Power Now and Speed Step Features in Gentoo Linux

Power Now and Speed Step Features in Gentoo Linux

Hi there,

In order to use the PowerNow or SpeedStep technologies in Gentoo, you first have to compile the kernel with support for these features. The process is a bit steep but can be easily learned. The process is given below

Power Management Option

• Run-time PM core functionality
• ACPI support
  • Processor
  • Thermal Zone
• Cpu Frequency Scaling
  • Default CPU frequency governor
    • Performance Governor
      • Userspace governor for userspace frequency scaling
      • Ondemand cpu frequency policy governor
      • ACPI processor P-States driver
      • PowerNow/SpeedStep
• CPU idle PM support

Then emerge cpufrequtils and edit /etc/conf.d/cpufrequtils with a preferred editor

# Options when starting cpufreq (given to the 'cpufreq-set' program)

START_OPTS="–governor ondemand"

# Options when stopping cpufreq (given to the 'cpufreq-set' program)

STOP_OPTS="–governor performance"

 Now you only have to run rc-update add cpufrequtils boot to make sure it is started every time you boot.