Action report:
The ASUS card doesn’t support my monitor at 1920x1080. Also, you apparently need a 2nd monitor or dummy plug attached to an unused display adapter to use it for folding. So the ASUS card is out unless I can locate an updated driver. I tried the ATI drivers a while ago, and I don’t recall the problem, but they didn’t work well. You mention the ATI 185 driver, do you have an ASUS card?
I installed the GPU client on the onboard video alongside the SMP client. It looks like the GPU is running about 200 ppd based on 1% finished.
I was wrong about choosing the number of cores running for SMP, the command line parameter I entered that I thought was doing this was being ignored and all 4 cores run. I changed the CPU usage to 75%, but it still runs 4 cores, but not as hard.
I am going to try installing the SMP as a service when my current WU finishes. I don’t want to lose a days work. The GPU is installed as a service, but I wanted to finsh this note before rebooting and testing it.
The need for a dummy plus is a problem, but being in the business I have a garage full of ... last year's equipment. I never even paid it any attention.
The low ppd on the ASUS is probably due to not having a CPU core that will keep it fed. Being a motherboard chip, it may not hit the higher numbers of a dedicated GPU card, but it should be better than that.
I like your idea to reinstall as a service and keep running SMP. If you are going to get a better GPU card it will cost $100+, for a decent folding card.