Is it safe to change my CPU governor to "performance" to force max clock speed?
I don't want to overclock my Note 4, don't worry, not talking about that. But I am talking about MAX clocking it - forcing it to run at maximum rated speed. I've already tested out SetCPU and used it to change my governor to performance which forces the clock to max, and it nearly doubled my framerate in many games, especially the ones that struggled to play on this device like Xcom:EW.
But I quickly turned it off because I wasn't sure it was safe to do in the new era of smartphones, what with their DVFS and all. I'm worried that I'm going to overheat the CPU, and it's not going to be able to downclock because of temperature anymore. I'm only modifying the governor, but what if I actually used SetCPU to just change the CPU clock to max, without even touching the governor?
Can I hurt my phone by doing this? Can I safely start forcing my CPU to run faster while playing games, knowing that the only thing I risk is my battery draining faster, or am I actually risking damaging components by doing this?
Hello and thank you for using Q/A,
your CPU will not be damaged, but the battery life time will be shorted.
Regards
Trafalgar Square
RC
I personally have used Performance governor on Moto X 2013 for almost the whole 8 months I had it, 24x7 I mean. Never had a problem, yeah maybe battery life was little less than normal but I never did really care about it. Then I ran the same governor for a good period of time on my Note 3 too, same, no problem at all. Like you said, in games the frame rate difference is massive, but I don't play much games, I simply used that governor because it gets rid off all those micro lags and jitters which are Android's trademark, I simply can't them, with default Interactive the micro lags are very apparent.
However with Note 4 I am pretty happy with the BluActive governor, it makes most of the micro lags to go away, so sticking with it.
In any case unless you plan to use a mobile phone for maybe 5 years or so, I don't see any problem at all with it, other than a slightly increased heat, and maybe a little less battery backup, but you will find so many comments which might scare you, that chip burns off if you run it and all that, but those mainly are BS.
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According to the System Tuner app, my CPU went up to 75 degrees Celsius while I was playing a track on Google Earth. I was running Earth for only a few minutes before it reached 75. I'm not sure if that's the peak yet...maybe it can go even higher.
I've seen several other threads about heat, but most people talk about 50s and 60s. Anyone reach 75C? The front and back of the phone, the top around the camera, were both very hot. It was almost uncomfortable to touch.
Again, I'm talking about 75 Celsius, not Fahrenheit. And I'm referring to CPU temperature according to System Tuner app, not battery temp. Anyone reach this?
picture plz.
the reason is bc someone did a stress test on the N4 and found that the device shuts down at ~57-59C (correct me if im wrong) to prevent damage to the hardware.
Edit: found the link http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=koLJ4BU9tgc
75ºC on a quad core?
I thought it was supposed to be more efficient than a dual core... 167ºF just seems like it's way hotter than any electronic device should ever be.
Sent from my SPH-D710 using xda premium
My first gaming laptop was an ASUS Republic of Game first generation. They did a horrible job cooling the machine. During the 2 months before the machine failed, the GPU would reaches 110 - 140 C if I played games (then, of course, the machine turned the GPU off and still ran as everything else was still about 70-80 C)
When the machine did fail, I opened it up, and found 2 fried thermal unit, a fried GPU and a nearly fried HDD) Amazingly, the machine stills runs, as long as I don't load GPU driver
Well, that's the story. Back to OP, as you see, if the temp is too high, you device can be literally fried. So if you turn off the thermal throttle, please enable it back on and do you best to keep your device cool
I tried to replicate just now and could only go up to 63c. I don't want to keep trying based on the comments here so far. If it happens again I'll be sure to get a screen shot and be aware of what's running.
Where would the thermal throttle toggle exist, if I have the capability at all? I'm running faux123 kernel and use trickster mod and trinity kernel tools for tweaking. I don't see anything about throttle control.
On a similar note, faux123 seems to default to 1ghz minimum cpu frequency. Does that seem right? I've flashed lots of kernels before on previous phones and they always default to the lowest value. When I force the setting down to 384mhz, it automatically changes back to 1024mhz the next time I go in my tool apps. Does this seem normal?
denimjunkie82 said:
Where would the thermal throttle toggle exist, if I have the capability at all? I'm running faux123 kernel and use trickster mod and trinity kernel tools for tweaking. I don't see anything about throttle control.
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I haven't seen a Nexus 4 kernel that has thermal throttle toggle, or have it disabled yet. I am just checking if you're running one that I am not aware of
denimjunkie82 said:
On a similar note, faux123 seems to default to 1ghz minimum cpu frequency. Does that seem right? I've flashed lots of kernels before on previous phones and they always default to the lowest value. When I force the setting down to 384mhz, it automatically changes back to 1024mhz the next time I go in my tool apps. Does this seem normal?
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Minimum cpu frequency enforced by kernel is normal. I am not certain if faux123 default to 1 ghz min, but if it's the case, it seems weird for me too. Definitely not good for the battery. If there's no other CPU control apps, I recommend double check the settings, then find an update for faux123, or use trinity kernel
I just flashed a new kernel and my minimum cpu now seems more normal. I hopefully that alleviates the crazy temperatures too.
I'll try to test again tomorrow to see if my temps still go bonkers. It's time to sleep now. Thanks for the help, everyone.
Hello Guys, i registered to XDA developers to ask this question so please reply. i heard many say GPU of Nexus 4 is very bad because after 20 mins of gameplay the phone gets heated and the GPU performance is Dramatically Reduced to cooldown. I am going to buy Nexus 4 thats y im asking, i didnt hear this from my neighbours..., i saw someone say this in youtube comments. Anyone Experiencing this Issue? or its a defective product?.
This is a good thread to read about Thermal Throttling: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2144652
I am not sure about the GPU actually reducing it's power when the nexus is getting hot. I know the CPU will clock lower when it has reached 70 degrees so it can cool down. Most kernel's have the ability to up this to about 100 degrees so you won't have the thermal throttling as fast. You are also able to remove the throttling completely with a commando.
I've played alot of Dungeon Hunter 4/GTA Vice City/Real Racing 3 and I have never experienced severe FPS drops because of it getting hotter. The only thing you will experience is a battery that will be empty within 2 hours.
PS: This is based on what i've read on the forums, I do not have my nexus 4 for that long and I am not a developer, someone might be able to give you more accurate information.
The thermald.conf sets the battery threshold to about 40-41C before it begins to underclock aggressively (hence why it feels sluggish). I forget the exact number. It starts reading "Overheating" status when it reaches about 46C. Max rated temperature for the battery is 60C.
At that battery temperature ~41C, the CPU is no more than about 50C, so it's not the CPU overheating.
If you feel so inclined, you can modify the thermald.conf with root to modify how aggressive the thermal throttling acts, within reason. Otherwise you'll cook your phone.
desynch- said:
The thermald.conf sets the battery threshold to about 40-41C before it begins to underclock aggressively (hence why it feels sluggish). I forget the exact number.
At that temperature, the CPU is no more than about 50C.
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or you can run a custom kernel(like trinity) that disables the battery thermal throttle and not worry about it.
simms22 said:
or you can run a custom kernel(like trinity) that disables the battery thermal throttle and not worry about it.
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YMMV with that. My nominal binned SoC overheats really easily. With the way I use my phone, it'd be overheating way too often.
I modified my thermald.conf so it's less aggressive. It's not that hard to figure out.
The phone throttles its clock speed like a PC. It's not a big deal.
hy there,
im on latest sokp rom on my g2 (d802)
i want to get more juice from my battery, so I setup my core setings at 1036 mhz max and minimum 300 mhz.
wil this provide me a lot off battery in real life and will it also reduce heat ? even if i watch hd movie or play graphical games
In theory yes it should but not as much as you think cause it will be offset because it will have to keep a higher frequency for a higher period of time. Temperature should be reduced a lot but keep in mind games will lag if they need the extra power
drivenby said:
In theory yes it should but not as much as you think cause it will be offset because it will have to keep a higher frequency for a higher period of time. Temperature should be reduced a lot but keep in mind games will lag if they need the extra power
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hmm, well after i underclocked i played asphalt 8 for like 20 mins and game performance did not changed significantly. and i feel that the phone is now cooler then before when multitasking stuff.
is there also another way that can realy increase battery life besides underclocking.
abati said:
hmm, well after i underclocked i played asphalt 8 for like 20 mins and game performance did not changed significantly. and i feel that the phone is now cooler then before when multitasking stuff.
is there also another way that can realy increase battery life besides underclocking.
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you also can try custom governors
Hey there, you may be suffering a placebo effect, it can give you a little extra juice, but in my opinion you get most of your battery with these 4:
1. Reduce timeout to 15sec.
2. Adjust screen brightness to be as low as possible (lux helps with this)
3. Eliminate vibrations of any kind (haptic feedback, notications that make your phone vibrate ex. whatsapp) and so on...
4. Data (Use Wifi if possible, 2g when you are not using your phone and airplane mode in some cases extend your battery for a lot too)
Don't expect to get more than 30 min of extra use changing your kernel configurations. ALTHOUGH if you are a heavy user (let us say, in this case, a heavy gamer) there are some kernel configurations you should check.
Also remember, if a task takes you 30min but only consumes 1 % per 30 min compared to doing the exact same task in 30seconds consuming the same 1% which one is worth it?
Phones hardware is way above the software we have available at this time, underclocking and undervolting is an option and you won't feel the difference but, as I've stated before, those are not the main issues of the battery drain.
I hope I've helped you out!
As we all know, the Snapdragon 810 processor in our OnePlus 2 phones is prone to overheat, especially during heavy tasks such as gaming. With the stock kernel (which probably most of you are using) this leads to the A57 cores being partially or fully shut down and the display - which generates additional heat - being dimmed in order for the phone to keep a healthy temperature (healthy for both its components and the hands that are holding it.) This, in turn, leads to lag when playing especially demanding games. Which in turn leads to a frustrated user.
With root access, it's possible to use custom kernels and/or custom thermal throttling profiles in order to (at least partially) circumvent these issues, by throttling the CPU frequency and/or limiting the number of active cores, using different schedulers and governors, and by applying thermal profiles that allow the phone to get hotter (in order to keep higher CPU frequencies for a longer duration).
Since I bought the OPT, I was playing a very power hungry game - Republique - which, at its highest graphics quality setting, pushes the phone to its limits. I quickly switched from the stock kernel to the Boeffla kernel and started experimenting with schedulers, governors, hotplugging settings, CPU/GPU frequencies and thermal profiles, but nothing I have done so far makes it possible to play the game for more than 15-20 minutes before some kind of throttling / heat control sets in and the game starts lagging.
I tried limiting both CPU clusters to only 2 cores while maintaining higher frequencies, I tried throttling the frequencies and keeping all 8 cores active, and I tried all kinds of solutions in-between with anything from 4-8 cores active and frequencies anywhere between 60% and 100%. I also tried the various thermal profiles that the kernel offers. But whatever I did, the game was either lagging right from the start, or running smoothly for about 15 minutes before the screen was dimmed and the CPU was throttled, leading to a laggy experience.
So my question is, what do you guys do to keep the OnePlus 2 from overheating during gaming, while at the same time maintaining a lag-free experience? I don't seem to get anywhere with anything I try, so I'd be extremely grateful for some useful input.
vonotny said:
As we all know, the Snapdragon 810 processor in our OnePlus 2 phones is prone to overheat, especially during heavy tasks such as gaming. With the stock kernel (which probably most of you are using) this leads to the A57 cores being partially or fully shut down and the display - which generates additional heat - being dimmed in order for the phone to keep a healthy temperature (healthy for both its components and the hands that are holding it.) This, in turn, leads to lag when playing especially demanding games. Which in turn leads to a frustrated user.
With root access, it's possible to use custom kernels and/or custom thermal throttling profiles in order to (at least partially) circumvent these issues, by throttling the CPU frequency and/or limiting the number of active cores, using different schedulers and governors, and by applying thermal profiles that allow the phone to get hotter (in order to keep higher CPU frequencies for a longer duration).
Since I bought the OPT, I was playing a very power hungry game - Republique - which, at its highest graphics quality setting, pushes the phone to its limits. I quickly switched from the stock kernel to the Boeffla kernel and started experimenting with schedulers, governors, hotplugging settings, CPU/GPU frequencies and thermal profiles, but nothing I have done so far makes it possible to play the game for more than 15-20 minutes before some kind of throttling / heat control sets in and the game starts lagging.
I tried limiting both CPU clusters to only 2 cores while maintaining higher frequencies, I tried throttling the frequencies and keeping all 8 cores active, and I tried all kinds of solutions in-between with anything from 4-8 cores active and frequencies anywhere between 60% and 100%. I also tried the various thermal profiles that the kernel offers. But whatever I did, the game was either lagging right from the start, or running smoothly for about 15 minutes before the screen was dimmed and the CPU was throttled, leading to a laggy experience.
So my question is, what do you guys do to keep the OnePlus 2 from overheating during gaming, while at the same time maintaining a lag-free experience? I don't seem to get anywhere with anything I try, so I'd be extremely grateful for some useful input.
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All the phones throttle while gaming. I use thermal extreme with boeffla kernel. And use 2 a53 at 1,3ghz and 2-4 a57 at 1,4ghz and I modified the throttle file and it underclock to 1,2ghz when it gets hot but it doesn't happen if you don't play longer than 30minutes and it doesn't lag either. You can leave stock settings but if course it will get hot quicker. Also with thermal hotplugged or something like that, I used it all cores online all the time at full speed and it doesn't throttle for a long time, so I don't know what overheating are you talking about. My nexus 5 throttle faster and disable 2 of 4 cores and leave the other 2 at half speed, and our processor overheats?. Oneplus throttle the device a lot because of the rumors, fortunately we can change that. Try what I said, cheers.
Sent from my ONE A2005 using Tapatalk
Migdilu said:
All the phones throttle while gaming. I use thermal extreme with boeffla kernel. And use 2 a53 at 1,3ghz and 2-4 a57 at 1,4ghz and I modified the throttle file and it underclock to 1,2ghz when it gets hot but it doesn't happen if you don't play longer than 30minutes and it doesn't lag either. You can leave stock settings but if course it will get hot quicker. Also with thermal hotplugged or something like that, I used it all cores online all the time at full speed and it doesn't throttle for a long time, so I don't know what overheating are you talking about. My nexus 5 throttle faster and disable 2 of 4 cores and leave the other 2 at half speed, and our processor overheats?. Oneplus throttle the device a lot because of the rumors, fortunately we can change that. Try what I said, cheers.
Sent from my ONE A2005 using Tapatalk
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Thanks for the tip with thermal extreme! The implementation in the latest Boeffla kernel v1.1 beta1 seem to do a very good job of not letting the phone get too hot while at the same time not throttling the CPU too much. Today, the performance was stable for almost 30 minutes of gaming, and when I checked the CPU stats I saw that all cores were still active (2x A53 + 4x A57), and only throttled to 960 MHz. This still delivered enough performance. (I started the game with both CPU clusters at 1.2 GHz, so this also seemed to help with keeping the phone at an acceptable temperature. I'm sure it would've gotten much hotter much quicker at higher CPU frequencies.)
I have to admit though, I was playing inside in an unlit room and thus the screen wasn't at max. brightness. We'll see how it will perform during my next work break when I have to make the screen much brighter.
vonotny said:
Thanks for the tip with thermal extreme! The implementation in the latest Boeffla kernel v1.1 beta1 seem to do a very good job of not letting the phone get too hot while at the same time not throttling the CPU too much. Today, the performance was stable for almost 30 minutes of gaming, and when I checked the CPU stats I saw that all cores were still active (2x A53 + 4x A57), and only throttled to 960 MHz. This still delivered enough performance. (I started the game with both CPU clusters at 1.2 GHz, so this also seemed to help with keeping the phone at an acceptable temperature. I'm sure it would've gotten much hotter much quicker at higher CPU frequencies.)
I have to admit though, I was playing inside in an unlit room and thus the screen wasn't at max. brightness. We'll see how it will perform during my next work break when I have to make the screen much brighter.
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Does it throttle to 960mhz? for me never reach 1,2ghz. Playing real Racing for 30min it stays at 1,2ghz. And with thermal hotplugged (all cores enabled, all at stock freq gpu too) it doesnt throttle for 30 min, gpu only sometimes to 510mhz, i played 30 minutes and it didnt throttle, i dont know when it was going to throttle because i stop playing. But also, gaming with all cores and no throttling eats the battery.
Migdilu said:
Does it throttle to 960mhz? for me never reach 1,2ghz. Playing real Racing for 30min it stays at 1,2ghz. And with thermal hotplugged (all cores enabled, all at stock freq gpu too) it doesnt throttle for 30 min, gpu only sometimes to 510mhz, i played 30 minutes and it didnt throttle, i dont know when it was going to throttle because i stop playing. But also, gaming with all cores and no throttling eats the battery.
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I guess it throttled to 960 MHz because the game I'm currently playing (République) is pretty resource hungry.
So I've been following this section for months and just got my a2017u 2 weeks ago. I'm rooted with tenfars tool still locked on b20. I've noticed in the last few weeks a tapering off of new and useful info for this phone and would really like to see what and where everyone is with it? LSpeed? Kernel Auditor? Or any tweaks that have helped either performance or battery life!!! Looking for anything to make this already great phone better!!! TIA
I have been using EX Kernel manager to tweak the settings as kernel auditor was not working properly with the big.LITTLE arrangement. I have upped the readahead value and underclocked the cpu to 1036mhz on the little cores and 1401 mhz on the big cores. working still as snappy and getting +2h SOT. I'm a heavy gamer and Asphalt 8 still plays as fluid as before, even better tbh due to less heating.
If you don't like to underclock, you could try these:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/htc-10/development/pnp-tweak-custom-butterfly-ghostpepper-t3431307
+2h? That's really good! I know overclocking can/could/might damage the CPU. Does underclocking have any of the same risks? I'm rooted and unlocked atm. So no warrenty anyway
aPexalpha said:
+2h? That's really good! I know overclocking can/could/might damage the CPU. Does underclocking have any of the same risks? I'm rooted and unlocked atm. So no warrenty anyway
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Overclocking can't really harm anything. The excess heat might but it would take a long time and really high temps (you couldn't keep the device in your hands). The only thing you risk by overclocking is a system crash. Just reboot, lower the clock values and voilà ! So no, underclocking can't hurt anything. Overvolting however poses a real threat to the integrity of the components. It's quite the same thing as in computers (except for the heat, you don't always realize it's too hot in a computer).
That being said, is overclocking still even possible on smartphones nowadays ? Just for the fun of it because it's not needed in the least on the Axon 7 .
That's impressive results ! Not sure those hours are needed since the battery is doing well with the software power saver but still a good thing to know.
Still any extra sot is welcome. I'm not a gamer, don't really have any apps that truly need the full power of the sd820 so might give it a shot. Greenify does wonders for standby time.
Not sure if the built in 'intelligent country control' does anything tbh
I'm on my phone most of the day whether it be YouTube play music, texts,calls,etc.. I'm just hoping to find a balance between battery and my multitasking ADHD LOL
Nik2424 said:
I have been using EX Kernel manager to tweak the settings as kernel auditor was not working properly with the big.LITTLE arrangement. I have upped the readahead value and underclocked the cpu to 1036mhz on the little cores and 1401 mhz on the big cores. working still as snappy and getting +2h SOT. I'm a heavy gamer and Asphalt 8 still plays as fluid as before, even better tbh due to less heating.
If you don't like to underclock, you could try these:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/htc-10/development/pnp-tweak-custom-butterfly-ghostpepper-t3431307
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Mine keeps switching back to 'normal' modes with CPU full on. Any idea how to fix that?
aPexalpha said:
Mine keeps switching back to 'normal' modes with CPU full on. Any idea how to fix that?
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Yup, I had that problem too initially.
First, I made system changes persistent upon reboot by running this command in Terminal emulator(you can also use adb shell):
reboot disemmcwp
Secondly, you have to disable smart power in the quick toggles.
Once this is done, set your new max values, select the arrow next to it to make it applied on every boot and then reboot your device. It should work.
Note: Everytime you open the EX Kernel manager you will see the speeds jump to max for like 1 sec but if you actually check the cpu statistics you'll see that your settings are sticking and the max clock speed was just for everytime you open the app.
The smart power! I forgot that thing controls the CPU.
So that round arrow thing means apply on boot? I selected that, figured it meant something like that.
Cheers!