When compared to several other distributions (Kubuntu, Manjaro, openSUSE Tumbleweed) my NUC is between ten to fifteen degrees hotter on EndeavourOS running the same software, although maybe different versions.
I’m sure this means one of three things:
Something is installed / enabled automatically on the others
I installed something on the others that I have completely forgotten about.
The sensor is being reported incorrectly somewhere.
Reviewing journalctl shows a lot of short lived CPU throttling events, which I suppose is a good thing and means that thermald isn’t required on this system. Does anyone know what the difference could be?
Thanks. I thought thermald wasn’t needed on newer systems but combined with powertop --auto-tune things are running cooler.
Just a couple of notes:
KDE users can install systemd-kcm from the aur for graphical systemd unit management from the KDE settings.
Powertop works better on some computers than tlp (This one for example). You can create a systemd service for it by running sudo sh -c "echo -e '[Unit]\nDescription=PowerTop\n\n[Service]\nType=oneshot\nRemainAfterExit=true\nExecStart=/usr/bin/powertop --auto-tune\n\n[Install]\nWantedBy=multi-user.target\n' > /etc/systemd/system/powertop.service".
I followed your tutorial and both tlp and thermald are now installed onto one of my computers running EndeavourOS.
But Thermald does not start automatically; each time I boot (or reboot) I must type sudo systemd-manager in the Terminal. scroll down to Thermald, and then manually start it.
Can you tell me the Terminal command I must enter so that Thermald will always start automatically?
Thanks for replying to me but I’m afraid that neither of the commands you gave work. (I even tried using your command with thermald.service instead of just plain thermald but that didn’t work either.) Do you (or anyone else) know the Terminal command to make Thermald start automatically on every boot?
[verix-custom-1@verix-custom-1 ~]$ systemctl status thermald
● thermald.service - Thermal Daemon Service
Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/thermald.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
Active: active (running) since Sat 2019-09-28 14:42:08 EDT; 3min 26s ago
Main PID: 536 (thermald)
Tasks: 2
Memory: 7.9M
CGroup: /system.slice/thermald.service
└─536 /usr/bin/thermald --no-daemon --dbus-enable
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: [WARN]Polling mode is enabled: 4
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: [WARN]sensor id 8 : No temp sysfs for reading raw temp
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: [WARN]sensor id 8 : No temp sysfs for reading raw temp
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: I/O warning : failed to load external entity “/etc/thermald/thermal-conf.xml”
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: [WARN]error: could not parse file /etc/thermald/thermal-conf.xml
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: [WARN]sysfs open failed
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: I/O warning : failed to load external entity “/etc/thermald/thermal-conf.xml”
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: [WARN]error: could not parse file /etc/thermald/thermal-conf.xml
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: I/O warning : failed to load external entity “/etc/thermald/thermal-conf.xml”
Sep 28 14:42:08 verix-custom-1 thermald[536]: [WARN]error: could not parse file /etc/thermald/thermal-conf.xml
[verix-custom-1@verix-custom-1 ~]$
Now I do not know what has happened, but now Thermald is indeed starting automatically when I boot the computer - but, from what I read in that output, something is wrong with it and it is not doing anything.
I notice that tlp is enabled automatically but tlp-sleep is not. Is that significant?
How would I get Thermald to do something to lower the computer’s temperature? (I’m not even sure that my particular computer runs too hot anyway.) Perhaps the Terminal output above will tell you something, something that I cannot understand.
It does it quietly in the background and it will take some time before you notice the effect, it’s a slow burner but once it is kicked in, you don’t have to worry about your hardware’s temp.
Thanks Bryan. Is the fact that tlp-sleep is not automatically activated significant? And how would I tell whether Thermald is actually working (after, say, several weeks)? I do not know how to determine the temperature of my computer.
To be honest, I noticed this just now that you’ve mentioned it. I have been running Thermald for years now and I never ran into a problem with tlp-sleep not activated.
You should notice after a aprox. a week that the temperature stays steady.
Okay, but how do I tell exactly what the temperature is? Sorry for such a basic question but the only way I ever saw the temperature before (on other distros) was in the gnome-disk-utility and, in EndeavourOS, the temperature is not displayed there.
If you use Xfce then you can add the cpu temp in your taskbar, (I believe left click on the task bar to unlock it and then you can add it, I’m sorry I use Gnome, so I’m a bit rusty with the workarounds in Xfce.)
I am using Xfce and the closest thing to cpu temp is a panel plugin called Sensor plugin. It can be set to display the temperature of the computer (but not of each individual core as the watch command that bkaplan gave to me).
Anyway, now I can easily monitor my computer to make sure that it doesn’t overheat. I use the HandBrake video program extensively and, as I’m sure you know, that program uses a tremendous amount of processing power (my computer has 32 GB RAM and, when using HandBrake, over 90% is used and the computer does get warm!).
Thanks to everyone here for helping me out, especially MyNameIsRichardCS54 (who asked the initial question), joekamprad, bkaplan, and, of course, Bryanpwo.