[mythtv-users] Slightly OT - Controlling the CPU fan

[Joe Votour]

Is there any chance that you could post these rules? 
I'm using an Athlon64 3200+, and the lowest that I can
get the CPU going is 1.8GHz (at least, that's what the
powernow-k8 module is reporting).  I'd love to slow
the thing down even further at idle.

I was experimenting with spinning down drives in my
chassis too (in addition to MythTV, I have a RAID-5
running in there), but unfortunately, SATA drives
don't seem to support spinning down via hdparm.

-- Joe

--- Mario Limonciello <mario.mailing at gmail.com> wrote:

> Jim Reith wrote:
> 
> >> > Even though my Myth backend does not sit in the
> lounge, it does sit in
> >> > the study and the fan noise is driving the
> family nuts to point they
> >> > want the backend shutdown when they are in
> there.
> >> >
> >> > I have done heaps of searching around and can't
> seem to find any solid
> >> > info but I would like to be able to throttle
> back the fan on the CPU
> >> > when the backend is idling as it seems to most
> of the time.
> >> >
> >> > I have lm_sensors running and I know the speed
> of the fan, but I can't
> >> > find any way to control it.  It is a Sempron
> 2400 sitting on a crappy
> >> > generic mobo.  Also, I am sure I could afford
> to turn the fan down as
> >> > the highest temperature the CPU has gotten to
> so far is 50 degree
> >> > celcius (although it is winter-ish here in QLD,
> Australia atm).
> >> >
> >> > Anyways, does anyone have any suggestions other
> than sticking the box
> >> > in the garage?
> >>
> >> You could buy a Zalman fan - they're very quiet.
> I have one and I've
> >
> >> been very pleased with it.
> >
> >
> > Chances are the fan speed is controlled by the
> motherboard and the 
> > only way you can really control it is by reducing
> the temp in the case.
> >
> > Since you said you were using lm_sensors I assume
> you've seen this page?
> >
> >
>
http://knoppmythwiki.org/index.php?page=Power+Management
> >
> > I found that making my (3) disk drives sleep after
> being idle for 5 
> > minutes dropped my case temperature 10 degrees
> >
> > mbmon -c 1 -t > starting_temp.log
> >
> >
> > # more starting_temp.log
> >
> > Temp.= 55.0, 25.0, 44.0; Rot.= 4787,    0,    0
> > Vcore = 1.65, 1.65; Volt. = 3.34, 4.92, 11.80,
> -10.74, -4.66
> > Thu Aug 11 18:34:20 EDT 2005
> >
> >
> > # more spundown_temp.log
> >
> > Temp.= 45.0, 25.0, 32.0; Rot.= 4591,    0,    0
> > Vcore = 1.66, 1.65; Volt. = 3.34, 4.92, 11.80,
> -10.74, -4.63
> > Fri Aug 12 05:43:42 EDT 2005
> >
> >
> > <once the weather cooled off>
> >
> > root at mythtvbox:~# mbmon -c 1 -t
> > Temp.= 43.0, 25.0, 32.0; Rot.= 4530,    0,    0
> > Vcore = 1.65, 1.66; Volt. = 3.33, 4.92, 11.73,
> -10.74, -4.63
> > Mon Aug 15 06:26:53 EDT 2005
> > One of the other suggestions I've seen but not
> tried is to use 12v 
> > fans but run them off the 5v supply so they spin
> slow and quiet. There 
> > are also adapters so you can dial down the fan
> voltages with a little 
> > pot. I agree that the Zalman fans are VERY quiet.
> I have one also. 
> > I've also bought round IDE cables to help case
> airflow and it happens 
> > that there are some on sale VERY cheap this week 
> > http://store.yahoo.com/svcompucycle/clearance.html
> (at the bottom of 
> > the page)
> >
> > One thing you want to make sure of is to not turn
> the fans down 
> > manually and fry your CPU
> >
>
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> >_______________________________________________
> >mythtv-users mailing list
> >mythtv-users at mythtv.org
>
>http://mythtv.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/mythtv-users
> >  
> >
> If your fan is controlled by your motherboard, and
> temperature is what 
> affects it - you can possibly set up some dynamic
> settings for cpu 
> frequency.
> 
> My athlon64 supports an ondemand cpu governor.  I
> simply wrote a few 
> rules for cpufreqd, and now my 3200+ will downclock
> to 1Ghz when there 
> is no CPU usage.  When CPU usage goes up, so does
> CPU frequency, all the 
> way up to what I think 2.2 ghz or so.
> 
> Luckily, my ASUS board supports slowing down the cpu
> fan when things 
> cool down.  Call it crazy, but the CPU fan actually
> turns off when 
> idling at 1ghz.  The loudest thing in the case ends
> up being my GPU fan, 
> as I have a controller that turned down the speed on
> my PS fan, and i 
> have a rheostat for the rest of the fans turned down
> to about 33 percent.
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>
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> 


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