I have not used seti@home for ages just got into it again today, i have a very powerful system which normally runs at around 28c after 4 hours of running boinc at full 100% which i connot change, after which my CPU hits around 38c which i can live with, becos i have a very good cooling system running. i feel sorry for people who dont have good cooling and are just sat there watching their CPU tmp going up and up and up. i think you get the point. well i just hope that cpu control with be part to the new boinc version.

The only thing you can do it install water cooling if you want to use boinc heeheehee

or maybe just take the side of the case off and blow on the cpu

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Asus STRIKER EXTREME 680I SLI Socket 775
Intel Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.98GHz OC'd per core
OCZ DDR2 8GB 1150MHz
EVGA 8800GTX 768MB ACS3 KO 2 in SLi
WD Raptor X 150GB SATA 10KRPM 16MB Cache
2 x 500 gb sata
Coolermaster RealPower 1000W Modular PSU

I have not used seti@home for ages just got into it again today, i have a very powerful system which normally runs at around 28c after 4 hours of running boinc at full 100% which i connot change, after which my CPU hits around 38c which i can live with, becos i have a very good cooling system running. i feel sorry for people who dont have good cooling and are just sat there watching their CPU tmp going up and up and up. i think you get the point. well i just hope that cpu control with be part to the new boinc version.

The only thing you can do it install water cooling if you want to use boinc heeheehee

or maybe just take the side of the case off and blow on the cpu

Yes version 5.8.0 does have cpu throttling control built in. It is available now as a download, but is not a released version yet, so use it at your own risk. I am using it on one pc just fine but ymmv.

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Cheers, i've got the new verson installed and is working gr8 on my system, the only thing is... is it possable to change the cpu usage from the the normal view and not the simple view? other then that it seems to be ok, drving me abit crazy the way every second it stops to allow the cpu usage to drop. i wish it would just run smooothy at say 30%.. now that i could live with.

another question which may sound abit silly is, what do you do with the credits you earn from running the program? if nothing then why do so many people run the program. i mean, why would you ware-out your computer if the overall outcome is nothing?

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Asus STRIKER EXTREME 680I SLI Socket 775
Intel Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.98GHz OC'd per core
OCZ DDR2 8GB 1150MHz
EVGA 8800GTX 768MB ACS3 KO 2 in SLi
WD Raptor X 150GB SATA 10KRPM 16MB Cache
2 x 500 gb sata
Coolermaster RealPower 1000W Modular PSU

Credit are only a measure of how much work you do. Some have turned it into a competition. There are always people who want to be the best, to be listed first. Some have farms of computers to do this. I just do it to contribute to science in a small way.

As for wearing out your computer, that is somewhat relative. My two computers crunch 24/7. My AMD has been doing so for 3 years with no problems. Any decently designed system can run at 100% CPU usage with no problems (laptops being the exception). All it takes is keeping the dust bunnies off the fans and heatsinks. You don't need special cooling unless you're overclocking the system.

Remember, that V 5.8.0 is an alpha test version. Bugs can be expected. It is a early implementation of the Simple GUI, local preference control and CPU throttling.

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Boinc V7.2.42
Win7 i5 3.33G 4GB, GTX470

Credit are only a measure of how much work you do. Some have turned it into a competition. There are always people who want to be the best, to be listed first. Some have farms of computers to do this. I just do it to contribute to science in a small way.

And some people have farms to contribute to science in a large way. All contributions are welcome, large and small.

As for credits, they are a way to track your contributions to projects, and to compare that to others if you choose to look.

Also, they are a good indicator of problems you may be having with your machine(s). Sudden drops in RAC, or a disproportionally smaller RAC than similar machines can indicate issues.

Any decently designed system can run at 100% CPU usage with no problems (laptops being the exception).

My MacBook Pro has been running BOINC 100% of the time with no issues. Just monitor the CPU temps to make sure they are within limits.

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Dublin, California
Team: SETI.USA

right, thanks for that guys.

does boinc run at a standard speed or will a faster processor and RAM cut down the overall completion time?

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Asus STRIKER EXTREME 680I SLI Socket 775
Intel Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.98GHz OC'd per core
OCZ DDR2 8GB 1150MHz
EVGA 8800GTX 768MB ACS3 KO 2 in SLi
WD Raptor X 150GB SATA 10KRPM 16MB Cache
2 x 500 gb sata
Coolermaster RealPower 1000W Modular PSU

does boinc run at a standard speed or will a faster processor and RAM cut down the overall completion time?

BOINC doesn't really do anything, but the science apps downloaded by BOINC (such as the SETI@Home project) are CPU dependant. The faster you buy, the better the crunch times, the more science gets done.

I believe, in order of importance, these are the most stressed components:

1. CPU speed
2. Internal CPU cache (such as L1/L2/L3, larger/faster cache is better [note not all L2 caches operate at the same speed for some older processors])
4. FSB/RAM speed
5. HDD speed

Each item down the list will produce less results regarding project performance when upgrading, with the HDD performance being very negligible. Also note that CPU caches are not user-upgradeable, but can be chosen when purchasing a new CPU.

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i dont mine running boinc but i;ve had to limit it to 30% cos i'm not happy with running my cpu at 100%. at the end of the day your burning out your computer slowly and getting nothing for it, but the chance to say. well yeh i've got so many million credits. which means nothing. until we find ET everyone is wasting there computers and power. now if we could buy somthing with the credits like t-shirts, or have a free starbucks coffee, maybe even free advertising on the seti@hoem website, then i would say f*** the cpu i'll run it into the ground if i have to. but then again might just be me

am i the only one which thinks running ur cpu 100% will kill it over time?

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Asus STRIKER EXTREME 680I SLI Socket 775
Intel Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.98GHz OC'd per core
OCZ DDR2 8GB 1150MHz
EVGA 8800GTX 768MB ACS3 KO 2 in SLi
WD Raptor X 150GB SATA 10KRPM 16MB Cache
2 x 500 gb sata
Coolermaster RealPower 1000W Modular PSU

am i the only one which thinks running ur cpu 100% will kill it over time?

No, but you are in a very small minority.
It will only lead to an early death for a system that isn't well built. Any system with decent cooling (water cooling, massive heatsinks not necessary- stock fan & heatsink are more than sufficient) will run for years at full load with no problems.
Of course if you put a system in a small box with no ventilation then you should expect it to die sooner rather than later.

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Grant
Darwin NT

i dont mine running boinc but i;ve had to limit it to 30% cos i'm not happy with running my cpu at 100%. at the end of the day your burning out your computer slowly and getting nothing for it, but the chance to say. well yeh i've got so many million credits. which means nothing. until we find ET everyone is wasting there computers and power. now if we could buy somthing with the credits like t-shirts, or have a free starbucks coffee, maybe even free advertising on the seti@hoem website, then i would say f*** the cpu i'll run it into the ground if i have to. but then again might just be me

am i the only one which thinks running ur cpu 100% will kill it over time?

On the contrary, running your CPU at 100% will not burn it out as long as you have adequate cooling. Chances are, you'll end up upgrading long before your system even thinks about showing any signs of wear and tear.

There's insufficient evidence to believe otherwise.

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Just to elaborate to OzzFan's last post. Electronic components don't 'wear out' like mechanical ones do. They may get cooked into breaking down if proper ventilation is not provided or dust is allowed to accumulate on the cooling components (fans and heatsinks), but they either work properly or don't. Overheating, temperature change and power surges (turning it on and off) are the main enemies of electronic equipment and is the primary cause of breakdowns. The only components that may wear slightly faster from using Boinc is the Hard Drive, since this is mechanical and would be used a little more than normal on the average system.

Edit: The reason I mentioned Laptops in an earlier post is that modern Laptops are built much closer to the thermal bubble. Hence, the two speed fans and throttling of the CPU frequency to prevent overheating.

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Boinc V7.2.42
Win7 i5 3.33G 4GB, GTX470

my problem isnt the cpu usage because I am running a 2.0 ghz dual core with 2 gigs of mem. The problem I have is that my comp is a laptop and BOINC DESTROYS my 8 hour battery life. As soon as I stop running it, the battery life shoots up again. The difference is extreme, as in running BOINC with 48 minutes left, stopping BOINC and having 3 hours left. I agree with the previous posters, call us ignorant but wouldnt it be better for SETI and others if we could contribute anything at all rather than nothing? Maybe I am just naive but I have not found a solution to throttling the CPU usage in the latest version of BOINC.

my problem isnt the cpu usage because I am running a 2.0 ghz dual core with 2 gigs of mem. The problem I have is that my comp is a laptop and BOINC DESTROYS my 8 hour battery life. As soon as I stop running it, the battery life shoots up again. The difference is extreme, as in running BOINC with 48 minutes left, stopping BOINC and having 3 hours left. I agree with the previous posters, call us ignorant but wouldnt it be better for SETI and others if we could contribute anything at all rather than nothing? Maybe I am just naive but I have not found a solution to throttling the CPU usage in the latest version of BOINC.

First, there is an option to not do work while on battery power. This would be the best option to use so that you don't kill your battery life. Laptops are a different story, as they are intended for portable computing and often don't have sufficient cooling. In that case, I'd rather contribute nothing as running BOINC on a system without adequate cooling is only asking to blow your investment. I have two laptops that I won't run BOINC on because I don't believe it's a good idea (and because I don't run them often enough to actually be worthwhile).

Second, as said previously in this thread, the option to control CPU usage is not in the current release of BOINC (v5.4.11). You must download the alpha release v5.6.x or later (current latest alpha release is 5.8.0). Then you set your preference online and BOINC will follow those preferences you've set. It also states in your preferences that the CPU throttle feature requires 5.6.x or later too.

The official release for CPU throttling should be coming soon (but I don't know exactly when).

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my problem isnt the cpu usage because I am running a 2.0 ghz dual core with 2 gigs of mem. The problem I have is that my comp is a laptop and BOINC DESTROYS my 8 hour battery life. As soon as I stop running it, the battery life shoots up again. The difference is extreme, as in running BOINC with 48 minutes left, stopping BOINC and having 3 hours left. I agree with the previous posters, call us ignorant but wouldnt it be better for SETI and others if we could contribute anything at all rather than nothing? Maybe I am just naive but I have not found a solution to throttling the CPU usage in the latest version of BOINC.

First, there is an option to not do work while on battery power. This would be the best option to use so that you don't kill your battery life. Laptops are a different story, as they are intended for portable computing and often don't have sufficient cooling. In that case, I'd rather contribute nothing as running BOINC on a system without adequate cooling is only asking to blow your investment. I have two laptops that I won't run BOINC on because I don't believe it's a good idea (and because I don't run them often enough to actually be worthwhile).

Second, as said previously in this thread, the option to control CPU usage is not in the current release of BOINC (v5.4.11). You must download the alpha release v5.6.x or later (current latest alpha release is 5.8.0). Then you set your preference online and BOINC will follow those preferences you've set. It also states in your preferences that the CPU throttle feature requires 5.6.x or later too.

The official release for CPU throttling should be coming soon (but I don't know exactly when).

Well Ill take your advice and uninstall BOINC but I have no problems with cooling or ventilation at all. The "hottest" my laptop gets is just warm, but I could be asking for trouble without knowing it. Thank you for your suggestion

Well Ill take your advice and uninstall BOINC but I have no problems with cooling or ventilation at all. The "hottest" my laptop gets is just warm, but I could be asking for trouble without knowing it. Thank you for your suggestion

It was more of my professional opinion than it was advice. There's a few people here that run BOINC on their laptops without issues. They simply keep their laptops clean with canned air.

It is the user's choice if they want to take the risk. If I ran my laptops more often than I do, I might actually run BOINC on them, but definitely not while on battery power.

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Well, it makes the recommended monthly drain/charge cycle to maximize battery life go a lot faster. ;-)

Alinator

huh.. the alpha version (5.8.1) works (albeit in fits and starts, 100%, 0%, 100%, 0%...) but it WORKS! The CPU temp. doesn't kick the fan into high speed anymore.

Wow, that was a struggle! I had to download a new version of BOINC.. I'm sweating just thinking about the 7 left-clicks it took to get this fixed ;-)

Thanks for the help, volunteers.

PS to the gripers out there, just DL the alpha version. If it doesn't work after that, maybe you should write your Congressman a letter and uninstall the SW until you receive the next email from SETI et al.

It is weird to see ppl willing to buy a machine or build a machine perhaps that will not handle 100 percent load for 24/7. I have build machines for more then a decade ever since the first machine that was bought, just was not up to the task's
that I wanted it to perform. Ever since that let down have build My own. When a machine can run a variety of test's for a few days it will pass and join the network. But have to guess that ppl just are not willing to accept that
what they have bought or build is not working the way they want it
too.

Keep up to good work SETI@Home Team.

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