Folding @ Home

[john_childs]

We really should get the chatter about Folding @ Home out of the main RSU group.

I had trouble getting a finished module to report. I had to shut down the program, reboot, and when I started everything back up while online, it finally went through. Not sure if that is the same problem you are having - Hope that helps. It will attempt to upload a finished WU when it finishes the WU. If it fails to upload (either because your internet connection was not active, or their server was down) then it will try again every 6 hours unil it successfully uploads. It will also attempt to upload finished WUs when the program first starts up. So you can exit the program and then start it again to get it to attempt to uplaod again.

[phil]

*sob* *sniff*

It has finally happened...

http://folding.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/teampage?q=13392

Phil

[john_childs]

Well, if you hadn't wasted those CPU cycles getting the screen capture of Universe with the floating UFO at the bottom of the frame then you might have been able to stave that off for a few more hours. ;)

I'm in the top 10 now with three whole work units. What's the deal. Has everyone stopped folding? I should not have been able to catch up to everyone that quickly.

[unisteve]

Winterburnd and I are still folding! Have faith. Seek not the fly, but let the fly come to you. Or something like that. I'm not an inspirational speaker, ok?

Anyway, I just sent in my FIFTH WU about 10 mins ago, and decided to check out the happenings in teh forums while I was online. Lo and behold, there waiting for me was a thread titled "Folding @ home" or pretty darn close.

Folding is fun! :D

[slugbath]

Rapture!

I arrived home from a gorgeous, balmy muni ride along the Pitt River to find that the team number had *finally* kicked in after my third workunit was completed. Yes, I'm on the roster, folding obsessively for CPUnicycle on my wee PC...

-andrea

[uni57]

Originally posted by phil
*sob* *sniff*

It has finally happened... Keep looking over your shoulder, because here I come too! :D

uni57 (Dave)

[phil]

Originally posted by uni57
Keep looking over your shoulder, because here I come too! :DA great big "bah!" to all these people with lots of computers! :)

Must stop typing... using up too much CPU...

Phil

[phil]

CRASH!

That was the noise of the team hurtling through the 500th ranked team barrier. As I type we're in 483rd place!

On a sadder note, I'm about to be overtaken again. Bah! :)

Phil

[Scott Stephens]

You better watch it. My comp is pulling a strong 3 WUs. I have a feeling its about to go on a power trip. So watch OnzaTrials1! Fear OnzaTrials1!............................................................ ........ Man my computer sucks.


Scott

[ratherbekayaking]

I'm watching... and still ahead by 2.8 points! who ever gets their 4th WU first! Everyone knows the real mans competition is in the less than 50 points part of the ranks. I look forward to knocking that pesky Catboy down a notch, blow him out of the top 20, where I belong. ;)


Originally posted by Scott Stephens
You better watch it. My comp is pulling a strong 3 WUs. I have a feeling its about to go on a power trip. So watch OnzaTrials1! Fear OnzaTrials1!............................................................ ........ Man my computer sucks.


Scott

[uni57]

http://folding.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/teampage?q=13392

uni57 (Dave)

[john_childs]

Originally posted by uni57
http://folding.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/teampage?q=13392

uni57 (Dave)
So all the multi processor folks have finally passed up us lowly single processor folks (well except for winterburnd).

At least Phil and John are next to each other in the rankings again. It was sad to see the two brothers torn apart like that.

[johnhimsworth]

Originally posted by john_childs

At least Phil and John are next to each other in the rankings again. It was sad to see the two brothers torn apart like that. Yeah, but he's ahead of me, despite the fact that I've done more WU's. That can't be fair. I demand justice! And I've been away for the last 2 weekends, so my computers been sat here not folding. I will have my revenge.....

John

[phil]

*wail*
*sob*
*sniff*

Right, I'm off to hijack the next shipment to the local computer shop.

Phil

[phil]

Originally posted by johnhimsworth
I will have my revenge.....

Note To Self: Change the name that John's computer is folding for when he gets home...

Phil

Mwuahahaha!

[john_childs]

It is interesting that many of us hit milestones this week. Michael Grant cracked 4000, Steve Howard and Dave (uni57) cracked 2000, John Childs (me), Nosabe332 (Eric) and Phil all passed up the 1000 point mark. Odd that all these milestones happened in the same week.

I'm also curious if Nosabe332 (Eric) has a 1200 MHz Athlon. We seem to be getting points at almost exactly the same rate. My computer is a 1200 MHz Athlon.

[nosabe332]

aye, we do seem to be coinciding. for the past few weeks i've been trying to overtake this 'john childs' fellow, but he is always literally one step ahead of me. i haven't turned off my computer for said few weeks to no avail. i have an amd athlon 1600, but am only using 94-96% of cpu cycles.. perhaps i shall kick things up a notch...

[john_childs]

Originally posted by nosabe332
i haven't turned off my computer for said few weeks to no avail. i have an amd athlon 1600, but am only using 94-96% of cpu cycles.. perhaps i shall kick things up a notch...
I shouldn't tell you this because you're going to easily pass me in the stats now. But I'll bet you that your CPU is running at 1200 MHz rather than 1600 MHz.

You can run WCPUID or SiSoft Sandra to check your systems CPU speed. SiSoft Sandra also includes benchmarks so you can verify that your system matches up with other 1600 MHz Athlons.

WCPUID
<http://www.h-oda.com/>
<http://hp.vector.co.jp/authors/VA002374/src/download.html>

SiSoft Sandra
<http://www.sisoftware.net/>

Both utilities are free. Sandra comes in both a free and commercial version.

What can happen is if your computer fails during the CPU initialization the BIOS may clock down your CPU and system bus speed in an attempt to get the system to boot next time without error. Sometimes these boot failures can be caused by a bad power supply (I just replaced my power supply because that was happening to me). In any event, it's likely that your system clocked itself down and just needs to be set back straight again to the correct CPU speed.

The settings for the CPU speed are in the BIOS setup. I'm not sure what the clock speed and multiplier and bus speed should be for the 1600 MHz Athlon. Your computer manufacturer will know.

[tomblackwood]

Originally posted by john_childs
Well, if you hadn't wasted those CPU cycles getting the screen capture of Universe with the floating UFO at the bottom of the frame then you might have been able to stave that off for a few more hours. ;)

I'm in the top 10 now with three whole work units. What's the deal. Has everyone stopped folding? I should not have been able to catch up to everyone that quickly.
After reading through this entire thread just cuz I'm nosy, I'm now thinking that this folding at home thing is kind of like the game Baccarat. You can watch it and watch it and watch it, but unless someone explains it, you'll never figure out what's really going on.

I'm off to fold some too.....the kind my wife encourages me to do every week.

TB

[michaeli]

Originally posted by john_childs

I shouldn't tell you this because you're going to easily pass me in the stats now. But I'll bet you that your CPU is running at 1200 MHz rather than 1600 MHz.Being a devout AMD fan and user, I do dislike the MHz war and will be quick to point out that nosabe's Athlon 1600 should not be running at 1600 MHz, it should be running at it's normal clock speed of 1.40 GHz. I'm not going to get into clock speed vs. true chip performance, but I do think it matters.

A few articles from Tom's Hardware:

Performance Matters (http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20011009/index.html)
AthlonXP vs. Pentium (http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20011031/index.html) (where an 1800+ fairly consistantly beats a P4 2GHz)
AthlonXP 1900+ review (http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20011105/index.html)
Duron 1200 vs. P4? (http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20011116/index.html)


Later,
Eli.

[nosabe332]

point taken. i realized that amd's nomenclature is not entirely in line with the clock speed. after downloading and running the wcpuid software, i realize that i am indeed running at 1.4ghz, just like every other 1600+ chip. what gives?! why can't i beat you!! *sob*

*looking for innocent computers*

[phil]

Eeeek!

What happened?! Last time I looked I was near the top, having been overtaken by the few people with loads of computers going at it. Now I've even been overtaken by people with one comptuer who started after me! Oh, the shame!

Now I have returned to York my pooter is back to being on all day rather than just when I'm sat in front of it.

I'd better stop typing... what a waste of cycles! Better turn off the virus checker... Messenger? No, folding is more important... Network driver? What a waste! <click>

[unisteve]

In a perhaps overzealous attempt to give more cycles to Folding, I have resorted to using MusicMatch instead of the CPU cycle hogging Windows Media Player. Instead of having 70 cycles going to music, I now have 87 going to Folding! Yes, Pinky...

Also, it may look as though I have stopped folding, but this WU has taken about 3 weeks, even longer than normal. (I mean, by 2 weeks I'm usually done...) I should have it in by the 26th or so... My comp has been on for about 10 days. Not even a reboot. I'm evil. And even with Windows it hasn't frozen.

After this WU I will have 9 done. I hope I get a lot of points.

Hark! It's the ballad of the Edmund Fitzgerald as sung by Gordon Lightfoot... I must go.

[phil]

Originally posted by unisteve
I have resorted to using MusicMatch instead of the CPU cycle hogging Windows Media Player.

Please Note: This is a Public Service *winamp* Subliminal Message.

Phil

[manic_mark]

hi

is anyone else using the console version of fah? if so what do you think of it. Does it run better than the other graphical/screensaver versions? as they seem to run quite slowly on my other computer. Just wondering if i should stick with this one or not?

[john_childs]

I'm running the GUI client. I have not tried the console client. The GUI client is more convenient.

From discussions the Folding @ Home forum, there should be no speed difference between the GUI and the console clients assuming that you aren't displaying the graphical molecular eye candy in the GUI client. They both use the same cores for the actual computation.

The screensaver client is slower. For one it only runs when the screen saver kicks in while the other clients run full time. And it also has to waste some CPU on displaying pretty pictures.

If it's running slowly for you (slower than it should be running for your CPU) then check to make sure that the assembly code optimizations haven't been disabled. In the GUI client you go Configure... >> Advanced tab. Then make sure the checkbox for "Disable highly optimized assembly code" isn't checked. I'm not sure how to check that setting in the console version but I'm sure there is a command line option for it.