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World Community Grid Forums
Category: Support
Forum: Website Support
Thread: Projects getting too big for older computers? |
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Thread Status: Active Total posts in this thread: 6
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
I've noticed that the projects seem to get bigger and bigger as time goes on, which is fine for my Pentium 4s and Athlon 64, but its getting harder and harder for my older Celeron (I hang my head in shame for still using this, but it still crunches away slowly without complaints!) to get work units done. It seems that even with a 1.2GHz processor and 512MB of RAM it's going to be pretty soon that it won't be able to help out at all...
Is there any hope of having some projects going in the future with smaller work units just for older computers, or am I going to have to make it retire soon? I know it doesn't do a whole lot right now as far as work, I am lucky to get one or two work units done a day (if that), but every little bit helps. |
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Sekerob
Ace Cruncher Joined: Jul 24, 2005 Post Count: 20043 Status: Offline |
Please visit the Systems Requirements page. WCG always tries to create the smallest possible footprint to open projects up to as many volunteers as possible, but as it is, the more complex the model, the higher the specs of hardware to run it.
----------------------------------------At the moment Genome Comparison has very low specs as does Help Cure Muscular Dystrophy. Latter only on the old WCG agent (runs on 1 core only). cheers
WCG
Please help to make the Forums an enjoyable experience for All! |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
"Every little helps", but you have to be sensible. There is a point where slower machines are just too expensive to run. You're welcome to decide that point for yourself, but if you have trouble returning work by the deadline, take that as a gentle hint....
But anything as fast as your computer has plenty of life in it yet. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Thanks for the advise guys. I guess I'll leave it hanging around for now. It is on the UD agent at the moment so it churns through the HCMD projects and GC projects nice enough, but if it picks up a FAAH or HPF2 project it really chokes up. Maybe I should make a profile specifically for it to use GC and HCMD. As long as it has a project to keep it busy, I am happy.
----------------------------------------[Edit 1 times, last edit by Former Member at Apr 18, 2007 5:53:06 PM] |
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Sgt.Joe
Ace Cruncher USA Joined: Jul 4, 2006 Post Count: 7850 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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I think your celeron is more than adequate for several of the projects. If you go to my post here:https://secure.worldcommunitygrid.org/forums/...thread=8358&offset=20 (it is at the bottom of page 2) you can see that I have a number of machines that are considerably slower than your celeron. The GC project is almost perfect for these machines. Didactylos has a good point though. At some point the length of time a machine has to run to produce useful output will become too long. My slowest machine takes about 6 hours average to crunch a GC unit. Much slower than that probably would not be worth the electricity to run it, although I do use the waste heat from these to help heat the basement and I only run them at night on off peak hours.
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Sgt. Joe
*Minnesota Crunchers* |
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davidhobbs
Senior Cruncher England Joined: Dec 30, 2004 Post Count: 152 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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Good man, Sgt. Joe!
I have a substantial group of 450MHz Pentium II's in my collection of grid computers. Like you, I also dedicate these to the appropriate projects and run them only on off-peak electricity. I have come to think of them as hi-tech fan heaters! David. |
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