I’ve had a look at the data around v7 and v6 WUs and below is a quick observational analysis of my data.

Under v6, I was roughly averaging 100 credits per Work Unit (WU).
Under v7, it seems that the average is sitting around 75-80 credits per WU.
In looking at run-times and taking the outliers out, cpu run time was around 600-660 seconds (10-11 minutes) per WU for v6, and appears to be around 800-1100 seconds (13+ to 18+ minutes) for a v7 WU. CPU time seems to have gone up by a factor of 2-3 from 50-60 seconds for v6 to 90-180 seconds for v7.

So doing a quick Back of the Envelope (10.5/15.83=0.66) shows that from a WU processing/throughput capability, I can expect to do roughly 66% of the volume of WUs that I did before (for example, if I was doing 400 WUs per day under v6, I can now expect to do around 264 WUs per day under v7).

Looking at the impact on credit gives 0.66*0.775 = 0.514 or 51.4%. In essence I can expect that daily credit for v7 will drop to circa 51% of what I was getting under v6.

I am aware of the comments around “that the system needs time to settle down” and that “it thinks all the WUs coming back at the moment are easy, hence the low credit” however, if the system continues to perform as is, then I can expect to see no change from current trajectory.

To test the assumption, I have looked at credit per day for the last 20 days. Below is the data:

2013.05.16 – 244,130
2013.05.17 – 220,168
2013.05.18 – 231,098
2013.05.19 – 226,353
2013.05.20 – 224,723
2013.05.21 – 210,477
2013.05.22 - 0
2013.05.23 – 431,485
2013.05.24 – 229,312
2013.05.25 – 228,767
2013.05.26 – 239,021
2013.05.27 – 231,271
2013.05.28 – 231,050
2013.05.29 – 0
2013.05.30 – 392,635
2013.05.31 – 209,556
2013.06.01 – 123,072
2013.06.02 – 94,061
2013.06.03 – 102,333
2013.06.04 – 99,896

The average daily credit prior to migration was 221,878. Following migration on 1st June, the average daily credit is showing as 104,841 which is circa 47% of the previous daily average under v6.

I suspect that many are starting to see their RAC decline, but as RAC is a lagging indicator and is currently composed of v6 and v7 numbers, the end effect is being masked. As this mask evaporates and RAC asymptotes towards the underlying v7 values, I suspect that the grumblings in the forum may get louder.

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If you're crunching SETI you should not care about absolute credits only relative credit within the project because our credit system makes no sense to most of us.

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I’ve had a look at the data around v7 and v6 WUs and below ....

Nice analysis. Contributes some reasonable explanation and understanding of the RAC problem. Further explanation of v7 is coming. Could be v7 will require more crunching to realize the goals of v7. That's what this analysis shows, it seems to me.

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"It is often darkest just before it turns completely black."

Seems that less credit is a slap in the face to all the crunchers who have been competing against each other for a long time and we should probably look for more deserving projects.

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Seems that less credit is a slap in the face to all the crunchers who have been competing against each other for a long time and we should probably look for more deserving projects.

Why so? Both will recive less credits.
Continue to compete but with shortened сarrots :)

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SETI apps news
We're not gonna fight them. We're gonna transcend them.

yes all will get the same

The only time I can see this as a problem is if different crunchers with similar rigs (I have an identical pair) see large differences between the two.

Over in beta Eric commented;

I think that we're having problem because the APR of the CPU versions of S@Hv7 hasn't stabilized yet. It's still strongly weighted toward fast CPUs, and that's reducing credit grants across the board. I'm hoping that a week from now things will be showing higher APRs.

I am going nowhere, but suggest that others give the project a chance to stablise.

For the few comments Eric has made I get the feeling he is quite busy.

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Lionel is right. The only times my RAC has fallen faster than it is now has been when the computers have been switched off.

The RAC of my main rig has dropped by 30k in the last week.

The "slower rigs" should be starting to check in by now, thus the system should be showing some sign of "stabilising". However, apart from one or two outriders, 80 credits per unit is the most I see, irrespective of AR or the number of flops contributed and most are below this. Not one V7 unit I've crunched has earned 100 credits.

"Credit New" is like the system they use in schools these days, where the top students are graded down and the poor students are graded up so that everyone is "average".

I know that in the real world SAH credits are worth zip, and I know that "it's all about the science", but until the scientists get up off their BFA's and start doing something with the data we have crunched, credits are all we have.

T.A.

Snip:

Not one V7 unit I've crunched has earned 100 credits.

I agree with everything being said. If my RAC graph line were a roller coaster, all the riders would black out from the G forces. But, I was able to find at least one v7 unit that earned over 100 points: here. Look quick before it disappears. (g)

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Not that it should matter a lot, since we are supposedly looking for E.T. and not playing pinball for high scores, but, hey, they put the scores for some reason, I imagine.
To testify your work (possibly across the whole board of Boinc projects, this is supposed to happen) and also to put some positive competition among crunchers. This in turn helps optimise the rigs and increase the throughput of the project.

Back to the credit issue, suppose you are mentally engaged with someone well above you in credits. He has already got all that credit in the gold age of credits. You upgrade your equipment and begin to plan how things will get. That you may reach that cruncher in, say, 6 months.
Then V7 comes. You do the same work. Everybody gets the same reduction in RAC, but now you reach, if ever, the same cruncher in double of the time.

Because RAC may well be the same for all SETI crunchers, but the credit achieved before does not. And what could be achievable targets (in terms of points or rank) get an impossible mission. Also just inside SETI itself. Not across the board.
The social lift gets severely damaged. And this is not fair.

Not everybody is competing for RAC, some of us just like to keep their position or improve them. And halving the credits takes out energy from the system and crystallizes the situation.
We do not need credit inflation to feel well. But such a "credit crunch" makes no good as well.

If you tell me that we are just using our spare CPU cycle, at least most of the people around here, look into my eyes: we are not talking about spare cycle any more since long time. When I switch on optimised CPU applications, my power consumption goes up 100 W. If I put a powerful graphic card, this adds another 100-200 W to the bill.
Are we all here high end gamers that we need GTX690s or Titans?
I doubt this. So, competition is part of the game.
I like also this part of the game and it helps me keep my PC in order. Is the RAC falling? There must be something wrong in my PC.
Right yesterday there was something not convincing in my SETI crunching. I double checked, twisted a bit. Rebooted and... bang! My main HD was failing (not yet fully, just sending alarming alerts. I swapped it just in time. Lost a day to reconfigure everything (Boinc took just half an hour the pain was elsewhere), but I have not lost a single bit of precious data. Just in time before havoc would come unannounced.
Sorry wingpeople! In the emergency, I made a small mess in my WUs. Tomorrow I will see if I can recover some of them and give them a honourable end.

Sleepy

P.S.-It has been reported elsewhere that in Beta they talk about one week time for the credit to go back to normal values. I hope so and I trust who stated this.

For anyone here who thinks that Credits have some merit you should realize that to Dr Anderson Credits are even more important.
Why else would he risk the ire of the seti@home base by writing the algorithm for CreditNew to approach from low->fair?
Dr Anderson likes Credits and he's stingy.

Is it possible for me to edit my original post. There is more data that I wish to add.

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Is it possible for me to edit my original post. There is more data that I wish to add.

Unfortunately no. It's a fine idea and would make for some really useful threads (especially stickies) but no, can't be done. You only get an hour to edit any post. Titles can be changed though.

As for CreditNew, it's not a 'credit system' but rather an 'anti-cheating manifesto'. Well that's what it reads like anyway:)

That is unfortunate. It means things are going to get long.

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Note: Unfortunately I cannot edit the original post so it is replicated here with additional text added in re: data for last two days, revised running average and Comment at end. Thankyou


I’ve had a look at the data around v7 and v6 WUs and below is a quick observational analysis of my data.

Under v6, I was roughly averaging 100 credits per Work Unit (WU).
Under v7, it seems that the average is sitting around 75-80 credits per WU.
In looking at run-times and taking the outliers out, cpu run time was around 600-660 seconds (10-11 minutes) per WU for v6, and appears to be around 800-1100 seconds (13+ to 18+ minutes) for a v7 WU. CPU time seems to have gone up by a factor of 2-3 from 50-60 seconds for v6 to 90-180 seconds for v7.

So doing a quick Back of the Envelope (10.5/15.83=0.66) shows that from a WU processing/throughput capability, I can expect to do roughly 66% of the volume of WUs that I did before (for example, if I was doing 400 WUs per day under v6, I can now expect to do around 264 WUs per day under v7).

Looking at the impact on credit gives 0.66*0.775 = 0.514 or 51.4%. In essence I can expect that daily credit for v7 will drop to circa 51% of what I was getting under v6.

I am aware of the comments around “that the system needs time to settle down” and that “it thinks all the WUs coming back at the moment are easy, hence the low credit” however, if the system continues to perform as is, then I can expect to see no change from current trajectory.

To test the assumption, I have looked at credit per day for the last 20 days. Below is the data:

2013.05.16 – 244,130
2013.05.17 – 220,168
2013.05.18 – 231,098
2013.05.19 – 226,353
2013.05.20 – 224,723
2013.05.21 – 210,477
2013.05.22 - 0
2013.05.23 – 431,485
2013.05.24 – 229,312
2013.05.25 – 228,767
2013.05.26 – 239,021
2013.05.27 – 231,271
2013.05.28 – 231,050
2013.05.29 – 0
2013.05.30 – 392,635
2013.05.31 – 209,556
2013.06.01 – 123,072
2013.06.02 – 94,061
2013.06.03 – 102,333
2013.06.04 – 99,896
2013.06.05 - 65,653
2013.06.06 - 112,209

The average daily credit prior to migration was 221,878. Following migration on 1st June, the average daily credit is showing as 99,537 which is circa 44.8% of the previous daily average under v6.

I suspect that many are starting to see their RAC decline, but as RAC is a lagging indicator and is currently composed of v6 and v7 numbers, the end effect is being masked. As this mask evaporates and RAC asymptotes towards the underlying v7 values, I suspect that the grumblings in the forum may get louder.


Comment on comments

Whilst some are focusing just on credit, the issue is not about credit as such. It’s about recognition.

There are many distributed computing projects to which people contribute resources. The manner and means in which those projects recognise individual contribution is through a system that is based on and allocates credits. Some projects choose to recognise a person’s contribution more than other projects, thus they grant a higher credit rate per contribution for that project. In short, credits are effectively an indication of a person’s contribution to a project.

In the case of "the New Credit System" implemented by Seti, recognition of personal contribution has been reduced. At present, the indication is that recognition for effort is effectively half that of what it was prior to the new recognition system being employed.

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........and abandonment for another project!!!!!!

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I will be ending all crunching when I hit the 20 mil mark. Electric bill is over 300 a month now with rigs blowing in the wind.....

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Every time a new version comes out its the same story. Every time Dr A. changes the way credit is granted its still the same story. Some peolpe quit, Most complain.

The way I see it, Credit is just a usefull tool to see how your own rig is doing. I tweak this, add that, overclock this, And hey I just got a little better RAC.

It could be like the old classic days. You get one credit for each work unit you do.

As for myself, I will crunch till Seti@home turns off the power or I die first.

Screw the credit.

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[/quote]

Old James

I will be ending all crunching when I hit the 20 mil mark. Electric bill is over 300 a month now with rigs blowing in the wind.....

Your rigs are not 'blowing in the wind'...
They are doing as much valid science as they were before. The token credits awarded for that work are not what they were before, at the moment.

So, I guess it's a matter of what you care more about. Token credits, or the science of Seti.

And my last bill, due on Friday, was $620.00

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"Time is simply the mechanism that keeps everything from happening all at once."

So what I'm seeing at my end in normalized credit per hour rates around 1/2 (45-48%) of what they were for MB V6.

Remember within seti@home, we are all experiencing the same credit "dilation" at the same time. Only users who somehow are sitting on a pile of unprocessed and unvalidated V6 WUs may be able hold on to their pre-V7 RAC a bit longer. But in the end we will all be dragged down together by the same amount and given enough time, our rankings between ourselves should stay approximately the same as they were two weeks ago.

And if weeks or months from now the home office decides to recalculate what "normal" is and adjust what credits we get from standard WU XYZ, we will all rise or fall together.

But if the Einstein or World Grid guys are giving you a hard time at the pub because you can't keep your RAC up anymore, then sorry to see you go.

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"Life is just nature's way of keeping meat fresh." - The Doctor