Posts by tbret

101) Message boards : Number crunching : New to SETI@home, have some questions. (Message 1542941)
Posted 17 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:
Hal900 I noticed your stats don't have Einstein so I'm asumeing you havn,t done it and it's been a while since I did all I can remember they did take a long time just can't remember how long so he mite not have a problem wish I could member how long they took .



If we're talking about Einstein GPU Perseus Arm Survey tasks, depending on the GPU they might take anywhere from 2 hours, 2-at-once, on a R9 270X to nearly 8 hours, one at a time, on a GT240, to almost 5 hours, 2-at-once, on a GTX 750Ti.

What everyone who does Einstein should know is to leave one "core" (or possibly a thread) vacant for the considerable shuttling of data to-and-from RAM that Einstein requires. The GPU needs more CPU resources at Einstein than it does here at SETI.

EDIT: If you want to know some of these crunching times, a look at my machines will give you some ideas. I'm running the following: GT240, 460, 550Ti, 560, 560Ti, 660Ti, 670, 750Ti, 770, HD 6770, HD 7770, R7 260X, R9 270X at Einstein and SETI.

I've been playing-with settings so you'd have to ask me how I have "X" machine configured (2 at once, 1 at once, etc) but other than a few accidental CPU tasks, all of my work is GPU with the CPUs only feeding the GPUs.

AMD CPUs just aren't that great at crunching and the FX series with shared FPUs are even not-as-good "per core and clock cycle" as the Phenom IIs were. But they can move data around pretty fast. I can keep four GPUs busy running eight total tasks for less than 50% of the processor's capacity. Sometimes much less.
102) Message boards : Number crunching : New to SETI@home, have some questions. (Message 1542937)
Posted 17 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:
Thank you for the advise. I suspended and then restarted the stalled WU and it is moving again. It has progressed more than 1% in only 2 minutes. Thank you again.


Jim, all of the advise you've been given is trying to point you toward something.

A GPU work unit still requires CPU work. With AstroPulse this is a sneaky percentage of a core's ability to crunch. Why sneaky? Well, there are work units that run with very little CPU time, and then there are these other work units that take almost all of a CPU's time in addition to the GPU.

If you are running one of those *and* you have your CPUs completely busy running other things, the GPU work unit is "fighting" for CPU-time. That's really bad news because it means the CPU task is also having to start and stop and move to RAM and move back from RAM and pick-up where it left-off. It's also causing the GPU work unit to do that. All of that swapping-around is taking-up a lot of time.

In general, then, you won't get the most work done in the least amount of time by running every possible work unit all at once. If the computer is capable of running five, you might want to run four, or even three.

If you keep-up with it for a while, you may find that the average time that four work units take to complete is faster if you do them two at a time.

That's going to depend on the specific work units and the specific projects that you have running.

Don't let some of the numbers you see fool you. If it says, "0.24 CPU and 1 GPU" that doesn't mean it is "only" going to use .24 of the CPU's capacity or that it will use 100% of the GPU's capacity. If it were that simple, trying to be helpful would be a whole lot easier.

It's a balancing act and the balance-point changes for each set of circumstances.
103) Message boards : Number crunching : New to SETI@home, have some questions. (Message 1541849)
Posted 15 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:
Robert,

I think a lot of your questions are best answered in a talk given by Dr. Eric Korpela.


CLICK HERE
104) Message boards : Number crunching : Net Neutrality (Message 1541120)
Posted 13 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:


And then the customers will sue for being extorted and in the end, it goes back to how it should be.


That's how I see it. This goes back into what Eric said in the first place whereby there are "peering agreements" and as long as everyone plays nice, then it is fine. Comcast doesn't own Netflix, so they can't control them, nor tell them what they are or are not allowed to do. Sure, Netflix might take a small hit with their client base and revenue for a short period until Comcast sees the error of their way, but even without net neutrality, if Netflix is suddenly unavailable to Comcast customers.. millions of customers are going to revolt and in the end, it seems to be a self-policing sort of deal anyway.





You very succinctly summarized what I couldn't get said in many lines. Thank you.

"It would be a self-limiting problem unless someone decides to limit it in one or the other party's favor."
105) Message boards : Number crunching : Considering new Graphics card (Message 1540705)
Posted 13 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:
Installed and running...switching it to some Seti WU's later tonight


You may find it will run a little better on CUDA 5.
106) Message boards : Number crunching : Net Neutrality (Message 1540529)
Posted 12 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:


IT is like having a toll road that leads to an amusing park. You pay to use the toll road, but they are trying to charge the amusement park for you using the toll road as well.



The sad part is that they usually get away with it in a tangential fashion. The amusement park ticket-buyer ends-up eating the cost of some local authority's wish-list. As long as the ticket-buyer buys, there is no reason for corruption to stop, and as long as the corruption can be accommodated, there is no reason for the amusement park to object to the corruption.

I really don't want to expand the discussion to real world cases of exactly what you are talking about, but they exist.

Oligarchy anyone?

The proposal before the FCC is bad news.
107) Message boards : Number crunching : Net Neutrality (Message 1540527)
Posted 12 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:
Those companys pay to their ISP for the used bandwidth like everyone else, who has own website, they don't get it for free, just like for example SETI don't get access to internet for free too, they have to pay for it. The users, who use these websites pay for the access to internet as well. So half way is paid by the owners of the websites, the other half by the users. So there's nothing for free, even if ISPs try to convince everybody, that website owners get access to the internet for free. That's a lie. Actually the ISP want to have the 2nd half of the way paid twice, once by the user and once by the website owners.


Not so much a lie as an over-simplification.

Your position seems to imply that all necessary capacity exists.

Just because you pay to get "X" and someone else pays to get "Y" doesn't mean that the infrastructure exists at all points between X and Y to get you the same access to "X" as you might have to "Z."

This same sort of thing has been going-on with electric utilities for years. There was an instance where a university was going to co-generate. They were going to be able to produce a large percent of the campus' needs. The "access fee" that the electric company was going to charge was 100% of the campus' bill. Why? Because the utility had to be able to take-on the entire load in the event that the co-generation facility went down. The infrastructure has to exist whether it is being used or not and the capacity has to be on-line whether it is being used or not. The university scrapped the plans to co-generate. The regulations allowed the electric utility to act the way they did.

Of course Verizon and Comcast want someone else to guarantee to pay for their infrastructure. Of course they do. They cannot "force" that deal on anyone and you would expect Netflix (and a lot of others) to resent having to pay for their own infrastructure plus pay a bill to use it. Of course they do. Only a governmental body can coerce such a "deal."

In the meantime, anything Comcast can do to raise the price of a competitor (say, for PPV movies) is something they want to look-into. The more they can twist an argument to their favor, so much the better for them.

I believe the FCC as an ulterior motive, but that may just be my mistrust of power. Where concentrated power is concerned, I believe unintended consequences are not as important to them as the intended consequences. I may be a little paranoid, but I don't think the real intentions are even being discussed.

In no way, and in no measure, am I in favor of this or any other mandate, edict, or coercion.
108) Message boards : Number crunching : Panic Mode On (88) Server Problems? (Message 1540116)
Posted 12 Jul 2014 by tbret
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Well that was very interesting.. Wonder what happen....


You must be imagining things.
109) Message boards : Number crunching : Net Neutrality (Message 1539890)
Posted 11 Jul 2014 by tbret
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No more blogs/social media/forums that denigrate those in charge whether they be corporations or governments <snip>


I think you've hit the nail on the head.

This really has been going-on for a very, very long time. "My company spent the money to lay the cables. We raised the money. We got the permits. We got it done. You cannot possibly be telling us that we have to allow someone else to use it for free. You just can't. That's insane!"

The counter-argument is, "Yes, you did build-out the infrastructure, but every provider can't possibly lay their own lines. So in the name of "competition" we want the right to use your infrastructure."

"Ok, then we'll charge you for using our infrastructure."

"Well, you are charging us more than you paid for it, so we can't fairly compete with you if you control our costs!"

"Help! Regulators!"

Think "Bell Telephone."

Think about Netflix, or YouTube with HD streaming. Spotify, Rhapsody, etc... They burn a lot of bandwidth and someone has to "provide" that bandwidth. So is it fair to tell Comcast (who sells pay-per-view movies) that they have to provide Netflix with unlimited bandwidth "for free?" Of course there is nothing the least bit just or fair or reasonable about that.

On the other hand, if Comcast can charge Netflix whatever it wants to provide bandwidth, then Comcast has a conflict of interest, don't they?

We've seen this same thing with "TV Stations" on a provider. If they don't pay for access via revenue sharing of adequate size, the provider has shut them down.

In the meantime, the consumer who thinks they should get NBC from Comcast since they subscribed and that included NBC, screams and the advertisers scream, and the regulators scream and something gets worked-out, but Comcast doesn't have to lose money to distribute NBC.

It really is overly-complicated with one party or the other able to hold the other hostage.

BUT, in my opinion, (and my intuition) is that what this is about is not some fresh new concern for either the provider or the distributor or the consumer. These regulations are meant to *cause* a "new" internet backbone to form. Anyone who connects to it will pay dearly (this seems to be what Eric is concerned about) for access to the "public" super-internet. The FCC really, really wants the same kind of control of the internet that they already have of "the airways."

You will have to "prove" being on it for "the public good" and they will control access and content and tax and charge fees for licenses. Like everything they touch (the V.A. Hospital system, for instance) they will bureaucratize it, raise its cost, the quality will sink, the burden to participate will go up, and it will become so heavy with crud that the inertia will stop innovation.

They don't care. All they really want is control. They've been licking their chops for a long time. Nothing can go without their destruction and the corruption that comes with it.

It won't happen immediately. This is going to take time. I have no hope that it won't eventually happen, though. We've got some awfully smart and sinister people in government. They aren't actually evil. They just think they know better than you do. Know what? Everything. Just like Blue Cross is happy to be paid as the administrator for Obamacare, eventually Comcast will be happy to process internet bills for a fee. You'll be able to get everything they tell you is fit for you to get (but they'll do it with money, not dictates)

Assume crash position.

That's just my opinion because it's a bleak way of looking at it and I feel pretty bleak.
110) Message boards : Number crunching : CLOSED*SETI/BOINC Milestones [ v2.0 ] - XXVII*CLOSED (Message 1539567)
Posted 11 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:

And I think no one here sees things differently :)


I see it the same as you do. What's funny is that it really will be someone running SETI on an old cell phone that crunches the work unit with the alien contact in it.

100k is 100k more.
111) Message boards : Number crunching : Some questions about BOINC for Android... (Message 1539564)
Posted 11 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:
That's strange and I'm not sure if running Seti on android is really worth it :-(


I think it's a miscalculation, or maybe just a "free publicity" thing.

If we caught all of the rain that fell over the oceans and harnessed the power from all of that falling water, we'd solve all of the energy problems we have.

If we get millions of pads and tablets and phones running SETI while they are being charged, then you've got some serious crunching power.

Twenty years from now, when your phone has more power than your desktop does now, maybe it'll be worthwhile, but not for a while.
112) Message boards : Number crunching : Net Neutrality (Message 1539521)
Posted 11 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:

I doubt it, this is on Social Media, lots of people are for Net Neutrality and against net metering and against ISPs throttling access to sites, right now I can't access the FCC server, too much traffic to file a comment, maybe later.



Yeah, you haven't seen it, but I've been commenting about this for a long time. I want the same thing you want. I'm just not confused like you seem to be. The President is a Democrat. The FCC Chairman who issued the rules to allow this is a Democrat. Which part of that don't you understand?

Just because a thing fits with your obviously hateful internal narrative does not make it true. It was the energized who put this man where he is. I suggest you enjoy his energy.



Eric made a posting online on Facebook, oh and I wouldn't count on Repubs/baggers winning in 2014, Democrats out number them and are energized. The natives are restless and there are Republicans who are voting Blue in 2014.


I never said anything about who was voting for who in 2014. I said you don't know what you are talking about and suggested you read and become informed.

EDIT: For everyone's sake, if you want to continue a Democrat / Republican argument, I suggest moving it to the politics forum where people will argue anything without ceasing even when they are shown to be mistaken.
113) Message boards : Number crunching : Net Neutrality (Message 1539499)
Posted 11 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:

Me too, the election in November 2014 is critical, if Repubs win, Seti could be doomed. And that's all I'll say on that.


You are doomed.

A Republican started the whole thing by saying the net should be free. An effort was made by businesses to un-free it. A Republican FCC Chairman issued a rule that said "Stop doing that!" to the businesses. A Democrat judge said (correctly, in my opinion), "Hey, FCC, you don't have the power to do that!" Another Republican tried to issue new rules that he thought would get-around the court's objections, but they were weak (in order not to conflict with the law). That lead to a Democrat issuing "rules" that allowed the problem we're facing. Those rules were blasted by a Republican as being unneeded and those rules were voted against by Republicans. One Democrat voted for them, but wished he had voted for something that wasn't offered. He saw this coming.

This has been a mess for many years, yes, it is true.

It is a staunch, some would even say overbearing, Democrat who issued these rules with holes you could drive Comcast corporate headquarters through, on purpose, touting the needs of businesses.

Everyone has known for a long, long time what THIS FCC Chairman wants. THIS FCC Chairman is a President Obama appointee.

Before the rules were written, there were potential legal issues. Now that the rules have been written (over the objection of the Republicans), we've got one heck of a mess.

Read a little. A mind is a terrible thing to waste.
114) Message boards : Number crunching : Does Astropulse use the GPU or not? (Message 1538851)
Posted 10 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:


So are there multiple versions of the Astropulse exe? Or is the stock version really mostly/only running on the cpu not the gpu?



Tom, I assume that when you installed Lunatics you told it not to install the CPU version. I mean... AstroPulse will run on the CPU if you tell it to.


EDIT: My bad. "These are all stock Seti setups all though I have looked/read some of the text/setup directions on the Lunatics distribution."

So in your computing preferences are you allowing CPU work?

There is a thing called "radar blanking." If you are interested, from the homepage somewhere you can find the method they use, but they don't just "wipe out the noise," instead injecting something-or-other. I don't know why because it is so out of my control that I don't care.

The practical effect of this is that when a "heavily blanked" GPU work unit is being crunched it spends A LOT of time on the CPU doing things the GPU can't do.

The run-times become long and the GPU just sort of sits there waiting for the CPU to tell it to do something.

So you are either accidentally running a CPU work unit, or you have a heavily blanked GPU work unit that is mostly being done on the CPU.
115) Message boards : Number crunching : Considering new Graphics card (Message 1538687)
Posted 9 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:


Unless you want to come to upstate NY and do the install for me? :)



No, but if you'll mail me the card I'll be happy to test it for you.
116) Message boards : Number crunching : Considering new Graphics card (Message 1538201)
Posted 9 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:
New card arrived today...it'll be installed Saturday night



I don't know how you can stand it until then.
117) Message boards : Number crunching : Lunatics' GPU app & switched users (Message 1537555)
Posted 7 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:


So maybe I am not understanding what you are saying?



I think you probably do understand what I am saying, but you are not having the same experience I have been having. I don't remember ever having that problem before, which is why I posted.

I've worked around my specific troubles by changing the account BOINC runs-from.
118) Message boards : Number crunching : i7 4770K overheating when running seti@home (Message 1536561)
Posted 5 Jul 2014 by tbret
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If I were to run without the aide of TThrottle, running on 8 cores would fry the CPU, even with the liquid cooler.

Which to me says something's not right with the installation.


It sounds like something is wrong to me, too.

From what has been said so-far, my first inclination is to suspect the heatsink installation on the CPU. I'm wondering if the heatsink isn't "floating" on heatsink compound instead touching the CPU.

What makes me think that is that with no thermal grease at all if the CPU were clean and the heatsink were clean and they were touching each-other, he shouldn't have-had the Vaseline experience he had --- even if Vaseline were a bad idea (and I have never tried that, so I have no thoughts about it at all).

It has been a long time ago, but I had a situation like that once where, although the heatsink was mounted securely to the motherboard, the heatsink nevertheless was not in direct contact with the CPU. The socket was stopping it. The cure was to turn the heatsink 90 degrees. And it was deceptive because it "looked" like it was touching and it "felt" like the heatsink was snug, because it was snug, but not against the CPU.

The surprise was that it even could be mounted 90 degrees out (the bracket allowed that).

The only other excuse I can think-of for that would be something like over-volting the processor either intentionally (in an over-zealous overclock), or by accident in the BIOS, or as the result of a bad voltage regulator on the motherboard.

Whatever it is, something sounds very not right.
119) Message boards : Number crunching : Considering new Graphics card (Message 1535048)
Posted 2 Jul 2014 by tbret
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This is weird. Your 750Ti should be faster than by (non-Ti) 750.
However, my 750 will do a single AP (no blanking) in 2700 seconds.
I really like the GTX-750. It is silent, does not run hot and it performs very well.



You may not have seen the edit, Tom. The 750Ti in question is doing two-at-a-time and I had forgotten setting it up that way. (lots of playing "musical computers" lately)

That means the 750Ti, which has a mild factory overclock on it, is taking 4,500 seconds to do two on a P4-based machine. An average of 2,250 per work unit.

The other 750Ti was found to be down-clocked (driver crash) due to someone switching users on it.

So my 750Ti numbers are low at this point.

I really should get a set-up, run stock on it, and put each card on that setup for a decent comparison. One of the reasons I don't is that it would be of most interest to people running the expensive cards and I'm just not very likely to buy expensive cards for SETI crunching.
120) Message boards : Number crunching : Considering new Graphics card (Message 1534765)
Posted 2 Jul 2014 by tbret
Post:
Oh crud -

An Edit didn't take Blurf.

I discovered after my original post that the 750Ti on the P4 is running two at a time!!!

I also discovered that the one on the AMD has down-clocked. I'll have to deal with that, but the 750Ti that should be CPU-starved is moving right along!


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