running seti on amd vs. intel

[rmrf]

Ok, I did a search for 'seti' but I kept getting this error:

"Your search contained ignored words, ignored words are words like a,and,to,between.Please re-construct your search without these ignored words."

So here is my question:

At home, I have an AMD Barton XP2500+ w/1GB PC3200 RAM. At work, I have a Intel Pentium 4 2.8Ghz HT w/512MB RAM. On the intel machine, I can run SETI all day long, while the machine is idle, and while I am working on it, and it does not effect the WU's being produced. On the AMD machine, SETI will run when the machine is completely idle, but the WU's produced in a day suck. If I try to do anything, which includes opening notepad, my computer bogs down and won't let me do anything until I kill SETI and reboot.

This is bothering me very much, and I have not been able to figure out what is wrong. memtest86 can run for 24 hours and not give a single error, and I have run prime95 for a few hours and haven't gotten any errors. This machine is not overclocked anymore either.

Is there something wrong with my computer, or do the AMD XP chips just suck for this kind of stuff? If I were to upgrade to an A64 chip, would this still be a problem?

TIA

 

[TheStu]

Is there a difference between the OSes at all? I do know that for some reason my comp lags when I am running Prime95 and some other stuff but my friend can run Prime, and F@H and he navigates around just fine... he is using a Desktop 2600 with the FSB at 225 and mine is in my sig... not much real difference between the two and I think my proc is technically a higher clock speed.... So it could just be that chip or the mobo or any number of things... but i have heard the P4s with HT do out-perform the XPs in work units.

 

[rmrf]

there is nothing different between the OS's. XPSP2 fully patched. I haven't tried setting it up under linux to see if it would behave differently on either PC. I am wondering if there is something wrong with my setup, I guess it is time to upgrade! Now I just have to get the WAF (wife approval factor) going for me, and it'll be done! It won't be too easy though, since I already talked her into a surround sound stereo for the main room using the money we get payed from giving the government a loan.

 

[sandorski]

I suspect you have changed the Priority of SETI from Low. Change it back or check to see that it is set to Low. Notepad should not be affected by SETI, nothing should be for that matter.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

SETI classic or BOINC runs seemlessly on every setup I have ever run it on so definitely check the priority. Not getting the WU production on the XP is just a case of hyperthreading allowing for better multitasking with DC projects production in mind. BTW, You can run 2 instances on the P4 HT setup if you aren't already though I am not certain how much performance gain that garners now. You should also mention the 2500+ is running 3200+ speed if your sig is correct, because otherwise you will get responses explaining why a 2500+ ain't up to snuff with a 800fsb P4 HT performance rating of 2.5ghz or not

 

[rmrf]

I had the priority setting to crunch while the computer was idle. It wasn't necessarily notepad that was being affected, but the whole computer bogged down when opening a simple program like notepad.

I guess I kind of spaced, and it is obvious that that HT will make more units, because it can crunch 2 at once. I reverted back to stock, and haven't updated my rigs yet.

The thing I'm most confused about is the usability of the computer with seti running. With the Intel system, it is like it is not even running. With the AMD system, it acts like I have every program on the computer running while trying to play HL2 (no, I didn't try to play HL2 with seti running on either machine ).

I guess the purpose of my post was to find out whether or not AMD's are like this comared to Intel's, or if I possible have some bad hardware in the mix. Thanks for the responses so far.

 

[imported_operator]

No it isn't a problem on every AMD cpu, i've ran seti (the command line client) on my duron 750, athlon xp 1800+ and my ahtlon 64 3000+.

They don't lag the computer at all. You are using command line client?

 

[CraigRT]

I am currently running SETI on my XP2500+ at work and it runs flawlessly, WU times are not as good as the A64, but the system does not have a problem running SETI at least. Make SURE your priority is at idle, so that any CPU cylces the PC needs, it gets.

my WU times are usually only thrown off maybe 20 mins by working on my PC through the day, at worst.

 

[Geomagick]

I've run the CLI seti on PC's ranging from 333MHz P2 to Athlon 64 over 2.6 and P4 over 3.7 and they all work fine.

 

[Vee]

Originally posted by: rmrf
Is there something wrong with my computer, or do the AMD XP chips just suck for this kind of stuff? If I were to upgrade to an A64 chip, would this still be a problem?
TIA

Yes, there is definitely something wrong with your computer! More precisely with your OS. At least that's my premier guess.

CPU's doesn't "multitask" as some sometimes suggests. The OS's sheduler does this.
The only thing ht does is to squeeze more work out of the P4, AND compensate for flaws in some windows software, and for flaws in Windows ways of handling things... And it can do this if the OS' sheduler sends it two threads.

Yes, AXPs suck a tiny bit on SETI. But it doesn't interfere with anything else, nor is it noticable.
If you're running software that is properly programmed to do sustained work at low priority, like SETI, you will not see any difference in behavior between cpus with or without ht. Again: on an AthlonXP, or any other cpu, you will NOT notice SETI running.

The fact that you do, seem, to me, to be most likely to be caused by a screwed OS, or corrupt SETI.

The suggestion that this is a difference between AMD or Intel is disinformation, u BS. Neither do I think this is due to bad hardware.

How long have you had this XP2500+ ? Did you put it into a MB that previously held another class of socketA cpu, like Thunderbird or Duron? And did you not reinstall Windows?

Alternatively, your SETI install might be bad.

 

[rmrf]

I'm running the cli version, not the graphical version. I have had this proc for about 1 year. I bought it and the motherboard at the same time, so that shouldn't be a problem. I reinstalled as I got a new hard drive at the same time as well. I guess it's time to try another download of seti.

Thanks for all the replies.

 

[Vee]

Here's something interesting I just noticed.
I started nVidias 'Grace', just for some relaxing and music. And, somewhat alarmed, noted that it wasn't running as smoothly as usually. "- Oh-oh! my system is screwed someway!", I figured.

For some reason I came to think about this thread and that my SETI was running on the last WU. I transmitted and filled the cache, and behold: Grace was running smoothly again.

Weird! It suggests SETI might disturb the system more, when on the final WU.