Re: Lower power portable Linux
On Wed, Nov 21, 2007 at 12:08 PM, mike ledoux <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I've had scripts to successfully 'hibernate' (suspend to disk) > my laptops for years, working at least as far back as 2.4-series > kernels. I have yet to see suspend to RAM work on Linux anywhere. > > I fit that description. If you want my hibernate scripts, let me > know and I'll pack them up when I get home tonight. Mike, Would you be willing to provide me with a pointer to your scripts, or email them to me? I would really appreciate it. I am just starting to delve into this issue, and am interested in what you did to achieve your results. Regards, Bob King ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: Lower power portable Linux
Mark Komarinski writes: > It's better now, for the most part. > > A few drivers still don't suspend and resume properly, but there are > often workarounds like removing them before suspending. Utilities > like powertop can help identify what's causing the CPU or other > subsystems to be drawing more power than needed. > > Using it, I was able to get my IBM x40 from about 14W to about 10W. > > Some of the recommendations from powertop are 'obvious' like using > noatime. Others include things like lowering the Tx power for the > wifi card or disabling bluetooth if it's not in use. Ya, powertop is a very good start. Mostly to point how badly some userspace programs are written to poll for stuff or use usleep() loops instead of being event driven. Using it I was able to get from about 400 wakeups/sec while idle to about 90-100 wakeups/sec. 40 of those are from 2 badly written programs that each do a 50ms usleep() loop. Another 10 from ipw2200, and 10 from acpi periodic interupts. Plus 10 from an xterm for some reason. -- Dave ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: Lower power portable Linux
On Nov 21, 2007 5:41 PM, Bill McGonigle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > In some ways this is easier. How is what easier? > As I understand it, suspend-to-disk is "just" moving all active RAM into swap > ... Right, and launching the Space Shuttle is "just" a moving a payload into space. ;-) In particular, with both S3 and S4, you have to (1) have all the device drivers stop talking to the hardware, (2) have all the state for outstanding system calls, signals, file handles, and such paused and preserved (even through the device drivers have been turned off), (3) on resume, re-initialize all the hardware and put everything back the way it was before you turned the power off. -- Ben ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: Lower power portable Linux
On Nov 21, 2007, at 12:08, mike ledoux wrote: > I've had scripts to successfully 'hibernate' (suspend to disk) > my laptops for years, working at least as far back as 2.4-series > kernels. I have yet to see suspend to RAM work on Linux anywhere. In some ways this is easier. As I understand it, suspend-to-disk is "just" moving all active RAM into swap and then marking the swapfile with some magic that the boot routines understand means "put this back into memory". IIRC the OLPC guys are fixing linux as they go. -Bill - Bill McGonigle, Owner Work: 603.448.4440 BFC Computing, LLC Home: 603.448.1668 [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cell: 603.252.2606 http://www.bfccomputing.com/Page: 603.442.1833 Blog: http://blog.bfccomputing.com/ VCard: http://bfccomputing.com/vcard/bill.vcf ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: Lower power portable Linux
On Nov 21, 2007 12:08 PM, mike ledoux <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Tue, Nov 20, 2007 at 06:03:31PM -0500, Ben Scott wrote: [...] > I have yet to see suspend to RAM work on Linux anywhere. [...] > > I'm especially interested in how it fares for someone like me, who > > prefers to run a traditional *nix window manager and logon, without > > session management and a desktop environment and a bunch of extra > > daemons and so on. > > I fit that description. Your two comments are directly related. Its not quite flawless, but suspend to ram is definitely working. ...its just that you prefer the DIY approach. Cheers! Ty -- Tyson D Sawyer A well-schooled electorate being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and read Books shall not be infringed. ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: Lower power portable Linux
On Tue, Nov 20, 2007 at 06:03:31PM -0500, Ben Scott wrote: > A recent review[1] of the Asus Eee PC stated (paraphrased): Power > management on Linux sucks. I haven't read the review, but I agree with the statement that power management on Linux sucks. > Turning off the CRT was about it. S3 (suspend-to-RAM) was often > prevented by drivers. S4 (suspend-to-disk) was experimental, > unstable, and/or just plain didn't work. > > Can anyone who has played with this more recently comment on how a > modern Linux distro does on today's hardware? I've had scripts to successfully 'hibernate' (suspend to disk) my laptops for years, working at least as far back as 2.4-series kernels. I have yet to see suspend to RAM work on Linux anywhere. > I'm especially interested in how it fares for someone like me, who > prefers to run a traditional *nix window manager and logon, without > session management and a desktop environment and a bunch of extra > daemons and so on. I fit that description. If you want my hibernate scripts, let me know and I'll pack them up when I get home tonight. -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] OpenPGP KeyID 0x57C3430B Holder of Past Knowledge CS, O- "If I had but one life to give for my country, I'd pick somebody I really, really dislike." Tidewater Joe ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: Lower power portable Linux
Ben Scott wrote: > A recent review[1] of the Asus Eee PC stated (paraphrased): Power > management on Linux sucks. > > [1] http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/11/16/review_asus_eee_pc/print.html > > Back when I looked into this (years ago), that was largely true. > During active use, Linux was more power efficient vs Windows, but when > the machine was fully idle, Linux did little to save even more power. > Turning off the CRT was about it. S3 (suspend-to-RAM) was often > prevented by drivers. S4 (suspend-to-disk) was experimental, > unstable, and/or just plain didn't work. From the comments to the above: http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/11/16/review_asus_eee_pc/comments/ The battery drain while sleeping issue that you had isn't some fault of Linux, it's just a configuration option that Asus set. There are multiple sleep modes in machines with ACPI - apparently they chose "suspend to RAM" which allows for extremely fast wakeups but uses some power rather than "suspend to disk" which takes longer to wake up but uses no power. which at least implies that suspend-to-disk is available and works better. Kent ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Fwd: Lower power portable Linux
-- Forwarded message -- From: Tyson Sawyer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Nov 20, 2007 6:53 PM Subject: Re: Lower power portable Linux To: Ben Scott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> S3 w/Ubuntu 7.04 on a Dell Latitude D820 is pretty good, but not perfect. Sometimes wireless or something like that might not recover, but its definitely good enough to configure the computer to suspend to ram instead of crash or power-down if it runs out of batter while unattended. That way I don't loose the state of my apps. Its also good enough that I sometimes use it. ...but since I don't fully trust all devices to work correctly after a suspend, I normally power it off. I just (3 days ago) updated to Ubuntu 7.10 and it is at least as good. I haven't tested it enough to know if it is better or not. Cheers! Ty On Nov 20, 2007 6:03 PM, Ben Scott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > A recent review[1] of the Asus Eee PC stated (paraphrased): Power > management on Linux sucks. > > [1] http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/11/16/review_asus_eee_pc/print.html > > Back when I looked into this (years ago), that was largely true. > During active use, Linux was more power efficient vs Windows, but when > the machine was fully idle, Linux did little to save even more power. > Turning off the CRT was about it. S3 (suspend-to-RAM) was often > prevented by drivers. S4 (suspend-to-disk) was experimental, > unstable, and/or just plain didn't work. > > Can anyone who has played with this more recently comment on how a > modern Linux distro does on today's hardware? > > I'm especially interested in how it fares for someone like me, who > prefers to run a traditional *nix window manager and logon, without > session management and a desktop environment and a bunch of extra > daemons and so on. > > -- Ben > ___ > gnhlug-discuss mailing list > gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org > http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/ > -- Tyson D Sawyer A well-schooled electorate being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and read Books shall not be infringed. -- Tyson D Sawyer A well-schooled electorate being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and read Books shall not be infringed. ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: Lower power portable Linux
It's better now, for the most part. A few drivers still don't suspend and resume properly, but there are often workarounds like removing them before suspending. Utilities like powertop can help identify what's causing the CPU or other subsystems to be drawing more power than needed. Using it, I was able to get my IBM x40 from about 14W to about 10W. Some of the recommendations from powertop are 'obvious' like using noatime. Others include things like lowering the Tx power for the wifi card or disabling bluetooth if it's not in use. I think the biggest draws are still the backlight on the display. Reducing that will help your battery life a lot, even if your other hardware doesn't play nice. -Mark ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Lower power portable Linux
A recent review[1] of the Asus Eee PC stated (paraphrased): Power management on Linux sucks. [1] http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/11/16/review_asus_eee_pc/print.html Back when I looked into this (years ago), that was largely true. During active use, Linux was more power efficient vs Windows, but when the machine was fully idle, Linux did little to save even more power. Turning off the CRT was about it. S3 (suspend-to-RAM) was often prevented by drivers. S4 (suspend-to-disk) was experimental, unstable, and/or just plain didn't work. Can anyone who has played with this more recently comment on how a modern Linux distro does on today's hardware? I'm especially interested in how it fares for someone like me, who prefers to run a traditional *nix window manager and logon, without session management and a desktop environment and a bunch of extra daemons and so on. -- Ben ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
