F@H - Monday, July 18

[kb3edk]

Welcome to TeAm AnandTech F@H

TeAm News

Production = 44,738 ppd (as of noon 7/18/2005) - down 2,000 ppd from Saturday

Active Users = 170 - up 3 from Saturday

No new users

Ranking: 25th place.

One current overtake target:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"General [M]ayhem" - 21st place - 41, 319 ppd - overtake: 2008

One current threat:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Portugal@Folding" - 49th place - 78,013 ppd - overtake: August 2006

New Milestones

Name--------------------|---------------Milestone
_____________________________________
jkresh.............................................40,000
TheTerl...........................................10,000
Paladin3..........................................10,000
Confusednewbie1552.........................1,000
_____________________________________


Congratulations everyone! :thumbsup::thumbsup:

Challenges

No current Challenges.

Useful getting started info can be found here: ProviaFan's FAQ and MDE's Start-up Guide

More detailed TeAm stats can be found on the EOC F@H stats page

New users will not appear until they have submitted a work unit under team #198

Milestones are as follows: 1,000, 5,000, 10,000, from 10,000 to 100,000 will be every 10k, and every 20K after 100,000. After 200,000 milestones will be given at 50k intervals

 

[Uppsala9496]

Thanks for the stats kb3edk.

Congrats to the MM's.

 

[ProviaFan]

Originally posted by: Uppsala9496
Thanks for the stats kb3edk.

Congrats to the MM's.

Quoted for truth :thumbsup:

 

[Insidious]

kb3edk, Thanks for the stats Sir! :thumbsup:

=Sid

wow :shocked: It just took 7 -deletes before I got assigned a WU that wasn't a 'timeless Gromacs' (745 thru 749)

Are they running low on work for non Pentiums to do? Wait.... QMDs are suspended as well.... WTF?

PS: I just passed a dead guy.... :beer: :beer: to wbresson!

 

[kb3edk]

Originally posted by: Insidious

wow :shocked: It just took 7 -deletes before I got assigned a WU that wasn't a 'timeless Gromacs' (745 thru 749)

...

PS: I just passed a dead guy.... :beer: :beer: to wbresson!

Yeah, normally when I get junk WUs I just curse under my breath and let them run along... been getting a lot of 'em the last couple days. 748 especially. Must take a lot of effort on your part to axe those, I admire your dedication :evil:
But yeah, I sure do wish I could get back on 600-pointers ASAP, I got a 100K milestone to make

I wonder what happened to wbresson... was it him or Moltres who was shutting it down for the summer but said they'd be back?

EDIT: I just checked, it looks like Moltres posted a few WUs last week. Welcome back, buddy :beer:

 

[Insidious]

Originally posted by: kb3edk
I admire your dedication :evil:

ROFL

I've been doing it a while and kind of have a system.

bring up service manager to Kill/Start F@H (leave it up)

bring up folding.bat in notepad (leave it up)

have a shortcut handy for folding.bat and fahlog.txt

spent about 45 seconds so far....

stop the service
check fahlog.txt for correct unit to delete (00 thru 09) then close fahlog.txt
edit folding.bat (backspace, number, Cntrl^S)
double click folding.bat shortcut (deletes the foul WU)
start the service
open fahlog.txt and check to see what just got assigned

up to about a minute now...

subsequent iterations go faster because all the needed windows are up and ready.

lather, rinse, repeat if needed

I wouldn't really recommend this choosy folding method to most (it is a PITA), but I figure
that since the F@H team is using their skewed "benchmarking" system as a manipulative tool to get people to crunch the WUs they like... no reason I shouldn't use the same 'system' to pick the units I like. :evil:

-Sid

(I'm not sure wbresson said anything about his leaving or comming back.... I'll give him another :beer: if he comes back and smokes me again )

 

[ProviaFan]

I just got one of those freakin things again (had a few the other day as well).

If I remember correctly, I did say no to timeless WUs during the setup process, but I guess F@H ignores this when they please. :frown:

 

[Insidious]

I looked at their project summaries and server stati and it made me think all their effort is going into QMD and or non-wild Beta WUs (which.... I am not allowed to fold on my lowly AMD processor) and the other queues are running out leaving us leftover turkeys.....

/me sighs.....

-Sid

 

[phaxmohdem]

ahh darn it I was hoping to make the 5K milestone before this thread came out. I've been getting hammered by crappy batches of 2 day long 200-300 pointers. Perhaps next time..... sigh.

Another question for the folding gods out there..... Concerning hyperthreading.... is it better to turn it off and run once instance of F@H or enable it and run two seperate F@H's?

 

[ProviaFan]

Most people report a small increase in production from running two copies on a HT system. I haven't done any tests myself to see how much of a difference it makes.

 

[Pokey]

Originally posted by: Uppsala9496
Thanks for the stats kb3edk.

Congrats to the MM's.

 

[rise]

i don't understand changing wu's or declining w'us. what is the reasoon to do that? i just have it set to start and let it run. should i be doing something to make it more productive?

 

[Insidious]

Originally posted by: rise4310
i don't understand changing wu's or declining w'us. what is the reasoon to do that? i just have it set to start and let it run. should i be doing something to make it more productive?

Not really, you are doing it right. I just fiddle with mine a bunch as there are times around here there is little else to do.

While you can increase your overall production by learning what work units give the highest production rates, it isn't really that big of an increase and you needn't worry about it unless you just like to fiddle with stuff like I do from time to time.

-Sid

 

[rise]

thanks sid. i wasn't sure if there were actual wasted work units. i'll just keep on going. i got enough tinkering to do with other stuff.

 

[GLeeM]

Belated Welcome to the TeAm, Wraithkiss, kresgefc & rise4310 If you have any questions or need any help, just ask.

Congratulations to the Milestone Makers! esp. Rebel_Alliance w/300,000

w00t, look who's in the Top 20 Producers - Phaxmohdem

Uppsala9496, welcome to the 100K Club

Xitar, welcome to the Top 100

TheTerl & Paladin3, welcome to the 10K Club

Thanks Adam

 

[GLeeM]

@phaxmohdem
HT Enabled or disabled in BIOS doesn't make much difference when running one instance. When enabled, you could run two instances and get from 10% to 25% increase if running regular WUs.

But on newer Intel CPUs, if you have enough ram to get QMD WU, just running one instance is working best for now. You need to have configured to get BigWUs and you also need to add the -advmethods flag. (If you need help on how to add a flag, please ask)

The reason it is best to just run one instance of QMD and the reason for the bonus is that the WU uses lots of physical ram and almost all of the memory bandwidth along with pushing the CPU.
If you do work that uses lots of ram, these might not give way very fast like normal WUs. EDIT: Idle processes give up cycles FAST, but memory has to be paged to disk.

I see that the server (.113) is giving these out again. I think you might need 1 GB ram to get these for a day or two, then they will lower the minimum back to 470 MB.

Because not many people do QMDs they are usually available.

 

[phaxmohdem]

GLeeM...

Tell me more about the flag you speak of, I am using the graphical client, and not the console mode. Do the flags apply the same?

Also how can you tell who is producing the most in the team? I'm proud to be up in the top ranks, but would love to figure out how you guys know this stuff

 

[phaxmohdem]

Well I figured out the stats thing

 

[Slider76]

Originally posted by: phaxmohdem
GLeeM...

Tell me more about the flag you speak of, I am using the graphical client, and not the console mode. Do the flags apply the same?

Also how can you tell who is producing the most in the team? I'm proud to be up in the top ranks, but would love to figure out how you guys know this stuff

go the console as its faster

 

[GLeeM]

Originally posted by: phaxmohdem
GLeeM...

Tell me more about the flag you speak of, I am using the graphical client, and not the console mode. Do the flags apply the same?

Also how can you tell who is producing the most in the team? I'm proud to be up in the top ranks, but would love to figure out how you guys know this stuff

If you don't leave the GUI display showing, the GUI is just as fast as the console - they both use the same cores, which do all of the work.

The GUI displayed takes CPU cycles same as a screen saver, so don't use a screen saver either, just set monitor to power off after X minutes.

As to the stats thing, have you seen this page? Edit: Look for "User Summary" link on that page, too

How to add a flag:

It works this way for the console version and I think for the GUI also.

Right click the shortcut that starts your client and select Properties.
In the Target textbox, at the end of what is in there, add a space, a dash, and "advmethods" without the quotes. While you are in there you might as well add another space, dash and "forceasm" w/o quotes. -forceasm prevents the client from looking at how the client was last shutdown (if not properly shutdown, it would restart without optimisations and take forever to finish work unit (WU)). "-verbosity 9" will show more info in the log (fahlog.txt) to make it easier to troubleshoot if you ever have problems.

 

[phaxmohdem]

Do the Flags also help out non-intel processors? Like A64/ A-XP? I added the flags to my FX-51 and 3.0GHz P4 system. jhow much faster does this make processing a WU on average? Sorry for all the Noob questions Hopefully in the future I'll be the one answering tehse for someone else.

 

[JeffCos]

Originally posted by: phaxmohdem
Do the Flags also help out non-intel processors? Like A64/ A-XP? I added the flags to my FX-51 and 3.0GHz P4 system. jhow much faster does this make processing a WU on average? Sorry for all the Noob questions Hopefully in the future I'll be the one answering tehse for someone else.

I don't think it makes it crunch any faster, it just makes you get the super huge bonus WU's like the 600 point Gromacs and the 450pt QMD's. Some people get them without the flags (usually only on the first WU), but you should get them if your machine is capable of handling them.

 

[GLeeM]

Originally posted by: phaxmohdem
Do the Flags also help out non-intel processors? Like A64/ A-XP? I added the flags to my FX-51 and 3.0GHz P4 system. jhow much faster does this make processing a WU on average? Sorry for all the Noob questions Hopefully in the future I'll be the one answering tehse for someone else.

The flags work for any processor. Because of a licensing issue only Intel CPU can get QMD. AMD crunches them, I guess. It would be interesting to see how well, but there are things to know before moving WUs between computers.

The client reports to the Assignment Server (AS) that you are willing to do late beta WUs if you add the -advmethods flag. Late or public beta WUs may be unstable and if they cause problems with your computer you can't complain because you volunteered, you can report problems and they will appreciate that though. Usually they are stable. Of late they have used this flag feature to allow those Intel machines that want to do the bonus QMD WUs to get them, if you have the minimum ram and don't want them, you have to either remove the BigWU = yes in config or remove the flag.

As a project gets older and is proven to be stable, they usually are then served to regular F@H clients (without -advmethod flag) so a WU that runs great on a particular CPU can change its flag/no flag need. It is really hard (impossible) to get what you want because of this and the fact that the AS assigns to each server for so many minutes per hour (or whatever) and moves on to the next. It's just a luck of the draw mostly.

Folding@Home server status web page is here. The PROGRAM column shows flag info. I = internal. F = no flag. A = advmethods. B = beta. G = Google. The WUs AVAIL column shows available WUs on that server, if it is below 200 it is harder to get a WU from that server, it seems to me.
You can see what projects are on which servers on the Currently Running Projects page.

Does anyone know if the flag on AMD helps to get bonus WUs?

 

[phaxmohdem]

Thanks for teh replies. one more Noobish question for ya.

Relating to Frames... Will a project that has 5000 frames to complete be worth more than one with say 500 or 250?

 

[rise]

from what i see, no. of course i'm a folding noob too but it seems no rhyme or reason.