GPU-application for SETI@home, other News, and Team-stats for 24.11. - 10.12. 2008.

[Rattledagger]

Originally posted by: The Borg
Guys,

Do you think that this is a better option from a software stability and ease of use pespective than trying to battle with FAH? I have tried that a few times and the latest changes meant I cannot use the graphics card I bought for FAH (and a bit of gaming (;-)).

What is the minimum nVidia card you can use? I have an old(er) AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ and am hesitant in putting in a card that is too powerful (imagine that) for the CPU. Planning a Core i7 upgrade next year with quite a few bells and wistles.

Well, I've not got a nvidia, but atleast 256 MB memory, and if not mis-remembers someone posted some benchmarks with a 9400-card (it's the weekly outdage now so beta-forums down), so 8500 or whatever numbering it's using should likely also work.

But, there's been some posts indicating it's the same problem as with GPUGRID.net, that 8800-cards doesn't work if uses the old G80, while cards with G92 works, so check which core it's really got...


Other things of note, under Vista you can't install as service (protected mode), and in case of multi-gpu, you need a monitor on each gpu. Also, if runs 64-bit windows, it seems to be a memory-leak or something, so you should re-boot daily to free-up gpu-memory again.

Better than FAH-client? No idea..., but atleast one feature you can use if any problems with games is, add your games as <exclusive_app>, see client-configuration

 

[Assimilator1]

I highly doubt that SETI GPU is more stable that F@H GPU seeing as the SETI client has only just been released & the F@H one has been out for months.

The Borg
What graphics card have you got?

As for putting in a 'too powerful' grx card, that's only going to be a problem where a game or app doesn't have enough CPU power to run it properly, I know that F@H GPU clients CPU power needs are pretty low (any mid range P4 & equiv. will do IIRC), no idea about S@H GPU though. Either way their's nothing stopping you putting in an 'overpowerful' card in your old rig & then latter on transferring it to the new i7 rig.

 

[The Borg]

I bought an ATI 1950Pro about a year ago. Struggled with the FAH client for a while, then gave up. Tried it again at the begining of the year and found it was no longer applicalble - very upset.

I have always just found the FAH SW to be very difficult to get going.

 

[Insidious]

Originally posted by: The Borg
I bought an ATI 1950Pro about a year ago. Struggled with the FAH client for a while, then gave up. Tried it again at the begining of the year and found it was no longer applicalble - very upset.

I have always just found the FAH SW to be very difficult to get going.

I find their installation guide pretty straight forward

It is a shame on the video card going obsolete. But it's hard to find any hardware that doesn't do that sooner or later. Especially the cheaper stuff.

-Sid

 

[Rattledagger]

Originally posted by: Insidious
I find their installation guide pretty straight forward

The installation-guide is detailed, and getting it installed isn't a problem... But, having a nice install-guide doesn't help much then the gui (systray)-client (v6.23) is total crap, it's a client with no real indication of progress, since it's either to open a log that won't be updated, or, if you tries to display the gui-window, the client will actually lock-up and crash (under Vista).

The cli-version is better, since you've atleast got a progress-indicator, and neither does the client itself crash. Also, if it keeps running, it seems to work more or less as it should... But, if you shut-down the client (ctrl-c), often a "fahcore_11 has crashed" pops-up. And, more than once on resume, the client immediately spits-out an error-message like "NaN" or "Unstable machine" or something, and the "excellent" error-reporting of the FAH-client kicks-in, by 1st. deleting the partial result, and afterwards reporting nothing to server.

 

[Insidious]

I think you're having more difficulty than most.

FahMon is the progress indicator of choice for most. But even without that nice little app, you get to set the time interval on updating of the status log, I'm not sure why you aren't being updated just as often as you like.

The video display.... yep, I gotta agree with you here. Why in the world would they include this when they have their own posts all over their forum that it doesn't work and shouldn't be used... (They get mad at me when I gripe about the exact same thing you observed)

But hey.... that's the nice thing about having so many projects in DC to choose from.

If dogma makes one unbearable, then there is always another good one to run.

-Sid

 

[Assimilator1]

Originally posted by: The Borg
I bought an ATI 1950Pro about a year ago. Struggled with the FAH client for a while, then gave up. Tried it again at the begining of the year and found it was no longer applicalble - very upset.

I have always just found the FAH SW to be very difficult to get going.

I've got a 1950Pro too, ran F@H on it without problems , & yes I was gutted about the support being dropped for it earlier this year too .
I do recall though some X19xx cards causing system stuttering problems when running F@H.
Anyway the card's faulty now & I'll be replacing it with a HD 4830 when I get some time.

Sid
Hey the X1950 Pro wasn't that cheap a card at the time!

*steals sids :beer:*
:laugh: