# Need tool to check the arch of my CPU.

## Nebetsu

Well I know what it is. It's an AMD Athlon XP 2400+. The problem is: In the BIOS it shows up as Unknown CPU 2000MHz. Whats more: Whenever I use the nvidia drivers (that were compiled with athlon-xp), the system locks up. I suspect it may be because it's acting as a 686 or something. Is there any way I can confirm this?

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## Keruskerfuerst

You can check it by:

```
cat /proc/cpuinfo
```

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## whig

AMD has given its CPUs artifical ratings for a while, my 3200+ is 2GHz. Which kernel and nvidia versions are you trying to run?

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## sirdilznik

 *whig wrote:*   

> AMD has given its CPUs artifical ratings for a while

 

++

The number in the cpu's name != clock speed.

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## whoracle

 *sirdilznik wrote:*   

>  *whig wrote:*   AMD has given its CPUs artifical ratings for a while 
> 
> ++
> 
> The number in the cpu's name != clock speed.

 

has anyone stated that is the case?

My XP2400+ = 2GHz

My AMD64 3000+ = 1.8GHz.

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## wynn

It's AMD's XP speed rating.

http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=253

 *Quote:*   

> QuantiSpeed is what allows AMD to use it's new XP ratings on these new processors. The XP rating is based on the speed that an equivalent Thunderbird core processor would need to be at to provide comparable performance. In the case of the XP1500 which runs at 1333Mhz, you would need a 1.5Ghz Thunderbird Athlon to provide the same performance. In this case with the 1666Mhz XP2000 you would need a Thunderbird core Athlon clocked to 2GHz to provide the same performance.

 

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## Nebetsu

I know I know. I just compiled my computer for an athlon-xp and thought that if it was messing up and thinking it was a i686 because the BIOS doesn't know what to make it of it, that might be why my nvidia drivers are crashing. I'm using nvidia-glx-1.0.8762, nvidia-kernel-1.0.8762-r1, and linux kernel 2.6.17-gentoo-r1. I don't think that should have much to do with it, since they were stable with my other processor. Oh and: 

```
nebetsu@yajuu ~ $ cat /proc/cpuinfo

processor       : 0

vendor_id       : AuthenticAMD

cpu family      : 6

model           : 8

model name      : Unknown CPU Type

stepping        : 1

cpu MHz         : 2002.645

cache size      : 256 KB

fdiv_bug        : no

hlt_bug         : no

f00f_bug        : no

coma_bug        : no

fpu             : yes

fpu_exception   : yes

cpuid level     : 1

wp              : yes

flags           : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat p                                                                                                                                                      

se36 mmx fxsr sse syscall mmxext 3dnowext 3dnow up ts

bogomips        : 4009.16
```

So it's not doing something stupid like I was thinking?

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## GNUtoo

 *Nebetsu wrote:*   

> Well I know what it is. It's an AMD Athlon XP 2400+. The problem is: In the BIOS it shows up as Unknown CPU 2000MHz. Whats more: Whenever I use the nvidia drivers (that were compiled with athlon-xp), the system locks up. I suspect it may be because it's acting as a 686 or something. Is there any way I can confirm this?

 

mabe the bios didn't have the right table in order to reconise the cpu

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## Nebetsu

 *new_to_non_X86 wrote:*   

>  *Nebetsu wrote:*   Well I know what it is. It's an AMD Athlon XP 2400+. The problem is: In the BIOS it shows up as Unknown CPU 2000MHz. Whats more: Whenever I use the nvidia drivers (that were compiled with athlon-xp), the system locks up. I suspect it may be because it's acting as a 686 or something. Is there any way I can confirm this? 
> 
> mabe the bios didn't have the right table in order to reconise the cpu

 

That's what I was saying... just without the lingo to back it up. I'm wondering if that would cause a problem.

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## GNUtoo

mabe you should bugreport

but i think that they can't do much because the nvidia driver are proprietary software

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## NeddySeagoon

Nebetsu,

What graphics card do you have ?

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## Nebetsu

Nvidia Geforce 5500

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## NeddySeagoon

Nebetsu,

The latest Xorg 7.0 and earlier,  (not 7.1) should work with the latest driver and your card.

If you want to use a framebuffer console, you must use the vesa-tng or vesa ones. The nvidia frambuffer driver in the kerenl prevents the binary Xorg nvidia driver loading properly. Check your kernel.

Do 

```
modprobe nvidia 
```

then ls -l /dev/nvid*  It should show 

```
ls -l /dev/nvid*

crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 195,   0 Jul 22 09:20 /dev/nvidia0

crw-rw-rw- 1 root root 195, 255 Jul 22 09:20 /dev/nvidiactl
```

or maybe more.

Providing it looks good this far. change your xorg.conf to use the nvidia driver.

If/when it fails, in the console, before restarting Xorg, do

```
 cp /var/logXorg.0.log /var/logXorg.0.nvidia
```

to preserver the log file.

Post your xorg.conf and the /var/logXorg.0.nvidia file. This shows both what you asked Xorg to do and what it actually did.

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## Nebetsu

No no no. I have nvidia already working. It's just whenever I play games, the system locks up. I can play for a bit. What I'm trying to ask is this:

If my motherboard doesn't know what my AMD Athlon XP 2400+ is and sees it as an Unknown CPU 2000MHz, then would it run at a i686 arch? And if that's the case, would using a system compiled for athlon-xp on a i686 cause lockups?

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## NeddySeagoon

Nebetsu,

No. Your motherboard does not control the arch of your CPU. Since you have an AMD Athlon XP, AMD do.

Your CFLAGS and USE flags control what arch your software is compiled for. The BIOS has no control.

Your BIOS may set the CPU clock speed and multiplier incorrectly if it gets the CPU type wrong but you would notice the perforamce hit - it will err on the slow side.

Random lockups are likely to be thermal or manginal AGP design on the motherboard or graphics card or both.

Try improving the cooling and turning off all the AGP speedups, like fast writes, until it becomes stable.

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## Nebetsu

Hows 46 C for my CPU temp and 59 C for my system temp?

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## Phenax

You'll need your load temps to really tell.

Also, I suggest you upgrade your BIOS. (Don't ask how to do this, contact the manufactorers of your motherboard. They most likely have the newest files and method)

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## NeddySeagoon

Nebetsu,

The temps will be the way round, your CPU wll be hotter than the system. Under a high load thats ok, Idle, its a bit on the hot side.

The CPU can change 20C between idle and working hard.

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## Nebetsu

So I may need a new heatsink?

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## NeddySeagoon

Nebetsu,

Tidy up the cables to allow the airflow through to improve. Thats good for 10C.

If the heatsink and fan are dirty, clean them carefully with stiff brush. Do not attempt to remove the heatsink.

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## Nebetsu

I just cleaned the heatsink and fan when I put in the processor. The cables are already pretty tidy. Very few cables are near the heatsink and it has lots of room. As well: When I use Visual Boy Advance using OpenGL on Windows, I'm having no problems whatsoever.

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## i92guboj

That can be the idle temp of an athlon-xp, they always had problems of that kind. Make sure that your heatsink is fully copper core (orange metal), and not just aluminium, or aluminium with a small piece of copper in the bottom, I mean full copper. Heatsinks are cheap enough, and a full copper one will not just avoid these inconveniences, but also inlarge the life time of your processor.

That can drastically cut the temperature.

Second, the i686 thingie has nothing to do, linux does not even need a bios once the system is up and running.

Third, that the bios cannot recognise your cpu correctly means just that it is old enough, and has no id for your cpu. The solution: upgrade your flash bios, in the manufacturers web site of your mobo there should be downloads and more info. (EDIT: this will just put a nice label telling youi the correct cpu model, but other than that, this will not solve anything... just to clariffy).

And yes, the cpu temp is always the hotter one, it is just that sometimes, some programs assume that the first interface in the i2c bus is the cpu, and the others are additional i2c's, but i have foundin real life that usually is more like the oppositte hehe, not a big deal though. Just look at the higher temp to know the temperature of your cpu.

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## Nebetsu

Ok by the looks of it, mine is aluminum. Thanks. Now I know what to look for when I get my next one, but that doesn't really solve my problem. I use VisualBoyAdvance using an OpenGL filter in Linux and it freezes in about 10 minutes. I played it for a couple hours in Windows and had no problems whatsoever. If it was a hardware issue, then it would freeze up in both OS's. With my AMD Athlon XP 1600+ that was unstable and pretty much dead, it would crash a few times after it was first booted up and then after it would run continuously for the rest of the day (hence why I got the new processor in the first place). It didn't matter if it was Windows, Linux, or even POST. This gives me reason to believe there is some problem with the way that Linux is interacting with this new processor or a BIOS setting that I forgot about and never switched. I don't really know what's going on with it. I just know that whenever I do anything involving OpenGL (in Linux) then my system won't last 10 minutes. With the other processor it did. I never changed the drivers in between.

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## i92guboj

 *Nebetsu wrote:*   

> Ok by the looks of it, mine is aluminum. Thanks. Now I know what to look for when I get my next one, but that doesn't really solve my problem. I use VisualBoyAdvance using an OpenGL filter in Linux and it freezes in about 10 minutes. I played it for a couple hours in Windows and had no problems whatsoever. If it was a hardware issue, then it would freeze up in both OS's. With my AMD Athlon XP 1600+ that was unstable and pretty much dead, it would crash a few times after it was first booted up and then after it would run continuously for the rest of the day (hence why I got the new processor in the first place). It didn't matter if it was Windows, Linux, or even POST. This gives me reason to believe there is some problem with the way that Linux is interacting with this new processor or a BIOS setting that I forgot about and never switched. I don't really know what's going on with it. I just know that whenever I do anything involving OpenGL (in Linux) then my system won't last 10 minutes. With the other processor it did. I never changed the drivers in between.

 

Not necesarilly, you are in the edge of what would be a sane temperature, some design questions and  the way that some programs handle opengl (even the fuctions that they use) can do things behave slightly different, since you are in the edge, it could happen. And, anyway, that temperature is not the most adequate for your cpu, so, to prevent breakage, you should really change the cooler, as I said, it is cheap enough and can prevent so much pain. 

Not all the gl functions sucks the same cpu cycles (yeah, im talking about gpu, not the main cpu in your mobo), and, thus, not everythings heats it to the same extent. Appart from that, the drivers might make a difference also, I am not really sure. But, the question, is that the linux binary drivers from nvidia are not that perfect, and the render sucks up a lot of cpu (this time i am talking about your main cpu), and, also produce some additional heat. So, yes, there is a difference, and you cant compare the behaviour under linux and windows. There are also another common thing that appears in linux -and more in gentoo, where you have to compile big things- and that might not appear in windows. I am talking about deffective mem sticks, they can be totally hidden in a windows machine for years, while they will make your gcc segfault when emerging firefox or something like that.

So, I would not discard that that fast. A look might worth the trouble, though, of course, there is no guarantee that that is your (only) problem  :Smile: 

EDIT, another thing that makes me think of that is that athlon-xp's are particularly sensible to heat, was your old chip also an athlon-xp or was it a regular athlon?

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## whig

The next thing to check is your ram. AMD CPUs are more picky about ram than intel, and Nvidia drivers make it worse. Use memtest86 (eg, on knoppix). Should errors be found you could try increasing the ram voltage in bios - use with caution. But then it's crashing anyway.

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## olger901

If your BIOS reports uknown CPU type you might need a BIOS update so that the processor will be recognized and supported (seen this problem before on a pc from a friend of my family and updating the BIOS solved the problem).

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## NeddySeagoon

Nebetsu,

Did you try the AGP slowdowns I suggested ?

Windows will 'know' your chipset and apply them without asking/telling you. Linux puts you in charge. 

You cannot easily compare operation under Windows with operation under Linux because of the difficulty of finding out the hardware settings Windows is actually using.

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## Nebetsu

6thpink: athlon-xp

whig: I'll try that! Thanks.

NeddySeagoon: Everything is disabled. I don't have any AGP features enabled. In fact: since the motherboard is so old, it won't even go 8x like it should, so it's at 4x

So I tried the memtest86 and everything seems to check out. No errors or anything.

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