lcnc, which is a script that does the taskset, and running it as linuxcnc
> which does not.  Then either way atop did not detect enough activity on the
> 2nd cpu to bother listing it more than 5% of the time.  In that regard,
> htop, which displays each cpu it is configured for, full time as a slider
> in the upper area of its screen.  To me, htop is the better utility, but
> then I am used to it and have been using it for years on this box full
> time.
>
> ksysguard OTOH used for the rest of this testing, showed a higher cpu usage
> overall for both cpu's and cpu001 was consistently in the 50-60% range when
> taskset was in effect, and about a 20% less total when it was not, only
> with possibly an 8% peak for #1 while it was running a 20 minute program
> with the motors off.
>
> Which of these two monitors utils is correct, I'll have to plead the 5th on
> as I don't have a clue.
>
> Then I thought I'd see how fast I can run the base thread, starting to hit
> realtime delays when taskset was used at about 17 microseconds, and pretty
> consistently at 14 microseconds, and when taskset was not used, I could go
> down another microsecond, perhaps 2.  Without taskset, and at 19
> microseconds, it has now run that 20 minute program 3 times without a delay
> warning thrown.
>
> This of course is without the local and slower gfx delays that relatively
> poor intel gfx chip will cause when it is using its own X to display the
> axis output.  Hooking up my lappy, and ssh-ing into it so as to use the
> laptops gfx, probably wouldn't be quite that advantageous as its an ati gfx
> chipset and only a 1.4Ghz 'turion', but I'd think, until I observe
> otherwise, that what I'd see would be laggy gfx if the miss-match was too
> great.
>
> I guess what I'm saying is that in the overall scheme, using taskset isn't
> the magic twanger I thought it might be.  The gfx in use, from this testing
> would seem to have the more noticeable  effect.  I will, very occasionally
> hit a realtime delay when running on its own x server&  local screen with a
> 20 microsecond base thread when using taskset.  Konversation is running,
> but firefox is not, kcalc and update_manager are but neither of the last
> are using detectable cpu.
>
> When I installed atop, it started an atop daemon, but I have no clue if it
> is actually active and collecting data when the display isn't running, in
> any event I just now used htop to run it down&  send it a quit signal just
> in case.
>
> htop, FWIW, is showing cpu1 at around .5% so it must be using the same
> mechanism as atop to collect the data.  As this HAS to be a bit intrusive,
> its possible it might cost a microsecond in base thread time to actually
> collect the data.  I don't normally run it, or ksysguard, on that box since
> the gfx for ksysguard would have to impinge on the rest of the system.
>
> Conclusion?  Forget taskset, and export the display to a remote server for
> best realtime performance.  I believe that is the same conclusion some of
> you have reached.  However, the improvement wouldn't seem to warrant the
> sheckels to buy another of those boxes and a display, territory of $375
> additional cost, although that box could probably boot from a usb key and
> wouldn't need a dvd writer, bringing that back down to perhaps $300.  Still
> not worth the minuscule improvement IMO.
>
> Thanks Mark.
>
> Cheers, Gene
>    
Gene,

Yeah, atop does run as a daemon collecting info in the background.  If 
you crank up atop on the command line with the -s switch, you get a neat 
screen which shows what CPU the process is running on.  On my Ubuntu 
11.10 with a quad core, I see processes occasionally running on all four.

Mark


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