Here at my desk at home I have two computers.
The first is the one I use most of the time for surfing, emails and writing etc. It has no problems and when it requests Seti tasks it usually gets them within minutes.
The other computer, a quad, which I use for things that require serious power has silly problems. It can lose the wireless kbd and mouse for no apparent reason. Its monitor sometimes refuses to switch on until I thump it in the right spot. If I re-boot it, then that usually fails and I have to power down and restart a few seconds later. A new power supply and re-seating of all components and connectors has failed to find the problem. And when asking for Seti tasks it usually takes many requests with the 'project has no work msg'.

Or is just me imagining things?

IMHO:

Very complex machines, like computers, may have vary small variations in the behaviour of individual components, and in the interactions of the components. Even though two machines may be identical "models" or "part numbers", they will have small variations in their performance and in their interaction with humans.

Us humans have (so I'm told) spent several hundred thousand years evolving the way we deal with the complex and subtly varying humans around us. This has given us a whole way of thinking and a vocabulary to deal with the personalities we meet every day. Complex machines, on the other hand, have only been with us for one or two hundred years. When we meet the little variations in behaviour of these complex machines, it is very easy to use the "personality model" to describe and discuss the variations.

I've spent 35+ years testing and measuring complex machines, everything from airplanes and helicopters to construction machinery and city buses. I learned early on that the people who work daily with these machines often talk about their personalities, and usually with some basis. Time and time again I find myself in a hanger or a barn full of outwardly identical machines, listening to a driver or a mechanic tell me things like "this one loves to work" or "that one doesn't like the cold". I've learned to take these statements very seriously, because I can usually find and measure a real basis for these "personality traits".

I guess this also explains the success of things like "the little engine who could" and recent animated movies like Cars and Wally. Before anybody accuses me of being a crazy old coot, I'm not saying these machines have personalities, I'm just saying that "the personality model" is the easiest way for us to interact with them.

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Most Definitely.
I have 3 primary crunchers and each is an individual. One just sits there and grinds away without complaint, Another likes to be stroked, it requires a daily "look see" to keep it happy, just turning on the monitor and changing from the Tasks tab to the Stats tab and back suffices, if it feels neglected it throws a tantrum. Then, like Winternight's machine it requires a bit of effort to get it to restart. The third is somewhere between the other 2, generally reliable but it chucks an occasional "hissy fit" just to keep me on my toes. I think it sometimes gets a bit jealous of the attention No. 2 gets. I'm also sure they plot and scheme as they talk to each other across the LAN.

I think it's quite possible that a computer with a good quad CPU and 3 video cards has enough crunching power to have some level of self awareness and a true AI would be clever enough not to make itself known.

<wink>

Brodo

My cruncher works fine most days, but sometimes, like a race car, it has a bad hair day, and it takes a lot of manipulation to set it straight. You never know what each day will bring. Fortunately, most bad personality traits can be cured with either hardware changes, settings changes, or both, so at least we have some way to control these tempremental beasts! :)

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Warning, addicted to SETI crunching!
Crunching as a member of GPU Users Group.
GPUUG Website

No, you are not imagining things.

Not only do they have personalities, they also have in-built stress detection - the more stressed you are the more probably they are to play up.
They also respond to the threat of physical violence - how often do they start to work when they are offered a one way trip off the desk top with a hammer through the monitor/keyboard........

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Bob Smith
Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society)
Somewhere in the (un)known Universe?

Personalities?????
Oh, yaah.

And attitudes.

And sh't you cannot understand.

My kittens have their own little things that they will not do without.

Boot first, and then talk to me...LOL.

The Frozen Nehi has this cute little thing where I have to boot, then let it BSOD, and then reboot, and then let it fail, and then go into bios and change the data transfer rete, and then reboot again, and then let it fail, and then reboot again, go into bios, change the data transfer rate, and then reboot.

It doesn't seem to matter whether I change the data transfer rate up or down, just that I change it.

Seems the kitty loves her petting.

Yes, kitties need loving. And some of the others have their own little thingys to get on with too. So, I would agree that computers have personalities.

Folks over the years have not understood why I can get the kitties to do what I do. Perhaps this explains it.

Few have taken the time to pet the kittens as often as I do.

And they do need it.

I think somebody in a another post mentioned something about highly overclocked CPUs being 'imprinted'...

This is true........they get pampered with their settings.
I have had more than one, when overvolted and overclocked, that would no longer want to run at stock settings.

They are children. They are kittens. They need to be touched.

Do you hear me now?

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

Yep, absolutely true. Although in my case it's definitely the Gfx card that has a 'grumpy!' personality. It's a 9800GTX+, and when it was in my main rig, it would only boot if you babysat it all the way through to the desktop, requiring reboots and resets and re-saving settings to CMOS.

Now transferred to my children's machine, it does exactly the same in that machine, and then on top of that, now occasionally throws a blue screen at me failing on the video driver as well.

I've also managed to get an astropulse on my kids' machine too, where although I'm happy to accept it on there (it took about 20hrs, estimated 24hrs), I really want to get one on my rig, simply because I've never had one on here and I want to see how long it will take on here. Kids machine has a AMD 9850 in it, mine has an AMD 955.

I might have to see if there is any warranty left on it, but then it might really be pi***ed with me!

regards, Gizbar.

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A proud GPU User Server Donor!

Or is just me imagining things?

Nope.

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That has to be the best explanation I've ever seen written describing our interactions with machines and our insistence in labeling them with human traits.

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Yes.

We created them.

They evolved.

There are many copies.

And they have a plan.

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Join the PACK!

And they have a plan.

So Douglas Adams was right about the mice - it was just the film-makers who got it wrong by casting the furry ones....

Yes.

We created them.

They evolved.

There are many copies.

And they have a plan.

So who wants a toaster now?

Claggy

So who wants a toaster now?

Do you really mean "toaster" or rather "cylon"? ;-)

Gruß,
Gundolf

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Computer sind nicht alles im Leben. (Kleiner Scherz)

SETI@home classic workunits 3,758
SETI@home classic CPU time 66,520 hours

All this has been shown in Stanley Kubrick's film "2001 A Space Odissey".HAL 9000.the computer which sabotages the mission, has not gone mad but has reached a level of consciousness that made him (not it) understand that the mission was a sacrilege, since it was directed to discover the origin of life, which humans are not allowed to comprehend. To use the Latin word, the mission was "nefas" and HAL9000 sabotaged it purposely.
Tullio

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Thanks for the confirmation it is not just my imagination. And to say it's still continuing today, the Pent M has completed one task and got a new one, the quad completed lots, got only a few.

Edit] Just to rub salt in the wound, the Pent M just asked for another 114secs and got an AP task.

My toaters are all retired now.

Including the $1000.00 AMD speccial edition........

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

And they have a plan.

So Douglas Adams was right about the mice - it was just the film-makers who got it wrong by casting the furry ones....

:-D

Greetings,

I like this thread! :)

I have concluded that it is the lack of attention that causes an otherwise faithful PC to become cantankerous.

Several months ago, my Linux box decided to get uppity. One day, I saw that the hard drive light was on solid, no flickering, no winking out and coming back on, just continuously lit. It had a X series Asus MOBO, P4 processor and 1GB RAM.

While trying to diagnose what the problem could be, swapping out the hard drive, I lost all access to the PC completely. I could get no video out of her, nothing. Ok, swapped the video card. Still nothing! Went and bought a new modular PSU, swapped it in for the old and still nothing. I then swapped out the MOBO for another Asus with P4 and 2GB RAM, an older setup, and STILL nothing! I quit, for a while, out of frustration and lack of time.

About a week later, when I gained some time to "play" with it some more, I hit the power switch and lo and behold, I got video! Woohoo!!!! :) I ran memtest86 and the RAM was good to go. I ran PartedMagic with the original hard drive re-installed, during my failed diagnostic attempt, and the hard drive was dead. Swapped in an identical drive and it was good to go.

I installed Kubuntu, installed Adept Package Manager and then BOINC. I attached to SETI again, merged the old with the new and ran it continuously. It ran for about 29 days uptime when I had to re-boot after doing some updates. It ran for about a week when I looked and saw the hard drive light was lit solid, AGAIN! This, about a week ago.

Started doing my diagnosis again. Didn't lose the video this time. Could not boot into PartedMagic. If the machine sat turned off for a few minutes, I discovered that I could get the Linux to boot before the machine would lock up tight. Still could not boot into PartedMagic. I have come to the conclusion that I have one of 2 problems now. 1.) There is something wrong with the MOBO, the CPU or the RAM, or any combination thereof. Or 2.) there is something wrong with the hard drive which is causing the PC to lock up.

Attempted solution: I have ordered a new Asus MOBO, i7 CPU and 4GB RAM. I will upgrade this machine with the new parts, which I should see today, and put the replaced parts in the Linux box and see what happens. With any luck, I hope this will solve my problem with that cantankerous Linux box, assuming of course that the hard drive is NOT the problem, in which case I will need to get a new one. No other spares lying around now. :(

Keep on BOINCing...! :)

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CAPT Siran d'Vel'nahr - L L & P _\\//
Winders 11 OS? "What a piece of junk!" - L. Skywalker
"Logic is the cement of our civilization with which we ascend from chaos using reason as our guide." - T'Plana-hath