Part of CachyOS Wiki Notes. From the official CachyOS wiki (last updated 2026-07-26). Mostly AMD-specific power tuning plus a few cross-cutting tweaks.

AMD P-State driver (`amd_pstate`)

CPU frequency scaling driver for modern AMD APUs/CPUs, based on Collaborative Processor Performance Control (CPPC): finer-grained frequency management and a low-latency interface for the kernel to send performance hints to hardware (legacy ACPI P-states only switch in 3 P-states).

Kernel cmdline entries per mode:

Non-Autonomous Mode — amd_pstate=passive
Guided Autonomous Mode — amd_pstate=guided
Autonomous Mode (EPP) — amd_pstate=active

AMD P-State EPP is the default when nothing is configured. Test at runtime:

echo active | sudo tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/amd_pstate/status
echo guided | sudo tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/amd_pstate/status
echo passive | sudo tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/amd_pstate/status

Modes: autonomous = platform considers only min/max performance + Energy Performance Preference; guided-autonomous = platform sets the operating performance level per workload within OS-set min/max registers; non-autonomous = the OS hands the platform the desired performance level directly.

Configuring AMD P-State EPP

Governors: powersave and performance. The page recommends powersave plus a preference.

sudo cpupower frequency-set -g powersave
sudo cpupower frequency-set -g performance

echo power | sudo tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu*/cpufreq/energy_performance_preference

Preferences: performance, power, balance_power, balance_performance.

AMD 3D V-Cache Optimizer

Optimizes cache scheduling on dual-CCD 3D CPUs (7950X3D, 7900X3D). Requires the BIOS CPPC option set to “Driver” so sysfs can override the mode.

echo frequency | sudo tee /sys/bus/platform/drivers/amd_x3d_vcache/AMDI0101:00/amd_x3d_mode
echo cache | sudo tee /sys/bus/platform/drivers/amd_x3d_vcache/AMDI0101:00/amd_x3d_mode

frequency (default) — tasks go to the second CCD, which clocks higher than the 3D-cache CCD.
cache — tasks go first to the higher-cache CCD; mainly profitable for games.

After switching, the preferred-core ranking should change; read it with:

grep -v /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu*/cpufreq/amd_pstate_prefcore_ranking

AMD P-State Core Performance Boost (AMD Turbo Core)

echo 0 | sudo tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu*/cpufreq/boost   # Disable boost for all cores
lscpu -ae                                                       # Shows AMD CPB disabled globally

echo 1 | sudo tee /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/boost   # Enable boost on cpu0
lscpu -ae

CachyOS ships a power-profiles-daemon backporting AMD CPB support: CPB is disabled under the powersave profile, enabled under balanced or performance.

ADIOS I/O scheduler

Adaptive Deadline I/O Scheduler (firelzrd; stable branch is in the kernel): a blk-mq block-layer scheduler aiming at low-latency I/O by combining deadline scheduling with learning-based adaptive latency control. Inspired by and building on mq-deadline and Kyber — it predicts I/O completion latency from past performance and request characteristics (type, size) and uses that to adjust deadlines and batching.

Version in linux-cachyos: 3.2.0; same in linux-cachyos-rc.
Four priority tiers, Tier 0 (critical system ops) to Tier 3 (background); tunable via sysfs.
Enable temporarily (lost on reboot):
```
sync && echo adios | sudo tee /sys/block/<yourdrive>/queue/scheduler
```
Replace <yourdrive> with the real identifier (e.g. sda, sdb, nvme0n1).

Gotcha: NOT enabled by default — still under active development and testing, not considered stable for all workloads and hardware. In edge cases bugs could cause system lockups.

NVIDIA Smooth Motion (RTX 40xx & 50xx)

Driver-based AI frame interpolation: infers an extra frame between two rendered frames — an alternative for games without DLSS Frame Generation. Works for DX11, DX12 and Vulkan (DXVK and VKD3D both fine).

NVPRESENT_ENABLE_SMOOTH_MOTION=1

64-bit applications only — no 32-bit games.
Overlay conflicts → NVPRESENT_QUEUE_FAMILY=1.
Drawbacks: may add slight input lag; MangoHud reports a misleading FPS (a monitor’s built-in counter is correct); image quality below DLSS Frame Generation, artifacts in fast motion; incompatible with external frame capers (in-game caps fine); cannot be combined with DLSS Frame Generation; OpenGL needs Zink:
```
NVPRESENT_ENABLE_SMOOTH_MOTION=1 zink-run <command>
```
Zink costs performance and may glitch.
Dual GPU: set DRI_PRIME=1 to pick the NVIDIA dGPU.

Power saving

thermald

Thermal management daemon for Intel systems: monitors thermal sensors and applies cooling actions (CPU power limits, performance-state changes) before firmware throttles more aggressively. Useful on Intel laptops, convertibles, tablets, handhelds and SFF PCs exposing Intel thermal controls via /sys/class/thermal. AMD CPUs are not supported.

sudo pacman -S thermald
sudo systemctl enable --now thermald.service

systemctl status thermald.service
journalctl -u thermald.service -b

RCU Lazy

Reduces power use at idle / light load — useful for laptops and handhelds. The page states 5–10% power savings at the cost of slightly reduced performance depending on scenario. Enabled by default in linux-cachyos-deckify. Kernel cmdline:

rcutree.enable_rcu_lazy=1

NVIDIA troubleshooting — GSP firmware

GSP firmware can “in some cases” hurt performance; the 555.58.02 driver largely fixed this, but it can persist on some systems (symptoms: KDE hiccups, bad performance). Disable via /etc/modprobe.d/nvidia-gsp.conf:

options nvidia NVreg_EnableGpuFirmware=0

Then:

sudo mkinitcpio -P

Gotcha: NVIDIA’s open kernel modules are built on GSP firmware, so GSP cannot be disabled there and this option is ignored — use linux-cachyos-nvidia or nvidia-dkms. Re-test GSP after each new driver install, since NVIDIA does its QA against GSP.

Audio — enhancing laptop speakers (EasyEffects)

sudo pacman -S easyeffects
sudo pacman -S lsp-plugins-lv2
sudo pacman -S zam-plugins
sudo pacman -S calf
sudo pacman -S mda.lv2

Output tab manages effects on speaker audio; Effects tab adds/modifies them.
Community presets: download from the EasyEffects Community Presets repo → Presets → “Import preset from local storage” → select file → Load.
Custom profile: ”+” in the Presets menu → name it → Load → add effects under Output > Effects.
Convolver: add it to the chain and load a .wav impulse response for your laptop model. Gotcha: it can raise volume a lot — add a Limiter after it.
Automate startup in the app’s preferences; use PipeWire > Presets Autoloading to bind presets to output devices.
Alternative: JDSP4Linux (github.com/Audio4Linux/JDSP4Linux) for PipeWire/PulseAudio clients.

OBS Studio

Use the CachyOS obs-studio-browser package instead of stock obs-studio — it carries patches for common issues such as CUDA errors and virtual camera problems.

sudo pacman -S obs-studio-browser
# If obs-studio was installed, pacman asks whether to replace it — answer "Y".

Swap: switching from ZRam to Zswap

CachyOS uses ZRam by default; Zswap is optional. Assumes the default setup (ZRam enabled, no swap partition/file created at install).

Disable ZRam via kernel parameter: systemd.zram=0

Enable Zswap:

zswap.enabled=1 zswap.shrinker_enabled=1 zswap.compressor=lz4 zswap.max_pool_percent=30

Neutralize CachyOS’s udev rule that disables Zswap (usr/lib/udev/rules.d/30-zram.rules from github.com/CachyOS/CachyOS-Settings):
```
sudo touch /etc/udev/rules.d/30-zram.rules
```

Create a swap file for Zswap.

Btrfs:

sudo btrfs subvolume create /swap
sudo btrfs filesystem mkswapfile --size 4g --uuid clear /swap/swapfile
sudo swapon /swap/swapfile
echo "/swap/swapfile none swap defaults 0 0" | sudo tee -a /etc/fstab

(Change --size for a different size — the page’s prose says e.g. 8GB while its command uses 4g.)

Non-Btrfs:

sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/swapfile bs=1G count=8
sudo chmod 0600 /swapfile
sudo mkswap /swapfile
echo "/swapfile none swap defaults 0 0" | sudo tee -a /etc/fstab
sudo swapon /swapfile

Add the lz4 module to /etc/mkinitcpio.conf’s MODULES array:
```
sudo nano /etc/mkinitcpio.conf
```
```
MODULES=(... lz4)
```

Rebuild the initramfs — per bootloader:

sudo sdboot-manage gen                      # systemd-boot
sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg   # GRUB
sudo limine-mkinitcpio                      # Limine

Reboot.

Obsidian Vault

Explorer

General System Tweaks

AMD P-State driver (`amd_pstate`)

Configuring AMD P-State EPP

AMD 3D V-Cache Optimizer

AMD P-State Core Performance Boost (AMD Turbo Core)

ADIOS I/O scheduler

NVIDIA Smooth Motion (RTX 40xx & 50xx)

Power saving

thermald

RCU Lazy

NVIDIA troubleshooting — GSP firmware

Audio — enhancing laptop speakers (EasyEffects)

OBS Studio

Swap: switching from ZRam to Zswap

Graph View

Table of Contents

Backlinks

Obsidian Vault

Explorer

General System Tweaks

AMD P-State driver (amd_pstate)

Configuring AMD P-State EPP

AMD 3D V-Cache Optimizer

AMD P-State Core Performance Boost (AMD Turbo Core)

ADIOS I/O scheduler

NVIDIA Smooth Motion (RTX 40xx & 50xx)

Power saving

thermald

RCU Lazy

NVIDIA troubleshooting — GSP firmware

Audio — enhancing laptop speakers (EasyEffects)

OBS Studio

Swap: switching from ZRam to Zswap

Graph View

Table of Contents

Backlinks

AMD P-State driver (`amd_pstate`)