CPU Frequency Scaling broken ?

[Alexx Roche]

After last nights update (update-manager) old laptop was no longer able to play video or flash-video fast enough, (looked like a slid-show at best) though the audio worked fine.

Booting into 2.6.32-38-generic fixed the issue, but

echo $(uname -r) $(cpufreq-info |grep 'current policy'|sed 's/.*within//')
2.6.32-38-generic 800 MHz and 800 MHz. 800 MHz and 800 MHz.

(though this may be /etc/init.d/ondemand kicking in.)

(Lucid Linx on Intel Centrino Duo Dell Latitude D420 with 2Gig of RAM)

I have checked the BIOS and SpeedStep is enabled.

If I boot into 2.6.31-14-generic then the 'current policy' is "800 MHz and 1.20 GHz"

cat /proc/version_signature
Ubuntu 2.6.32-38.83-generic 2.6.32.52+drm33.21

grep fail /var/log/boot.log
 * CPUFreq Utilities: Setting ondemand CPUFreq governor... [fail] * CPU1...

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: linux-generic 2.6.32.39.46
Regression: Yes
Reproducible: Yes
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-38.83-generic 2.6.32.52+drm33.21
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-38-generic i686
AlsaVersion: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.21.
Architecture: i386
ArecordDevices:
 **** List of CAPTURE Hardware Devices ****
 card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: STAC92xx Analog [STAC92xx Analog]
   Subdevices: 1/1
   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: alexx 2248 F.... pulseaudio
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'Intel'/'HDA Intel at 0xefebc000 irq 21'
   Mixer name : 'SigmaTel STAC9200'
   Components : 'HDA:83847690,102801d6,00102201'
   Controls : 13
   Simple ctrls : 8
Date: Sat Mar 10 18:10:15 2012
HibernationDevice: RESUME=UUID=18512727-1247-4647-a30d-b358cc4f852f
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 9.10 "Karmic Koala" - Release i386 (20091028.5)
MachineType: Dell Inc. Latitude D420
PccardctlIdent:
 Socket 0:
   no product info available
PccardctlStatus:
 Socket 0:
   no card
ProcCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-38-generic root=UUID=12451b00-83c2-4c8f-978e-12f5b9602f1e ro quiet splash
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_GB:en
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_GB.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
RelatedPackageVersions: linux-firmware 1.34.7
SourcePackage: linux
dmi.bios.date: 12/18/2006
dmi.bios.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.bios.version: A03
dmi.board.asset.tag: 9004588
dmi.board.name: 0TJ984
dmi.board.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: 9004588
dmi.chassis.type: 8
dmi.chassis.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnDellInc.:bvrA03:bd12/18/2006:svnDellInc.:pnLatitudeD420:pvr:rvnDellInc.:rn0TJ984:rvr:cvnDellInc.:ct8:cvr:
dmi.product.name: Latitude D420
dmi.sys.vendor: Dell Inc.

[Alexx Roche (ubuntu-one-alexx)]

I found a workaround: ( if you still have the 2.6.31-14 kernel installed then) open a terminal and paste in the following)

sudo su -
kern_img=$(grep 2.6.31-14 /boot/grub/grub.cfg |grep menuentry|grep -v recovery|sed -e "s/' .*/'/" -e 's/menuentry //')
sed -i "s/GRUB_DEFAULT.*/GRUB_DEFAULT=$kern_img/" /etc/default/grub
grep 2.6.31-14 /etc/default/grub || sed -i "s/GRUB_DEFAULT.*/GRUB_DEFAULT=0/" /etc/default/grub
update-grub
reboot