Guest Pat Coghlan Posted August 3, 2007 Posted August 3, 2007 For a long time I wondered why it took minutes from the time I clicked on a URL in an e-mail (Thunderbird) until the web page opened in Firefox. The problem is present on my Dell laptop, but it's generally not a problem with my desktop(s). I investigated several counters in the performance monitoring utility, and finally discovered that the counter called "% of Maximum Frequency" kept ratcheting up to 100%. See http://web.ncf.ca/~ff293/Images/For%20Newgroup.png I can't find a good description of what this counter really indicates. Can anyone shed some light on this please? Thanks. -Pat
Guest Randy Scarborough Posted August 3, 2007 Posted August 3, 2007 Re: What is % of Maximum Frequency (Perf Monitor)? ----- Original Message ----- From: "Pat Coghlan" <news@coghlan.ca> > For a long time I wondered why it took minutes from the time I clicked on > a URL in an e-mail (Thunderbird) until the web page opened in Firefox. The > problem is present on my Dell laptop, but it's generally not a problem > with my desktop(s). > > I investigated several counters in the performance monitoring utility, and > finally discovered that the counter called "% of Maximum Frequency" kept > ratcheting up to 100%. See > http://web.ncf.ca/~ff293/Images/For%20Newgroup.png > > I can't find a good description of what this counter really indicates. > > Can anyone shed some light on this please? > > Thanks. > > -Pat > My Athlon 3200+ is able to operate at 2000 MHz (100%), at 1800 MHz (90% of 2000), or at 1000 MHz (50%). The frequency can be adjusted dynamically by an AMD process called CoolNQuiet or by software such as RightMark's RMClock utility. These bump up the frequency when the system is doing something CPU-intensive and drop it down when the system moves toward idle. Intel processors have a similar ability but I do not know what it is called. The "% of Maximum Frequency" reports the ratio between the current frequency (at the instant it was measured) and the maximum (2000 MHz in my case). On my system it is always one of the three legal values mentioned above. I have some software that reads the AMD hardware register containing the current frequency, and this value and the "% of Maximum Frequency" measurement move synchronously. The above is based on observation and experimentation but not on specific documentation of the counters. It seems accurate enough for my usage. Randy Scarborough
Guest Pat Coghlan Posted August 3, 2007 Posted August 3, 2007 Re: What is % of Maximum Frequency (Perf Monitor)? I suspected it may be related to the clock (FSB?) rate. I have a Dell Lattitude laptop, so I imagine there's another app tweaking the frequency. Randy Scarborough wrote: > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Pat Coghlan" <news@coghlan.ca> > >> For a long time I wondered why it took minutes from the time I clicked on >> a URL in an e-mail (Thunderbird) until the web page opened in Firefox. The >> problem is present on my Dell laptop, but it's generally not a problem >> with my desktop(s). >> >> I investigated several counters in the performance monitoring utility, and >> finally discovered that the counter called "% of Maximum Frequency" kept >> ratcheting up to 100%. See >> http://web.ncf.ca/~ff293/Images/For%20Newgroup.png >> >> I can't find a good description of what this counter really indicates. >> >> Can anyone shed some light on this please? >> >> Thanks. >> >> -Pat >> > > My Athlon 3200+ is able to operate at 2000 MHz (100%), at 1800 MHz (90% of > 2000), or at 1000 MHz (50%). The frequency can be adjusted dynamically > by an AMD process called CoolNQuiet or by software such as RightMark's > RMClock utility. These bump up the frequency when the system is doing > something CPU-intensive and drop it down when the system moves toward idle. > Intel processors have a similar ability but I do not know what it is called. > > The "% of Maximum Frequency" reports the ratio between the current frequency > (at the instant it was measured) and the maximum (2000 MHz in my case). On > my system it is always one of the three legal values mentioned above. I > have some software that reads the AMD hardware register containing the > current frequency, and this value and the "% of Maximum Frequency" > measurement move synchronously. > > The above is based on observation and experimentation but not on specific > documentation of the counters. It seems accurate enough for my usage. > > Randy Scarborough > >
Recommended Posts