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World Community Grid Forums
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Forum: Chat Room
Thread: Hardware Guru's w/ crunching knowledge (& GPU Crunching?) |
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Thread Status: Active Total posts in this thread: 21
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dbw051000
Cruncher Joined: Feb 25, 2008 Post Count: 2 Status: Offline |
Hopefully this is the right forum for the post, if not, sorry mods.
Considering building a new computer, and was just wondering if anyone could offer some pointers on the best hardware setup for WCG. (p.s. I'd be building it myself. Built upwards of 30 systems, so I'm not tech illiterate; however, I usually build systems for high performance gaming or graphics work. Really I'm just wondering if there are any additional considerations for making a computer optimized for WCG crunching. I assume the only real thing that matters is processor and memory, but mostly processor?) Currently Planning on something like this: Intel QX9650 Yorkfield (probably oc'd to 4.2-4.5) 4 GB DDR3 1600 Also, and I apologize before hand if this has been posted before, does anyone know if BIONIC/WCG support GPU crunching? I seem to remember reading something about SETI and Folding at home trying to do that w/ the 88xx series of nVidia cards at one time. Just wondering. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Hello dbw051000,
The only way to speed up your projected system is to spend even more on your CPU. Looks good. Folding@Home can use some ATI GPUs. They have a page on their site specifying what works. I don't keep up with SETI. Keep in mind, there is no such thing as a general purpose GPU, so you have to make sure that a project has been programmed for your specific GPU. Lawrence |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Also, and I apologize before hand if this has been posted before, does anyone know if BIONIC/WCG support GPU crunching? I seem to remember reading something about SETI and Folding at home trying to do that w/ the 88xx series of nVidia cards at one time. The only DC project currently using GPUs is Folding@Home - they only (currently) use some models of ATI cards due to some limitations/issues with nVidia cards. [Edit 1 times, last edit by Former Member at Feb 29, 2008 3:33:14 AM] |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Hi
You are bang on the money with a Yorkie and goodly ram. If you want to fold too then a top end ATI card is the way to go. But bear in mind that gpu folding also requires one of your cpu cores for polling and such (at least it did last year when I was folding). However, for the price of a high end Yorkie and lots of DDR3 you could build a pair of Kentsfield Q6600 rigs with some ddr2. I would do the latter myself. |
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dbw051000
Cruncher Joined: Feb 25, 2008 Post Count: 2 Status: Offline |
Thanks very much for so many prompt, helpful responses. :)
Does anyone know if the developers of WCG/Bionic software and people managing the various projects/WU's are looking to try and increase GPU functionality in regards to crunching? I've heard GPU's are much more efficient for this type of processing than CPU's, and it would seem to be a worthwhile endeavor. Unfortunately, I currently have 2x 8800 series cards from nVidia, so I suppose I'll have to make do with the CPU's only for the time being. :) (I've heard there's some suspected problems w/ the nVidia drivers that are holding up their being able to do folding?) |
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Sekerob
Ace Cruncher Joined: Jul 24, 2005 Post Count: 20043 Status: Offline |
It's in the cards but not in the current development path. IF WCG would get a project offered to host that needs a GPU, it's likely that allot more pressure will be exerted on BOINC (not boinic or bionic) from here.
----------------------------------------The problem is mainly in the way work is distributed. The schedulers need to check if the client is fit to do the job. Already the BOINC client identifies what's called the Accelerator and stores that info like <accelerators>NVIDIA GeForce Go 7400</accelerators>. There are hundreds and hundreds of these cards out there. At any rate, how things work here and only a few other Distr.Computing projects is, a new Homogeneous Redundancy class needs creating. There's no project like WCG hosting 5 different projects in 6 HR classes. But WCG is not shy of a challenge if the project, hosted and run for free, is real & humanitarian & allows the results to be open to the global scientific community. Find a/the scientist(s) that has one or more to crunch for a reasonable long period (not 2 weeks) and contact WCG and have them complete the project proposal form.
WCG
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
But bear in mind that gpu folding also requires one of your cpu cores for polling and such (at least it did last year when I was folding). Yes that is still correct - F@H on GPU still needs 1 dedicated CPU to "feed" the GPU. (I've heard there's some suspected problems w/ the nVidia drivers that are holding up their being able to do folding?) Correct: http://folding.stanford.edu/English/FAQ-ATI#ntoc16 http://foldingforum.org/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=1171 |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Given the cost of high-end graphics cards, and the limited and very specialised science that can be done with them, I would not advise buying such a card when designing a good computer for crunching. Spend the money on more cores or a faster CPU.
Of course, if you have such a card for other reasons, take advantage of it and run F@H if you want. |
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Rickjb
Veteran Cruncher Australia Joined: Sep 17, 2006 Post Count: 666 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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I think lots of crunchers are also wondering about what should be their next machine. See my response to another post in the Suggestions/Feedback branch: "Would it be difficult to create a Test project?" at https://secure.worldcommunitygrid.org/forums/wcg/viewthread?thread=15227
----------------------------------------I've been researching this and haven't yet made a decision. I think I'll be going Intel, and would strongly prefer the new Penryn 45nm generation of CPUs - E8000 series (2-core) or Q9000-series (4-core). The "extreme" versions of Intel chips (eg QX) are not good value for money, and usually the vanilla ones can be overclocked to almost the same speed. Intel should be releasing new Q9000-series chips in April 08, and also dropping prices of many chips, so I'll be waiting until at least then before deciding. Best bang-for-your-buck right now is the older 65nm Q6600, which can be overclocked to about 3.0GHz, but I would get an E8400 instead, and plan to upgrade to a Q9xxx later. The E8400 can overclock like a scalded cat, and a used one will be much more saleable than a used Q6600. If you do buy a Q6600, make sure the motherboard is Penryn-compatible (P35 or X38 chipset), so you can upgrade. And unless you've got $$ to burn, get DDR2 RAM rather than DDR3, as the difference in crunching speed would be very small. For another source of advice, try Xtreme Teams on WCG: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=207 and also: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=134602 BTW, AMD have just announced that their 45nm Deneb desktop CPUs should start shipping in H2 2008. Also from AMD was an announcement that they & IBM have successfully achieved the first steps in 22nm fabrication, using extreme UV lithography. That's not expected to result in chips for us hoi poloi until 8 years' time tho :-( ! Rock on AMD. and keep the b's honest. Happy crunching [Edit 3 times, last edit by Rickjb at Mar 12, 2008 9:53:24 AM] |
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Sekerob
Ace Cruncher Joined: Jul 24, 2005 Post Count: 20043 Status: Offline |
Was reading yesterday that Intel had a patent going for a Cosmic ray sensoring. The CPU's and particularly RAM are susceptible given the levels of shrinkage where a particle blasting in from space is enough to knock a bit. It would get detected so that the operation impacted would get repeated:
----------------------------------------http://www.newscientist.com/blog/technology/2...osmic-ray-alerts-for.html Intel Patents On-Chip Cosmic Ray Detectors Intel thinking ahead.... soon a new gadget on your desktop: Cosmic Ray ambience rate, current and average. 
WCG
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