Re: [PATCH 0/2] platform/x86: asus-armoury: add Whisper Mode support

[Marco Scardovi]

In data mercoledì 29 luglio 2026 15:10:56 Ora legale dell’Europa centrale, Denis Benato ha scritto:
> 
> On 7/29/26 09:32, Hans de Goede wrote:
> > Hi Marco,
> >
> > On 28-Jul-26 15:56, Marco Scardovi wrote:
> >> In data martedì 28 luglio 2026 13:39:39 Ora legale dell’Europa centrale, Hans 
> >> de Goede ha scritto:
> >>> Hi,
> >>>
> >>> Thank you for your patch.
> >>>
> >>> On 28-Jul-26 09:18, Marco Scardovi wrote:
> >>>> This series introduces support for ASUS WMI Whisper Mode hardware controls
> >>>> in the asus-wmi header and asus-armoury driver.
> >>>>
> >>>> Background & Findings:
> >>>> ----------------------
> >>>> After talking with Denis and thanks to NeuroMarshal reverse engineering
> >>>> and
> >>>> firmware trace analysis on modern ASUS laptops, three specific WMI Device
> >>>> IDs were identified that manage acoustic profiles and thermal regulation
> >>>> under ASUS Whisper Mode:
> >>>>
> >>>> 1. ASUS_WMI_DEVID_WHISPER_MODE (0x0012007A):
> >>>>    - Controls the BIOS-level Whisper Mode acoustic profile toggle
> >>>>    (read/write boolean).> 
> >>>> 2. ASUS_WMI_DEVID_WHISPER_ENABLE (0x00090022):
> >>>>    - Enables or disables Dynamic Whisper acoustic regulation (read/write
> >>>>    boolean).> 
> >>>> 3. ASUS_WMI_DEVID_WHISPER_STATUS (0x00090023):
> >>>>    - Reports status and allows runtime control over Dynamic Whisper state
> >>>>    (read/write boolean).
> >>> I wonder how this interacts with the platform_profile stuff ?
> >>>
> >>> I would expect enabling whisper mode to lower the max performance,
> >>> so does this automatically change the platform_profile away
> >>> from performance when it is set to performance ?
> >>>
> >>> Note the platform_profile API is extensible. To me it seems more
> >>> logical to expose this as a whisper mode platform-profile ?
> >>>
> >>> Regards,
> >>>
> >>> Hans
> >> Hi Hans,
> >>
> >> Thanks for the feedback!
> >> Here you can find my opinions on your questions.
> >>
> >> 1. Interaction with platform_profile:
> >> In ASUS laptops, where presents, Whisper Mode operates as an
> >> independent boolean toggle/feature controlling fan acoustic target limits in
> >> firmware/EC, rather than acting as a global thermal profile. Setting 
> >> WHISPER_MODE or WHISPER_ENABLE via WMI sends a direct call to the EC/BIOS, 
> >> which adjusts acoustic thresholds internally without altering the active 
> >> platform_profile state (throttle_thermal_policy) in asus-wmi. IIRC on Windows 
> >> it even permits to "hear" the ambient to make the fans run in a way to blend 
> >> with the ambient noise.
> >>
> >> 2. platform_profile vs firmware_attributes (asus-armoury):
> >> platform_profile is designed for mutually exclusive global power/thermal
> >> modes (Quiet, Balanced, Performance). Whisper Mode, on the other hand, 
> >> consists of independent BIOS feature toggles (0/1 controls for BIOS Whisper 
> >> Mode, Dynamic Whisper Enable, and Status).
> >> Since asus-armoury is dedicated to exposing BIOS/Armoury Crate firmware
> >> attributes via fw_attributes_class (similar to nv_dynamic_boost,
> >> nv_temp_target, panel_od, etc.), exposing these three WMI controls as
> >> sysfs firmware attributes fits the overall design of asus-armoury much
> >> better than extending platform_profile.
> >>
> >> I hope I've been of help. Feel free to let me know if you have more 
> >> questions: I'll try to answer the best of my capacities.
> > Thank you for clarifying things. Since the EC/BIOS interface sees this
> > as 2 independent settings, I agree that exposing this as a firmware
> > attr is the best way to expose this.
> >
> > Its a bit weird that one can select Performance profile and enable
> > whisper mode at the same time. But if that is how the Asus firmware
> > interfaces work, then that is how it is.
> Hello Hans and Marco,
> 
> I agree that this is weird and we don't have a device with whisper mode,
> but there is the possibility of the official windows app allowing whisper mode
> only on certain modes: we would need to find someone with windows
> to confirm this, but I also don't think binding whisper to quiet/low performance
> is a bad idea.
> 
> My opinion is that either whisper gets its own profile and is a combination of
> quiet + whisper set to 1 or we check what windows does since I don't want
> to have hardware running in configurations that ASUS never intended to.
> 
> Best regards,
> Denis
> > Regards,
> >
> > Hans
> >
> >
> 
Hi Denis,
I made more checks on Whisper Mode and find out why it isn't under a single
power profile: it works the contrary of power profiles.

To be more specific: while power profiles tends to match the fans with the
TDP, in Whisper Mode it sets the max power (if under performance) but cut
it if the dB/RPMs are too high to respect the Whisper Mode. So it basically
works for any power profiles but instead of pushing up the fans to cool the
CPU/GPU, it kills the power to maintain the loudness in check

Let me know if it is a feature you want or not. If we end up deciding to kill
it feel free to let me know.

Best regards,
Marco