OPP Level auto-adjusting?

[quadomatic]

Just checking, but if I set maximum OPP level to 5, but bring my CPU back down to 600Mhz, does OPP auto-adjust down, so as to not waste battery?

 

[Blue Protoman]

I wouldn't assume so. Remember, upping the OPP halves the life of your Pandora.

 

[Natro]

The short answer seems to be YES... Both the Voltage levels and Clock Speed are dynamically adjusted in the OMAP3530 by default.


There are various threads about this. This is one of them:SmartReflex


It looks like it is configurable...


OMAP Power Management SmartReflex


I dont really know what this all means... I would need a hardware/linux expert to translate what this all means. Any takers?

 

[DavidBowman]

I wouldn't assume so. Remember, upping the OPP halves the life of your Pandora.

I know that this has been thrown around a lot, and while it's not necessarily false, neither is it true. It will only affect your Pandora that much if you were to run it at the higher voltage 100% of the time, and that's also at maximum clock speed. Since that's not what will happen in the real world, running at a higher OPP level isn't that dangerous. That said, you take your own risks when you do this.

 

[Blue Protoman]

I'm not ever setting mine past OPP3.

 

[quadomatic]

I wouldn't assume so. Remember, upping the OPP halves the life of your Pandora.

I know that this has been thrown around a lot, and while it's not necessarily false, neither is it true. It will only affect your Pandora that much if you were to run it at the higher voltage 100% of the time, and that's also at maximum clock speed. Since that's not what will happen in the real world, running at a higher OPP level isn't that dangerous. That said, you take your own risks when you do this.

Yeah...


And, what exactly is the life expectancy of the processor in the first place? I feel like, by the time it conked out because of OC'ing and overvolting, it would be time for an upgrade anyway...


I'm used to OC'ing and overvolting (my desktop CPU is a rebranded Phenom II with 2 cores disabled, sold as an Athlon X2 5000+, I unlocked the other 2 cores, overvolted it, and overclocked it to 3 Ghz. I only paid $50 for the CPU, so I saved a good bit of money)

 

[Natro]

Again, this has been discussed many times...


This is straight from the OMAP3530 specification document from TI which can be found here:

To avoid significant device degradation for commercial temperature OMAP3530/OMAP3525 devices (0°C
£ Tj £ 90°C), the device power-on hours (POH) must be limited to one of the following:


· 100K total POH when operating across all OPPs and keeping the time spent at OPP5-OPP6 to less


than 23K POH.


· 50K total POH when operating at OPP5 - OPP6.


· 44K total POH with no restrictions to the proportion of these POH at operating points OPP1 - OPP6.


To avoid significant device degradation for extended temperature OMAP3530A/OMAP3525A devices


(-40°C £ Tj £ 105°C), the following restrictions apply:


· OPP5 and OPP6 are not supported.*


· The total device POH must be limited to less than 50K.*


*If an extended temperature device is operated such that Tj never exceeds 90C (-40°C £Tj £ 90°C) then


the OPP POH limits for commercial devices indicated above apply.

100,000 hours = 4166 days = 11.4 years of constant 24/7 use... this INCLUDES the 23,000 hours (2.6 years) running at OPP5-6. Even if you ran at OPP5-6 constantly, you would still get 5.7 years of 24/7 use. Also keep in mind that this all assumes that the SmartReflex feature which dynamically adjusts the clock speed and voltage levels is disabled.


Assuming you were to use (power on) your Pandora for an average of 8 hours a day for 365 days of the year, you would get about 34 years out of it before the chip reaches its lifespan. At OPP5-6 your Pandora would only last half as long... a measly 17 years.


EDIT: I forgot to add link to OMAP3530 document

 

[WizardStan]

And, what exactly is the life expectancy of the processor in the first place? I feel like, by the time it conked out because of OC'ing and overvolting, it would be time for an upgrade anyway...

Estimated 20 years of 24/7 use at standard voltage, 5 years of 24/7 use in overdrive. Yeah, seems like forever to me


But that's just an estimate, not a guarantee. Your particular CPU might only have a 2 year, 24/7 life, and by overvolting it you've reduced it to 6 months. Used 4 hours a day and it dies after 3 years and you have no idea why... Not very likely to be that extreme, but some people don't feel like taking the chance anyway