freebsd stable - Aug 2008 - Temperature monitoring on old desktop - Dell OptiPlex SX270?

Hello,

got this old machine, a SX270[1] that I thought I would put to use as
my workstation (yes, my current workstation have lower specs than this
machine).
I have installed FreeBSD[2] 7.0-stable on it (i386). Normal[3] and
verbose[4] dmesgs are available. Everything seems to work, but there is
one thing tha doesn't: it doesn't report thermal parameters via acpi:
root@kg-work2# sysctl hw.acpi.thermal
sysctl: unknown oid 'hw.acpi.thermal' 

n fact the whole acpi section from sysctl seems a bit incomplete:
root@kg-work2# sysctl hw.acpi
hw.acpi.supported_sleep_state: S1 S3 S4 S5
hw.acpi.power_button_state: S5
hw.acpi.sleep_button_state: S1
hw.acpi.lid_switch_state: NONE
hw.acpi.standby_state: S1
hw.acpi.suspend_state: S3
hw.acpi.sleep_delay: 1
hw.acpi.s4bios: 0
hw.acpi.verbose: 0
hw.acpi.disable_on_reboot: 0
hw.acpi.handle_reboot: 0
hw.acpi.reset_video: 0
hw.acpi.cpu.cx_lowest: C1

There is an acpidump[5] available too (from 'acpidump -dt').

The bios on this machine is from 2004, and that might be the cause. I
couldn't find a newer bios than version A06, release date 09/29/2004.
Does anybody know about a newer bios for thios machine anywhere?

Or does anybody know how to fix the DSDT in the bios to enable thernal
reporting?
Or perhaps there is a way to read the temperature off the cpu, like the
coretemp(4) driver?

For those who wonders: yes, I have tried mbmon, lmmon from ports, but
they didn't report anything useful as far as temperature goes.
root@kg-work2# mbmon -d -A
ioctl(smb0:open): No such file or directory
SMBus[Intel8XX(ICH/ICH2/ICH3/ICH4/ICH5/ICH6)] found, but No HWM
available on it!!
Summary of Detection:
  * No monitors found.
InitMBInfo: Bad file descriptor
This program needs "setuid root"!! 

Output from 'lmmon -si':
  Motherboard Temp               Voltages

  255C / 491F / 528K        Vcore1:   +3.984V
                            Vcore2:   +3.984V
     Fan Speeds             + 3.3V:   +3.984V
                            + 5.0V:   +6.654V
     1:    0 rpm            +12.0V:  +15.938V
     2:    0 rpm            -12.0V:  -15.938V
     3:    0 rpm            - 5.0V:   -6.654V

I think 255 degrees Celsius is a bit unrealistic, the machine can't fry
eggs yet. :-)

Any good hints will be gratefully accepted. 

References:
1) SX270 - http://tingox.googlepages.com/sx270
2) http://tingox.googlepages.com/sx270_freebsd
3) http://tingox.googlepages.com/w2-dmesg-7.0-stable-20080721.txt
4) http://tingox.googlepages.com/w2-dmesg-7.0-stable-20080721_verbose.txt
5) http://tingox.googlepages.com/sx270-acpidump-dt-20080721.txt.gz 
-- 
Regards,
Torfinn Ingolfsen,
Norway

On Sun, Aug 03, 2008 at 01:50:53AM +0200, Torfinn Ingolfsen
wrote:
> The bios on this machine is from 2004, and that might be the cause. I
> couldn't find a newer bios than version A06, release date 09/29/2004.
> Does anybody know about a newer bios for thios machine anywhere?
The first questions to ask are: 1) does this machine even have a H/W
monitoring IC on it, and 2) is it enabled/wired to thermistors and
fans?
> Or does anybody know how to fix the DSDT in the bios to enable thernal
> reporting?
I don't think this is possible.
> Or perhaps there is a way to read the temperature off the cpu, like the
> coretemp(4) driver?
What processor is in it?  Not a Core2Duo.  I'm guessing since it's circa
2004, probably a Pentium 3 or 4, or possibly an older AMD.  None of those,
to my knowledge, have on-die temperatures -- they all rely on external
H/W monitoring.

I just checked http://tingox.googlepages.com/sx270 and sure enough, an
older P4.  coretemp(4) won't work with this.
> For those who wonders: yes, I have tried mbmon, lmmon from ports, but
> they didn't report anything useful as far as temperature goes.
healthd, lmmon, and mbmon/xmbmon are all fairly "old", and expect the
H/W monitoring IC to be in a specific place, and that the tie-ins exist.
> Any good hints will be gratefully accepted. 
I would start by booting the machine into Windows and install
SpeedFan.  If that thing is able to detect and provide thermal data,
then we can continue from there.  Otherwise chances are there's no H/W
monitoring IC on the board.

P.S. -- If you look at the mainboard and see a Winbond chip, that does
not guarantee there's H/W monitoring capabilities.  Many of the Winbond
ICs provide Super I/O (legacy stuff: floppy, LPT, ISA/PCI interface,
etc.), and it's entirely up to the board engineers which IC they use,
and if they bother implementing H/W monitoring tie-ins.

-- 
| Jeremy Chadwick                                jdc at parodius.com |
| Parodius Networking                       http://www.parodius.com/ |
| UNIX Systems Administrator                  Mountain View, CA, USA |
| Making life hard for others since 1977.              PGP: 4BD6C0CB |