Posted on 06/10/2012 9:00:28 PM PDT by texas booster
It has been a while since our last Free Republic Folding@Home update.
The team has seen growth in the past couple of years as contributors have added high performance GPUs from NVidia and AMD/ATI, and same consoles such as the PS3.
The team started in 2001 with a few volunteers, and grew dramatically in 2005 as we started actually posting regular threads.
As we grew from a Top 2000 team to a Top 100 team, we attracted the attention of DU. After a couple of years of name calling, they realized that merely boasting that you can beat the opposition means nothing if you can't back it up. They float in the Top 300 due to the strength of two primary folders. Still, they have folded for nearly 8 years and we thank them for that.
Today the FR team 36120 folds about 330 individual computers, down from our peak of about 1,800 systems. However, the team is currently averaging 250,000 ppd, many times greater than we have ever accomplished.
If you have a computer running Windows, Linux or OS X, or a PS3, then you can start folding very quickly. Look here for starting instructions:
Why would you fold? There are multiple distributed computing groups searching for everything from cryptography to SETI. I started folding after helping in the original Genome@Home project, as scientists worked to complete the first sequencing of the human genome.
Now I fold to advance the science of treating diseases. A partial list of diseases that the project has worked on include:
Alzheimer's Disease
Mad Cow (BSE)
CJD
ALS
Huntington's Disease
Parkinson's Disease
and many cancers
When I was younger I thought that I could help find a cure for my parents' diseases. Now I fold to find a cure for the diseases that currently or may inflict me, and one day may inflict my children.
Read the thread and PLEASE ask questions. I will try to answer all questions that are posted.
Tuesday I head over to InfoCOMM 2012, so if some of the other folders can help out I would really appreciate it.
If we could reach 100 active folders and 1000 systems, we would see our output double. While we fold to cure diseases, a race to the top is always fun.
BTTT
I recently broke into the top 100 list of the group! My HP desktop running Windows 7 folds 24/7, and I just starting folding on the wife’s old laptop with Ubuntu Linux.
Actually, I just found my forgotten name on this list: http://vspx27.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/main.py?qtype=teampage&teamnum=36120
OK, I’m back up and running under my FR name. However, my system has changed: I’m now Win 7 (x86 version) instead of XP. I find that FAH is bogging down Firefox (so I assume it’s bogging down everything) because it’s not bogged down when I pause FAH. What setting do you think I need to diddle with?
Thanks for the update. I stopped a while back when a new version of the client started acting up. Maybe it’s about time to check the latest version and see how it works out.
Texas, thanks for taking your time posting this, I’ve been Folding steadily, but I was starting to think about deleting FAH from my machines.
I have never gotten the GPU Folder to work, my video cards just aren’t powerful enough to make a real difference and I never could get the GPU Folder to run as a service.
I’ve still managed to accumulate 5M+ points using the CPU Folders on 3 machines. The last time I looked at my score, it was somewhere over 2M.
I probably should look to see if there have been improvements or changes to the setup that I should incorporate.
I’ve never had F@H bog down even the slowest machine. There may be some other settings to check. I have had a couple of machines that would overheat at 100% of CPU that required some limits.
In general, in setup you can limit the percentage of CPU time or the number of cores to use on a multicore machine.
Its been a while since I did it, maybe others could chime in with more help. If we knew a little about your setup, it would be easier to give precise answers.
I’m still folding! Have moved up from 127 to 86 in our team.
It’s kind of fun to participate as I did in SETI at home. Other then wasting electricity anybody document any of these projects accomplishing anything worhwhile?
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core Processor
From FAH’s “System Info” tab
Memory: 2.00 GiB
Free memory: 901.86MiB
Opened programs are quite bogged down until I pause FAH. Then, everything returns to normal.
“Did you ever get a new video card from NVidia or ATI?”
Nope, last time I tried, (a couple of years ago), the card fried the motherboard (or CPU, don’t know which). Had to get a new system which is folding fine - not gonna try messin’ with it, lol.
Haven’t seen you on the state board in a long time. Maybe you could get a few more folders there.
FReegards,
RT
I forgot:
My video card is NVidia GeForce 9500 GT
The F@H team is working to rewrite the code to make it faster. I stuck a cheaper NVidia into an old system and it pumps out a few hundred points per day.
Wait about 4 months and you may get to reinstall it all, for a decent speed boost.
While SETI was fun, the goals of F@H are more modest - push the boundaries of biomedical science in a real and tangible way.
The link above has a list of the 96 currently published peer-reviewed papers.
At some point, each person makes their choice about the balance between their electric bill and folding.
I will gladly donate $10 per month in power if one day I know that my efforts helped save someone’s loved one.
Try lowering the utilization percentage for F@H to 70% or so.
I now run only the console version. It hides itself and I don't even notice it - and I am running 7 independent F@H cores.
The only time I ever see a conflict is when I play certain old games that need a DOSbox. Then I pause the GPU folding.
If you go to F@H's site you'll find more info, such as the following:
Go browse around - you can also grab the latest client for your system at the site.
Happy Folding!
Thanks for the info.
I try to hit the Folding Forum every so often, but can get lost there digging through the voluminous info they’ve culled from around the world. It truly is a world-wide undertaking. Cheers.
I’m using FAH version 7.1.52 that I just downloaded.
Strange: After running 20%+ of the units on both cores, everything is suddenly now normal. No lag. Crazy. Problem solved, I guess. I hope.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.