[APP] QuickClock Advanced - Official Feedback and Help Thread

pandapaul

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Howdy AndroidCentral Forum Members,

I've posted this on a couple other forums, but I wanted to make sure it's readily available here as well. This is an official thread for feedback and help regarding my app, QuickClock. I greatly appreciate all feedback, and the more detailed it is the more helpful it is likely to be. Below I will include a copy of the full and most recent help file. If ever you have any questions, you may post them here, PM me, or use any of the other contact methods listed on the About screen within the app.

Thanks & take care,
Paul

QuickClock Advanced Overclock - Android app on AppBrain


Getting Started with QuickClock

The Short Version:
1. Calibrate > Automatic > Wait for reboot
2. 'Proceed' > Wait for end of calibration
3. Main menu > Overclock > Touch 'Profile' and make you selection


1. Open up the app and hit 'Calibration' then select 'Automatic' and ensure that all three boxes are checked so that the entire calibration process will run. *This is crucial if you want to get the most out of your phone's CPU.*
- It begins at a universally functional setting at 300 MHz then progressively sets the VSEL 1 lower every 10 seconds until the phone crashes. When the device reboots, the calibration will continue with the Max Speed Finder and will determine a reasonable max speed for your device. Once finished, QuickClock will know how low to set your voltages and how high to set your speeds.

2. Once the calibration is complete, head to the Overclock menu by hitting 'Overclock' from the main menu screen. Select a calibrated profile by touching the word 'Profile' or the name of the current profile next to it or by hitting the menu hardbutton and selecting 'Load Profile.' This will load and set to the CPU the calibrated profile of your choice.

3. If you'd like to customize your settings, put in whatever frequencies you would like to use as your four scaling points and hit 'Set CPU.' Make sure that your lowest speeds are at the top and your highest are at the bottom. If your requested speeds do not produce VSESL's exceeding 88 and are within the bounds of your device's minimum and maximum speeds, then the CPU will be reconfigured to the exact specifications you have given. If nothing crazy happens, confirm that you would like to keep the settings in the dialog that pops up. You may also check the box in the popup to save these settings to the currently selected profile.
- If you have put in a speed that is too high for the phone, you may experience what people call 'turtling' where everything slows to a crawl. I've included an Anti-Turtler which requires you to confirm that you'd like to keep the settings. If you choose 'No' or do not say 'Yes' within 10 seconds, the default speeds and Stability Buffer will be loaded and set. It also checks for lag while counting down and will immediately revert to defaults if it is able to detect significant lag time. Once you've set your new speeds, try them out for a while. If you find they aren't actually stable then just increase that stability buffer a little bit, or likewise decrease the buffer if you think you could go lower. When doing this or any other testing use the 'Calculate' button to merely display the calculated VSELs without actually setting them to the CPU. This way you can preview and check things out before they get set.

I've implemented as many safeguards in the app as I could think of, but there's always the possibility of damage to your CPU when adjusting these kinds of parameters. So have fun with it, but be smart and be careful.


Scaling Constraints

Setting Min and Max

On the first screen of QuickClock you will see four numbers aligned left to right below the current frequency and VSEL. These are the currently available scaling frequencies. The '[' and ']' indicate the min and max constraints that you may change by simply touching the current min or max then selecting the new one(s). If you have the scaling constrained to one frequency alone, then touching that number will remove both the '[' and ']' to indicate that you must choose both min and max. First select your desired min and then select the max.


Using Profiles

Loading a Profile

To load a profile, simply touch the word 'Profile' or the name of the current profile on the Overclock menu and then select the profile you would like to use from the list that pops up. If you prefer to use the menu hardbutton, you may click the 'Load Profile' button there to access the same list. When you choose one, the profile will automatically be set to the CPU.

Saving a Profile

When setting the CPU configuration using the 'Set CPU' button, you may opt to update the currently selected profile using the checkbox in the Anti-Turtler dialog. To save the current CPU configuration to a different profile, touch the name of the current profile then select 'Overwrite.' Alternatively you may hit the menu hardbutton while in the Overclock menu and select 'Overwrite.' There are four profile slots available for your use, and by default they contain a variety of useful configurations. The profile slots are color-coded to give further identity to each profile and because colors are fun. If you choose to save a new configuration, the information previously in that slot will be overwritten. You will be prompted for a name, which you may leave the same or alter in as creative a fashion as you desire.

Exporting Profiles

If you would like your profiles to be exported for any reason, you may select 'Export' from the hardbutton menu on the Overclock screen. This will write all four profiles to one Zip archive (named as you choose) on the SDCard. The profiles are exported in the same format used by Droid Overclock and may, therefore, be imported into that app if you like.

Some Definitions

Bare Minimum Voltage/VSEL (BMV)

The lowest possible VSEL setting at a given frequency that will not immediately crash the phone. This is not a stable setting, rather it is a point of information used to calibrate the application in conjunction with the Bare Minimum Frequency and Stability Buffer.

Bare Minimum Frequency (BMF)

The frequency at which the BMV is found. Again, the combination of these two settings does not produce a stable result. That is where the Stability Buffer comes in.

Bare Minimum Pairing (BMP)

Any BMV and BMF pair. e.g. 15 VSEL @ 300 MHz one for me, but so is 66 VSEL @ 1400 MHz. They both are points at which lowering the VSEL by one would result in an immediate crash.

Stability Buffer (SB)

The percentage to increase calculated bare minimum pairings. This defaults to 15% (originally 13%, but that proved less stable on 2.2.1).
 

irish22022

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Paul,

I gotta say, I'm pretty confused with all of this. I've calibrated twice, and gotten completely different numbers. What's the point of having a calibration if there's no consistency? How do I know which one to base my numbers off of? It went from voltage being at 17, all the way down to 12. My ceiling has been in the 1400's both times, but it freezes or restarts every time I go above 1350.

I'm currently at
450 26
800 48
1000 55
1200 66

I have the buffer at 26, and still I get lag spikes when I run the stress test. I have raised the voltages manually because they seem so far off of what I read from other people. And still, I can't get a minute without 3 lag spikes (should I be accepting anything over 1?).

Also, what are the stock settings? If I have it where I'm at, am I using more battery? I always here about people who are "overclocked and undervolted", how can you have both? The balanced profile isn't stable even after putting my stability to the mid twenties, and the battery saver spikes a lot too.

I don't know what I'm doing wrong, or why this is so complicated.
 

pandapaul

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Irish,

If the voltage calibration is producing drastically different results, it is likely due to some background process interfering and causing the lag count to spike up. The calibration is pretty reliable as long as there isn't a whole bunch going on in the background. With the stress test, a few lag spikes are completely fine. Don't worry too much about that :)

So the only things you should need to do are these:

1. Run the automatic calibration. If it reboots during the max speed finder, just set your max speed manually for now. I'll be improving the max speed finder just as soon as I have some time away from school.

2. Pick your preferred profile in the Overclock menu

3. If you find that your profile of choice isn't fully stable, then you just need to bump up the stability buffer a bit.

The thread of this same name on DroidXForums is a bit more active if you want to ping multiple folks with questions other than just me :)

Take care,
Paul
 

irish22022

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okay, I'll head over there next time.

I'm on liberty rom, so I have very few background apps running at all. No more then my messenging service, and maybe two other things. I do have superpower running, which may be causing an issue as it's the apps job to automate different things about my system during different screen states, etc... I'll disable that and post my results if there are any issues over at the other forum.

I know that when I run the stress test with the presets I get from the calibration, it either restarts, or I get upwards of 7-10 lag spikes in one minute (and then eventually restarts as soon as I do a couple of things at once).

One last question (i'm hesitant to transfer over to the other forum with this just now, because who knows if you'll remember my situation, I know you're busy)...

generally speaking, when selecting "balanced", is that both faster and more battery efficient? That just seems to good to be true. Why wouldn't the stock numbers be the most efficient as possible?
 

pandapaul

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Yeah, your mileage may vary of course, but generally the balanced profile does provide both better battery and high performance compared to stock. This happens because your CPU runs at the lowest frequency the majority of the time, so lowering the voltage at that point by a significant amount will noticeably increase battery life. On the top end, it implements a frequency that is overclocked matched with a voltage that is undervolted (compared to what a stock CPU might use if running at that frequency). From the factory, a CPU is volted for maximum stability and then some, because they are far more concerned about reboots than battery life. They have to use settings that will be consistent across every CPU, since they aren't going to take the time to test every single CPU. The aim of QuickClock is to help you do do that testing so that you can get the absolute best performance possible out of your CPU. :)