The psensor package is a graphical user interface for sensors that monitor the system from the desktop. It is not intended for automatic monitoring without configuration. And while it is possible to configure a log file, the primary purpose is to monitor a given system live. For example, to understand under what conditions it crashes: to see temperature or power curves.
On Debian 12 Bookworm, the package manager can be used to install the psensor package.
aptitude install psonsorSince this is a GUI, the best way to configure it is to start the tool and click on Psensor->Preferences and/or Psensor->Sensor Preferences. Basically Sensor Preferences is a subdialog of the Preferences dialog. Even without much effort, this tool can be useful by enabling only one sensor, set a temperature in degrees Celsius and enable the desktop alarm.
An advanced option is to configure a script to be executed in case of an alarm.
While psensor basically uses lm-sensors to read system sensors, there are some minor differences. First, not all lm-sensors are present, second, sensors from other sources like NVIDIA GPUs and hard disk monitoring are also included. So in that sense it can actually be more useful.
| System | LM Sensors | psensor |
|---|---|---|
| fam15h_power-pci-00c4 | power1: 46.59 W | |
| k10temp-pci-00c3 | temp1: +30.4°C | +30°C |
| it8721-isa-0290 | in0: 2.80 V | |
| in1: 2.80 V | ||
| in2: 828.00 mV | ||
| +3.3V: 3.29 V | ||
| in4: 792.00 mV | ||
| in5: 2.53 V | ||
| in6: 204.00 mV | ||
| 3VSB: 72.00 mV | ||
| Vbat: 3.29 V | ||
| fan1: 1839 RPM | 1839 RPM | |
| fan2: 844 RPM | 844 RPM | |
| fan3: 0 RPM | 0 RPM | |
| temp1: +46.0°C | +46°C | |
| temp2: +30.0°C | +30°C | |
| temp3: -128.0°C | -128°C | |
| intrusion0: OK | ||
| GeForce GTX 7500 Ti | ||
| temp | 39°C | |
| graphics | 4% | |
| video | 0% | |
| memory | 5% | |
| PCIe | 0% | |
| fan rpm | 905RPM | |
| fan level | 32% | |
| CPU usage | 21% | |
| free memory | 74% | |
| SAMSUNG SSD | 33°C |
The graph is updated every 2 seconds, which is sufficient, but the x-axis and y-axis are not well labeled, as only the minimum and maximum values are displayed.
The power readings, such as power1 from lm-sensors, are missing. Usually power readings are not critical. But sometimes they are. And to understand why a system shuts down, it is sometimes important to monitor the power.
The manufacturer-provided thresholds available in lm-sensors are not propagated to psensor. And while it is easily possible to open lm-sensors to configure psensor, it is a missed opportunity. However, sometimes these values provided by firmware engineers are incorrect, so the fact that psensor does not automatically set these values is correct.
See example output from lm-sensors:
am15h_power-pci-00c4
Adapter: PCI adapter
power1: 49.02 W (crit = 95.06 W)
k10temp-pci-00c3
Adapter: PCI adapter
temp1: +28.4°C (high = +70.0°C)
(crit = +90.0°C, hyst = +87.0°C)
it8721-isa-0290
Adapter: ISA adapter
in0: 2.80 V (min = +1.76 V, max = +0.36 V) ALARM
in1: 2.80 V (min = +0.38 V, max = +1.80 V) ALARM
in2: 828.00 mV (min = +0.82 V, max = +1.74 V)
+3.3V: 3.29 V (min = +1.99 V, max = +0.10 V) ALARM
in4: 792.00 mV (min = +0.01 V, max = +0.02 V) ALARM
in5: 2.53 V (min = +2.23 V, max = +0.82 V) ALARM
in6: 204.00 mV (min = +0.13 V, max = +0.82 V)
3VSB: 72.00 mV (min = +1.66 V, max = +2.35 V) ALARM
Vbat: 3.29 V
fan1: 1814 RPM (min = 142 RPM)
fan2: 834 RPM (min = 12 RPM)
fan3: 0 RPM (min = 37 RPM) ALARM
temp1: +45.0°C (low = +64.0°C, high = +83.0°C) sensor = thermistor
temp2: +30.0°C (low = +120.0°C, high = +12.0°C) ALARM sensor = thermistor
temp3: -128.0°C (low = -38.0°C, high = -119.0°C) sensor = disabled
intrusion0: OK| Version | Date | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 0.1.1 | 2024-02-11 | Add links |
| 0.1.0 | 2024-02-10 | Initial release |