GATT Folding @ Home

[Spazosaurus]

And for that reason alone, I feel like waiting for nvidia's new generation cards and upgrade to those instead. Nvidia came lonnnggg after ATI and beating them hands down in this. Just unacceptable.

[W1nTry]

And for that reason alone, I feel like waiting for nvidia's new generation cards and upgrade to those instead. Nvidia came lonnnggg after ATI and beating them hands down in this. Just unacceptable.

Now Capn you're getting ahead of yourself. You have to look at the big picture to understand the possible whys. First off ATI/AMD is focused on smaller cell type architecture for their GPUs, Nvidia has up till the GTX2xx series used, large monolithic cores. AMD has a CPU, Nvidia does NOT they are a graphics house. However the market is shifter towards integrated CPU/GPU and hence intel and amd are in favourable positions as they have x86 in their stables. Nvidia does not. The bulk of sales are ALWAYS in the low-mid and thats' where these new integrated CPU/GPU product are aimed, thus again win win for Intel and AMD, boo hoo nvidia, all they do is graphics.

Thus Nvidia has been pushing like HELL through high waters to show the... more CPU centric possibilities of their GPUs, cause guess what if the low end falls out from below them, they will be pushing up daisys. Folding @ Home is a marketing tool as much as a cancer solving tool for Nvidia as at the end of the day they need general purpose processing benig 'accelerated' by their hardware for ppl to see any real value in the upcoming shift.

That being said Nvidia has been pushing CUDA which is what it uses for folding and ATI has Stream. Nvidia pushing CUDA ALOT harder than ATI stream and most likely for the aforementioned reasons. ATI has been focused on performance and the FACT that you have 2x4870 PROVES it paid off. DO you buy a GPU to fold? or to play games? Last I checked most ppl play games.

That being said, I hope you will rethink you last comment.

[Spazosaurus]

Well the folding ability is not why I bought the card, but its something to do when im not gaming. Right now I cant even fold on the cards AT ALL. All the folding on my main system is done on the cpu. I could understand if it folds but is only slightly slower than nvidia's cards, but I cant run folding on the cards AT ALL. A LOT of people are getting the same issue im getting and its as though they dont care...THAT is unacceptable and this is why im considering switching to nvidia.

[W1nTry]

Hmm.. strange... though i've been using my 8800GT so I don't really know the case of your strife. Also the ATI cards are comparable in WU per day when large units are involved. I still wouldn't hinge my card purchase on whether or not it folds as your CPU folds like a beast and to achieve the same on the GPU would involve MUCH higher power consumption (keep that in mind).

[Spazosaurus]

True that. Ive pretty much given up on ati folding, but tis all good. The cpu is doing a pretty good job for the hour.

[TheApprentice]

Just did a stat check... The GATT Team is at #512 on the leaderboards.
http://fah-web.stanford.edu/teamstats/team71093.html

Great great job all of you guys.

[W1nTry]

I've been checking lately and I can now for the first time (that I am aware of) say we're in the top 500 ppl!!!

[Netizen1]

w00t~!

Good job Team!!!

[Guru]

GPU folding have meh card running toasty boy.  time for some fans...

[Nephilim]

aye guru you have any benchies with the i5 also any details, imma curious to move over mid next year but i doh wanna move to the i5 unless i get a significant boost over my q94

any info appreciated

[W1nTry]

Nice!!! another folder in the frey, that'll add a good couple thousand a day if he puts if full stream!

[Nephilim]

folders, a little help plixity

I just started back vm folding (*nix+smp) and i'm looking for some advice/info

set up as follows:

debian 5.0.3
f@h 6.02 SMP
2 of 4 cores (3.2)
2GB ram

as im only going to have this 1 instance running I'd like some help to maximize the ppd, i'd like to know what config should i be looking at to achieve this.

do big units yeild higher ppd?
would more ram allocated to the smp translate to faster WU completion?

i will continue to google-fu but so far the questions have no answers or i'm hitting a brick wall

any helpful input is appreciated

[W1nTry]

Larger WUs have larger points, however the larger the WU the more complex the calculations and the longer it takes, so it's a trade off. I've found that the SMP is still a better option than many single folding clients so you're on the right track with teh SMP. I don't believe you need more than 512MB to any given WU. Trick with the SMP client is DO NOT SHUTDOWN. It has to run the full course. If you intend to shutdown or restart regularly then I suggest going with multiple single clients as its been my experience that SMP once shutdown does NOT resume.

[Nephilim]

google-fu came up empty. it appears the nix client is as close to smp perfection as it can get - won't get any more crunch unless i up the hardware

never had that wu problem, though i am aware of it, even when i was using the win client it resumed fine, the only thing i could say against it is that it takes long to start back up

also i can pause the vm if i have to restart/shutdown

[W1nTry]

As I am now the happy new owner of a HD4870X2 and seeing as AMD has yet (or perhaps its stanford) optimize the folding agent for their architecture I am using my 8800GT to fold as well (in the SAME system). This card is used for PhysX and folding. However just as it's not just plug and play to get the PhysX and AMD cards to play together nicely (Nvidia made this rather backward thinking decision to disable PhysX if an alternative GPU is detected in the same system SHAME ON YOU NVIDIA), so too it's not straightforward with folding as well. Basically there is a walkthough on the Folding at home page here telling you how to configure multicard setups such as my HD4870X2 or SLI or crossfire, however they do NOT tell you how to run 2 alternative vendor cards in the same system (such as myself). Thanks to the power that is google I am happy to report that I can pass on to you fellow gatt folders the lil extra 'umph' that is needed to get this up and running, it's as follows:

ATI shortcut:
-forcegpu ati_r700Target: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Folding@home\Folding@home-gpu\Folding@home.exe" -gpu 0 -forcegpu ati_r700
Start In: C:\Users\Peter\AppData\Roaming\Folding@home-gpuATI

nV Shortcut:
Target: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Folding@home\Folding@home-gpu\Folding@home.exe" -local -forcegpu nvidia_g80
Start In: C:\Users\Peter\AppData\Roaming\Folding@home-gpunVidia

Basically if you read the first instructions on mutligpu setups you already know you need to make CUSTOM shortcuts referencing different work folders etc, to add to that when running multi VENDOR you need to add the extra initialization strings highlighted above. Cheers

Below is a link to the forum I found this solution on:
http://forum.xcpus.com/ask-gurus/29031-fold-nvidia-game-ati-same-computer.html

Also i've included a screenshot of my shortcut configs:


You will notice that the ATI shortcuts reference a different EXE from the nvidia shortcut as well as 2 different work folders. THe Nvidia shortcut also references  its own exe and has its own work folder. Because of the -local used in the Nvidia shortcut I am using the default install path for this exe though the work folder is uniquely named.

[TriniXaeno]

very nice guide w1n. +1

[W1nTry]

Ppl, i've noticed we're slipping lately. It seems that we are capable of reaching the top 500 and hover at or around 450, however this seems to be our sustained avg position. Our top folders theunknown and xelnaga have done admirably in the past and between them and myself have acrued the bulk of the points that have brought us to where we are (somewhere around 8.8 millions points) and I hereby extend the gauntlet to the other members of gatt to take up the mantle and put those idle CPU and GPU cycles to good use and help us not only maintain our current position, but also to progress ever forward to even higher rank!

[W1nTry]

Nope, truth is the better we do the better everyone does, i've not lost the point of it, but giving ppl another purpose other than 'good will' usually helps :p that being said, a man with an many spare cpu and gpu cycles should have a MUCH better ppd, what's ur excuse?

[Nephilim]

remote monitoring with hfm.net

recently I've been tuned unto hfm.net, which allows remote monitoring by generation it's own little website, using dropbox's public folder i thought this could be good for all those folders who crunch all over the place like frivolous women on carnival Tuesday, as it allows you to monitor how the progress is and can even alert you by email should anything be amiss.

Here's a quick set up of the current vm i have on it here

inb4 install vmware tools, i know i know...

[W1nTry]

It's been some time since this thread has gotten the bump. In addition to that I myself have not been folding nearly as much as i'd like to, that being said, recent changes to hardware have allowed me to in the least temporarily do some SMP folding and hopefully put back up some respectable numbers XD. I do encourage all members to join the fray, those are not active, please try to aid in whatever little way is possible. To the stalwart members honourable mention:
Xel_Naga
the_unknown (Capn Awesome I believe)
Great job guys, yal are the supporting pillars of GATT folding effort atm so keep it up.

We've been in the top 500 teams in the WORLD for the past year, however we're on the brink of falling out of that 500. Yes as of writing we're 498... so again those who are new, feel free to check out the FAQ on the stanford website regarding folding and ask any questions you may have, we'll do our best to respond, and to those who are inactive, take up your arms brothers! let's make 2011 an even better year than the previous an who knows, even break the 400!