Release SuperZaxxon - Beta 4 released

[SNESFAN]

IS it a problem in Beta 3 that I can not change CPUspeed to under 500?

same here with beta 4

 

[notaz]

I thought booting to 2.6 still ran off my SD but found that it is booting 3.2 from the SD and 2.6 from NAND. ISnt that wrong?

Huh? Both boot from NAND. If you boot from SD, it depends on how you set up your (auto)boot.txt, nothing to do with firmware.

IT made me notice that a Root Terminal from NAND gives a # as a prompt but booting to my Sd does not when I 'su' in terminal. I tried creating a .bashrc in /home/root/ but this does not seem to be read. I can not setup root Aliases or custom prompt.

This doesn't seem to be firmware related either, probably something with your SD setup?

IS it a problem in Beta 3 that I can not change CPUspeed to under 500?

same here with beta 4

Why would you want that?

 

[Kosmos]

I thought booting to 2.6 still ran off my SD but found that it is booting 3.2 from the SD and 2.6 from NAND. ISnt that wrong?

Huh? Both boot from NAND. If you boot from SD, it depends on how you set up your (auto)boot.txt, nothing to do with firmware.

OK, bad phrasing on my part ;-) I normally boot from an SD. But I wanted to boot to my old kernel (FROM SD) to use Audacity. But realized that any time I Right-Shoulder-Boot to the old kernel I am running in NAND. How Do I Boot the Old Kernel from SD.


(I Moved the OT to Support, TNX Notaz)

IS it a problem in Beta 3 that I can not change CPUspeed to under 500?

same here with beta 4

Why would you want that?

Two reason, Because & I Can! Or Used to (still can if I boot the old Kernel). But Seriously; I tend to underclock a lot. disappointed that the APM just will not work in linux on my EeePC.


If all I am doing is reading a book or doing a long-term testing of a program while mobile with my Arduino- then... then 300MHz worked fine and I could go a whole weekend away from an outlet!

 

[Null]

Why would you want that?

To maximize battery life when listening to music, that's why I underclock anyway.

 

[fusion_power]

With the new dynamic powersaving features of the current Beta firmware, is manual underclocking still needed for max. battery life, or does listening music automaticly drops the processor clocking?

 

[Kosmos]

Why would you want that?

To maximize battery life when listening to music, that's why I underclock anyway.

That Too. I always bought CreativeLabs or Cowon for their Better-than-Anybody Battery life. the Pandora has the same potential.

 

[Binky]

Isn't that what the new power management is for? Underclocking/volting when operating below capacity?


I know that music playback life reaches 43h under the new kernel, general/light use is around 20h

 

[mcobit]

Fusion is right.


The Pandora will automatically save power, when it is not needed with the new kernel. No real need to underclock manually.

 

[Kosmos]

Isn't that what the new power management is for? Underclocking/volting when operating below capacity?

As I learned with other OSes, sometimes manual control is needed when on-demand makes a bad choice! My son prefers low-res if it means higher-frame-rates; I choice higher-res and lower frame-rate. This must be done manually when we play. the Pandora is no different. What you may want at a normal clock-rate. I might be on Jury duty and need to eek out every "once of juice" I can and prefer a manual-low-power mode for normal use. And only bring it up when absolutely needed. In Ham Radio we call this QRP operating and it has its uses.


Part of why we like Linux is that we can customize things to be tuned to our needs and usage.

 

[Null]

Fusion is right.


The Pandora will automatically save power, when it is not needed with the new kernel. No real need to underclock manually.

I still like to do stuff manually though, then I'm 100% sure that it's being done.

 

[Kosmos]

1) So, some of us still want to be able to under-clock manually.

and my earlier question that got lost in this clocking...

2) How do I boot the old kernel from an SD. I thought I was but then this...


"OK, bad phrasing on my part ;-) I normally boot from an SD. But I wanted to boot to my old kernel (FROM SD) to use Audacity. But realized that any time I Right-Shoulder-Boot to the old kernel I am running in NAND. How Do I Boot the Old Kernel from SD."

 

[WizardStan]

OK, bad phrasing on my part ;-) I normally boot from an SD. But I wanted to boot to my old kernel (FROM SD) to use Audacity. But realized that any time I Right-Shoulder-Boot to the old kernel I am running in NAND. How Do I Boot the Old Kernel from SD.

Change your boot.txt

To maximize battery life when listening to music, that's why I underclock anyway.

As I learned with other OSes, sometimes manual control is needed when on-demand makes a bad choice! My son prefers low-res if it means higher-frame-rates; I choice higher-res and lower frame-rate. This must be done manually when we play. the Pandora is no different. What you may want at a normal clock-rate. I might be on Jury duty and need to eek out every "once of juice" I can and prefer a manual-low-power mode for normal use. And only bring it up when absolutely needed. In Ham Radio we call this QRP operating and it has its uses.

Reducing the CPU won't help unless the application is doing a stupid busy loop. Time spent doing nothing uses so little power I wouldn't be surprised if it in fact uses more power taking the 10 seconds to change the CPU speed than it would save.


If you reduce the clock speed instead of relying on intelligent throttling, you risk having the CPU maxed out: with no downtime it actually uses more power. There was some benchmarking on this a couple of years ago and it was found that underclocking and having the CPU run hot (near 100% usage) was worse than leaving it at stock and letting it idle as needed. There's a saying: premature optimization is the root of all evil, and this is exactly a case of why. Not being able to underclock significantly may technically be a bug (or undesired feature) but it shouldn't be a show stopper: trust in the governor, it's a lot better than you are giving it credit for. I went from a 6 hour near constant usage to 8 hours of usage with about 35% of my battery remaining because of it.

 

[Kosmos]

OK on the underclocking. According to what you say, I guess the issue is moot for me then. Thanks.


Now for this: My Boot.txt


setenv bootargs debug root=/dev/mmcblk0p3 rw rootdelay=2 vram=6272K omapfb.vram=0:3000K psplash=false


fatload mmc 0:1 0x80300000 uImage


bootm 0x80300000


What do I change? And where can I learn more about these arguments?

 

[WizardStan]

hmm, that looks like it should be doing it.


Make sure that uImage is actually the 2.6 kernel on your boot partition? 2002336 bytes in size, mine is.

 

[Kosmos]

on the SD in /boot correct? Because obviously the uimage on the root of the SD card (fat partition is the 3.2 kernel).


Be patient please.


[EDIT] I was wrong, there is no /boot on the SD card ext partition. So where do I look for the 2.6 kernel?


Maybe I have a broken installation? I remember being told to add an mmc_removeable to the end of autoboot.txt just to get it to boot into the new kernel.


If True, then I need to know why so it does not happen again.

 

[peacelovefleshbones]

Ok so here are the bugs I have to contribute.


-I use sticky keys, but sticky keys will randomly disable periodically.


-the battery takes longer to charge than I remember it taking with the old firmware. A good 2-3 hours longer.alternatively, battery life has not suffered and may in fact be a little better. I also cannot get it to reach a full %100. it always stops at %98.


-It occasionally runs a little slow. this was only noticable on a few applications, namely firefox 11, fennec, snes9x4p, and vba, usually these all run full speed with no need to frameskip on the emulators. I suspect that this slowing down only happens after going into low power or suspend mode. I havent confirmed that.


-the nub mouse responsiveness is iffy. the left nub for direction changes speed sometimes and the right one for buttons often right clicks when I left click and other such mix ups. Im pretty sure this is a sensitivity issue but, like others have said, its difficult to get the pandora to remember nub settings.


-my pandora has become sentient and is constantly asking me for pickled beets and to sacrifice the blood of he innocent to it. I have since convinced it that tomato juice is the blood of children but my supply of pickled beets is running low. As a result my pandora, which has since renamed itself "Azrael, king of death", is becoming more temperamental and resorts to petty name calling.


-incessant delusions of grandeur.

 

[Pickle]

-my pandora has become sentient and is constantly asking me for pickled beets and to sacrifice the blood of he innocent to it. I have since convinced it that tomato juice is the blood of children but my supply of pickled beets is running low. As a result my pandora, which has since renamed itself "Azrael, king of death", is becoming more temperamental and resorts to petty name calling.

excessive monetary transfers to my paypal shall appease any pickle problems you may be experiencing.

 

[WizardStan]

on the SD in /boot correct? Because obviously the uimage on the root of the SD card (fat partition is the 3.2 kernel).

No, this line:


fatload mmc 0:1 0x80300000 uImage


says to load the file uImage from the first fat partition. If the fat partition has the 3.2 kernel on it, then that is what it will load, always. If you want to load a different kernel, copy the 2.6 uImage to the root fat partition. Name it "uImage2.6" or something if you want, then you can simply change your boot.txt to jump back and forth on reboot.

 

[Kosmos]

OK I have both kernels on the root of the fat partition on the SD. Am I to understand that I would have to modify boot.txt in a text editor between boots to change kernels on the SD? And that using the Menu to change kernels ONLY works with kernels on the NAND?


Is this correct? I have looked at the /boot/bootmenu and am starting to get this picture. If Booting from the Menu Always uses the NAND bootstrap <?> and only Autoboot.txt uses the NAND.


(Bare with me a bit longer please)


In otherwords, what is the function of the boot versus autoboot.txt? And why autoboot had to have mmc_core.removable=0 but not my boot.txt


...And if a mod wants to move this segway to a separate thread that is fine and I apologize if this got OT.

 

[F_Slim]

ok, back to the freeze I reported one page earlier. I removed both SD cards, and after removing the one in the left slot, which also has all browsers on it, I could not reproduce the freeze after wake-up.


No change after inserting it again either.


But when I connect Wifi load eg. the forum in Firefox, then repeat the steps described in 1) (previous thread) it freezes again. Repeating without starting Firefox (11.0 from the repo) did not reproduce the freeze, although it did even after a reboot before removing the SD card (that's why I reported it).


Maybe it is related to Firefox not shuing down fast enough? I know from my Desktop PC that it takes some time for it to really close even after the window is closed ... and maybe something got "stuck" until I removed the SD? Not sure how to generate a useful test from this though.


BTW: I am sure that I am running Beta4, unless the one you can download here in the first post just changes the boot-screen and nothing else


I also tried to mess up Wifi by repeatedly pressing the Wifi-button (turning it on and off and on and off and...) and this does not make it crash ...