Properly shutdown clients

[Hoffalo]

Hi all
I run an SMP client on my i7 and a couple of gpu 2 clients for my 2 gtx 285s. i run it for about 15 hours a day (FAHMON says 30k ppd ). Anyway, when i shut down the clients is it best just to hit the 'x' button or is there another way that is 'safer'?

Thanks for the help.

[uncle fuzzy]

Use Ctrl+C to shut down the console client. Try to make sure none of the clients are writing checkpoint files before you stop them.

Systray or console as a service handle the client shutdown on their own when you shut down the computer.

[GreyWhiskers]

I have two systray clients on my ancient Windows XP rig running 24/7: a GPU3 driving my ATI 4670 AGP (right. ), and a standard Uniprocessor X86 client.

To efficiently bridge across middle of the night reboots (not frequent, but they do happen), I put the two clients in the startup folder, and they dutifully startup on reboot.

However, comma, they don't show up in the systray when started this way. I can see them in the Windows Task manager, but not the systray.

Every once in a while, the classic client starts up without setting the SSE boost on, and I get pitifully low ppd scores (they aren't that great to start with). I want to shut down the client and manually restart it. That's worked for me in the past.

But, since the clients aren't showing up in the systray, the only way I know to shut down the client is through the Windows Task Manager.

Again, unfortunately, the Image Names in the Task manager are as follows - showing both clients with the name "Folding@home.exe":

FahCore_11.exe
FahCore_78.exe
Folding@home.exe
Folding@home.exe

So, there are a couple of questions here:
- Is there a way to autostart start the systray clients so they actually show up in the systray?
- Is there a way I can tell which "Folding@home.exe" client is tied to the Core78? The Core11 is behaving OK, and I don't unnecessarily want to shoot it in the head (it gets the lions share of the points anyway).

Thanks.

[7im]

First, change your Windows update to stop happening in the middle of the night. Change it to a few minutes before you get out of bed each day. Then you can startup the clients yourself. Or whatever.

Alternately, start the clients from a scheduled task, 10 minutes after login. Might work better.

Also, add the -forceasm switch to your CPU client (core 78). It will force SSE boost if possible.

[GreyWhiskers]

Thanks. I ended up killing both clients and manually restarting them. I added the -forceasm flag to the client configure (since I started the client manually, the systray icon was visible, so I could make this change). The core came up with the extra SSE boost.

I guess the message is that if we want the systray icon to show up in the systray, we can't let it start from the startup folder. Very strange.... Maybe the v7 systray client won't be that way??

Again, thanks.

[jrweiss]

What "Run" option (Normal, Minimized...) is selected in the Startup shortcut for the client? You might try toggling that.

[7im]

Also, the hidden tray icon has been seen before, but is not a common issue. The GPU Systray client creates a shortcut when you run the installer, and that icon doesn't seem to get hidden, or at least we don't hear about it in the forum very often.

Are these Startup shortcuts ones that you created? If so, nrweiss might be on the right track.

[bruce]

First, change your Windows update to stop happening in the middle of the night. Change it to a few minutes before you get out of bed each day. Then you can startup the clients yourself. Or whatever.

I changed Windows Update to download but not install. It will still nag me and I can do the install when I want to, not when MicroSoft wants me to. I've suggested to the folks at Windows Update that they need to give me an option to install fixes if they do not require a reboot but that's complicated and they probably don't care that one or two people suggested it.

[Phantom2487]

During the summer months when I deviate from my 24/7 plan I change the checkpoints from the default 15min to 5min so I save ~20min more of work a day when I do shutdowns..

[bruce]

If you shut down at a random time, each machine will loose an average of 7.5 minutes (somewhere between 0 and 15). You'll change that to 2.5 minutes for a savings of 5 minutes per machine per shutdown.

[GreyWhiskers]

Thanks for all your thoughts.

I looked at the shortcuts that were being executed from the STARTUP folder, and they were set to "NORMAL". I think jrweiss was exactly on the right track - I just set them to MINIMIZE. I haven't done a reboot since - that's at least a 15-30 minute exercise that I avoid whenever possible. I will report back on what happens the next time I do reboot.

Thanks again.

GW.

[GreyWhiskers]

Follow-up to 11 Feb note.

Bottom line: setting up the STARTUP folder shortcut to start the FAH Clients (CPU and GPU) MAXIMIZED ended up with the console icons in the systray.

I tried first to set them to MINIMIZE - and they still didn't show up in the systray.

So - it seems to work fine - having AFTERBURNER autostart to set the ATI 4670 GPU overclock, and the shortcuts starting the clients with Windows XP RUN parameter for the shortcut set to MAXIMIZE.

GW.