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World Community Grid Forums
Category: Support
Forum: BOINC Agent Support
Thread: Would a RAM upgrade help my machine crunch more? |
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Thread Status: Active Total posts in this thread: 8
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
This laptop has four gigs of RAM. If I added another four gigs for a total of eight, do you figure it would make a big difference?
Also, I leave my laptop running 24/7 unless I'm on the road. It gets proper ventilation and the temperatures seem to be consistent. So in the long run will this still reduce the laptop's lifetime? It's only a few weeks old. |
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twilyth
Master Cruncher US Joined: Mar 30, 2007 Post Count: 2130 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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Others here are more knowledgeable so wait for them to check in, but I don't think you need any more ram just for BOINC - although it can depend on the projects you run.
----------------------------------------Right now I'm just running FAHV and MCM1 - primarily. When the computer is in use I only allocate about 1% of 16gig on this machine and all 8 threads seem to run fine - although I do run process lasso to tweak things. As for wearing the cpu or other components out, as long as you keep an eye on your temps, I don't think that is likely. The biggest problem with laptops seems to the cpu cooling fan. Because they are so small and don't have room for full-sized coolers, they can get clogged with dust a lot faster than a desktop, especially if you have a lot dust or have pets.   |
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Falconet
Master Cruncher Portugal Joined: Mar 9, 2009 Post Count: 3315 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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I don't think you should get more RAM. It won't do much, if anything at all, to your crunching performance.
---------------------------------------- - AMD Ryzen 5 1600AF 6C/12T 3.2 GHz - 85W - AMD Ryzen 5 2500U 4C/8T 2.0 GHz - 28W - AMD Ryzen 7 7730U 8C/16T 3.0 GHz |
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PMH_UK
Veteran Cruncher UK Joined: Apr 26, 2007 Post Count: 786 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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Suggest using a laptop cooler and leave the screen at least part open.
----------------------------------------Also take care with the power adapter as these get hot too. Check the hard disk temp if possible, heat will shorten it's life. Paul.
Paul.
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Coleslaw
Veteran Cruncher USA Joined: Mar 29, 2007 Post Count: 1343 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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You don't mention the laptop specs. Additional RAM could help if you are running multiple CEP2 work units at the same time. Running CEP2 from a RAM Drive would be an option with more RAM too which would lower wear and tear on the hard drive and possibly speed things up a tad bit.
----------------------------------------As others have stated, in laptops the biggest concern is typically heat. You can get the laptop coolers in the US for under $10 on Walmart.com, so for a dedicated BOINC machine, they are well worth the investment. If you participate in any GPU projects outside of WCG, the heat is even worse. It isn't healthy on the fan in the laptop to run 100% 24/7 in most laptops. They just aren't typically built for this purpose.     |
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ryan222h
Senior Cruncher Joined: Sep 4, 2006 Post Count: 425 Status: Offline |
4gb is plenty unless you happen to be running 8 CEP2 workunits concurrently, which I wouldn't recommend on a laptop anyway. Hit CTRL-ALT-DEL and select task manager, then performance tab (Win 7). There you can see how much free memory your system has during crunching.
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pacerintl
Cruncher USA Joined: Nov 7, 2006 Post Count: 47 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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You would need to also jump to Windows 64 bit to recognize the extra ram...a faster processor would be the way to go.
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pacerintl
Cruncher USA Joined: Nov 7, 2006 Post Count: 47 Status: Offline Project Badges:
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I recently got the Acer R7, it's a I5 machine but with turbo boost...runs as a R7 when the processor requests it...have the 6 gig of ram it came with but can upgrade to 12.
----------------------------------------[Edit 1 times, last edit by pacerintl at Mar 2, 2014 6:26:58 AM] |
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