Power saving for the win!

Update 2: I've released a new version of the package that fixes numerous bugs and brings new features. Since updating requires some special care, it's best to check out the new article on this before trying to do anything manually.

Update: Apparently the startup script doesn't work correctly yet. Upon system boot, the governor is set to performance, probably after my script set it to ondemand or powersave. I'm currently looking into this and will release an update as soon as possible. Until then, You can either set the governor manually after logging in, You can remove my package, or You can turn the ondemand init-script back on:

Code:
update-rc.d ondemand enable

The latter method will set the governor to ondemand on system startup. This is not as good as powersave if You're running on battery, but it's still better than performance.


I'm happy to announce the second package in my PPA! cpufreq has joined the ranks of tablet-mode and is ready to be downloaded!

It's basically nothing else than a packaged version of my article on CPU governors and the power supply status. It has a few more checks (if certain nodes on the sys filesystem exist) and now also displays a list of available frequencies. If You want to increase the running time of Your laptop on battery, I recommend You get it while it's hot!

As of now, the package requires absolutely no configuration (as long as some things on Your system work the same way they do on mine) and if You should encounter any problems, just drop by, leave a comment or write me a mail. I'll try to fix it as soon as possible.

To install it, add the PPA to Your APT sources and update Your package list (as described here). After that, install it via synaptic or the console:

Code:
apt-get install cpufreq

Congratulations! You can now pull the plug and Your system automatically changes to the powersave governor! In addition, You can use cpufreq to change the governor manually on the command line (see the man page for details).

That's it! You're done!