Video Playback with F@H 7.4.x Series

[LiFers]

When F@H first became compatible with ATI GPU folding, I didn't have any problems running it 24/7 and also using the computer as a media PC (Media Player Classic Home Cinema x64 on Win7).

Unfortunately, somewhere around the 7.4 series, or a little earlier, video playback is horribly jerky when running F@H.

- Is there a way to tweak the GPU slot to use a lower priority or to be more friendly with other GPU tasks?
- Is there a way to auto-pause the GPU slow when an application is running (ie mpc-hc.exe)?

Any other ideas?

Thanks.

[bruce]

Welcome to foldingforum.org, LiFers.

Work being processed in a GPU is very different than work being processed by a CPU. The GPU has no such thing as priority, nor can one GPU task suspend another GPU task. The only solution offered by FAH is to suspend GPU folding whenever you're using the computer with the "idle" option. It does reduce your production but it gives you back full use of the system whenever the mouse/keyboard is in use.

It should also be noted that folding 24x7 on your CPU does not cause these problems since the OS manages CPU priority very effectively.

Microsoft is gradually upgrading their WDDM model and the GPU manufacturers are adapting their drivers to use the features so within the next several years, the industry will have better solutions to your issue. It's just not ready yet.

Here's a recent discussion of a similar issue, but it's still mostly untested. viewtopic.php?f=80&t=26415&p=267489#p266556

I think maybe you've forgotten about the problem in earlier versions of FAH. Here's your previous question on the same subject: viewtopic.php?f=67&t=21727&p=217150#p217150

[LiFers]

Nothing's improved since 2012? Innovation in GPGPU is moving slow....

Thanks Bruce.

[Napoleon]

Nothing's improved since 2012? Innovation in GPGPU is moving slow....

in comparison to... what exactly?

[gwildperson]

I think the answer is: in comparison to innovation in GPU gaming.

Look at the list of changes in any recent generation of drivers and count the percentage of fixes associated with games vs. those associated with GPGPU. It probably closely matches the numbers of GPUs sold that play games vs, the numbers which run GPGPUs. And just how many times have you updated your operating system since 2012?

Folding@home doesn't set the standards for operating systems or for drivers, they just write applications that use whatever is provided by Microsoft, Linux, Nvidia, and AMD.

[7im]

Image quality and processing speed has improved since 2012. But the basic handling of how data is sent to the GPU has not. Still just a PCIe slot. Still no ability to load balance multiple video apps. Still the same driver model from two operating systems ago.

[foldy]

I had also problem with F@H GPU folding and watch video with MPC.
Because of my hardware, i have a intel i5 CPU and AMD GPU, my solution is to configure MPC to use the LAV codec with intel quicksync.
So F@H folds on AMD GPU and video is rendered in intel CPU and everything is smooth now
maybe it helps others...

[LiFers]

I've also noticed that F@H GPU causes massive problems with Remote Desktop. Either RDP runs incredible slow (unusable) or the entire computer freezes and you can't get back into it without rebooting.

I've had to disable GPU for the foreseeable future.

[Joe_H]

Windows RDP is incompatible with GPU folding. It usually crashes the driver and causes the GPU WU to fail. If you do resume GPU folding, it is preferable to use another remote access app such as VNC.

[7im]

Windows RDP is incompatible with GPU folding. It usually crashes the driver and causes the GPU WU to fail. If you do resume GPU folding, it is preferable to use another remote access app such as VNC.

And this is an issue with all GPUs and is specific to Microsoft's RDP, not a FAH client issue. Other remote software like LogMeIn and VNC work just fine with GPU folding.

[bruce]

The programmers at Microsoft assume that the sole purpose of the video subsystem is to display whatever Windows want to display whenever Windows wants to display it. This gives them the right to reset the GPU, killing anything that it's doing, and later, if all active applications are notified that they need to refresh their window, no harm has been done.