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Number crunching :
BOINC on Same Machine Different OS?
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Author | Message |
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cRunchy Send message Joined: 3 Apr 99 Posts: 3555 Credit: 1,920,030 RAC: 3 |
At the moment I run SETI on my living room PC. (Win7 Quad Core x64 12GB Memory - Basic Office Machine. Phenom.) (PC is always on but I only use this PC for SETI and some browsing or light office or media.) All is well atm but SETI seems to cache to the hard disk a lot. (pagefile). (It's audible.) I was thinking as I have another unused PC exactly the same if it would be worth me putting linux on that PC and running BOINC from that headless instead? Question is: Does BOINC hammer the disk, pagefile less in linux? |
Mike Send message Joined: 17 Feb 01 Posts: 34258 Credit: 79,922,639 RAC: 80 |
I have 3 different OSès installed on my PC. Win 7, Win 10 and Linux Mint 18.2. Linux might swap a little less on the hard drive but i can tell you when running seti you will see not much difference because seti app writes a checkpoint every minute to HDD. I can`t hear my PC, its also in my living room, so i would rather suggest to buy an other hard drive. On Linux i`m using an external USB 3 HDD for example. With each crime and every kindness we birth our future. |
rob smith Send message Joined: 7 Mar 03 Posts: 22227 Credit: 416,307,556 RAC: 380 |
Given your GPU and memory SETI shouldn't be hitting the disk hard or often. Check the "checkpoint" time (under advanced/options/computing preferences. The default time is 60 seconds, try winding up to say 120 or even 180 seconds and see if that helps. Bob Smith Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society) Somewhere in the (un)known Universe? |
cRunchy Send message Joined: 3 Apr 99 Posts: 3555 Credit: 1,920,030 RAC: 3 |
Given your GPU and memory SETI shouldn't be hitting the disk hard or often. Check the "checkpoint" time (under advanced/options/computing preferences. I've taken your advice and changed the checkpoint to 120 seconds. These are solid little SFF machines but the noise (repetitive every second) whilst BOINC is running tells me either the drive is caching or the fan is altering speed. (I have opened and dusted it.) I am however thinking that it might be a good thing to try a linux setup. (This will leave my livingroom PC free to be switched on or off as I please.) I prefer a basic visual GUI environments and don't like leaving a machine single use. (So in linux I might want to do a little compiling for Android.. Once in a while.) Anybody can suggest a basic linux distribution that has a simple GUI that leaves as much memory for BOINC but allows for a point and click person like me? I've used Ubuntu, slack etc.. Just looking for something that leaves as much memory and CPU for BOINC as possible but allows me to do the odd extra thing? |
rob smith Send message Joined: 7 Mar 03 Posts: 22227 Credit: 416,307,556 RAC: 380 |
I'm running Mint 18.x on all three of my Linux machines, one has only 8GB of RAM. I also run it on another machine with 8GB of RAM from a 16GB USB stick with no memory problems. Linux appears to be more memory efficient that Windows, but does like to have its swap file the same size as the RAM. One thought - AV software having a prod? Bob Smith Member of Seti PIPPS (Pluto is a Planet Protest Society) Somewhere in the (un)known Universe? |
TBar Send message Joined: 22 May 99 Posts: 5204 Credit: 840,779,836 RAC: 2,768 |
These are solid little SFF machines... It would also depend on the GPU in the target machine. Your listed machine has a old low end ATI card. For older ATI cards, pre-HD7750, you will need to use an older version of Linux if you want to use the older ATI GPUs for SETI. The last version of Ubuntu I can use for my HD 6800 series comes on the 14.04.1 Install Image. That image will install kernel 3.13 which works with the older ATI drivers. This machine is using the OS installed from the Ubuntu 14.04.1 installer, https://setiathome.berkeley.edu/show_host_detail.php?hostid=8097309 It's also running the SETI Apps I compiled myself, although the Stock SETI Apps will also work...just not as well ;-) |
Jord Send message Joined: 9 Jun 99 Posts: 15184 Credit: 4,362,181 RAC: 3 |
The default time is 60 seconds, try winding up to say 120 or even 180 seconds and see if that helps.I've tested that, it doesn't matter. The application ignores the preference setting. This was before: 15/09/2017 22:12:29 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed 15/09/2017 22:13:35 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed 15/09/2017 22:14:40 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed 15/09/2017 22:15:46 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed Then I set mine to 120 seconds, but it's still doing this: 15/09/2017 22:16:51 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed 15/09/2017 22:17:57 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed 15/09/2017 22:19:03 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed 15/09/2017 22:20:08 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed 15/09/2017 22:21:13 | SETI@home | [checkpoint] result blc05_2bit_guppi_57903_48954_HIP9598_0008.15227.818.24.47.10.vlar_0 checkpointed So still checkpointing every 65 seconds or thereabout. @TBar, the Radeon HD 2300/2400/3200/4200 don't do OpenCL. I think to remember that to use the beta OpenCL some of the HD 4000 series could use, you needed at minimum a 4350. |
Kissagogo27 Send message Joined: 6 Nov 99 Posts: 716 Credit: 8,032,827 RAC: 62 |
with a HD4350 ,it takes more than 9h to crunch a GPU WU :'D |
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