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World Community Grid Forums
Category: Community
Forum: Teams
Thread: Eat, Drink, and be Crunching (Team HomeBrewers Welcomes You) |
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Thread Status: Active Total posts in this thread: 515
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Looks like we'll be passed tomorrow night by Michigan Tech, dropping us to #85, then it will probably be about 5 days until we are passed by the China Grid Team. I think we have a good chance of hold #86 until after the first of the year.
Cheers. Bill Velek |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Looks like we'll be passed tomorrow night by Michigan Tech, dropping us to #85...<snip> Sad. On the better news side, that hard drive came in for the 4-processor machine. I will build it today (hoping everything works) and start up BOINC on it. That should provide a few more points per day. It will be interesting to see just how many a quad core machine can pump out. Experts are predicting 8 core processors by the end of next year... Cheers FB |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
I just want to briefly wish all of my friends here some very warm season's greetings, whether it be for Christmas, Hanukkah, or any other holiday at this time of the year. I hope that Santa is good to all of you, and that we will all have good health and good fortune in the year to come.
----------------------------------------To get back on topic, I am now back up to five full carboys and will be bottling and brewing at least one batch next weekend after all the holiday activities are over. Maybe Santa will bring me some new brewing toys to play with. ;-) Moving a few links up to this message to make them easier to find: http://tinyurl.com/yuozlv http://tinyurl.com/yulxqf http://tinyurl.com/2khudb Cheers. [Edit 1 times, last edit by Former Member at Dec 28, 2007 7:01:41 AM] |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
...and to go with that Winter Ale or mead:
Annie's Apple Bread Ingredients 1/2 cup butter or margarine 2/3 cup sugar 2 eggs, beaten 1 tablespoon lemon juice 2 cup flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 2 cup chopped apples 1 cup chopped black walnuts or pecans Cooking Directions: Preheat oven to 350. Cream butter, sugar, eggs and lemon juice. Stir in flour, baking powder and salt. Fold in apples and nuts. Bake in a greased and floured 9x5x3" loaf pan for 45-55 minutes. Yield: 1 loaf Posted to MM-Recipes Digest V4 #253 by "Deborah Kühnen" on Sep 23, 97 Happy Brewing to All, and to All a Good Night! Fred |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Tonight we are still ranked #85, and I appreciate that we picked up four new members in the past couple of days, presumeably due to my Christmas recruitment message which I posted in about 30 different brewing forums. However, despite our recent growth, we are not going to be able to avoid being passed by numerous teams in the next few days and weeks ... especially the big heavy hitters which have been very rapidly gaining on us.
----------------------------------------SETI.USA is now generating close to ONE AND A HALF MILLION POINTS per day, and will pass us in two days. China Grid should also pass us in two days ... or three at the most. Team 'MySaoirse' has been generating close to a half million points per day, but we still have about a ten day lead on them. It should be at least a couple of weeks before any of the other teams pass us, and in the next month or two we could be passed by a half dozen other teams. The bad news is that it will take us 4 or 5 months to pass any team that is currently ahead of us. But in our struggle to remain in the TOP-100 until out next birthday, things are still looking good, so far. Staying in the TOP-HALf-PERCENT will be a bit more difficult. It will be extremely helpful if all of our members will make SOME sort of an effort to recruit at least one new member. Cheers. [Edit 2 times, last edit by Former Member at Dec 27, 2007 5:29:18 AM] |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
SETI.USA is now generating close to ONE AND A HALF MILLION POINTS per day, and will pass us in two days. I see that's thanks to 2 guys, Mac2312 and Chimichango. I wonder what sort of companies they work for... Probably research labs or something with lots of underused computers. I still have not forgiven my company management for not seeing beyond the tips of their wallets. I am experimenting with a new BOINC protocol of operations which seems to work well - I am running a 2 dual core Xeon server only at night (6p-6a), and in the last month it has generated about 2500 points per day. Keep this in mind when recruiting to business users - users don't have to be "inconvenienced" by processors being used during work hours (one of the objections my management had is that the servers were "less responsive" with that running, even though they couldn't tell me when it was installed on a particular server). BOINC is able to set and use multiple profiles, so different machines can be run on differing schedules. It will be extremely helpful if all of our members will make SOME sort of an effort to recruit at least one new member. You're right, Bill, let's make that a goal in the next month? Well, that would be 2 new members, it's better than zero! Or is anyone else there? Also, I know this doesn't count as recruitment, but that 4 processor machine is finally up and running (what a nightmare!) and I installed the latest BOINC (5.10.x). In 18 hours, it has completed 14 tasks, with two more due in 1/2 hour. On top of that, I now have (unplanned) spare parts to think about the next one  . |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
I've just added another computer, too, ... BUT ... it's running that dadgummed Vista, and as noted in a thread on Vista in the chat room, the BOINC agent does not automatically boot up on start up. That is a major pain in the rear, and I've found a number of other very annoying aspects of Vista, which you can probably tell I'm using for the first time. Based on my lousy experiences so far, if it ever turns out that WindowsXP is completely eliminated and I'm stuck with Vista on all new computer acquisitions, I'm just going to have to bite the bullet and learn about Linux. Anyway, the computer is actually a lap top that my wife got for Christmas, and while she knows I've loaded the BOINC agent to crunch for the WCG and is generally supportive of the project, she is not as keenly attentive as I try to be ... so there will probably be a LOT of times when she turns the computer on and will probably forget to manually start BOINC. That really sucks ... BIG time. Anyway, I'm going to contact Hewlett Packard and also Microsoft to find out if there isn't a way to swap out the operating system ... for free ... because I'm darned sure not going to buy a copy of WindowsXP to install in a brand new computer. If that is not going to be possible, then I'll start looking into Linux and will also tell HP that if they are going to insist on loading Vista on their new computers and not make XP available as a replacement, that I'm definitely going to buy something else in the future. If enough of the public expressed that attitude, then MicroSoft wouldn't have any choice but to give us what we want, or at least make some drastic improvements to Vista. Practically no one seems to like it.
As for the new computer, it is an HP Pavilion dv6605us Entertainment Notebook PC with an AMD Athlon 64 x2 Dual-Core Processor TK-55 1.80GhZ, AND 959 Mbytes of RAM, and a 140Gbyte HardDrive. Does the BOINC agent take care of fully using the dual core, or should I be clicking on the program twice to run two different applications? Oh, yeah, one other question: does Vista always take so LONG to load? I swear, I'm going to get a stop-watch and time it the next time; it takes so long that I actually thought that something was wrong with the computer. It's downright ridiculous!!!! Thanks. |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Between us and the other new guys, we'll break 65k soon!
I've just added another computer, too, ... BUT ... it's running that dadgummed Vista, and as noted in a thread on Vista in the chat room, the BOINC agent does not automatically boot up on start up. That is a major pain in the rear, and I've found a number of other very annoying aspects of Vista, which you can probably tell I'm using for the first time. Yup... I used a demo copy for about 2 days. Then XP came back. Wow, what a piece of crap. I just hope they "fix" the interface problems before long. It's expected that SP1 will be out soon, which will fix a lot. As for the new "style", we're stuck with it. I really prefer XP's, and not just because I'm used to it. That limited sized menu with automatic scrolling is just about the most annoying thing I've ever seen! Anyway, I'm going to contact Hewlett Packard and also Microsoft to find out if there isn't a way to swap out the operating system ... for free ... Good luck! I hope you succeed. I buy IBM (now Lenovo) with XP for now, though it's just a matter of time before they switch over too. As for the new computer, it is an HP Pavilion dv6605us Entertainment Notebook PC with an AMD Athlon 64 x2 Dual-Core Processor TK-55 1.80GhZ, AND 959 Mbytes of RAM, and a 140Gbyte HardDrive. Does the BOINC agent take care of fully using the dual core, or should I be clicking on the program twice to run two different applications? It runs automatically on up to 4 processors (cores?) per machine. The WCG BOINC profile configuration menu allows an override to as many processors as the machine has. If you go into the BOINC Manager under Tasks, you will see that multiple projects are being processed at once (2 in that CPU). Oh, yeah, one other question: does Vista always take so LONG to load? I swear, I'm going to get a stop-watch and time it the next time; it takes so long that I actually thought that something was wrong with the computer. It's downright ridiculous!!!! Hmm... It mostly depends on three things for any version of Windows: 1) The speed of the hard drive (is it 5400 RPM or 7200? 8MB or 16MB cache? SATA or IDE?) Slow drives transfer data to the processor slowly. 2) The amount of RAM. XP loves 1GB, I'm guessing Vista likes 2GB. Hogs is what they are, not operating systems. 3) The amount of "useless" software in the startup. Utilities, background processes, protectors, checkers, anti-this and anti-that. All of that is extra bytes to load in and run, taking up memory, processor cycles, and drive time to load. HP is not as bad as Dell or Gateway, but I'm sure it's bad enough. Other thoughts: - Vista is big and slow to load. That makes it faster to run later. At least, that's the theory. -If BOINC won't load itself as a service, put it in the STARTUP group. Then it will start along with everything else. -Go through Control Panel to Add/Remove Programs, and remove anything you won't need. Less junk is more speed. -Don't buy brand name computers except for laptops. OEMs can still buy XP - in fact, I just did for a customer's PC. That will change too, though. Just for reference, an OEM copy of XP Professional is $140. Home is $80 and Media is $115 (or thereabouts. Prices move up and down all the time). The OEM license states you need "new hardware" - meaning a hard drive or system board type thing, not necessarily a whole computer. -If you want to try Linux, join the club. I'm going to install Ubuntu Linux on a machine this weekend for the first time, and use it as an additional firewall/proxy for my home network. If that works, I'll equip a user desktop with the graphical version of Ubuntu, called "Kubuntu", and start playing with the new Linux Windows interface. Yes, there is a BOINC for Linux! -These new Intel Core2Quad processors run COOL! This unit is running BOINC for 2 days, with all cores flat out 100%, and it's running 34 degrees C. The hard drives are warmer than the processor with an Intel-supplied cooling fan (if you use their fan, they give you 3 years warranty on the CPU). -AMD's quad core chip looks good. My AMD board manufacturer says they "are working on quad core support" with a BIOS update... I hope they succeed, then I'll have a quad core AMD too. I need to get another quad core Intel for that other board I couldn't use on this machine. - I found that using the Intel thermal grease increases the CPU temp by 10C - remove theirs from their fan (you can use rubbing alcohol) and use Arctic Silver 3, 4, or 5 (99% pure liquefied silver suspension). Cheers FB |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
Banner day for the Homebrewers yesterday, ladies and gents:
----------------------------------------75,543 points That puts us at #114 on yesterday's crunch charts (out of 5000 listed teams), and 40% better than last month's average. It doesn't put us back where we used to be, but that's a long road ahead. In order to stay in the top 100 more or less permanently, were things to stay at the status quo (that is, no more new teams putting in millions of points a day), we would need to hit 90k per day - a goal which is not unreasonable, though not easy by any means. Cheers FB [Edit 1 times, last edit by Former Member at Dec 30, 2007 5:15:18 PM] |
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Former Member
Cruncher Joined: May 22, 2018 Post Count: 0 Status: Offline |
A special roast for special friends. Make it a company-special dinner with a vegetable medley, roasted Yukon gold potatoes, crusty rolls and butter.
Espresso-Crusted Beef Roast 1 (4 to 6 pound) ribeye roast, small end Espresso Rub: 1 tablespoon ground espresso coffee beans 1 tablespoon packed brown sugar 1 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon coarse grind black pepper Balsamic Sauce: 1 cup balsamic vinegar 1/4 cup butter, at room temperature 4 teaspoons all-purpose flour 1 cup ready-to-serve beef broth 1/4 teaspoon coarse grind black pepper 1. Heat oven to 350ºF. 2. Combine rub ingredients; press evenly onto roast. Place roast, fat side up, on rack in shallow roasting pan. Insert ovenproof meat thermometer so tip is centered in thickest part of beef, not resting in fat. Do not add water or cover. Roast in oven 1 3/4 to 2 hours for medium rare; 2 to 2 1/2 hours for medium doneness. 3. Remove roast when thermometer registers 135ºF for medium rare; 150ºF for medium. Transfer roast to carving board; tent loosely with foil. Let stand 15 to 20 minutes. Skim fat from drippings; reserve drippings. 4. Meanwhile bring vinegar to boil in small nonreactive saucepan; cook over medium heat 20 minutes or until reduced to 1/4 cup. Mix butter and flour in small bowl until smooth. Add broth, reserved drippings and pepper to pan. Gradually whisk in butter mixture until smooth; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer 1 minute, stirring constantly. Keep warm. 5. Carve roast into thin slices. Serve with sauce. Makes 8 to 10 servings. Recipe provided courtesy of Texas Beef Council |
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