The 1ghz overclock


Is that 5 years running time or 5 years of average usage?


I rather doubt many people would use their Pandora for much more than 8hours per day on average, if that, (unless they're running a server or something crazy), so that would become 15 years at least. Also you're unlikely to be running at 1GHz all the time.
Yeah, it's 5 years running time, estimated. You'd have to be running it in OPP5 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, nonstop.


My BeagleBoard may see that kind of use seeing as it's my ssh/http/torrent/irc/whateverelseIfeellikethrowingatit always-on server, but my Pandora is in low power mode (or even off) at least 16 hours a day. Even if I kept it in OPP5 constantly, I'd still expect it to last a decade, and I'll love it even in 2020. :)
 
TI specifies the following lifetimes in their docs:

3.3 Recommended Operating Conditions
All OMAP3530/25 modules are used under the operating conditions contained in Table 3-3.


Note: To avoid significant device degradation for commercial temperature OMAP3530/OMAP3525 devices (0°C ≤ Tj ≤ 90°C), the device power-on hours (POH) must be limited to one of the following:


• 100K (11.4 years) total POH when operating across all OPPs and keeping the time spent at OPP5-OPP6 to less than 23K (2.6 years) POH.


• 50K (5.7 years) total POH when operating at OPP5 - OPP6.


• 44K (5 years) total POH with no restrictions to the proportion of these POH at operating points OPP1 - OPP6.


Note: Logic functions and parameter values are not assured out of the range specified in the recommended operating conditions.

Not long enough for you?


With 8 hours/day of power-on-time, it'll last (at full performance) for 15-30 years, depending on how often you play heavy games. I think some other parts will break down long before that...


IIRC, the earlier firmwares could not automatically switch OPP-domains, so it got put at the default OPP3. If I'm not mistaken, it now goes back there when there's no heavy stuff running, so you won't actually be running at OPP5 all the time if you increase the speed.


TI guarantees that the chip can run properly at the specified speeds (500Mhz for OPP3, 600Mhz for OPP5), within certain power constraints, at those performance domains. However, those are worst-case numbers, so the chance that your chip can run significantly higher ( or reach its speeds on a lower OPP) is quite high. Heat isn't really an issue, the complete chip normally consumes <2W at max, which can be easily dispersed. The ARM-core only contributes <500mW to that... The really limiting factor for TI is power consumption. Battery lifetime is, for most mobile devices, more important than pure speed. There's also a slim chance that some transistors aren't able to switch at higher speeds at those voltages (more likely at OPP3), which may cause funny things...


All in all, overclocking is quite safe. The worst thing that can happen is that it'll crash, or cause unstabilities, and power-consumption goes up (and as such, battery-life goes down).
 
I intend to use every dirty warranty voiding trick to go beyond the speed limit. 1.2x Ghz *should* be possible.


Unlike many people here, i have trouble attaching emotional value to a piece of silicon.


before you ask:


yes this is a manhood measuring contest :lol:


yes i have destroyed several x86 cpu's and power regulators before.
 
As long as you're aware that you could destroy your Pandora, not get a new one under warranty, and have to wait and wait and wait all over again to purchase a new one, I wish you luck :)
 
works fine with no battery btw, just don't put the battery in/out while connected to the charger
I'm pretty sure that running without a battery is considered experimental, and is known to not necessarily work on every individual unit. :p
 
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Is that 5 years running time or 5 years of average usage?


I rather doubt many people would use their Pandora for much more than 8hours per day on average, if that, (unless they're running a server or something crazy), so that would become 15 years at least.
That depends on what you mean by 'use'. I didn't plan to turn off my Pandora (when I get it). After all, I don't ever turn off my N800. I ordered the Pandora as an upgrade to the N800 - they're quite similar in many ways. I had many months of uptime on my N800 until the other day when the old battery suddenly failed me before I noticed.

Also you're unlikely to be running at 1GHz all the time.
My N900 drops to 250MHz when idle.
 
Yeah, me too. I think the normal lifespan is 20 years and it goes down to 5 years.


Still, 5 years running time when overvolting to OPP5 is a lot ;)
Well rest assured that the CPU will out last the Nubs. :) Use it, enjoy it. Keep the 1GHz bursts as short as need be. Use the desktop for compiling/rendering.

I'm pretty sure that running without a battery is considered experimental, and is known to not necessarily work on every individual unit. :p
I think "swapping" the battery whilst powered on is ill advised. See FAQ.
 
That too. But I'm pretty sure that not all of them will behave normally when being operated without a battery at all... Alas, I can't find a link on the matter right now, though.
 
So much paranoia :) I can't see a good reason not to overclock - at least within whats allowed in the warranty. Even at 1ghz, a 15+ year lifespan is far longer than you're likely to be using it for. Who uses a single computer that long? While I'm not one of the "gotta upgrade as soon as a new model is out" sorts (I'm still quite happy with my iPhone 3G) progress is very rapid in the low power chip market. ARM - and it's downstream partners like TI - have a lot of fantastic new toys in the pipe. Think of a Pandora 2 (or 3, or 4) that runs for weeks, or sports the power of modern desktops now.


Capabilities aside, while the Pandora does appear reasonably rugged, it's still a portable handheld. After around 5 years of use, lugging around, occasionally dropping and whatnot... Even if it's still working, it'll be time for a new model :)


Of course, I plan on ripping mine apart in the first week, and seeing what fun I could have with those exposed GPIO pads. I'm never happy with my toys in an unmodified state :)
 
I intend to use every dirty warranty voiding trick to go beyond the speed limit. 1.2x Ghz *should* be possible.


Unlike many people here, i have trouble attaching emotional value to a piece of silicon.
Me too.


However, I do have an emotional connection with my bank account, and 330€ is a lot of money in a bankrupt country.
 
The main disadvantage to upping the voltage, as someone already alluded to, is reduced battery life. It'll take some experimentation to determine the extent of the reduction, though.
 
The main disadvantage to upping the voltage, as someone already alluded to, is reduced battery life. It'll take some experimentation to determine the extent of the reduction, though.
It will have an impact, but likely not a very significant one. You're only upping the voltage by a very small amount after all, and maintaining the same current draw (I believe) so the actual increase in power consumption would be fairly minimal. My understanding (which may be grossly incorrect) is that the pandy drops down to a lower voltage/clock speed in sleep state, so this setting shouldn't affect standby battery life whatsoever. If that's a case, you'd be looking at a such a small decrease in battery life as to be largely unnoticeable.


But... I'm much to lazy to work out the math, and I'm probably missing important variables here, so feel free to ignore my random babbling.
 
Has anyone tried to run N64 emulator with the 1GHz OC? I bet Zelda OOT will be running even faster and probably completely full speed. Also, did ED ever make a PND file for the N64 emulator yet? I remember him saying something about him porting one a few days ago...


Thanks,


Frostedfires
 
Oh wow thanks, Does anyone know if the 1GHz Overclock will increade the speed of games by much? I know from 600MHz to 800MHz helped a lot, so 800MHz to ~1000MHz should be a great improvement. I am very interested in the N64 emulator for the pandora so any other links would be wonderful too!


Thanks!

Look here for info about Mupen64plus:


Beta testing
 
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Most people seem to be excessively worried about overclocking. I will be happy to overclock my 720Mhz-rated Pandora up to 1.2Ghz, but I will do it safely.


My N900 has the same OMAP3 SoC, but according to that table, it's rated for only 600Mhz. Maybe I got lucky, but my N900 runs happily at 1150Mhz for hours, under heavy load. The popular maemo.org 'power kernel' manages dynamic clock speed and voltage, depending on the load. It uses a lower voltage than normal at low and regular clock speeds, without any problems, and uses a higher voltage at top speed, also without any crashes or glitches.


The smaller N900 phone gets slightly warm after an hour running at top speed, playing HD movies. I think that this slight warmth is not dangerous. It is certainly not getting to anything like the typical running temperature of a Pentium II chip, let alone those P4 chips that require some serious cooling machinery to survive. And the ARM silicon is supposed to be able to handle well over 100C without problems.


ARM chips have been running at dynamic clock speeds with dynamic voltage for 10 years, e.g. Intel's ARM5 X-Scale. They are designed to do this, and they do it very well.


What we need, to avoid any chance of damage to the core, is a monitoring / alarm system which watches the temperature sensors, and alerts the user or slows down if the CPU is getting hot. It could also keep track of the average clock speed, to ensure that the CPU has not been running full-throttle for too long. This can be configured for the user's preferences, whether for unmitigated speed or absolute safety.


A safety system like this could make it very safe to overclock with a top speed of 1150Mhz, without damaging the CPU at all.


As I understand the "5 years" is 5 years running 24/7 at top speed, without any rest. That would be equivalent to perhaps 100 years of real time for a pocket computer, given my usage patterns, need to sleep, work and play elsewhere. I doubt I'll outlive my Pandora's CPU.


If you have a performance car, do you drive by holding the accelerator flat to the floor until it reaches 400km/h, then keeping it at full throttle all the time while you're driving? No, you use full acceleration only from time to time when you need it. The same is true with our ARM SoC. You use top speed during a compile or intermittently when running a demanding game or watching an HD movie - the CPU should have some idle time between frames, and even a very big compile will be done in 10 to 15 minutes. Unless you intend to harness the thing in a compute-cluster, it will be switched off, suspended, idle or running slacking at low Mhz perhaps 80% of the time. It's not going to get hot.


In the unlikely worst case scenario, you can write Craig to send you a replacement board, perhaps it will come with a newer CPU. $100 every 5 years, it's No Big Deal.


When you need a burst of speed to overtake those lame cookie-cutter phones with their under-clocked CPUs and tiny batteries, you can ramp it up to 1.2GHz for a few minutes or half an hour. It won't crash, and in my opinion damage is avoidable by monitoring, and very unlikely in any case.


Sam
 
Most people seem to be excessively worried about overclocking. I will be happy to overclock my 720Mhz-rated Pandora up to 1.2Ghz, but I will do it safely.
When OPT starts making 720Mhz rated Pandoras, I'm sure you will. In the meantime you'll have to deal with the same 500/600Mhz processor that can overclock to about 1Ghz that the rest of us have :p


TI didn't reclassify ALL OMAP3530s as 720Mhz despite what that wiki page may suggest. They started selling two distinct products based on the same design: one with a max speed 0f 600Mhz, the other with a max of 720Mhz. The 720Mhz one costs more and wasn't even available when OPT ordered them. No one is certain what the real difference between the two are, however, but it would seem that all of the 600Mhz ones can overclock to at least 800 and many beyond 1Ghz.
 
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