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World Community Grid Forums
Category: Community
Forum: Hardware Chat Room
Thread: Free or cheap used PC's for WCG - worth it? |
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Thread Status: Active Total posts in this thread: 44
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OldChap
Veteran Cruncher UK Joined: Jun 5, 2009 Post Count: 978 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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Depends on the spend.
----------------------------------------Simply put latest tech uses a lot less power but costs more Old Tech even just going back to Nehelem uses a bunch more power but is often dirt cheap to buy Those E5-2660 or 2670 builds are probably a good compromise just now. If you are very keen then maybe look for some of the latest engineering samples around.... More $$$'s but more efficient and more cores. You can read more about that idea here: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?294437-DC-PrOn  |
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KLiK
Master Cruncher Croatia Joined: Nov 13, 2006 Post Count: 3108 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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Hi, Manuelz, To expand on AMuthig's comments, there are a few decent routes you can take when buying used systems, depending on your budget. The sub-$100 Sandy Bridge i3 is an option, but there are also sub-$200 i5 and sub-$300 i7 options as well, all of which offer a great price-to-performance ratio. Or, if you're a little more hardware-inclined, you could buy used parts from eBay and assemble something yourself. I actually just did something in the middle. I found a desktop for $50 on Amazon with a Pentium E5300, 4GB RAM, and Windows 7 Pro. Then, I went to eBay and found a Core 2 Quad Q6600 for $20, and replaced the Pentium with it. For about $80 after tax and shipping, I've got a quad-core cruncher that works well.  Q6600 are good, but they spend about 90W of TDP...same as X3360, of which I got 2 in a 2 machines & which are quite a bit faster & has a SSE4.1 for same amount of $50 on eBAY! http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Xeon-X3360-vs-Intel-Core2-Quad-Q6600 but the best choice would be Q9660S or L3360, which is the fastest CPU & low powered one...has about 60W of TDP!  |
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Kasey Domer
Cruncher United States Joined: Jul 24, 2013 Post Count: 44 Status: Offline Project Badges: 
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KLiK,
----------------------------------------The $50 was for the rest of the computer, not the processor. I only spent $20 on the processor.  Crunchers: 1: Xeon E5-2695 v3 @ 2.5GHz turbo (14C/28T) 2: Xeon E5-2658 v3 @ 2.3GHz turbo (12C/24T) 3: Ryzen 7 1700 @ 3.675GHz OC (8C/16T) 4: Core i7-4700MQ @ 3.2GHz cTDP up (4C/8T) |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Ohh dear.. My wife forbid me to let a pc run 24/7 because it drives our cats crazy. So for the moment I can only run during the day - which will be my gaming PC I guess. I'll look around for some cheap server to rent for the time being. Thank you everyone for your inputs anyways, I hope they help someone!
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Seoulpowergrid
Veteran Cruncher Joined: Apr 12, 2013 Post Count: 823 Status: Offline Project Badges:
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I'll look around for some cheap server to rent for the time being. This thread mentions several: link And a shorter thread with my own issues with what turned out to be shared cores (oops) and multiple recommendations in the replies: link  |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Dedibox is sold out. May I ask you what kind of server you rent on Wholesale? Are the sub 35 dollars worth it?
----------------------------------------OMG I just missed a SSD Server on Dedibox that came free because I wasnt registered yet... :/ I guess I keep trying Got a Kimsufi :) I'll try to install that now.. :p [Edit 2 times, last edit by Former Member at Feb 29, 2016 11:46:40 AM] |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Seems to be working (not sure), load shows 59% - wcg doesn't show anything yet but the device seems to be added... I anyone has experience running WCG on a headless server, I'd be really greatful for some help :) You can send me an email or answer here.
----------------------------------------What I did: Followed the usual instructions, installed boinc and linked it. What I would like: Access Server through Boinc Manager (described here: https://secure.worldcommunitygrid.org/forums/...ad_thread,37011_offset,50 but I can't manage) - but do is this really useful? I'd be happy enough if the server would just be crunching away at 100% or close by... edit: Changed my profile to custom and now, a few mins later, its running on 99%. Seems to work - I guess I can see it in Device Statistic History after midnight? And I'd still take some help to access through boinc manager [Edit 1 times, last edit by Former Member at Feb 29, 2016 1:48:26 PM] |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
It'll take a while for you to start seeing your results hit. If you are working on projects that have a quorum of 2, you will need to wait for your wingman to upload their results before you get the credit granted.
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
I only do WCG at this time, in WCG activated everything
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Seoulpowergrid
Veteran Cruncher Joined: Apr 12, 2013 Post Count: 823 Status: Offline Project Badges:
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May I ask you what kind of server you rent on Wholesale? Are the sub 35 dollars worth it? Sure, I have a couple "Dual Xeon 5520" as $40 a month gets me 16 CPU days per calendar/solar day. Two of those machines equals a month of CPU days every solar day for $80. For $35 they have Xeon 5520 which is 8 threads but $5 more a month doubles that to 16 threads. I'm really happy with their service but my only complaint is they changed their ID system so you don't have full admin privileges by default. The purpose is to make it harder for hackers to take control of someone's machine and use it for nefarious purposes. I shouldn't mind (as it does protect me a bit more) but I need either an admin account or learn more linux coding in order to tweak a file so I can run CEP WUs on them. Aka I need to learn linux more but it's kind of far down my list of priorities. So for now I'm using those servers to run WUs for non-CEP WCG projects and have my personal home PC running only CEP. Edit: New machines usually get just one or a small number of WUs when they initially join. That explains why your new machine was only running at 59%; it didn't have enough work. As the machine stayed connected and kept connecting with WCG servers, it showed it really wants to crunch and WCG gave it more work, which is why it is now at 99%. No worries :) [Edit 1 times, last edit by Seoulpowergrid at Feb 29, 2016 5:03:12 PM] |
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