Intel Alder Lake CPU not using P-cores?

Message boards : Questions and problems : Intel Alder Lake CPU not using P-cores?
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Drago75

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Message 110591 - Posted: 30 Nov 2022, 13:27:03 UTC

Just got a Laptop with an i7-1280P (6 P-cores, 8 E-cores), hyperthreading capable, together 20 threads running Windows 10. When I start BOINC on it the following happens: BOINC starts 20 tasks at once and all cores start running. After a few seconds the P-cores go back to idle while the 20 tasks seem to be handled all by the 8 E-cores which leads to really long calculation times and the E-cores are on the virge of overheating. When I reduce the number of tasks to 16 they get handled ok by the E-cores and the temps come down to around 75 degrees. My question is, does anybody know how to give the P-cores some work, too?
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Profile Jord
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Message 110594 - Posted: 30 Nov 2022, 15:08:26 UTC - in response to Message 110591.  

I don't think you can. I think it's the same way as with Android, where these fast energy guzzling chips are reserved for use by the operating system only. Just because they are so fast and energy guzzling.
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Drago75

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Message 110597 - Posted: 30 Nov 2022, 21:02:38 UTC - in response to Message 110594.  

That would be sad! To leave half of it`s computing power unused... I can`t imagine that any OS would be that cpu demanding, Those Intel cpus seem to do quite well in gaming, surely they don`t run the latest games on the small cores only to reserve all the p-cores to perform Windows updates in the background,
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Dr Who Fan
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Message 110598 - Posted: 30 Nov 2022, 21:29:14 UTC

Like Jord posted and If I am reading correctly, Intel has "crippled the good part of the chip" and you probably don't have control of what portion BOINC will run on.

https://laptopsreviewer.com/product/intel-core-i7-1280p/
... Just like the other 12th Gen Intel Core processors, Core i7-1280P comes with Thread Director which is a new functionality designed to help Windows 11 decide which cores to use for what workload for best performance and efficiency possible.
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Drago75

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Message 110600 - Posted: 30 Nov 2022, 22:09:23 UTC - in response to Message 110598.  
Last modified: 30 Nov 2022, 22:23:23 UTC

ok, meanwhile I tried to manually asign individual tasks to the p-cores via the task manager which worked! The tasks assigned to the p-cores ran a lot faster, unfortunatetly the whole cpu got throttled down all the way to 2000 Mhz slowing all the others. All core temperatures were kept at 67 degrees C and the fan went into silent mode. So far I couldn*t find a way to fire it up as MSI center doesn*t seem to have any effect on fans or cpu frequency on this laptop. The BIOS doesn´t offer fan control either. Man, this is frustrating! The Alder Lakes seem to be no good for BOINC unless maybe under Linux they perform better,
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Message boards : Questions and problems : Intel Alder Lake CPU not using P-cores?

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