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How To Easily Overclock Your Nokia N900 In Under Two Minutes

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The ability to overclock the N900 has existed for a long time now and we have covered it before. But overclocking the N900 has never been so easy, two simple installs from the Application Manager and a short command via the terminal is all it takes. If you have been wanting to try it out but were holding out because it seemed too complicated, this guide is for you.

How To Easily Overclock Your N900 In Under Two Minutes

However, please note that overclocking the N900 will void your warranty, although it is possible to the flash to the stock kernel/state if you no longer want to overclock your device. Apart from that you also risk damaging your device and losing data. Please continue at your own peril.

That said, lets get started.

  • The first thing you need to do is install ‘rootsh’ from the Application Manager, make sure you have the relevant repositories enabled.
  • Next install the ‘Enhanced linux kernel for power users‘ from the ‘System’ section in the Application Manager. It supports overclocking upto 1.15 Ghz.
  • Restart the device.
  • Now install ‘Enhanced kernel for power users (settings)‘.
  • Open the X-Terminal and enter the following command.
sudo gainroot
kernel-config load ideal

This will load the ideal profile which overclocks your phone to 850 MHz. At this point if you experience reboots or the phone seems to act funny, try using the ‘lv’ settings that uses slightly higher voltages than the ‘ideal’ profile. If it is still unstable try ‘ulv’. The various presets are ‘default’ – ‘lv’ – ‘ulv’ – ‘xlv’ – ‘ideal’ – ‘starving’.

sudo gainroot
kernel-config load lv
kernel-config limits 250 850

If the N900 seems stable, you can have these settings as a preset of your own.

sudo gainroot
kernel-config load lv
kernel-config limits 250 850
kernel-config save myideal

With the current configuration, the N900 will resort to the default 600 MHz state everytime it is rebooted. This is done to avoid letting the N900 get caught in a reboot loop. If you are happy with the N900’s performance and stability, you can then also set the N900 to overclock by default on startup. Use the following command:

sudo gainroot
kernel-config default ideal (whichever preset you want to set as default e.g. myideal)
kernel-config show (this will show you your current settings)

If you want to revert to the original settings, here is the procedure to follow. Jakiman over at talk.maemo.org has a very comprehensive guide as well, if you are looking for more information I suggest you give it a read.

Overclock N900 With QCPUFreq

One last thing, if you want to configure the N900’s overclocking setting with a visual UI and not the terminal, install QCPUFreq from the Application Manager. Then once you have installed the packages mentioned above all you will need to do is move the slider to overclock to the desired level. My suggestion is don’t go past the 850 MHz mark.

Before you do this, please keep in mind one thing ‘because it can be doesn’t mean, you have to do it!’

27 thoughts on “How To Easily Overclock Your Nokia N900 In Under Two Minutes”

  1. Problem:

    Unable to install ‘Enhanced Linux kernel for power users’
    Conflict with application packages: fcam-drivers(1.0.5-2)

  2. @Magnus,

    fcam, as far as I know, also uses a custom kernel. You’ll have to choose between one or the other.

  3. For me the levels “250 and 900″ work the best. The “ideal” profile reboots my device in less than 10s even if I decide to do nothing.

    Mostly doing the overclock is pretty safe, though, because the settings revert to normal if the device reboots.

  4. BTW, do you guys know how long is the device covered under the warranty?
    I bought mine as soon as it came out.

    I will be overclocking when the warranty is over.

  7. Much easier to google for zimage files no need to get into terminal and do all the typing.

    There are images avail from 650 all the way to 1000mhz-500dsp. I’m using this one which took like 10 secs if you know how to flash your n900 via XP/WIN7 using flasher3.5. Even if you reboot ur phone it will boot in the overclocked state and idle is 125mhz and now the battery lasts more than a day.

  9. just to tell ever 1 overclocking dunt void your warranty sent my n900 to nokai with a brocken chager port it was overclock to 1.2ghz and nokai gave me a new phone

  10. Pingback: Weaponizing the Nokia N900 – Part 3.5 - #!/zitstif.no-ip.org/

  13. Dav…I had a same problem…turn off the phone and put the battery out for few min..then put the battery in and leave the camera lens cover open and start the phone.Go to application menu and start camera from there.
    This works for me,hope it works for you too.

    Sorry about bad english hope you will understand.

  15. Hi Guys with kind heart pleas help your brother, I am lost here and i will appreciate your help, I am new to N900 but the battery sucks, while trying to install the enhanced linux kernel…… got error msg “unable to install enhanced linux kernel for power users…..conflicting application package, PLSSSSSSSSSSSS HELP ME

  16. i m not able to use mobile hotspot,wat should i do?and im not able to install enhanced linux kernel power user ,it shows conflicting application packages, so what should i do? and how to use x terminal? plzzzz help me ,i m new to n900….

  17. karnel config not found //// ??

    and i couldnt find Enhanced kernel for power users,,, i found Enhanced kernel for power users (settings) when i installed it it installed Enhanced kernel for power users.
    help ??

  18. Hi, I find that after doing all of the stuff mentioned above, I cant get my Camera to work. Can somebody please help? Thank you

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  23. After i type in the command ‘kernel-config save myideal’
    It says
    ‘saving to home/user/.kernel/myideal
    /home/user#” Is that how it’s supposed to be?
    Or should it say something after that.

  26. Done overclocking n900.. My current cpu Min speed is 250Mhz to Max 900Mhz.. and it works like a charm.. :)
    Im very happy n satisfied wid this speed..

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