Reducing CPU Power Consumption and Fan Noise on Qubes OS 4.3.2

[timw234]

I’m aware that Qubes is a somewhat resource-intensive operating system. How can I make my Intel Core i7-13800H in a Lenovo P16v run more efficiently under Qubes OS 4.3.2?

If possible, I’d like to reduce power consumption and prevent the CPU and the fan of the dedicated GPU from ramping up so quickly. I don’t mind if the system becomes a little slower as a result.

I’ve already made the necessary changes in the BIOS settings.

I’d really appreciate any help or suggestions.

[artist]

@timw234

I’m aware that Qubes is a somewhat resource-intensive operating system.

I think it’s a misconception that Qubes OS is always hungrier for resources than a standard monolithic system. Sure, extra resources makes things easier, but especially since 4.2, my hardware actually struggles more with Ubuntu than it does with Qubes.

I would look at disabling Turbo Boost and the use of minimal templates.

[WhiteShadow]

@timw234

reduce power consumption and prevent the CPU

Assign fewer vCPUs to your qubes to reduce the hypervisor’s physical CPU overhead. Xen is very good at quickly handing out CPU time to each qube, but weaker at choosing among Performance-, Efficient-, and Low-Power Efficient-cores.
For better optimization use this guide:

CPU Pinning Alder Lake

If you have an Alder Lake or newer Intel CPU, you probably want the option to load a qube on the P or E cores, and this might help someone who is new to xen. https://dev.qubes-os.org/projects/core-admin/en/latest/libvirt.html https://libvirt.org/formatdomain.html#cpu-allocation Dom0 First, you need to add the following to GRUB_CMDLINE_XEN_DEFAULT dom0_max_vcpus=4 dom0_vcpus_pin If you want to use SMT read the notes at the end. The CPU I’m using is the 12900K, which has 16 physical cores an…

@timw234

dedicated GPU from ramping up

Regarding your GPU, I have no idea. Are you sure it’s ramping up?

@artist

the use of minimal templates.

From the hypervisor’s point of view, it doesn’t matter which templates you use. Whether it’s fedora-xfce, Windows standalone in HVM, or a minimal arch/debian template, they all receive CPU time based on the total number of vCPUs you assign and the physical cores available for Xen to schedule onto.

[artist]

@WhiteShadow

From the hypervisor’s point of view, it doesn’t matter which templates you use. Whether it’s fedora-xfce, Windows standalone in HVM, or a minimal arch/debian template, they all receive CPU time based on the total number of vCPUs you assign and the physical cores available for Xen to schedule onto.

That is true . I mentioned minimal because, as far as I know, running multiple minimal VMs lowers background software activity and RAM usage (system-wide).

I experienced less triggers of fan noise cause of fewer CPU wakeups and background software spikes.