Mailinglist Archive: opensuse (2114 mails)

[Randall R Schulz <rschulz@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Tuesday 04 September 2007 15:18, Hans Witvliet wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I think i fried my system (again ;) and was considering the config
> for my next system.
>
> When looking at the power consumptions of the multi-core CPU's, i was
> wondering if it is possible to power-down one or more cores when the
> system load does require them...

Idle CPUs (or cores) naturally consume less power.


> A quad core is nice, but needs over an 100watt of energy, that has to
> vent-out aswell...

I was under the impression that the Core 2 processors were more energy 
efficient (as well as far better performing) than their predecessors.

In any event, peak power consumption occurs only during 100% CPU 
utilization (and that power consumption depends somewhat on the mix of 
instructions, i.e., which portions of the CPU's processing logic is 
active). When the CPU is idle, it's power consumption (and thus its 
heat output) are much less.

Keep in mind, too, that the "chipset" consumes quite a bit of power, 
independent of what kind of CPU it serves. These are things like the 
memory controller hub, MCH, the I/O controller hub, ICH (usually 
combined) and especially the GPU as well as other chips contribute 
significantly to the system's power consumption.


Check out <http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=2097&page=3> 
for interesting power consumption measurements for various current 
CPUs, including the Core 2 Duo.


Randall Schulz
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