Thermal management

Wed Jun 18 02:31:18 UTC 2014

Hi John,
This is an intense e-mail.  I think you should post this online
somewhere, and track your progress.  I think there could be other people
who are looking to hack around on other hardware, that might benefit
from your in-depth study on this.

I am throughly impressed with the volume on information here.

I don't have any advice where to turn next, however.  The only thing I'd
suggest testing is a few other distros to see if the fan control works
better on another one.  Some distros have their kernel set up
differently, and have packages Ubuntu doesn't... so you never know.  It
has helped me to track down a problem or two in the past.  Puppy is a
good one to try, as they make a few version from different distros like
Ubuntu and Slackware... and it is very small to download and doesn't
require any special install to dual boot.  You can copy the files out of
the ISO and boot from GRUB (which is handy if you have no optical drive
or USB booting)

Definitely let us know when you figure this out.  And please add your
solution to wiki.ubuntu.com in some appropriate place.  You might try
asking some specific questions in askubuntu or ubuntuforums.

On 06/17/2014 02:56 PM, John Hupp wrote:
> This is a fresh attempt to summarize what I've been looking at the
> past few weeks, with a nod to Phill W's request.  People with more
> specialized expertise will likely want to correct this in any number
> of ways.  Better knowledge is very much welcome.
>
> Fan control, especially on laptops, which was my central interest, is
> part of the larger topic of thermal management, which includes active
> and passive methods.  Fan control is the usual active method.  Passive
> methods include several technologies for throttling devices, and these
> methods have varying effects on performance.  Thermal management has
> historically focused on the CPU, but has broadened to embrace the GPU,
> hard drive, LCD screen, and the entire enclosure.  This has become
> increasingly important as form factors have shrunk.
>
> Thermal management for a desktop is usually an easier proposition
> because the heat sources are not as crammed together, because it's
> easier to add fans if needed, and because the thermal management
> technologies most commonly used in a desktop are, in general, better
> supported, and they are more exposed by the OEM's.
>
> The situation for laptops is, in general, the opposite of everything
> just said about desktops.
>
> *Some further orientation and outline of the various approaches*:
>
> BIOS (presumably similar for UEFI): This is the first thing to look
> at.  The BIOS likely sets up some thermal management, and may present
> simple or sophisticated controls in its interface.  In other cases the
> OEM has decided not to present any user-configurable controls there
> whatsoever.  When an OS has booted, the BIOS may relinquish all or
> part of thermal control to it (commonly via ACPI).  But it may
> continue to exercise control through SMM (System Management Mode),
> which temporarily suspends processing by the OS in a way that is
> transparent to it, and runs some SMM BIOS code.  By definition then,
> it can be difficult to know what, if anything is controlled by SMM. 
> And SMM is platform-dependent, so there doesn't seem to be a
> standards-based way for developers to write code that works across
> whatever makes and models use SMM.
>
> ACPI (Advanced Configuration and Power Interface): This is the
> successor to PNP configuration and APM power management.  Under ACPI,
> power management is no longer the responsibility of the BIOS via APM,
> but of the OS.  ACPI is closely related to OSPM (Operating
> System-directed configuration and Power Management), which has been
> described as a system implementing ACPI.  Proper functioning under
> ACPI requires support by the hardware, the BIOS, and the OS.  The ACPI
> BIOS loads some ACPI tables into memory, the most prominent of which
> is the DSDT (Differentiated System Description Table).  These tables
> provide hardware enumeration data and AML (ACPI Machine Language)
> bytecode.  The OS kernel uses an interpreter (ACPICA -- ACPI Component
> Architecture) to run the bytecode and employ the data to set
> everything up.  [A development note: ACPI was merged into the UEFI
> Forum in 2013.]
>
> ACPI and Sysfs: The state of the kernel is reflected to user space via
> a sysfs, a virtual filesystem mounted at /sys.  In Windows-ish terms,
> this describes what device drivers are loaded and what their settings
> are.  But in addition to the original device nodes that describe the
> kernel state most concisely, there are also symlinks to many of the
> original device nodes, set up in various /sys locations, serving
> various purposes.  So for thermal management purposes, one might be
> instructed to look at the contents of /sys/class/thermal, but a number
> of the folders there are symlinks to yet other /sys directories.  Some
> of the kernel parameters reflected at /sys are writable (or are
> supposed to be, or were at one time).
>
> Hwmon - a sysfs extension: This extension to sysfs provides alternate
> interfaces under /sys to report or control kernel parameters that may
> also be represented elsewhere in /sys.  But some user applications are
> written such that they rely exclusively on the hwmon interfaces.
>
> ACPI and Procfs - What is now accomplished for thermal management
> purposes by the sysfs mounted at /sys, was previously accomplished by
> the procfs mounted at /proc.  So there is a lot of documentation
> regarding, for instance, /proc/acpi/fan and
> /proc/acpi/thermal_zone/*/trip_points (see
> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingACPI), but that information is now
> obsolete.
>
> Generic Thermal Management Framework - Much of thermal policy or
> decision-making has been handled in the OS by the kernel, but exposed
> to some degree to user control via sysfs.  The idea under this
> framework is reduce the role the kernel plays to that of a
> facilitator, and leave policy/decision-making to user-land tools.  But
> worth noting is that such user tools do not fundamentally add to
> lower-level methods.
>
> *SOLUTIONS* (check the standard repositories first for any additional
> packages you want to download)
>
> BIOS: Start here.  This may be all you need to improve your fan
> control.  Sometimes an updated BIOS is required.
>
> lm-sensors + fancontrol (http://www.lm-sensors.org): This solution
> explicitly relies on the hwmon interfaces of /sys, and it only works
> with PWM (pulse-width modulated) fan controllers, not with
> voltage-regulated controllers (and no, I don't know why on either
> count).  But its README says this:
>
>     Laptops, on the other hand, rarely expose any hardware monitoring
>     chip. They often have some BIOS and/or ACPI magic to get the CPU
>     temperature value, but that's about it. For such laptops, the
>     lm-sensors package is of no use (sensors-detect will not find
>     anything), and you have to use acpi instead.
>
> ACPI - Editing/creating thermal trip points:  Regarding thermal
> management, you will see documentation that commands like these should
> change the thermal trip point temperature:
> $ sudo sh -c "echo 75000 >
> /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/trip_point_1_temp"
> or
> $ echo 75000 | sudo tee trip_point_1_temp
> But this does not seem to be supported by recent kernels and yielded
> "Permission denied" errors in my tests.  I have seen conflicting
> information on whether trip points should be editable.
>         Concerning laptops, there is this statement at
> https://01.org/linux-acpi/documentation/debug-how-isolate-linux-acpi-issues:
> "Most notebooks also use native fan control instead of ACPI. There
> are, however, a couple of notable exceptions: HP/Compaq, Acer, and
> Fujitsu-Siemens often use ACPI-based fan-control."
>
> ACPI - Overriding the DSDT table: There is documentation (e.g.
> Patching DSDT in recent Linux kernels without recompiling
> <http://blog.michael.kuron-germany.de/2011/03/patching-dsdt-in-recent-linux-kernels-without-recompiling/>)
> about how to edit the DSDT table that the BIOS presents to the kernel,
> and then direct the kernel to use the edited table.  One wonders about
> that as a method for creating/modifying ACPI thermal trip points.  I
> have not tried it.    One source with more expertise says that this
> *might* work, but notes that if a fan is controlled by SMM, this may
> overrule something set up in ACPI.
>
> i8kutils (i8kctl
> <http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/trusty/man1/i8kctl.1.html> and
> i8kmon
> <http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/trusty/man1/i8kmon.1.html>): This
> relies on SMM, and as a platform-dependent solution, the authors are
> aiming to support only Dell laptops.  But this is probably the best
> solution for those.
>
> thinkpad-acpi
> (http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/How_to_control_fan_speed): This is an
> extension of the ACPI support provided by the standard kernel.  Note
> that it does not support all Lenovo laptops.  Lenovo 3000's, for
> instance, are not Thinkpads and are not supported by this extension.
>
> Asus: See
> http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus/705656-fan-control-asus-prime-ux31-ux31a-ux32a-ux32vd.html
> and https://gist.github.com/felipec/6169047 and
> https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AsusZenbookPrime#Sensors_.28temps_.26_fans.29
> as good starting points.
>
> Thermald: See the links following for information about the thermal
> daemon new to 14.04.  It is an implementation of the Generic Thermal
> Management Framework.  It controls cooling via
> - the Running Average Power Limit (RAPL) driver (Sandybridge upwards)
> - the Intel P-state CPU frequency driver (Sandybridge upwards)
> - the CPU freq driver
> - the Intel PowerClamp driver
> - active or passive cooling devices as presented in sysfs (but it
> cannot create any new devices; if there is no FAN device, it will not
> control the fan)
> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Kernel/PowerManagement/ThermalIssues
> http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/trusty/en/man5/thermal-conf.xml.5.html
> https://01.org/linux-thermal-daemon/documentation/introduction-thermal-daemon
> http://www.linux.com/news/featured-blogs/200-libby-clark/721494-linux-thermal-daemon-monitors-and-controls-temperature-in-tablets-laptops
>
> *MY CURRENT CASE*
>
> I wanted the fan to start at a lower temperature on a Lenovo 3000 C200
> laptop. 
>
> The BIOS exposes no thermal settings.  But someone who previously made
> a serious attempt at this on a Lenovo 3000 N200 says that the fan is
> controlled by SMM.  This makes sense, since the fan trips at the same
> temperature in Windows or Lubuntu.  It's notable that active cooling
> is done via SMM, while passive cooling is via ACPI.
>
> Lm-sensors: It does not find a PWM controller that it can work with.
>
> ACPI: There are only two trip points defined, both passive, and the
> lowest of them at 87C.  There is no FAN device in /sys/class/thermal,
> and attempts to modify trip point settings resulted in "Permission
> denied."  I still wonder if editing the DSDT table might net me any
> gains, but I decided for the time being not to invest any more time,
> especially with the prospect that SMM would undo my work.
>
> Thinkpad-acpi: It does not support the Lenovo 3000.
>
> Thermald: I installed this with high hopes, but found out that it
> cannot control a fan if an ACPI fan device does not already exist. 
> And since this laptop does not have a SandyBridge or newer processor
> to take advantage of the RAPL or P-state drivers, thermald does not
> bring much to the table that ACPI did not already provide.
>
> Further recourse: The only measures I can imagine now are to write
> something like i8kutils for this Lenovo platform.  Or edit the DSDT
> table just to see what happens.  I say "imagine" because I will very
> likely do neither!  One source also mentioned the prospect of
> controlling the embedded controller for the fan via hwmon, but I
> haven't seen any details on how to accomplish that apart from lm-sensors.
>
> A small bit of consolation: I recall that Speedfan regards 50C as a
> good trip point, and thermald will try to keep the CPU under 45C.  But
> I have read that it's generally OK for laptops to run somewhat hotter
> than desktops.  This laptop fan kicks on around 68C and seems to hold
> the line pretty well, so maybe the thermal management is not as bad as
> I first thought.
>
>
>

-- 
Regards

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