RAC is an average taken over a period and to a formulae that SETI devised. So, it has meaning, when it has settled down.

Regarding the loss of Top RAC performing computers from the list because they don't have the minimum 290,000 cobblestones is just a time delay factor.

Those rigs heading to the top 100, dependent on how new they are to start, will suddenly re-enter the top 1000 within the next 1 to 2 months as they achieve the minimum number of cobblestones. That is unless the minimum number of cobblestones is not set to be a continuously rising figure? Anyone care to comment if it should be?

My top rig should be back at number 29 (or so) by about the third week of April!

I still think, that the Top 1000 should be measured by Total Credit. That is, after all, the sum of the contribution made to SETI by that computer.

RAC is good for measuring the recent health of a PC, but not necessarily achievement in totality.

I don't think there is any prescribed minimum number of credits. It is a starightforward listing of the TOP 1000 as measured by credit.

So yes, that minimum figure will rise, because most of top pc's have a high enough RAC, and they are constantly adding credits to the total.

The point here is there has been a change to the way the high RAC hosts are selected. Previously, RAC was RAC and TC was TC, just like the other projects. IOW, a RAC of less than 1 would never make the list regardless of how much credit it had. IIRC, a host had to have a RAC of well over 500 to even make the RAC list.

It should be pretty obvious that displaying hosts that haven't even produced a single result in almost 2 years as being one of the top 1000 short term producers, while requiring hosts that people have spent thousands of dollars or countless hours on tweaking to the max to crunch flat out for weeks to get past the "chaff" is utterly ridiculous.

Alinator

All is as it should be. No changes are required. You play the game by the rules that are in place when you take the court. End of line.
I am one who has spent much money and time chasing the RAC goal. It is just a sport for me. But the SCIENCE is why I came here.
The ultimate winner would be humankind if we find a kindred soul elsewhere in the universe as we know it who can communicate with us.
So quit bickering about how computers are ranked. Most points? Most points since last Tuesday? Most points in a leading role by a quad processor? Most points in a supporting role by a computer that should have been retired 2 years ago?
Gaaack.
It is what it is. Quit trying to reinvent the wheel.

Crunch on.

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

All is as it should be. No changes are required. You play the game by the rules that are in place when you take the court. End of line.
I am one who has spent much money and time chasing the RAC goal. It is just a sport for me. But the SCIENCE is why I came here.
The ultimate winner would be humankind if we find a kindred soul elsewhere in the universe as we know it who can communicate with us.
So quit bickering about how computers are ranked. Most points? Most points since last Tuesday? Most points in a leading role by a quad processor? Most points in a supporting role by a computer that should have been retired 2 years ago?
Gaaack.
It is what it is. Quit trying to reinvent the wheel.

Crunch on.

That's one viewpoint, and I'm not re-inventing the wheel the project is. If this change is intentional, then it smacks of solving a problem which didn't exist (the creative scripters/mergers?), and flies in the face of the logic of listing the top performing hosts on a short term basis.

What's next, change the TC listing to require the host is active or setting a RAC floor for it in order to display?

Alinator

All is as it should be. No changes are required. You play the game by the rules that are in place when you take the court. End of line.
I am one who has spent much money and time chasing the RAC goal. It is just a sport for me. But the SCIENCE is why I came here.
The ultimate winner would be humankind if we find a kindred soul elsewhere in the universe as we know it who can communicate with us.
So quit bickering about how computers are ranked. Most points? Most points since last Tuesday? Most points in a leading role by a quad processor? Most points in a supporting role by a computer that should have been retired 2 years ago?
Gaaack.
It is what it is. Quit trying to reinvent the wheel.

Crunch on.

That's one viewpoint, and I'm not re-inventing the wheel the project is. If this change is intentional, then it smacks of solving a problem which didn't exist (the creative scripters/mergers?), and flies in the face of the logic of listing the top performing hosts on a short term basis.

What's next, change the TC listing to require the host is active or setting a RAC floor for it in order to display?

Alinator

All I can say is when one of my rigs shows up in the 'Top 100" rankings, I am darn proud of it. I don't play games (other than OCing) with my numbers. No scripting, no scripting, no merging, etc., etc., etc.,......
Every point has been aquired by normal means by the work of a single computer crunching the numbers.
I don't need the rules to be changed to put a shine on what I have accomplished. And if I see a 2 core 1.2ghz rig showing a RAC of 20 quadrillion, I know what's going on. It don't buff my butt much.

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

The reason for some hosts showing RAC of 0.11 and being in the TOP 1000 is that the the default filter for the list is Total Credit and not RAC.

It's just that the default view presented on clicking the Top Computers list shows it by RAC.

So all hosts who don't make it to the TOP 1000 by Total Credit have been knocked off the list even though the RAC might be in the Top 1000.

Which once again, I think reinforces the fact that the RAC is a meaningless statistic.....;-)

RAC is an average taken over a period and to a formulae that SETI devised. So, it has meaning, when it has settled down.

Regarding the loss of Top RAC performing computers from the list because they don't have the minimum 290,000 cobblestones is just a time delay factor.

Those rigs heading to the top 100, dependent on how new they are to start, will suddenly re-enter the top 1000 within the next 1 to 2 months as they achieve the minimum number of cobblestones. That is unless the minimum number of cobblestones is not set to be a continuously rising figure? Anyone care to comment if it should be?

My top rig should be back at number 29 (or so) by about the third week of April!

Reading thru here I still don't understand why I am not listed. I have enough credits and RAC.

---

Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

Reading thru here I still don't understand why I am not listed. I have enough credits and RAC.

Based on when I scanned through the RAC list earlier today, it looks like your highest Total Credit host is still ~20K credits short of making the list.

<edit> Just scanned them again, and the current lowest tc on the list is 290457.

Alinator

At My current rate of progress in Boinc combined I may be in the Top 1000 in less than 6 days, I don't know where "who?" will be of course, But the frenchman(who?) will get higher I'd think. In Seti I'm already there as I'm in 594th place so far. Of course I'm closing on the "BORG" in Seti(581 right now). ;) And as to RAC Boinc stats displays It one way in there counters and on their website It's different, I don't know what is exactly going on, As It may be some sort of delay, As I've noticed that as the combined went down some, Seti went up some too, So maybe It will get to where It needs to be eventually.

Edit: Me I don't worry too much about RAC either(It is interesting though), I do use It as a partial barometer as to how good My PCs are doing, But that's It, Crunch away all.

---

The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

All is as it should be. No changes are required. You play the game by the rules that are in place when you take the court. End of line.
I am one who has spent much money and time chasing the RAC goal. It is just a sport for me. But the SCIENCE is why I came here.
The ultimate winner would be humankind if we find a kindred soul elsewhere in the universe as we know it who can communicate with us.
So quit bickering about how computers are ranked. Most points? Most points since last Tuesday? Most points in a leading role by a quad processor? Most points in a supporting role by a computer that should have been retired 2 years ago?
Gaaack.
It is what it is. Quit trying to reinvent the wheel.

Crunch on.

Well said...I endorse your view very happily !

---

The point here is: There has been a recent change to the logic for the Top Computers.

Why? And why no announcement? Why continued silence from the moderators/powers that be?

It is intentional? A mistake?

If it is intentional, there needs to be a legend or *something* on the Top Computers pages that explains how to read it. Because it is no longer the "Top Computers by RAC". It's now something more like "Top Computers that meet an arbitrary minimum credit threshold that is undisclosed."

---

Dublin, California
Team: SETI.USA

Reading thru here I still don't understand why I am not listed. I have enough credits and RAC.

Based on when I scanned through the RAC list earlier today, it looks like your highest Total Credit host is still ~20K credits short of making the list.

<edit> Just scanned them again, and the current lowest tc on the list is 290457.

Alinator

DUH...Now I see, sometimes I am a bit slow...

---

Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

The point here is: There has been a recent change to the logic for the Top Computers.

Why? And why no announcement? Why continued silence from the moderators/powers that be?

It is intentional? A mistake?

If it is intentional, there needs to be a legend or *something* on the Top Computers pages that explains how to read it. Because it is no longer the "Top Computers by RAC". It's now something more like "Top Computers that meet an arbitrary minimum credit threshold that is undisclosed."

Well said...I endorse your view very happily !

The truth is gents, that many people seem to crunch SETI for the stats, instead of the science. Doesn't really matter, Seti benefits whatever.

---

Not only is the Top Computer list a bit weird....

... this may just be me.... though the rest of the forum pages are fine...

... the links on the top computers list page are in a language that isn't English.... Eastern European at a guess...

Me thinks there's some corruption on those pages ;)

/edit
I meant links, not column headings....

---

The truth is gents, that many people seem to crunch SETI for the stats, instead of the science. Doesn't really matter, Seti benefits whatever.

If it were not for the competition of Stats there would be no where near the amount of science being done. I have a couple machines that have no reason to even run other than for my stats and Seti. People say "Oh you are a credit whore" Well I do more for science than most of the people that complain about me...And yes I want my STATS!

---

Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

The truth is gents, that many people seem to crunch SETI for the stats, instead of the science. Doesn't really matter, Seti benefits whatever.

If it were not for the competition of Stats there would be no where near the amount of science being done.

The baby crunchers are doing more than the super crunchers.

The bottom 90% produces more results/credit/science than the top 10%.

So what is the competition accomplishing?

Hey, if you’re into credits, you’re into it.

Yes, science is getting done either way, *I think*, have not seen that lately?

Just remember more credits/results/science is being returned by the masses, than the few super crunchers combined!

I just spent the last two and a half months trying to get my AMD X2 to qualify in the top 1,000 RAC performers so I could hang out with the other AMD X2 owners like hiamps and tapir. I made it in about a week ago and now I've just been kicked out. If nothing changes, it's going to take me at least 151 days to re-qualify. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a poor sport but I've suddenly lost interest in the extra fan noise my system is creating and the extra electricity it draws. A lot of the fun from this challenge is gone (at least for the next 5 months). I really hope this is an accidental configuration change and will be put to rights at some point. If it's not, I won't stop crunching but I will probably set my system back to stock and go on with life as a non-member of the top performing system club.

---

The truth is gents, that many people seem to crunch SETI for the stats, instead of the science. Doesn't really matter, Seti benefits whatever.

If it were not for the competition of Stats there would be no where near the amount of science being done.

The baby crunchers are doing more than the super crunchers.

The bottom 90% produces more results/credit/science than the top 10%.

So what is the competition accomplishing?

Hey, if you’re into credits, you’re into it.

Yes, science is getting done either way, *I think*, have not seen that lately?

Just remember more credits/results/science is being returned by the masses, than the few super crunchers combined!

Good observation, and very true. Although a few of us have fun playing around vying for top computer stats, the vast majority of participants are not out there buying the latest technology, the fastest processor, or overclocking their computer to the max just to squeeze out a few more points per day.
They are participating the way that Seti first started out. Running in the background, contributing computer time that would otherwise be wasted. And there are far, far more of them than the few at the top!

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

How is this person a top performer? He no longer even runs Seti...This is why the current system doesn't seem fair to me. Top performers should at least be actively running seti still.

Rank User RAC TOTAL
897 peser 0.07 1,177,804.88 Germany 10 Aug 2005 12:45:15 UTC

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Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

Perhaps the management will enlighten us with the 'enhanced' criteria being used for the 'Top Computers' rankings. Then at least all would know what the rules are and it would clear up any misunderstanding about the ranking listings.

---

"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

Isn't the main problem with this 'new' system, that if you were to build a new computer today which has an RAC of 10,000, it would not appear in the Top Computer listings for 30+ days and then suddenly it would be numero uno.

Andy