CPU Throttling?

[Aunty Entity]

I'm running a web cam on a OrangePiOne.  For the last four days its been performing adequately, at least as well as the RaspiPiZero. At the moment though its suddenly decided to become a snail... slower than paint drying or melting blanc mange. So here I am looking for pointers. I don't have a lot of detail, but what I have follows.

 

I'm using mjpg-streamer to handle the webcam.  In the past this has been rock solid without issue, at this point I assume its not the problem in itself.

 

Architecture:          armv7l
Byte Order:            Little Endian
CPU(s):                4
On-line CPU(s) list:   0-3
Thread(s) per core:    1
Core(s) per socket:    4
Socket(s):             1
Model:                 5
Model name:            ARMv7 Processor rev 5 (v7l)
CPU max MHz:           1200.0000
CPU min MHz:           240.0000
BogoMIPS:              57.14
Flags:                 half thumb fastmult vfp edsp neon vfpv3 tls vfpv4 idiva idivt vfpd32 lpae evtstrm

 

pi@weathercam:~$ cat /etc/default/cpufrequtils
# WARNING: this file will be replaced on board support package (linux-root-...) upgrade
ENABLE=true
MIN_SPEED=1200000
MAX_SPEED=1200000
GOVERNOR=ondemand

 

MIN_SPEED had the weird 408000 speed in it, I thought to try and lock it into max speed by replacing it with 1200000 but no change.

 

 

root@weathercam:/home/pi# armbianmonitor -m
Stop monitoring using [ctrl]-[c]
Time        CPU    load %cpu %sys %usr %nice %io %irq   CPU  C.St.

14:16:15: 1200MHz  1.02  25%   0%  22%   0%   0%   3% 37.6°C  0/8
14:16:20: 1200MHz  1.02  25%   0%  14%   0%   0%  10% 37.3°C  0/8
14:16:25: 1200MHz  1.09  25%   0%  16%   0%   0%   8% 37.6°C  0/8
14:16:30: 1200MHz  1.08  25%   0%  16%   0%   0%   8% 37.9°C  0/8
14:16:36: 1200MHz  1.07  25%   0%  22%   0%   0%   2% 38.0°C  0/8
14:16:41: 1200MHz  1.07  25%   0%  24%   0%   0%   0% 37.8°C  0/8
14:16:46: 1200MHz  1.06  25%   0%  24%   0%   0%   0% 37.6°C  0/8
14:16:51: 1200MHz  1.06  25%   0%  25%   0%   0%   0% 37.5°C  0/8
14:16:56: 1200MHz  1.05  25%   0%  24%   0%   0%   0% 38.0°C  0/8

 

not much to see here, looks like full speed, even the CLI is pretty slow though...

 

root@weathercam:/home/pi# armbianmonitor -u
System diagnosis information will now be uploaded to http://ix.io/2jZj
Please post the URL in the forum where you've been asked for.

 

Regards,

A

[Werner]

For creating a good overview over the system you should use armbianmonitor -u and provide us with the link it generates.

For using always the max cpu frequency you can use cpufreq-set -g performance

 

The armbiammonitor -m output tells me that there is one process that utilizes one of the four cores with 100%.

The min frequency is 480 AFAIK and has been set since some people reported issues when running at 240 and the system did not manage to get up to speed in certain situations. There is no significant difference in power consumtion with the higher clock rate anyways.

[Aunty Entity]

12 minutes ago, Aunty Entity said:

System diagnosis information will now be uploaded to http://ix.io/2jZj

3 minutes ago, Werner said:

armbianmonitor -u completed...

 

4 minutes ago, Werner said:

For creating a good overview over the system you should use armbianmonitor -u and provide us with the link it generates.

For using always the max cpu frequency you can use cpufreq-set -g performance

 

The armbiammonitor -m output tells me that there is one process that utilizes one of the four cores with 100%.

The min frequency is 480 AFAIK and has been set since some people reported issues when running at 240 and the system did not manage to get up to speed in certain situations. There is no significant difference in power consumtion with the higher clock rate anyways.

 

[Werner]

5.65 | armhf | armv7l | 4.14.78-sunxi

Your system is way outdated. Therefore support is difficult...

[Aunty Entity]

1 minute ago, Werner said:

5.65 | armhf | armv7l | 4.14.78-sunxi

Your system is way outdated. Therefore support is difficult...

uh?

 

[Werner]

https://docs.armbian.com/Release_Changelog/

Seems like you missed the versioning update which happened last November.

 

Anyway I think it should be possible to at least update your kernel to current branch which comes with Linux 5.4.x using armbian-config

[Aunty Entity]

Ok, might be my bad, I had a much newer R1 image, not the One, I thought I'd put a new image on it.. I'll see what happens.

[guidol]

The cpu doesnt seem to be throttled, because the usage of the CPU isnt high.

From the armbianmonitor -u I do read that you are (maybe) only connected via WiFi:

 

[ 4.961697] usb 3-1.1: Product: F5D8053 N Wireless USB Adapter

Bus 003 Device 003: ID 050d:815c Belkin Components F5D8053 N Wireless USB Adapter v3000 [Ralink RT2870]

and you have the Camera

[ 5.211696] usb 3-1.3: Product: USB2.0 PC CAMERA [ 5.211718] usb 3-1.3: Manufacturer: Generic

and a 

[ 5.461815] usb 3-1.4: Product: USB Reader

on your OrangePi One.

 

But the OrangePi One does have only one USB-Port - and a OrangePi One without USB-devices show at lsusb only:
 

root@opi-one(192.168.6.114):~# lsusb
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

Yours does show more devices:
 

Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 003 Device 005: ID 1976:4082 Chipsbrand Microelectronics (HK) Co., Ltd. 
Bus 003 Device 004: ID 1908:2311 GEMBIRD 
Bus 003 Device 003: ID 050d:815c Belkin Components F5D8053 N Wireless USB Adapter v3000 [Ralink RT2870]
Bus 003 Device 002: ID 05e3:0608 Genesys Logic, Inc. Hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0001 Linux Foundation 1.1 root hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

It looks like a Hub, the USB-Reader, the Camera, and the Belkin-WiFi

So maybe the the additional devices will disturb your WiFi - and with that also your SSH-Session

or you are using a - in your  area - much used WiFi channel.

 

And I didnt know how good the chipset Ralink RT2870 is supported within Linux (normally it shouldnt be a problem).

 

[Aunty Entity]

Thanks for looking Guido.  You're doing well identifying that lot, from the list I can hardly tell you whats what.  What has me somewhat tossed by this state of affairs is... in a previous location, this device ran like the wind for months, but I had bad power in the location and I'd have to come back and reset it frequently. Having moved it a new location with a different power supply for four days solid it again ran like the wind.. until today.. Where its now running like it has the handbrake on.  I s'pose the wifi is another wrinkle and I could reset the router too... but wasn't expecting it to be an issue.

You're right about only 1USB port, so there is a hub which has the card reader onboard, the camera and the wifi dongle.  Only the camer and wifi are really in use, although I guess the other bits still reserve their right to use it. Hmmm I s'pose where it is now located I could probably wire it into the regular network and see if that makes a difference also.  In the past the RT2780 has been a flawless performer, if I have to hand an unknown off the network its usually my goto piece.

 

I'm about to take 5, so I'll come back and have another look at this later, and give a heads up on how everything is going.

 

Thanks,

A

[Aunty Entity]

Its now been powered down for 24hrs and I've come back to it, powered up and its running like a train again? <boggle> So far no other changes.  But I have done another monitor -u to see if there's anything obvious going on in there. Still suspect heat and throttling.. given the symptoms...there's a 5deg difference from when it was going slow.

 

http://ix.io/2ke1

 

[Aunty Entity]

Alright then, we're at the solution, and as suggested earlier it is infact, a overworked USB port.  To get there I tried swapping out the camera, the hub, cooling the CPU briefly, had it down to 25c  all to no avail.  Then gave in, just bunged the cam into the USB port and the network back into the RJ45 rather than USB Wifi.

I'm still surprised by...  how much the system as an entity lags when the USB port is busy

                                     that 2 devices is enough to bury it.

                                     that at times it appears to all work, then just slows to a crawl over time.

 

Thanks for all your time,

A

[guidol]

7 hours ago, Aunty Entity said:

Still suspect heat and throttling.. given the symptoms...there's a 5deg difference from when it was going slow.

http://ix.io/2ke1

with 26-43 degree celsius you should not get any throttling.

For wifi problem in the new location it could be that there the used wifi channel is jammed by other systems in the nearby, because many neighbours are using the same channel.
So using a network-cable at this location would be a better idea for testing.

When you are using the USB-Port "to much" for data how about trying to check the resolution of the camera? when you are using a lower resolution the camera hasnt to transfer that much data and leave more room for the ssh-data.
Another camera change could be to use another framerate (transfered pictures per second) and leave the resolution.

And you should check the transfer format of the camera...maybe there is a difference between ram and compressed-motion (jpeg/mpeg-like) format.