Power consumption calculation

[Teddy300]

Hello,
before i start folding i want to calculate the power consumption costs because iam a student and power isn´t cheap in my country (germany). I can run the folding software while my PC is on. Is the following calculation somewhat accurate?

CPU: Intel Pentium G3258
Thermal Design Power (TDP): 53 Watt
CPU Usage: ~90% according to windows

GPU: GTS 450
Maximum Graphics Card Power: 100 Watt
GPU Usage: ~90% in average according to a program

Both 3 Hours a day (30 days a monthly)

power consumption cost a month: (53 Watt * 0,9) + (100 Watt * 0,9) * 3 hours * 30 days = 12400 kW * 0,28 € = 3,50 €

Iam bit surprised because of the low costs. I thought the GPU usage would cost more money.

[Nathan_P]

Hi and Welcome

Your calculation is fairly accurate one, I verified it using a total system power of 150w while folding and came out with 3.78 euro's a month

[Joe_H]

Welcome to the folding support forum.

As an approximation, your calculations are good. You would need to use a watt-meter to see what the actual power draw was while folding to have an accurate value.

However, running only 3 hours per day your GTS 450 is probably not going to be able to complete current GPU projects within the deadlines. There are some older projects with longer deadlines that you can opt into if your GPU is not able to finish current WU's on your time budget.

[7im]

If only folding a few hours a day, the NaCl client is a better solution.

[Teddy300]

Welcome to the folding support forum.

As an approximation, your calculations are good. You would need to use a watt-meter to see what the actual power draw was while folding to have an accurate value.

However, running only 3 hours per day your GTS 450 is probably not going to be able to complete current GPU projects within the deadlines. There are some older projects with longer deadlines that you can opt into if your GPU is not able to finish current WU's on your time budget.

Thank you for the quick response.

Indeed i noticed that my second GPU project need quite some time to finish. Not sure about GPU folding yet.

I put the folding client into autostart and let in run on light everytime my pc is on. I didnt notice any performance problems while working / playing.Iam surely not a top scorer in points but its something. Finished over the weekend 3 projects and will continue

[bruce]

Noticeable lags are almost always associated with GPU folding. To avoid those lags, GPUs do not fold unless (A) the slider is set for "FULL" or (B) the system detects a idle state (when a screen-saver would run, if you had one, though that's not necessary). Other settings change how many of your CPUs fold, and when. Since your G3258 has two cores, those other settings don't change much.

Try your system with the "FULL" setting and see if you notice a lag, and if so, don't use that setting.

It should also be noted that older GPUs use more power than newer ones for the same performance level.

[Teddy300]

Noticeable lags are almost always associated with GPU folding. To avoid those lags, GPUs do not fold unless (A) the slider is set for "FULL" or (B) the system detects a idle state (when a screen-saver would run, if you had one, though that's not necessary). Other settings change how many of your CPUs fold, and when. Since your G3258 has two cores, those other settings don't change much.

Try your system with the "FULL" setting and see if you notice a lag, and if so, don't use that setting.

I cant use my PC at full or even medium folding because the lag is just to much. So i will stick to CPU folding most of the time because it works without any noticeable performance drop.

The cpu usage is nearly 50% on light. I already checked the options to increase the cpu usage, but i couldnt find any option for it (Windows 7.3 client)
Thank you

[jrweiss]

What do you use your PC for? You can often turn off "hardware graphics acceleration" in browsers and other apps to reduce lag significantly. Since the CPU yields more easily, let it do the accelerating via the software.

[bruce]

The cpu usage is nearly 50% on light. I already checked the options to increase the cpu usage, but i couldnt find any option for it (Windows 7.3 client)

If the options provided by the slider do not meet your needs (e.g.-you are not going to use your GPU but you want to use 100% of the unused CPU resources) you can use the Advanced Control application (FAHControl) to set additional combinations. By managing the slots yourself, the slider setting becomes insignificant.

Go to the slot tab of Configure.
Edit the CPU slot and set the number of CPUs to whatever your CPU provides (Apparently that's 2 for your system, but I'm not sure).
In the GPU slot, under Extra slot options, add Name=pause-on-start Value=true and it won't start folding whenever you reboot or restart FAHClient.

Before you do that, be a good citizen and do a FINISH on your GPU slot ... if that's feasible. To finish only the GPU slot, right click on the slot in Status tab.

[Teddy300]

I will cpu fold whenever my pc starts. Might not be much for some of you, but i made 800 points (4 WU) since i started last week. I will fold with my GPU on smaller projects.

I added another cpu folding process, so that my cpu usage is now constantly at 100% on both cores. To my surprise i could even play a game without any noticeable lag. Ok its a bit old but surprising. All fine so far

Makes me happy to support science with my pc while he is on anyway.

Thank you very much guys.

[davidcoton]

Just to clarify something...

If you changed the number of CPU cores as Bruce suggested, you added the second CPU to the existing slot (process, as you put it -- though not in the OS';s understanding of "process"). This is the most efficient way of using two CPUs for folding.

If you created another CPU slot, you will be running two separate processes on one CPU each. This will work, BUT note that WUs for single CPUs are sometimes in short supply, and there may be times when you can't get work. Also, the total contribution to science is rated lower this way -- folding the larger (2 core) WUs is preferred.

You may have other reasons for choosing two slots, like getting smaller WUs that meet deadlines while only folding part time. So the two slot option is not necessarily wrong, but is not the best in most circumstances.

[bruce]

... -- folding the larger (2 core) WUs is preferred.

You may have other reasons for choosing two slots, like getting smaller WUs that meet deadlines while only folding part time. So the two slot option is not necessarily wrong, but is not the best in most circumstances.

As we sometimes repeat, all contributions are appreciated ... and "wrong" is too strong a word, but "not the best" fits a lot better.

FAH does not recommend the two-slot option; a single multi-CPU slot is much better for the project.

[Teddy300]

Just to clarify something...
If you created another CPU slot, you will be running two separate processes on one CPU each. This will work, BUT note that WUs for single CPUs are sometimes in short supply, and there may be times when you can't get work. Also, the total contribution to science is rated lower this way -- folding the larger (2 core) WUs is preferred.

Iam running now 2 cpu folding processes with the option "-1" so that the client decides the number of threads. So i guess it runs both folding processes on multicore? I haven´t found any advantage when i set the cpu option to "2".
The cpu usage with 1 project was 50%. With 2 projects the cpu usage is ~100% for both projects together (~48% each project)

Iam currently pausing my gpu folding because the ETA with 10 days and the size of the project are just to large for my available time.

Thank you very much <3

[7im]

Please run only 1 CPU slot for best performance. Remove the 2nd CPU slot. Set the single CPU slot to run with "2" cores. This will earn the most points and help the project the most. This will use 100% as you want.

[bruce]

Change the -1 in one CPU slot to 2 like I suggested. Remove the second slot.