PowerTOP 2.15 needs the kernel to support the 'perf' subsystem as well as support for trace points in the kernel: CONFIG_PERF_EVENTS=y CONFIG_PERF_COUNTERS=y CONFIG_TRACEPOINTS=y CONFIG_TRACING=y I run powertop as root with kernel 6.10.3-amd64 and get the above messages. root@cupcakke:/boot# grep CONFIG_PERF_COUNTERS /boot/config-6.10.3-amd64 root@cupcakke:/boot# But the kernel doesn't seem to have such an option. At a minimum the error message needs to be updated to match whatever kernel feature is missing and possibly have multiple combinations offered for different kernel versions. Also we need a bug filed against the Debian/Unstable kernels to get whatever support is needed to run powertop.