Usually after I played several flash movies in Opera and FireFox, the CPU usage goes crazy. Once it happens, if I reboot the system, usually prepare_preload keeps using a lot of CPU Usage. And then later, XOrg does that.
Sometimes the system monitor shows low CPU usage, but the system is a lot less responsive and the CPU usage spikes if I do anything.
Only after some time/several reboot the system goes to normal.
I’m using openSUSE 11.2 x64 with Dell E6400/8GB Ram/Intel Graphics Card.
Which Intel GPU?
-> Intel(R) Core™2 Duo CPU P8400 @ 2.26GHz
Is this on GNOME or KDE4?
Gnome 2.28.2
Do you use an xorg.conf ?
-> I don’t think so. I don’t have /etc/X11/xorg.conf
Has this been like this since you installed?
-> I have installed openSUSE three times (without changing home folder) and
it has been like that. Thuogh it seemd the second installation, I messed up
my wireless driver a little bit (I have broadcom) and it seemed worse at that
time.
Did you ever perform a memory test?
-> I don’t know how to do this.
If you boot the system from a liveCD do you have the same issues?
-> Have not tried it. In fact I have never used liveCD.
I think I might have found the source of the CPU usage problem. It seems when I do some heavy computation with Python or play HD movies, the CPU clock strangely becomes stuck at 800MHz.
joon@linux-i9f6:~> cpufreq-info
cpufrequtils 005: cpufreq-info (C) Dominik Brodowski 2004-2006
Report errors and bugs to http://bugs.opensuse.org, please.
analyzing CPU 0:
driver: acpi-cpufreq
CPUs which need to switch frequency at the same time: 0
hardware limits: 800 MHz - 2.27 GHz
available frequency steps: 2.27 GHz, 2.27 GHz, 1.60 GHz, 800 MHz
available cpufreq governors: conservative, userspace, powersave, ondemand, performance
current policy: frequency should be within 800 MHz and 800 MHz.
The governor "ondemand" may decide which speed to use
within this range.
current CPU frequency is 800 MHz.
analyzing CPU 1:
driver: acpi-cpufreq
CPUs which need to switch frequency at the same time: 1
hardware limits: 800 MHz - 2.27 GHz
available frequency steps: 2.27 GHz, 2.27 GHz, 1.60 GHz, 800 MHz
available cpufreq governors: conservative, userspace, powersave, ondemand, performance
current policy: frequency should be within 800 MHz and 800 MHz.
The governor "ondemand" may decide which speed to use
within this range.
current CPU frequency is 800 MHz.
In the normal situation,
frequency should be within 800 MHz and 800 MHz
part is
frequency should be within 800 MHz and 2.27 GHz.
.
So because of the frequency stepdown my computer became very sluggish.
I just found out about this so I haven’t had chance to try
Hmm possibly it is no longer in the default install. In Yast-Software Management search for yast2-power. Install that mod and you should be able to control policy.
OMG. I think the problem was clogged vent of my laptop. I just cleaned it and it was pretty bad.
It never occurred to me that the bad ventilation was the problem. It would have been much easier to detect if I had gotten some kind of too high CPU temperature warning or something.
i’ve had similiar concerns, so i finally searched for it in software management, which says “Preload lists files to load into the system cache. This shortens system boot time if used correctly.” in it’s description, but i don’t see why this should hog the cpu for many seconds every time i boot or reboot… does any one know how to configure or “use” this" “properly”?
fyi, i have recently cleaned the heatsink/fan and used ceramique grease, and the temp stays low, this is on a desktop with plenty of ram, 32 bit athlon, kde, plenty of ram and rarely used swap space.
a hot processor will definately slow things down if you are lucky, or fry the proccessor if your’ bios isn’t so nice or not set to save itself, sadly i’ve seen many bioses that will happily let you turn your’ cpu into glass in thier default settings, something i always check.