Folding@Home - Turning Up the Speed!

Departments of Chemistry and of Structural Biology, Stanford University ^ | August 4, 2008 | Dr Vijay Pande

[texas booster]

With the 6.20 (classic & GPU) and 6.22 (SMP) clients out, we (Dr. Pande and the F@H team) can start looking forward to the next steps in client development. We still have some last bits of work to completely unify the clients, but the hard part is already completed there for the most part.

The 6.2x series introduces several new features for donors, but in time, the clients have been getting gradually more and more complex to use. The Win/SMP and multi-gpu setups are examples of very challenging setups. Our primary plans for the future are to make setup much easier, especially for the very challenging clients (Win/SMP, multi-gpu). Our dream client install would be a single installer that would install either the classic, SMP, or GPU client based on donor choices during the install process, and the installer would take care of complex install situations (such as multi-gpu).

It may take a while to get to a client installer like that. In the mean time, we are looking to improve our installation instructions to make the process easier with existing clients.

We have spent a lot of effort developing these new clients and putting all of our effort into getting them to run well (the GPU2 client/core has gotten a great deal of effort, which has paid off in the transition from GPU1 to GPU2). It's now time to concentrate on usability and ease of installation.

Our hope is that with this completed, we will have a very advanced set of clients, but with very easy installation. That's easier said than done, but that's where we're headed.

[Cold Heat]

Yeah, the rates are not the worst, but after Katrina, Entergy went way up on the cost. My usage for F&H with 5 to 6 computers was about 80 bucks per month or so.

[wideminded]

"What was called the protein-folding problem 20 years ago is solved", says Peter Wolynes, a chemist and protein folding expert at the University of California, San Diego.

"Most researchers won't go quite that far. David Baker of the University of Washington, Seattle, believes that such notions are "dangerous" and could undermine interest in the field. But all agree that long standing obstacles are beginning to fall."

- August 8th issue of Science, p. 784.

[steve86]

My goodness! I’ll have to double check my usage with a kill-a-watt meter.

My overall electrical bill for a summer month is about $130 and it’s 103 here today. No GPUs, though lol

[texas booster]

You once posted a thread about a young boy named Dylan who contracted cancer. That one thread allowed the techie dozen of us that provided help to post for months, effortlessly.

It is too easy to fold just for the points and lose sight of why we fold - to cure diseases that afflict our parents, our children and our neighbors.

Are any of your old buddies from the truckers forum still folding?

[texas booster]

Thank you for your contributions.

F@H seems to add about $50 per month to my budget, but air conditioning is a much larger factor in my bill than keeping 7 computers running 24/7, most of which would run almost 24/7 any ways.

One does not need to keep the computers running 24/7, but it does help out the point total. We have over 100 folders that loaded the software and then just let it run when they are surfing. Not as many points, but still an awful lot of science getting done.

Please consider rejoining when you get your next system. I bumped from a Pentium D to a dual core and found that my power consumption went down.

You will also notice that we talk about points per watt, when in the old days of 5 cent electricity we promoted points per dollar of system.

If you energy bill is going to jump a lot, then run us in the winter!

[Drango]

Well I’ve got a lot of reading to do...my NEW system is a Dell XPS One with a core 2 duo E6550 (2.33 ghz)and an ATI 2400, but only 256mb, which may be too small to fold with the GPU. Not the fastest machine around but it should do OK, if I download the right client and configure it correctly.

[Egon]

My shameless self-promotion for this thread:

If you're interested in tracking your folding machine(s) over the web, please Freepmail me or follow the links below.

Available features include:

• Timely snapshot of each machine's progress on it's current project
• Point values for project
• Estimated completion dates/times
• Warning indicators for machines that appear to have stopped communicating or folding
• Warnings for machines that won't make their deadline
• Team ranking status box (courtesy of EOC)
• Machine stats like PPD (points per day)
• Project comparison stats: PPD, average time taken to completion, etc.
• It's free-- and always will be
• ...other features as time permits, and people request

Links

• Team Page
• Instructions

Please Freepmail me with any questions.

[Cold Heat]

If gas stays down, and I get my hospital bills paid off, I'll take a look. I am sure that DLTV misses my input. I was quite a ways up the rankings, around #240 or so. Been doin it for a while. My quad, a duo and a couple fast singles were putting them out. Plus I had a couple more junkers and a laptop.

Interesting stuff, but I had to get my power bill and all else back to budget for a year or so. Then I start saving for my next cruise.

Good project. hope something big comes from it. Real big.

[texas booster]

I don't have a subscription to Science so I will miss some of his contentions.

We mostly understand how a protein is folded, and even are starting to see into the "why" a protein is folded.

There is an enormous gap into being able to model a protein and its interactions with other materials. Proteins operate very differently in the presence of water than when it is not present.

An earlier folding problem looked at the delivery of medicine by nanotube. Normal biochemical modeling does not take into account the motion of each atom in water, e.g. F@H calculations showed that standard modeling was not detailed enough to be able to accurately predict the results without these interactions.

Proteins seem to randomly vibrate (Brownian motion) for a long time, then everything lines up and the protein folds into a new shape. How a particular energy level is reached that triggers folding into a new energy level is a prime concern of the latest research.

Thankfully, research is starting to give us answers to old questions, while also providing new questions for the mill.

[texas booster]

When you do restart please toss a system (or all 6) our way. You will quickly climb the ranks past #269 on our team.

DL.TV - like they are going to vote conservative!

[Cold Heat]

LOL!

I'll think about it......:-)

[texas booster]

Points per day on ATI video cards, as of earlier this week:

[texas booster]

Points per watt for various ATI cards:

[Ancient Drive]

yeah.. I have a 450 Watts PSU. I believe that should be enough. I don’t run a lot of peripherals.

[texas booster]

So the choice seems to be to pull your HD2400 and give it to your kids or neighbors, and buy an HD3650.

Even better if Dell will sell you an upgraded card before delivery.

I use the HD2400 on one system. It's a Vista unit and I still haven't had time to set it up the way it was under XP.

Look at running the SMP console on your system. Will provide the most bang for buck without the faster GPUs. Don't run both.

Dealing with folding and Vista making me consider a M*c.

[texas booster]

As long as its not a Lucas power supply!

Lucas Electrics - destroying the British automobile industry one car fire at a time.

[Drango]

The Dell XPS One isn't upgradeable....It's eyecandy for the home office. Essentially underpowered and overpriced but it's sweeeeeet to look at.

[texas booster]

Wow, a Dell iMac...

[BellStar]

FOLDING PING!

[texas booster]

Always good to have new folders.

Please ping if you need any assistance.