I'm switching teams.

[mihapiha]

I have decided to take the folding farm offline. The contribution from this point on will vary. Its getting slowly but surely hotter over here and I don't need something else heating up the place.

Depending on the weather I might take the PC offline for a few months at a time, or I might get them to fold at 50% load or something. I just wish to reduce the heat.

This week we had our first week with 26°C, and it will now rise... I much prefer the AC running to the folding farm.

 

[sheroo]

Shame the AC won't generate anywhere near as many PPD.

 

[mihapiha]

it really is.

I just have to figure out how long I can maintain folding. There's going to be another 300k before I switch anything though

 

[sheroo]

In the UK we used to have a thing called economy 7, it may still be around in some form or another. It was basically 7 hours overnight when the electricity tariff was a lot cheaper than in the daytime. Have you looked into something like that? and maybe just run it overnight?

 

[mihapiha]

Unfortunately there is no such thing in Austria. At least not to my knowledge. I was thinking of letting it run during the night..

At the moment I'm playing around with it. I'm trying to get Ubuntu 12.10/13.04 running properly. The problem here: The CPUs are not properly recognized. They are downclocked to 1.8 GHz 24/7. I haven't had luck changing that so far with the incidator-cpufreq tool... It would be quite important that I'd fix this issue...

 

[sheroo]

Slightly off topic - what do you think is the best version of Ubuntu to run a 1p folding rig - in terms of PPD? I've heard that 10.10 is about as good as any?

 

[mihapiha]

10.10 was the standard for a very long time.
I believe 12.10 is taking over now. I can't get 12.10 working properly though. It would downclock the CPU to 1.8 GHz and it wouldn't go up to 2.5 GHz when under load. I have to fix that issue, but I don't know yet how to do that.

On another note: I managed to get the 2.75 GHz stable in Windows...

Nice score:

This is a folding topic, and if my experience can help anybody, do feel free to ask questions...

 

[RadeonHDx]

The PPD of this is truly unbelievable, just a shame that you have to turn it off .

 

[mihapiha]

I don't really need to turn it off. It still has 20°C leeway to Tjmax.
But It's been folding 24/7 for more than 6 months straight. I wanna have some fun with it. For the summer-time I'll probably only turn it off in August or weeks which are really really hot. For now I'd like to get a few things tested and sorted out.

Specifically, I'd like to get a 3D capable driver for my HD4870 or a graphic card which is supported properly with Windows Server 2008. I might be forced to get some Quadro/Tesla/Xfire or something of that nature. This would really suck.

I would prefer to get a 7950 or 660 ti in there so I can play a couple of games if I want to. Windows Server 2008 R2 is working like a charm. Even with a 12.5% overclock to 2.8 GHz. I figure even if a game only supports 4 cores, it's fast enough for pretty much any game.

I would also like to get Ubuntu 12.10 or 13.04 running properly. If it wouldn't downclock itself to 1.8 GHz it would be just awesome. Especially since never programs work better with it, and I can transmit the OC to windows.

As soon as something of this is fixed or sorted out, I'll probably let it fold again. But most likely not on all 48 cores or not all day.

But I'm having fun:

http://youtu.be/tZzLPOWoVbU

 

[mihapiha]

I did some testing. Ubuntu 12.10 will work just as fine as Ubuntu 10.10 in terms of folding. It will need a graphic card though, because it's more hardware intense. I'm not sure whether this effect anything in your case.

The last few days of testing also confirmed something else: There seem to be a bug in the cracked BIOS I use for the OC on my server motherboard. If I use the newest stock bios, everything works fine, if I use the cracked BIOS I am pretty much limited to Ubuntu 10.10. 11.10, 12.10 and 13.04 won't clock the CPU up in Folding@Home. So it would remain downclocked to 1.8 GHz (in my case). There is no software fix for that because it's the BIOS's fault. Only Ubuntu 10.10 will run the right clocks.

What I've done now, is to set up 15 GB for Ubuntu 10.10, 15 GB for Ubuntu 12.10 and 30 GB for Windows Server 2008 R2. I still have to figure out if I can get RAID 0 to work properly and if the fact that I intend to use two 500 GB WesternDigital Caviar Green with merely 5200 RPM is enough for Folding@Home. I did test with one before and the compressing and decompressing of the huge WUs just took forever. I hope RAID 0 would fix that issue. I only have one 60 GB SSD and it's very crowded with 3 OSs on it....

But I will keep you guys posted. I might just keep the SSD for Ubuntu 10.10 and Folding@Home.

Just to let you know: the PPD difference between 2.5 and 2.75 GHz is a whopping 100k PPD

 

[sheroo]

Wow, that's a huge difference. I was about to go down the route of having multiple drives for my folding rig. 1 to have Ubuntu 10.10 on and another with Windows 7, so that I can overclock and stress test etc. as I'm not really familiar with Linux. What tool are you using as a boot manager?

 

[mihapiha]

Linux sets up a Boot-Manager by itself. I don't see why I'd need another one. What hardware did you plan on using for folding? I might have some insight in terms of wattage consumption and/or expected PPD or OC...

 

[mihapiha]

Yes. AIDA64 finally got an Update and now supports over 100 cores.

It made a few new Benchmarks and results possible....

 

[mihapiha]

Coputer sold. I won't be contributing any time soon. But I will be contributing again in time I bet!

The F@H-brake never lasted too long before...

 

[Feronix]

Computer sold. I won't be contributing any time soon. But I will be contributing again in time I bet!

The F@H-brake never lasted too long before...

I guess those juicy benchmark scores might have helped with the sale, that's incredible dude! Also, good for you for finally selling it, I know you've been wanting to for some time. Bit less good for the team, but as long as you come back it's alright!

I should also really join, but I want to upgrade first

 

[mihapiha]

At least now I can finally go and finish my Corsair 900D build. Everything is ready apart from the main hardware. I will still have to wait just a little longer because I'm busy with work.

But After Christmas I'll start researching and see what I'll get. I am leaning a Core i7-4930k with ASUS P9X79-E WS motherboard.

Since the Corsair 1200i PSU is in the case and I have two 480 monsta radiators in the case, I think I will go with 3-way R9 290X when PowerColor releases the LCS edition in late December...

I have yet to find a way to finance the 4k Monitor... But I still have a few weeks. This one of course will be more for gaming, but it probably won't be that bad folding either...


But you could fold with your current Computer. Every contribution helps the team. Mine because of the server was just over average

 

[stevehat1]

Sorry for the team to lose the points but good for you to finally sell the comp.

You new build looks interesting keep us posted on the build!

 

[yassarikhan786]

Sad to see your powerhouse of a rig not folding for us anymore , but glad that you finally sold it .

I've just placed an order for the EVGA 780 Ti ACX from Scan, so the teams average should get a nice little boost once I get my hands on it. I had to pre-order as Scan don't have any in stock.

Apart from overclocking and setting the 'advanced' client option, do you guys have any tips on maximizing my PPD?

 

[stevehat1]

Sad to see your powerhouse of a rig not folding for us anymore , but glad that you finally sold it .

I've just placed an order for the EVGA 780 Ti ACX from Scan, so the teams average should get a nice little boost once I get my hands on it. I had to pre-order as Scan don't have any in stock.

Apart from overclocking and setting the 'advanced' client option, do you guys have any tips on maximizing my PPD?

Here is one that helps PPD a little, in slot options add Name: next-unit-percentage and Value: 100. This tells the client to download the next WU after the current WU is at 100% or finished. This helps real PPD as the QRB starts from when the unit is sent and ends when it is returned, So about a 4 minute saving on total WU processing time as the client default is at 99% complete and the new WU sits there waiting for the existing WU to complete.

Also the advanced option is no longer necessary as Core 17 has gone to General FAH

Let us know PPD on that monster after you get it!!!

 

[yassarikhan786]

Here is one that helps PPD a little, in slot options add Name: next-unit-percentage and Value: 100. This tells the client to download the next WU after the current WU is at 100% or finished. This helps real PPD as the QRB starts from when the unit is sent and ends when it is returned, So about a 4 minute saving on total WU processing time as the client default is at 99% complete and the new WU sits there waiting for the existing WU to complete.

Also the advanced option is no longer necessary as Core 17 has gone to General FAH

Let us know PPD on that monster after you get it!!!

Thanks for the info Steve . I'll definitely post some numbers when it arrives. It was meant to be in stock today, but the shipment was delayed .