From: Thomas Renninger When unplugging the AC adapter on these machines following happens in BIOS: - ACPI processor event fired, frequencies get limited to the lowest one(600 MHz) and BIOS already sets lowest freq. - when waiting about 10 seconds another ACPI processor event is fired, and all frequencies are available again, highest freq(1700 MHz) is set. - when plugging in ac adapter before waiting 10 seconds ACPI processor event is happening immediately and all frequencies are available again, highest freq(1700 MHz) is set. I found these bugs in kernel: - speedstep centrino driver does not recognise that BIOS changed the frequency behind it's back. It tells you that 600 MHz are already set, and does not invoke PRE/POST transition validation. On next frequency settings, the frequency is "out_of_sync" and the validater assumes 600 MHz and the frequency stays there. Patch [1/2] - userspace governor is using its own cpufreq_policy struct and forgets to set max_frequency there in cpufreq_governor_userspace(CPUFREQ_GOV_LIMITS) That results in scaling_setspeed staying high in sysfs even the frequency has been lowered on _PPC change. When _PPC allows all frequencies again, the userspace governor uses it's own policy_struct with the old max value again (now the low one) and the frequency still stays at lowest frequency. Also the userspace governor need not to hold it's own cpufreq_policy, better make use of the global core policy, save some memory and avoid to forget any struct member to be copied. Patch [2/2] I tested with ondemand and userspace governor on a speedstep-centrino system, both governors had problems with but should work fine now, whether _PPC (or whatever ACPI function) prechanges the freq or not. The first patch fixes the ondemand governor working properly again, the second is also needed to make the userspace governor working on these machines. This patch: BIOS might change frequency behind our back when BIOS changes allowed frequencies via _PPC. in this case cpufreq core got out of sync. -> ask driver for current freq and notify governors about a change Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton --- drivers/cpufreq/cpufreq.c | 10 ++++++++++ 1 files changed, 10 insertions(+) diff -puN drivers/cpufreq/cpufreq.c~cpufreq-_ppc-frequency-change-issues-freq-already-lowered-by-bios drivers/cpufreq/cpufreq.c --- 25/drivers/cpufreq/cpufreq.c~cpufreq-_ppc-frequency-change-issues-freq-already-lowered-by-bios Tue Jan 31 13:14:28 2006 +++ 25-akpm/drivers/cpufreq/cpufreq.c Tue Jan 31 13:14:28 2006 @@ -1437,6 +1437,16 @@ int cpufreq_update_policy(unsigned int c cpufreq_out_of_sync(cpu, data->cur, policy.cur); } + /* BIOS might change freq behind our back + -> ask driver for current freq and notify + governors about a change + */ + if (cpufreq_driver->get){ + policy.cur = cpufreq_driver->get(cpu); + if (data->cur != policy.cur) + cpufreq_out_of_sync(cpu, data->cur, policy.cur); + } + ret = __cpufreq_set_policy(data, &policy); mutex_unlock(&data->lock); _