Tweaks and configuration for Radeon Open Source driver

Can I tweak or configure Radeon driver to reduce overheating. My GPU gets 70-80C temp on start. I don't want Catalyst by now because they are very slow for 2D.

using mobility hd4570, Ubuntu 12.04 x64 3.2.0-24-generic.

Tosho, I had exactly the same problem about setting the power_profile at startup and keeping it thourgh supend-resume applying the common solutions (as described here) and finally found a working alternative solution using pm-utils. I'm not sure if it is the best way to do it (I'm new to Linux) but it does all I wished for: Set the radeon power_profile to low on boot and retain that setting after suspend-resume.

Step 1: Create hook

gksudo gedit /usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/radeon-power_profile

Step 2: Fill in the desired setting

#!/bin/sh

echo profile > /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_method
echo low > /sys/class/drm/card0/device/power_profile

exit 0

Step 3: Make it executable

sudo chmod +x /usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/radeon-power_profile

That's it :)

I was having a similar problem where my Mobility Radeon HD4570 was running extremely hot (idled at 84 degrees) and ran considerably hotter than when running Windows. I used Jockey (aka Additional Drivers from the Dash) to install the proprietary drivers and rebooted, and I'm now seeing a drop of around 20 degrees on my previous temp's so this may be worth trying.

Hope it helps

$ cat /etc/udev/rules.d/30-local.rules

KERNEL=="card0", SUBSYSTEM=="drm", DRIVERS=="radeon", ATTR{device/power_method}="profile", ATTR{device/power_profile}="auto"

Where ATTR{device/power_profile}="auto" can be (source: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ATI):

• "default" uses the default clocks and does not change the power state. This is the default behavior.
• "auto" selects between "mid" and "high" power states based on the whether the system is on battery power or not.
• The "low" power state are selected when the monitors are in the dpms off state. "low" forces the gpu to be in the low power state all the time. Note that "low" can cause display problems on some laptops; this is why auto only uses "low" when displays are off.
• "mid" forces the gpu to be in the "mid" power state all the time. The "low" power state is selected when the monitors are in the dpms off state.
• "high" forces the gpu to be in the "high" power state all the time. The "low" power state is selected when the monitors are in the dpms off state.