Gravity (Jun 09 2011)

So bruno (the upload server) has been having fits. Basically an arbitrary CPU locks up. I'm hoping this is more of a kernel/software issue than hardware, and will clear up on its own. In the meantime, we did get it on a remote power strip so we can kick it from home without having to come to the lab.

As for thumper we replaced the correct DIMMs this time around on Tuesday. But then it crashed last night! So there was some cleanup this morning, then re-replacing the DIMMs with the originals, and then coming to terms with the fact that the most likely scenario is that those replacement DIMMs were actually DOA. So we're back to square one on that front, hoping for no uncorrectable memory errors until the next step.

In better news we moved some assimilator processes to synergy and were pleasantly surprised how much faster they ran. In fact, we are running the scientific analysis code now which has been causing the assimilators to back up, but they aren't. That's nice. Really nice, actually. [EDIT: I might have spoken too soon on this front - not so nice.]

Still trying to hash out the next phase for the NTPCkr and how to present all this to the public. We're doing a bunch of in-house analysis ourselves just to get a feel for the data and clean up junk, and as expected most of the "interesting" stuff is turning out to be RFI. We want to get it to a point where we're presenting people with candidates that contain signals which aren't always obvious RFI. That would be boring and useless.

- Matt
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-- BOINC/SETI@home network/web/science/development person
-- "Any idiot can have a good idea. What is hard is to do it." - Jeanne-Claude

Matt, thanks for the news!


- Best regards! - Sutaru Tsureku, team seti.international founder. - Optimize your PC for higher RAC. - SETI@home needs your help. -
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>Das Deutsche Cafe. The German Cafe.<

Thanks for the update Matt,

Any chance of Seti Beta being brought online?

Claggy

Thanks too Matt,

Claggy

Memory incompatibility is rampant these days. Did you check the sticks with Memtest86+ yet?

Usually, a BIOS upgrade fixes incompatibility issues, but not all the time.
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What if Fiction was Fact and Fact was Fiction and vice versa?

Thanks for the update Matt. Good luck on the DOA sticks.

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Thanks for taking the time to keep us updated Matt :)
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Executive Director GPU Users Group Inc. -
brad@gpuug.org

why does it seem there is so many problems with server memory? i'm not just talking about the seti servers, but any servers in general seem very picky and there seems to be a high failure rate for server memory.

i cant remember the last time i had a desktop memory issue. and every computer i build gets a 24 hour memtest+ burn in to verify that part of the computer is running ok.

is there something inherent with servers or their memory which makes them have troubles? i have very little server expierence apart from small to medium offices of 25pc's or less.

is there something inherent with servers or their memory which makes them have troubles?

The amount of memory.
Most desktop systems these days have 4GB, some 8GB, very few 12GB. A server system can have up to 2TB of memory. That's 64 memory slots.
In order for memory to work, the timing has to be spot on- the margin for error is almost non-existant. The more memory modules you have in a system, the greater the electrical load, and the greater the effect of capacitance & inductance- and they really screw timing up.
While a server system might work with 12 modules of one type of memory, it may not work with 14. In order for a system to be stable it needs memory that meets the design specs exactly. The slightest variance will introduce timing erros, and you end up with memory faults- even though the memory may not actually be faulty. It's just not suitable for that system with that many memory modules populated.

Thanks Matt

So bruno (the upload server) has been having fits. Basically an arbitrary CPU locks up. I'm hoping this is more of a kernel/software issue than hardware, and will clear up on its own. In the meantime, we did get it on a remote power strip so we can kick it from home without having to come to the lab.

So bruno (the upload server) has been having fits. Basically an arbitrary CPU locks up. I'm hoping this is more of a kernel/software issue than hardware, and will clear up on its own. In the meantime, we did get it on a remote power strip so we can kick it from home without having to come to the lab.

Any chance of doing the same with whatever it is that periodically freezes the Server Status Page, and apparently blocks new work production at the same time?