PowerBook frequency reporting (#3): Some apps, system components affected by reading?

Continuing coverage of an issue where the Terminal's sysctl command incorrectly reports a lower clock frequency than normal on some PowerBooks (a PMU reset temporarily solves the problem), an increasingly significant number of users are reporting real-world speed gains despite no actual change in processor speed.

These reports seem to indicate that there may be something more to a PMU reset, or some applications and systems components are gauging performance based on the sysctl reading.

Nick Winterhalter writes "I restart my 1GHz PowerBook TiBook quite often and switch between multiple users very frequently. The multiple-user 'rotating cube"'animation has been slightly jumpy ever since updating to 10.3.1, like the machine didn't have as much horsepower as before. The transition is now always completely smooth after the PMU reset.

"Regardless of identical results from Xbench, the machine feels significantly faster in certain areas. Particularly in application switching, menu manipulation, and smooth scrolling in Safari. Perhaps it's Exposé?"

Do you notice faster speeds after a PMU reset? Let us know at late-breakers@macfixit.com.

Resources