PhenomMsrTweaker: Cool and Quiet customized

[Misko78]

This is Pro retail version, everything is up to date. I've booted from another disk with my old system (W7 x64 RC1) and everything is working well.

[vengance_01]

I am running just fine on Win 7. I don't use the automatic feature. Instead I just use 2 states. Idle and surfing LP state and then full speed for gaming, etc... I just run it at startup and switch from the tray.

[cyclometric]

I ran P-MSR-Twkr very smoothly for however long I had Vista 64, and actually was using the modded version with (3 or 4) P-states. I was running it fine after clean-installing Win 7 Pro Retail 64, too, but maybe a month later, it stopped running, giving me just the "... has stopped working" or whatever it is, and I couldn't ever get it going. I switched to the Custom CNQ instead and that seems to run just fine, even as a service, it's just not as slick or feature-rich as PhnmMsrTwkr.

[kstud]

Anybody know if support for the X6 (Thuban) will be available?

[richierich]

I think the author doesn't support this program anymore...and someone has used K10 stat instead. You might want to try that.

[kink]

Hi folks,

I've just released a revamped new beta, supporting all 5 P-states, Thuban, and a highly configurable custom C&Q.
See the sourceforge page.
Please uninstall any previous version before installing the new one, and provide feedback. Have fun

[ridney]

thanks for sharing kink! will give this a try

[charged3800z24]

Getting it now, thanks for the update. I was hoping for one.

[cyclometric]

Hi folks,

I've just released a revamped new beta, supporting all 5 P-states, Thuban, and a highly configurable custom C&Q.
See the sourceforge page.
Please uninstall any previous version before installing the new one, and provide feedback. Have fun

Windows 7 x64. Haven't had PhenomMSRTweaker installed in a long time. Was using CNQSVC, but stopped the service and set it to manual start, which effectively uninstalls it.

Currently in BIOS CNQ is disabled, I believe.

The PhenomMsrTweaker exception is "PowerReadFriendlyName()" and behind it, or rather on top of it, is an unhandled exception in .NET Framework. Here is the stack which the .NET debug message is showing:

************** Exception Text **************
System.AccessViolationException: Attempted to read or write protected memory. This is often an indication that other memory is corrupt.
   at OpenLibSys.Ols.ReadMsr(UInt32 index, Int32 core)
   at PhenomMsrTweaker.K10Manager.GetCurrentPState(Int32 coreIndex)
   at PhenomMsrTweaker.Form1.timer1_Tick(Object sender, EventArgs e)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Timer.OnTick(EventArgs e)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Timer.TimerNativeWindow.WndProc(Message& m)
   at System.Windows.Forms.NativeWindow.Callback(IntPtr hWnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wparam, IntPtr lparam)

[richierich]

Hi folks,

I've just released a revamped new beta, supporting all 5 P-states, Thuban, and a highly configurable custom C&Q.
See the sourceforge page.
Please uninstall any previous version before installing the new one, and provide feedback. Have fun

Thank you, works awesome on my system 2!!

[richierich]

3.3GHz setup:

[kink]

Thanks for the feedback! @richierich: Does the Turbo still work if you enable custom C&Q? You can easily check that by setting the P-state bounds to 1-1, which simply puts all cores into P1. Now check with the GUI, CPU-Z or Overdrive whether P0 gets activated sometimes during a single-threaded load. /edit: Should be easier to detect if you fix the process causing the load to a single core (the GUI displays the current P-state of core 1, refreshed every 250 ms, so fix it to core 1) - open the task manager, right-click on the process, and set its affinity to CPU 0.

@cyclometric: Thanks for the info. The exception code is now fixed (no more secondary exceptions). I'm surprised the PowerReadFriendlyName() fails, I thought 256 bytes would be enough for every power scheme name - it should work with the hotfix provided below (only contains the GUI exe, simply overwrite it). It also fixes a silly bug which caused the GUI not to start if your max multi is locked (non Black-Edition) and < 13.

[VIP3R]

Thanks for the updated version.

[FlanK3r]

thx for this great program, i like it!

[Manicdan]

its tools like these that power conscious overclockers love.

btw i see the theres a dropdown for different windows power profiles. does CnQ act differently between them? like the load point at which the cpu jumps from one pstate to another is different based on different power profiles?

i know that some games which are duel core optimized, dont push 4 cores enough to push to the fastest pstate, i actually get better performance running at max speed, instead of letting CnQ do its thing. but it seems that Balanced, and High Performance, with the same settings (5% min 100% max) acted differently

[kink]

Well, the default C&Q is a black box - its buried somewhere in the Windows driver and affected by the BIOS initialization. Phenom I is only equipped with 2 default P-states (the K10 architecture provides for 5 P-states), and the cores are individually managed (unganged C&Q). This lead to a performance drop of 25% for single-threaded apps on my machine (compared to no C&Q) because a thread hops very quickly from one core to the other (Windows scheduler). So every time it hops to a new core and the core was previously idle, the core processes the thread for some time at its low speed until C&Q detects the load and switches to high performance. By that time, the thread may already be about to hop to the next core...
Phenom II uses 4 default P-states (5 if it supports Turbo) and all cores are kept in the same P-state at a time (ganged C&Q; Turbo is an exception) - but only if using Vista or newer (as far as I know). By doing so, thread hopping is not a problem anymore (well, it may still not be optimal for caching), but the CPU will probably consume more energy compared to unganged C&Q.

By using custom C&Q, you have full control over what's happening.

And remember that Windows power schemes do not only affect the CPU, but a bunch of other power-related settings too which may influence overall system performance. Also, the percentage range for the CPU is not that finely grained (it's probably only a way to limit the range of allowed P-states for default C&Q).

[Manicdan]

good insight, btw, what stupid reason did windows have for the thread scheduling jumping bananas thing

[zaraza]

can this tool force 16x multiplier on the 1055t? without turbo... so 16x multiplier for all cores

[kadir_slayer]

hi,

it seems a nice program. ı want to try it but I think it has some resolution problems because I can't see all options and I can't expand it, either. the desktop is at 1920*1200 but it is the same at 1440*900. ı will attach some screenshot and you will understand what ı mean..

[kink]

This is due to your DPI settings (aka font scaling). I've tweaked the GUI for normal 100% scaling, didn't think about that. I may fix it in the future. Thanks for telling.

@zaraza: I'm working on it, it should be possible.

[kink]

Bugfixed version 2.01 out. Even DPI aware now . Supposed to handle hardware Turbo more clearly too (please report - should also allow you tu use higher multis in non-P0).

Download

[kink]

Me again, notifying about release 2.0.2 - now supports setting the max number of cores in the Turbo state when using custom C&Q (also allows you to disable the Turbo). Higher multis should be allowed now, e.g. for 1055T. Could someone owning a Thuban check whether the Turbo works as expected when using custom C&Q? I still have my Phenom I 9950, can't test it myself...

/edit: updated the first post with some undocumented functionality (fan management)

[cyclometric]

Bugfixed version 2.01 out. Even DPI aware now . Supposed to handle hardware Turbo more clearly too (please report - should also allow you tu use higher multis in non-P0).

Download

Thanks very much for this fix, kink. I am happy to be back to using PhenomMsrTweaker instead of the CNQOCSVC... your tool works much better, and has enabled my machine to get a low temp of 25 @ idle, and still runs great fully oc'd to 3600 (200x18) on my PhII 940. Hip hip hooray!

[richierich]

So I can keep my processor at 16.5x?? Awesome. I'll have to try it out later tonight.

[kink]

@richierich:
Yes, that should be possible according to the AMD docs. There's a multi-limit for non-P0 states in case Turbo is enabled. Additionally, there's a hard multi-limit for all states, so you may not be able to use anything higher than 16.5x because 1055T is no Black Edition CPU. But you should always be able to use up to 16.5x if you disable the Turbo in BIOS. In case Turbo is enabled but not locked (according to the docs, that depends upon the CPU), PhenomMsrTweaker should also allow you to use the max multi in non-P0 states by temporarily disabling the Turbo while applying the settings and then re-enabling it. Please report whether it works as expected. I'd also be very interested to know if the Turbo gets activated when using custom C&Q...