ESXi 5.5 & Processor Power State

[zenarc]

Calling on the ESX experts here for some help. I've setup and old chassis to be an ESX box for some misc home needs. At the moment 2VM's are running - a pfsense gateway and a Linux NVR for my security Cameras. At present the system is running with a load around 0.1. I'm trying to maximize my power savings but can't seem to figure out why I'm not getting the option of my C1,2,3,4 power states, and why its its spending most its time in P0 even with no VM's running. System specific details and run stats are below. Any thoughts are appreciated.

SERVER DETAILS
Motherboard : SuperMicro X7DVA-E
Processor : Intel Xeon E5430 - 2.66GHz, 4core, no H/T
Processor Supported Technologies:
VT-x
Idle States
SpeedStep
Demand Based Switching

BIOS CONFIG
Thermal Managment 2 - Enabled
C1 Enhanced Mode - Enabled
Intel Virtualization Technology - Enabled
Intel EIST Support - Enabled
C State Supported - _C1234

ESX CONFIG
Low Power Configuration

EVALUATION OF POWER STATES
With no VM's running, running the 'esxtop' command and then 'p' switch.
cpu load 0.00 0.00 0.01
PSTATE MHZ: 2667 2333 2000
CPU %USED %UTIL %P0 %P1 %P2
0 1.4 1.5 27 0 73
1 0.3 0.4 100 0 0
2 0.2 0.1 27 0 73
3 0.1 0.0 100 0 0

 

[dave_the_nerd]

It does look like two of your four cores are spending 73% of their time more or less off.

ESX must be putting enough demand on the CPU to keep them awake?

 

[zenarc]

It does look like two of your four cores are spending 73% of their time more or less off.

ESX must be putting enough demand on the CPU to keep them awake?

I'm thinking not for 2 reasons, see below: (Also this was perhaps poor moment in time grab, its usually 0-30% in P2 on any core)

1. If you look at the overall load factor, 0.00, 0.00, 0.01 there is nothing to keep those cores busy.
2. core '0' is most busy at 1.4%used yet is in P2 while core '3' is least busy at 0.1%used yet is 100% P0

It just doesn't make sense.

 

[Ferzerp]

Are all pieces of hardware explicitly supported on the HCL?

 

[XavierMace]

Does the motherboard have an option OS Control on the Power Management? I know HP and Dell's both do and VMWare's own documents confirm it needs to be set to that for ESXI to manage the power states.

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/techpaper/hpm-perf-vsphere55.pdf