SPCR Folds Team Blog

ryboto · Post by **ryboto** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 5:45 am

I wish I got some notice! I broke 500,000 a while back, when I had some cluster computers folding for me. They reformat them every semester, so I lost 30+ computers....anyone think I should go install a few clients after winter break?

Post by **NeilBlanchard** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 6:06 am

Hello,

As long as you has permission -- please go for it!

ryboto · Post by **ryboto** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 6:24 am

NeilBlanchard wrote:Hello,

As long as you has permission -- please go for it!

hmm...permission you say...well...they gave their employees admin privileges to install software, never had me sign any agreements. I guess permission would be nice, maybe I'll present the idea to the supervisor. They've got core2's for word processing, untapped power! Then again, it would mean I'd have to go to the clusters and install the clients...not sure when I'd have the time.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 7:38 am

ryboto wrote:I wish I got some notice! I broke 500,000 a while back, when I had some cluster computers folding for me. They reformat them every semester, so I lost 30+ computers....anyone think I should go install a few clients after winter break?

No disrespect meant or intended. Of course people pass milestones all the time, I just thought I would post the "current news" to see if people liked it.

Frankly you've been kicking ass for quite some time. You didn't get to position 21 on a wing and a prayer. You surpassed 3000 WUs and you're just shy of 3/4 of a million points.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 7:42 am

ryboto wrote:I wish I got some notice! I broke 500,000 a while back, when I had some cluster computers folding for me. They reformat them every semester, so I lost 30+ computers....anyone think I should go install a few clients after winter break?

If you're expected to stress test servers with a program like Prime95 then what difference would it make to them exactly which program you used for stress testing? This is what VG30ET did, he got 1 million points in 4 months (he had one month at 377,000 points) and then he stopped.

I saw you on the top 20, you can't fool me.

ryboto · Post by **ryboto** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 10:20 am

aristide1 wrote:
No disrespect meant or intended. Of course people pass milestones all the time, I just thought I would post the "current news" to see if people liked it.

Frankly you've been kicking ass for quite some time. You didn't get to position 21 on a wing and a prayer. You surpassed 3000 WUs and you're just shy of 3/4 of a million points.

Well, to be honest, I'm not really kicking ass anymore. I've only got two dedicated SMP machines, my own, and a lab pc. A family pc is folding with the ancient console client, as is an old P4 in the lab. Jon, a friend I helped assemble a Q6600 system for, he'll randomly complete a WU for me, that's why it shows 5 active processors. I really wish I had the money to get a second dedicated low power folding system, but I can't right now. Everyone's going to pass me soon, I was at the 18th position once, but ever since I lost those cluster machines, and everyone's upgraded to quad cores or some other core 2 I've been eating WU dust. I'll get a slight increase though, as another classmate has told me he'll fold nightly with my username for our team with his PS3. It's good to see more active users though, we need to regain some of the ground we've lost to the other teams.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 1:11 pm

Ryboto,

This business of who's in the top 20 or ranking high on the charts should be in good fun only.

I think credit is due for people who have folded constantly, even at a mere 40 points per day or less, for years on end. Some of us are cranking points like crazy with just a couple of dual cores, that in no way invalidates all the single core processors.

If we could list all folders by expenditure ($ spent on hardware and electricity), instead of points, the ranking would look very different.

It's not worth much, but if you make use of a 1.2GHz Pentium III Tualatin and 2*256MB of PC 133 I'd be happy to send it to you.

ryboto · Post by **ryboto** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 7:17 pm

aristide1 wrote:Ryboto,

This business of who's in the top 20 or ranking high on the charts should be in good fun only.

I think credit is due for people who have folded constantly, even at a mere 40 points per day or less, for years on end. Some of us are cranking points like crazy with just a couple of dual cores, that in no way invalidates all the single core processors.

If we could list all folders by expenditure ($ spent on hardware and electricity), instead of points, the ranking would look very different.

It's not worth much, but if you make use of a 1.2GHz Pentium III Tualatin and 2*256MB of PC 133 I'd be happy to send it to you.

I consider it all good fun as well, I mean, I don't have any idea how the results are helping progress at Stanford, I just don't see the point in wasting power in idle.

Are you offering to send me a computer?? I had a Pentium 2 folding, but it would take forever to complete a WU, so I just turned it off, maybe I'll turn it on again, who knows it might actually complete something before the deadline(50 days is it? I can't remember).

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 8:11 pm

Right now just a CPU and RAMM. PIII mobos are like $40. I don't think it's worth it.

I would not fold with a Pentium II.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 7:27 am

Well that didn't go as well as I had hoped. I had purchased my Intel PC with a C2D E6400 for the specific purpose of OCing and folding. The CPU has a Tuniq Tower and there are small added heatsinks, most aluminum but a couple of Swiftech copper jobs that surprised me with their effectiveness, often worth 20C on a regulator.

So I overclocked the thing straight from a 266 MHz FSB to 333, to resolve that northbridge divider frequency issue and keep as much of the motherboard as close to stock speeds as possible.

That was a good increase. Checkpoints dropped from like 22.5 minutes to 16.5 minutes. 1760 WUs dropped from about 38 hours to 27 hours. Wow. I left it like that for a while, and I didn't apply it until it got plenty cold in the apartment.

Now the Asus NB heatsink runs plenty hot. It has multi-fins, but really cool is the middle fin has a "T" top. So I attached 2 copper heat sinks on top of it right there. All the added cooling goes directly to the center of the heatsink. The tower case is now laying on it's side until the thermal tape gets comfortable and attaches well.

An hour later I rebooted. I set the CPU to 1.375, which shows about 1.36 volts on CPU-Z. I set the FSB for 401 (not sure whether the divider actually switches at 400 or higher than 400). Memory is running synch, so it's not OCd at all. I rebooted and it came up in a hurry. CPU-Z showed all the correct numbers, the 2.13GHz processor is now running at 3.2GHz. I downloaded MemSet in a hope to set the command rate to 1, but the setting was not available.

I started FAH and waited. CoreTemp settled down with both cores in the mid 50C range, occasionally core 1 reached 57C briefly and came down. The northbridge with the added heat sinks was now 2C cooler at the higher speed. The case is small and crammed with cables, so it needs to be transferred to the larger case I am modding at this time. Core temps at 333 FSB hovered around 51/53.

But, checkpoints dropped to only 14 minutes 20 seconds. It was not the kind of gain I had hoped for. I did reach 2 goals.
1. The 400 FSB
2. About 1 WU per day.

Added- I had hoped for more than a 2 minutes per checkpoint gain.

No wattage ratings right now, I will take them later. To be fair when I jumped to the 333MHz FSB I saw my memory was running CAS 6 and switched it to CAS 4, I don't know how much of the increase was caused by that change, but I also synched it, so it changed from DDR2-800 CAS 6 to DDR2-667 CAS 4. Overall I may complete 1 additional WU per week.

I suspect I will throttle down during the summer months, the added speed is not worth overheating, but it will depend on temps in the larger case. The neat part is the cost of the extra NB cooling was a whopping $4.

Update from a review of an MSI motherboard on Anandtech.
Bold and emphasis added by me, and could explain why the latest increase in FSB wasn't worth as much.

The problem is that once we started to raise the FSB over 445 with the Q6600 or QX6850 processors, the board automatically (drastically) reduced chipset timings and memory sub-timings. We have noticed this occurring on a couple of other budget level P35 boards and figure the manufacturer is trying to save the board - or maybe reach artificially high FSB rates with quad-core CPUs. We feel that the FSB rates are deceiving, as most boards have to compensate for higher FSB rates with increased strap settings and looser chipset/memory timings. When comparing application results during overclocking testing with the 8x465 and 9x415 results, we noticed a 3%-6% difference in memory sensitive benchmarks after compensating for the slightly higher CPU speeds in the 9x415 setting. Our advice on this board is to run lower FSB rates at higher multipliers with quad-core in order to maximize performance.

From this page:
http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=3169&p=5

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 7:53 am

Brisbane X2 4000+ | TR HR-01 Plus | Abit AN-M2 | Lian Li A05 S-Flex/Marathon | X1950 Pro w/HR-03 | 400W FSP Zen

Ryboto,

My AMD X2 4000+ differs somewhat:

1. Biostar TForce 6100, now out of production, runs Ubuntu.
2. Seasonic 300 watt APFC.
3. Zalman butterfly NB cooler, worth 20C.
4. Small heatsinks on really hot VRMs
5. Sound, CnQ, sleep modes, all disabled (strictly a folder).

The SB is hot with no airflow, as hot as the NB(stock NB cooler), but cools off considerably with it. 2 Yate loons are blowing air front to back. BIOS reports cpu temp 17C, but 37C is more like it at idle. Stock cpu hs barely gets warm. FSB is set to 230. Voltage is down to 1.25. Uses 95 watts while folding.

Chose the Biostar over the Abit for 3 reasons:
1. Solid state caps
2. The 2.2 volt VDIMM jumper.
3. Runs Ubuntu
I'm assuming both board have plenty of OC options.

ryboto · Post by **ryboto** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 8:56 am

aristide1 wrote: Ryboto,

My AMD X2 4000+ differs somewhat:

1. Biostar TForce 6100, now out of production, runs Ubuntu.
2. Seasonic 300 watt APFC.
3. Zalman butterfly NB cooler, worth 20C.
4. Small heatsinks on really hot VRMs
5. Sound, CnQ, sleep modes, all disabled (strictly a folder).

The SB is hot with no airflow, as hot as the NB(stock NB cooler), but cools off considerably with it. 2 Yate loons are blowing air front to back. BIOS reports cpu temp 17C, but 37C is more like it at idle. Stock cpu hs barely gets warm. FSB is set to 230. Voltage is down to 1.25. Uses 95 watts while folding.

Chose the Biostar over the Abit for 3 reasons:
1. Solid state caps
2. The 2.2 volt VDIMM jumper.
3. Runs Ubuntu
I'm assuming both board have plenty of OC options.

The abit doesn't have much overclocking ability, but I wanted undervolting(which it can't really do either, but the 7025 chipset is supposedly low power), and I also liked the Abit's features, which is why I chose it. It uses 108W from the wall while folding. It's undervolted to 1.00v at 2.0ghz. I'd run it at 2.1ghz, but I'd have to decrease ram speed. I may go back to 2.1ghz 1.031v, and DDR2-700, I'll have to do a benchmark or two. I figure if I removed the video card my load draw would drop ~30W. I'll probably be upgrading to an HD 3870 and load draw should decrease while folding due to the reduced power state of the card at idle. The system runs ubuntu fine from an external WD drive, but I have yet to find the time to experiment with undervolting in ubuntu. I haven't tried overclocking because not only would it increase power draw, I'm cooling the CPU passively, with only two fans in the whole system. Ideally, I'd upgrade to a new system, and keep 2gb, the cpu, motherboard, and a single 2.5'' hard drive and make a dedicated low power folder with the X2 4000. That probably wont happen until I can purchase a 45W quad core. Trying to keep the system power draw with full load CPU at or under 100W.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 10:09 am

Ryboto NewEgg lists AMD quad cores as "95 watts".

Close enough?

ryboto · Post by **ryboto** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 10:43 am

aristide1 wrote:Ryboto NewEgg lists AMD quad cores as "95 watts".

Close enough?

not yet! Maybe if we see 65W quad cores they could be undervolted to be around 45-50W.

Wibla · Post by **Wibla** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 2:17 pm

Abit OT...

I had managed to put the noctua 120mm in the front of the hdd's in my antec solo the wrong way, so it was trying to exhaust.. no wonder I had temps in the 40-42C range, and the cpu fan was struggling with not enough fresh air...

Code: Select all

before:
titan:~# hddtemp /dev/sda /dev/sdb
/dev/sda: ST3160023AS: 41Â°C
/dev/sdb: ST3160023AS: 40Â°C

after:
titan:~# hddtemp /dev/sda /dev/sdb
/dev/sda: ST3160023AS: 33Â°C
/dev/sdb: ST3160023AS: 38Â°C

Also, I put in a new Nexus PHT-7750 SkiveTekÂ® Cooler today, and it works very well from what I can see - I cant hear the cooler from where I sit when folding, which I could before... crappy oem coolers.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 4:05 pm

Wibla, all copper. Yummy.

Myth! · Post by **Myth!** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 7:15 pm

just wanted to say YAYYYYY!! hit page one of stats at last

Myth! · Post by **Myth!** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 7:23 pm

Aris, was reading your OC post. Was the anandtech test just talking about quad cores? Also, you started your post saying it didn't go as well as expected, but didnt mention which goals you didnt acheive. On a side note, a guy from OCZ recommended me not using SPD or EPP profiles with my Asus striker mobo and setting the RAM parameters manually. Not sure if its just the striker that is giving problems or all Asus bioses

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 7:53 pm

I updated it in bold.

Myth! · Post by **Myth!** » Thu Dec 06, 2007 10:40 pm

looks like you gained 2min10 secs per frame to me

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Fri Dec 07, 2007 3:13 pm

At 333 FSB I noted some minor quirks, Windows Update didn't work. Thought it was a program bug until I noticed it worked at stock speeds.
At 400 FSB Bit Defender A/V has problems. I'm going to up some voltages and see if that resolves it, but other wise I need to consider going back to 333.

This is nonsense. My past OC efforts, though minor, had no issues. Part of that was I never asked the motherboard and memory to run at higher speeds, only the cpu. So next time I hope to drop a quad core with a 266MHz FSB onto a motherboard designed to run at 333MHz and go from there. Running a 200 FSB cpu at 266 FSB should be a piece of cake. I'm going to continue to look for ways to lower temps, as I dont want to slow down during the summer months. Lapping, attaching heats sinks to heat sinks, putting thermal compound inside the base of the Tuniq Tower, strategically placed fans, etc.

What are your thoughts of temps in the upper 50's centigrade??

Myth! · Post by **Myth!** » Fri Dec 07, 2007 8:49 pm

am running mine at 60c via speedfan right now (runs at 50c with 100% fans). It might shorten the life of the cpu by 20% but I still think I'll have moved on to a newer chip before it cooks.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Fri Dec 07, 2007 9:29 pm

Myth! wrote:just wanted to say YAYYYYY!! hit page one of stats at last

Almost forgot to say congratulations.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Fri Dec 07, 2007 9:32 pm

Need dual channel memory cheap?

NewEgg is doing the special even better.

Crucial DDR2-667 2*512MB CAS 3 for $15 after rebate, free shipping.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6820146568

Yes I posted it in the deal section as well.

Sue me!

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Sat Dec 08, 2007 11:21 am

aristide1 wrote:
Myth! wrote:just wanted to say YAYYYYY!! hit page one of stats at last
Almost forgot to say congratulations.

You too Whiic!

Myth! · Post by **Myth!** » Sat Dec 08, 2007 9:14 pm

why thank you kind sir.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Mon Dec 10, 2007 4:54 pm

Color codes over at
http://folding.extremeoverclocking.com/ ... s=&t=31574
have changed as follows:

Color codes:
0 gray / <--- Is this you? You should fix that.

1+ black /
100+ purple /
200+ green /
400+ blue, was 200 /
800+ green, was 400 /
1.5k+ orange, was 800 /
3k+ dark red, was 1200 /
6k+ bright red, was 1600

I recall several times when all of the top 20 was bright red, but occasionally the dark red was also on the front page.

When I restarted a while back there were greens on the top 20.

No offense adrianhensler, you're green under the new system.

You can see the old colors on the bottom right in the production group totals box, which they forgot(?) to update.

FGump is in position #85 with just 124 WUs completed.

He's just 3000 point shy of the guy in front of him who completed 4257 WUs!

Dualies rock! OK, quads rock more.

We're 90K per day, anybody care to make it 100?
I do, I'm putting together another X2 dualy tonight.

Congrats Cruiserman, Kurt-spare, UberSprite to the 100K milestone.
RyamanXP and dryfire to the 200K
Bolek and Viking to the 400K, in front of me,

Hortalonus to the 500K,
ARM_Systems:_Home_of_the_StealthPC to the 600K,
Did we mention VikingDude at 800K before?

And all the little guys that I am too lazy to type out.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Wed Dec 12, 2007 5:28 pm

Wow, had my new X2 dualie up and folding. OS is W2K with all updates. DDR2-667 memory was running at DDR2-800. Decided to up the FSB 10 MHz, and BOOM!

I reboot and it starts rebooting constantly. I load the BIOS defaults, and its the same thing. I get out the W2K CD and I run the repair but no help.

There was a lot of useless software on the thing anyway, so I decided to go the FORMAT C:\ route.

Somebody reminded me why I do ths again. I need it right about now.

Post by **NeilBlanchard** » Wed Dec 12, 2007 6:45 pm

Hello,

I've found that F@H will "detect" memory errors as well as x86MemTest -- in fact better. You cannot run it to the ragged edge. This machine was perfectly stable otherwise, with 4GB DDR400, but F@H only "lets" me run it at DDR333...I hate to say it, but I should drop back to 2GB and see if it runs at DDR400.

aristide1 · Post by **aristide1** » Wed Dec 12, 2007 7:00 pm

NeilBlanchard wrote:Hello,

I've found that F@H will "detect" memory errors as well as x86MemTest -- in fact better. You cannot run it to the ragged edge. This machine was perfectly stable otherwise, with 4GB DDR400, but F@H only "lets" me run it at DDR333...I hate to say it, but I should drop back to 2GB and see if it runs at DDR400.

If FAH is your priority then why bother over 2GB of memory?
Otherwise, never mind.