Re: [gentoo-user] MacBook: How many hours on battery with Gentoo?

[b.n.]

Ritesh Kumar ha scritto:
> On Feb 19, 2008 12:09 PM, Florian Philipp <lists@f_philipp.fastmail.net>
> wrote:
>
>
>     On Tue, 2008-02-19 at 11:28 +0100, b.n. wrote:
>     > Lowe Schmidt ha scritto:
>     > > Hi.
>     > >
>     > > I'm planning on buying myself a MacBook and I'm just wondering
>     if anyone
>     > > knows how many hours I will get out of it if I run Gentoo. I
>     mainly use
>     > > a bunch
>     > > of terminals, gvim and some lightweigth gtk app so nothing heavy
>     going on.
>     > >
>     > > All input appreciated
>     >
>     > My Macbook Pro with light, normal usage lasts about three hours (OS X
>     > lasts at least one hour more).
>     >
>     > m.
>
>     Have you found any reason for this discrepancy? I'd suspect them to be
>     on par with the right tuning.
>
>
> Are you doing any kind of CPU frequency scaling? In the kernel (I use
> gentoo sources) configuration enable

Yes, I do frequency scaling (the ondemand governor is used when the
laptop is unplugged). I also use laptop-mode for the hd and pommed to
tune screen brightness.

I think the problems are the wireless and the video drivers. The new
Macbook Pro wireless drivers (I bought my machine in late October 2007,
just when Leopard came out -although, well, I found myself almost never
using it) required SVN version of madwifi (dunno if now the stable
version works, will check when upgrading kernel), and so far attempting
to set power saving on my wireless card fails.

The Macbook Pro also has a nvidia video card. The nvidia drivers work
quite well (apart from some issues with external dvi resolution), but as
far as I know, on it the "Powermizer" feature is somehow disabled. :(

I guess both things combined can explain at least a significant quantity
of the power drain. Suggestions are much welcome, I hate the reduced
battery power.

m.
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