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Gingerbread doesn't use both cores of the cpu??? Then my app is lying.

Satires

Android Expert
Jan 28, 2012
772
123
Nowhere land..
I've heard it from more than one source that the gingerbread OS doesn't utilize both cores.

I have an installed called "System Panel"

It says different!

If I go into menu/monitoring and move the screen up and down really fast to put a load on the phone, the first core lights up and the second core then kicks in.

Is this BS?

It does show the core usage in real time. If I just leave the phone sit, the second core goes to sleep.

Wutcha think?
 
Gingerbread as the operating system isn't programmed to use multiple cores, but there are plenty of apps that use multiple cores. So whatever app your using knows how to use both and thats what your seeing.

When you move up to ICS multiple core use is built into the OS so you should see some performance improvements.
 
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This is because of the default mot_hotplug CPU governor.

Whenever the phone isn't doing anything hard, the second CPU isn't turned on. That saves a good amount of energy. When the phone starts to do something more process intensive, then the governor meets the requirements to turn on the second core.

From the the Android CPU governors explained thread on these forums:

21: Hotplug Governor:
The Hotplug governor performs very similarly to the OnDemand governor, with the added benefit of being more precise about how it steps down through the kernel's frequency table as the governor measures the user's CPU load. However, the Hotplug governor's defining feature is its ability to turn unused CPU cores off during periods of low CPU utilization. This is known as "hotplugging."
 
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