Topton N100 Reporting 402 MHz

[TheNarc]

@roxy Yeah I understand. For what it's worth, when it worked for me it "just worked". The difficulty I had was with the flash command, because the environment that the ISO boots into is a little odd. I think there was a "mount" command I had to use even though it seemed more like a DOS environment (uses drive letters). Anyway, if you decide to try it and have trouble I can see if my memory serves me well enough to help.

[roxy]

@TheNarc

Good to know.

BTW, I have found , probably noewer ISO file

CW-AL-4L-V2.0(先锋四网N100-N200-I3-N305-V2支持5个M.2版本)2023.11.08.iso

;-) but I am even more afraid to use it ;-)

see https://pan.x86pi.cn/d/BIOS%E6%9B%B4%E6%96%B0/1.Intel%E8%BF%B7%E4%BD%A0%E4%B8%BB%E6%9C%BA%E7%B3%BB%E5%88%97BIOS/1.%E7%AC%AC12%E4%BB%A3AlderLake-U-P-N%E5%85%A8%E7%B3%BB%E5%88%97/1.%E7%AC%AC12%E4%BB%A3AlderLake-N%E5%85%88%E9%94%8B%E5%9B%9B%E7%BD%91N95-N100-N200-N305%E7%B3%BB%E5%88%97-V1-V2/2.%E7%AC%AC12%E4%BB%A3AlderLake-N%E5%85%88%E9%94%8B%E5%9B%9B%E7%BD%91%E7%B3%BB%E5%88%97-V2/AlderLake-N%E5%85%88%E9%94%8B%E5%9B%9B%E7%BD%91N100-N200-I3-N305-V2_2023-11-08%E6%9B%B4%E6%96%B0/CW-AL-4L-V2.0(%E5%85%88%E9%94%8B%E5%9B%9B%E7%BD%91N100-N200-I3-N305-V2%E6%94%AF%E6%8C%815%E4%B8%AAM.2%E7%89%88%E6%9C%AC)2023.11.08.iso?sign=io2D4-Uq4Iu8MnJFDXPoCslAE1W3XC2bL0XReRoMGF4=:0

[TheNarc]

@roxy Yes as far as I can tell we have the exact same hardware. BIOS reports the same too (info doesn't change in the modded version):

[roxy]

@TheNarc

Okay,

before I start flashing the bios in my Intel N100 device, I would like to summarize all the information and consider the pros and cons.

I have the device: AlderLake ULX Intel(R) N100 device with the bios BK-1264NP Ver: 1.5 (build date 09/28/2023 17:23:35).
I have pfsense 2.7.2-RELEASE (amb64) built on Wed Dec 6 21:10:00 CET 2023 installed on the device onto FreeBSD 14.0-CURRENT.

I didn't change the thermal paste yet; I left the original one. The device is running 24/7, and the temperature is around 40-45 degrees Celsius.
I have a 128GB NVME installed, and I have a 8GB RAM installed.

In my BIOS settings, I can't see any options to change Power Limit 1 and Power Limit 2.

I don't have any issues with the thermal throttling, and the device is running smoothly.
The only issue (right now) is the speed of transfering files between two NICs.
The device is supposed to route the traffic between two NICs, and the speed should be around 2.5Gbps.

I have observed that running iperf3 between two NICs gives 2.35Gbps at the beginning, but after 20-30 seconds, the speed drops to 1.2Gbps and increases to 1.8Gbps and stays around 1.8Gbps.

Now, lets rethink the pros and cons of flashing the bios:
Pros:

• I will be able to change the Power Limit 1 and Power Limit 2; I can set them to 15W and 25W.
• I will be able to set boot perfromance to Turbo mode.
• I will be able to enable C-States.

Cons:

• I will spend time on flashing the bios.
• I will to change the thermal paste and probably add new thermal pads and USB fan.
• I can brick the device and I will have to buy a new one or move to another device and install pfSense on it, and configure it again.
• My wife will be angry because I will spend time on the device instead of spending time with her.
• My kids will be angry because I will spend time on the device instead of playing with them.

Assuming the optimistic scenario, I will flash the bios, change the thermal paste, add new thermal pads, and add a USB fan and this could give me 2.35Gb/s speed between two NICs instead of current 1.8 Gbps, which is around 30% increase in speed, which I usually don't need.
My current speed usage is around 54-100Mbps (because of WIFI speed). The only case I need 2.5Gbps is when I am transferring files between two NICs, which is not a common case. I need to connect with a cable and transfer the files. I really barely do that. I can use a USB stick to transfer the files.
Moreover, I can always change the vmbr1 setting in my proxmox in order to avoid traffic between pfsense interfaces :-) -> this gives me 2.5Gbps speed of transferring files between.

@TheNarc , are there any more advantages?

Conclusion:
I asked co-pilot what to do and I got:
co-pilot suggesiton: I will not flash the bios, I will not change the thermal paste, I will not add new thermal pads, and I will not add a USB fan. I will spend time with my wife and kids and I will play with them. I will use a USB stick to transfer the files between two NICs. I will change the vmbr1 setting in my proxmox in order to avoid traffic between pfsense interfaces. I will enjoy my life.

but, I am reaaly torn between the other option, which is

dark side suggestion: I will flash the bios, I will change the thermal paste, I will add new thermal pads, and I will add a USB fan. I will spend time on the device instead of spending time with my wife and kids. I will transfer the files between two NICs with 2.3Gbps speed. I will enjoy my life.

In both cases, I will enjoy my life.
Don't know which one to choose.
I need to think about it.

[stephenw10]

You are not forced to re-paste or add a fan by flashing the BIOS. You can just leave the settings the same but it gives you the option. You would be able to set the power levels higher and see if that impacts the transfer speeds. And if it does you've probably found the problem and can stop looking.

Alternatively you could do nothing at all. It's still passing traffic at 1.5Gbps even after slowing down.

[AnonymousRetard]

@roxy Haha, I think you pretty much nailed it on the pros and cons. But as @stephenw10 said you are not forced to do all the changes after flashing the BIOS. Assuming the flashing of the BIOS goes well and your device still works everything should keep working the same until you start further tinkering with it.

IF you do end up increasing the PL1 limits though it is probably a good idea to monitor the temperatures and test stability.
In my case, it seems like my box is able to run normally for about 1-2 weeks before crashing with general protection fault or page faults if the temperature is in the 55-60C range (this is where my box seems to end up with only passive cooling and light pfSense usage), but if it creeps up much higher during heavy benchmarking it can fail in as little as ~1-2 hours (with only passive cooling my box would reach 70C+ during memtest86+ and the whole box would become too hot to touch).

Whether your box can survive at higher temperatures or not is probably very different from device to device. It will depend on brand and silicon quality of the RAM and NVMe drive. (In my case it is the RAM that ends up failing at high temperatures).

Atttached below is a picture of how my final solution looks like (I did not have to change any thermal paste in the box, just attach this fan on top). With that USB fan on the "medium" speed setting and the lid to the whole media wall box closed the temperature ends up in the 38-45 C degree range with very short spikes usually no higher than ~55C.
20240323_150654_small.jpg

[roxy]

Guys, I did it

Super thanks for all informations.
I managed to build custom.iso with bios4.rom overriding the original CW-AL-4L- bin file.

I did it as follows:

• downloaded original ISO file
• mounted it and copied the folder to my disk
• edited the content (changed the bin file with bios4.rom
• changed the nsh script
• maked new iso file using mkisofs -J -o custom.iso path_to_the_folder_containing_EFI (not sure if I rembember the command properly now)
• build Ventoy ISO bottable usb drive , uploaded custom.iso to main drive
• booted machine without NVME drive but only with USB disk
• Ventoy asked to select ISO file
• Chose custom.iso
• Prayed for 3 minutes
• Entered reset
• Prayed again

Here is the link to my folder with custom.iso and bios4.rom files.

• And I could see new bios :-)

Amazing. I copied mostly all the config from screenshots in this thread but changed PL1 to 9000 and PL2 to 25000

Finally my pfsense is running 1.7 GHz ~ 2.7 GHz and it is not going down when busy ;-)

During the stress test:

openssl speed -elapsed -evp aes-256-cbc

You have chosen to measure elapsed time instead of user CPU time.
Doing AES-256-CBC for 3s on 16 size blocks: 140236100 AES-256-CBC's in 3.00s
Doing AES-256-CBC for 3s on 64 size blocks: 47219519 AES-256-CBC's in 3.01s
Doing AES-256-CBC for 3s on 256 size blocks: 12167751 AES-256-CBC's in 3.00s
Doing AES-256-CBC for 3s on 1024 size blocks: 3067654 AES-256-CBC's in 3.01s
Doing AES-256-CBC for 3s on 8192 size blocks: 385097 AES-256-CBC's in 3.00s
Doing AES-256-CBC for 3s on 16384 size blocks: 192343 AES-256-CBC's in 3.00s
version: 3.0.12
built on: reproducible build, date unspecified
options: bn(64,64)
compiler: clang
CPUINFO: OPENSSL_ia32cap=0x7ffaf3bfffebffff:0x98c007bc239ca7eb
The 'numbers' are in 1000s of bytes per second processed.
type             16 bytes     64 bytes    256 bytes   1024 bytes   8192 bytes  16384 bytes
AES-256-CBC     747925.87k  1004733.25k  1038314.75k  1044372.84k  1051571.54k  1050449.24k

I see the CPU speed as follows

Intel(R) N100
Current: 2923 MHz, Max: 806 MHz
4 CPUs: 1 package(s) x 4 core(s)
AES-NI CPU Crypto: Yes (inactive)
QAT Crypto: No

One minute of iperf3
gives the following results on server (left) and client (right) side

[  5]  32.00-33.00  sec   282 MBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.037 ms  2333/206402 (1.1%)                                                │[  5]  30.00-31.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206364
[  5]  33.00-34.00  sec   282 MBytes  2.37 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  1952/206412 (0.95%)                                               │[  5]  31.00-32.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206385
[  5]  34.00-35.00  sec   284 MBytes  2.38 Gbits/sec  0.005 ms  967/206365 (0.47%)                                                │[  5]  32.00-33.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206337
[  5]  35.00-36.00  sec   269 MBytes  2.26 Gbits/sec  0.008 ms  11585/206395 (5.6%)                                               │[  5]  33.00-34.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206455
[  5]  36.00-37.00  sec   276 MBytes  2.32 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  6389/206316 (3.1%)                                                │[  5]  34.00-35.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206350
[  5]  37.00-38.00  sec   282 MBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  2486/206435 (1.2%)                                                │[  5]  35.00-36.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206435
[  5]  38.00-39.00  sec   282 MBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  2563/206429 (1.2%)                                                │[  5]  36.00-37.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206279
[  5]  39.00-40.00  sec   280 MBytes  2.35 Gbits/sec  0.008 ms  3850/206380 (1.9%)                                                │[  5]  37.00-38.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206477
[  5]  40.00-41.00  sec   282 MBytes  2.37 Gbits/sec  0.048 ms  2064/206395 (1%)                                                  │[  5]  38.00-39.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206357
[  5]  41.00-42.00  sec   283 MBytes  2.38 Gbits/sec  0.004 ms  1342/206402 (0.65%)                                               │[  5]  39.00-40.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206292
[  5]  42.00-43.00  sec   281 MBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  2866/206389 (1.4%)                                                │[  5]  40.00-41.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206375
[  5]  43.00-44.00  sec   282 MBytes  2.37 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  2088/206331 (1%)                                                  │[  5]  41.00-42.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206524
[  5]  44.00-45.00  sec   284 MBytes  2.38 Gbits/sec  0.008 ms  980/206427 (0.47%)                                                │[  5]  42.00-43.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206349
[  5]  45.00-46.00  sec   284 MBytes  2.38 Gbits/sec  0.004 ms  763/206422 (0.37%)                                                │[  5]  43.00-44.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206482
[  5]  46.00-47.00  sec   283 MBytes  2.38 Gbits/sec  0.046 ms  1234/206382 (0.6%)                                                │[  5]  44.00-45.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206391
[  5]  47.00-48.00  sec   280 MBytes  2.35 Gbits/sec  0.003 ms  3854/206350 (1.9%)                                                │[  5]  45.00-46.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206267
[  5]  48.00-49.00  sec   277 MBytes  2.32 Gbits/sec  0.041 ms  5745/206395 (2.8%)                                                │[  5]  46.00-47.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206357
[  5]  49.00-50.00  sec   279 MBytes  2.34 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  4701/206405 (2.3%)                                                │[  5]  47.00-48.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206525
[  5]  50.00-51.00  sec   269 MBytes  2.26 Gbits/sec  0.003 ms  11297/206389 (5.5%)                                               │[  5]  48.00-49.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206326
[  5]  51.00-52.00  sec   283 MBytes  2.37 Gbits/sec  0.008 ms  1703/206387 (0.83%)                                               │[  5]  49.00-50.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206374
[  5]  52.00-53.00  sec   282 MBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.006 ms  2278/206380 (1.1%)                                                │[  5]  50.00-51.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206476
[  5]  53.00-54.00  sec   284 MBytes  2.38 Gbits/sec  0.010 ms  861/206391 (0.42%)                                                │[  5]  51.00-52.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206294
[  5]  54.00-55.00  sec   279 MBytes  2.34 Gbits/sec  0.003 ms  4093/206377 (2%)                                                  │[  5]  52.00-53.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206331
[  5]  55.00-56.00  sec   282 MBytes  2.37 Gbits/sec  0.009 ms  1764/206331 (0.85%)                                               │[  5]  53.00-54.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206483
[  5]  56.00-57.00  sec   283 MBytes  2.38 Gbits/sec  0.006 ms  1367/206388 (0.66%)                                               │[  5]  54.00-55.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206345
[  5]  57.00-58.00  sec   281 MBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.006 ms  2681/206393 (1.3%)                                                │[  5]  55.00-56.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206441
[  5]  58.00-59.00  sec   281 MBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.003 ms  2974/206411 (1.4%)                                                │[  5]  56.00-57.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206410
[  5]  59.00-60.00  sec   279 MBytes  2.34 Gbits/sec  0.014 ms  3864/205962 (1.9%)                                                │[  5]  57.00-58.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206407
[  5]  60.00-60.00  sec   561 KBytes  1.96 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  502/899 (56%)                                                     │[  5]  58.00-59.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206273
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -                                                                                 │[  5]  59.00-60.00  sec   285 MBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  206402
Test Complete. Summary Results:                                                                                                   │- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Jitter    Lost/Total Datagrams                                              │Test Complete. Summary Results:
[  5] (sender statistics not available)                                                                                           │[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Jitter    Lost/Total Datagrams
[SUM]  0.0-60.0 sec  28452 datagrams received out-of-order                                                                        │[  5]   0.00-60.00  sec  16.7 GBytes  2.39 Gbits/sec  0.000 ms  0/12385018 (0%)  sender
[  5]   0.00-60.00  sec  16.5 GBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  182820/12382050 (1.5%)  receiver                                  │[  5]   0.00-60.00  sec  16.5 GBytes  2.36 Gbits/sec  0.002 ms  0/12382050 (0%)  receiver
iperf 3.9                                                                                                                         │CPU Utilization: local/sender 90.4% (18.7%u/71.7%s), remote/receiver 35.4% (4.5%u/30.9%s)
Linux iperf 6.5.13-3-pve #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC PMX 6.5.13-3 (2024-03-20T10:45Z) x86_64

Take a look into this screen recording .... link

So we saved the World. My wife and kids will be proud of me. The WiFi speed will be the same, as was before. Nothing will be changed from family perspective.

But me, .... I am going to

[TheNarc]

@roxy Congratulations! Nothing like a problem definitively solved!

[stephenw10]

Nice

[AnonymousRetard]

@roxy Haha, so you went the "dark side" route anyways. Glad it worked out for you! Thanks for sharing all the information. I downloaded the files you shared on google drive and archived the steps you did in case I ever want to tinker further with my BIOS as well in the future. Mine is still running the original version but with seemingly different hidden default settings. Since it is performing as expected though I don't think there's much to fix with another BIOS but I really like tinkering with computers and perhaps I can save a watt or two or something (or perhaps unlock even more performance instead) if I feel like I want to tinker further.

[JohnnyUtah1054]

@roxy When loading the custom bios on this mini PC did anyone else get the 1.nsh is not recognized as an internal or eternal command. Ive followed the post here and the Server the Home post both give me the same result.

Thx for any help in advance

[roxy]

Hi @JohnnyUtah1054 ,

no I didnt see anything about 1.nsh.
You can try to use my binary custom bin file. It worked. An it is still working right now. I didn't changed from that moment. Everything works smoothly. I am happy with 2.5 GHz network + firewall.

[grety]

@roxy Hey looks like the images have been deleted from this thread, any chance you can share the iso again please?

[stephenw10]

The link to the ISO is still good. It's only the screenshots that were uploaded that are no longer available.

[roxy]

@grety ,
the link to my Google Drive is still alive ;-)
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1k60AVx_5Yl_8JkP8lvAryoa0ALUSv0Gv

[grety]

@roxy Thanks for the link!
However I get the same error another use had 1.nsh is not recognized, maybe we've got different hardware.

[McG800]

@grety Do you have an NVME drive installed? I was getting this error as well, but once I removed the drive it worked like it should have.

[chrcoluk]

Interesting, these topton n100's ship with a really crippled bios, can change hardly anything, they have also have a high default power limit as well. So it is tempting to flash.

[binhex01]

Super useful post, thanks for the details guys, i managed to get my cheap Chinese N100 BIOS flashed with 'Power & Performance' unlocked which then allowed me to set PL1 and PL2 and finally get some decent performance out of the box (was getting stuck at 402 Mhz on all cores like the OP).

So I have written up exactly what i did including photos from 'thys' forum post over on servethehome.com and the modified BIOS with full instruction on how to flash it and bundled it up into a zip HERE.

IMPORTANT - Please ensure you read the ENTIRE readme.txt (included in the zip) before considering flashing the BIOS.

[alirx]

Greetings, guys!

I have 6-port CWWK N100 box (CW-AL_6L), no PL settings in bios as well, although mine boost fine, but gets quite hot (around 50C doing basically nothing as it's not yet configured for things i want it to do, and that's after I changed thermal paste to smth decent). So I'd like to lower power limits (I belive they are set to 25W by default, but have no way to confirm it).

I've managed to find and flash newer BIOS for this box on CWWK site, thinking that it would unlock it. But no.

How exactly do you mod the bios for your 4 port version?

Or should i even bother and better to look into SpeedShift tunables and try to adjust power consumption that way?