Folding on Cloud instructions (3 mil ppd)

[ptchernegovski]

Just an note on some things I am doing/trying.
I run 7.6.21 still on GCP, I find it to be ok mostly, apart from config setup.
Due to the amount monthly, vs credit, I am trying to run a CPU folding too. Have started another GCP, but with 10 cores, 9GB memory, and a T4. It should end the 90 days with about $20NZD credit left. So far I only have the GPU running, but will try work on the CPU side later. I know it won't do much, but just trying to figure out a way to use up as much of the credit as possible.

[Knish]

i already noted here: viewtopic.php?f=16&t=36004#p346177 what I think would be a pretty good solution to use up that free money

further details on that is actually much simpler than gpu since no edits of config files nor etc/hosts necessary. obviously we still want to set the preemptible setting, and doing custom 16 vcpu is only about $1 cheaper than the highcpu v16. Then just install fahclient, load ur information, set the remote monitoring, reboot then done!

if one still has too much free credits and not enough time, remember default limits per region is 24 max cpus but 32 total for your account. To exceed that one has to request additional quota

[Gnomuz]

Thanks a lot Knish for this detailed how-to. GCP was a no-brainer, the VM is happily folding at 1 million PPD.

As for Azure, it's another story. Following your guide, I got an error message when trying to create a NC6s v3 spot instance : 'The requested size for resource ... is currently not available in location 'eastus' zones '' [...] Please try another size or deploy to a different location or zones'
When I try to create the instance with '--priority Regular', I get an error message about exceeded quota on vCPUs, which is normal, as the quota is 0 and 6 are required.

I then went through the price list, and tried the same in all regions where the instance NC6s v3 was listed with prices for Spot. Same result in all regions.

Am I doing something wrong, or do we have to conclude your great idea to help science is somehow blocked on Azure side ?

Thanks in advance for your attention.

[Knish]

This is somewhat of a mystery. First, make sure you wait 5 to 10 minutes after upgrading before trying to create a VM. It needs time to unlock complete access for you (if you refresh and the "upgrade" button shows up again, then u need to still wait).

I am located in the US and created a new VM no problem a week ago. A person in France just days later reported the same thing you are reporting. I do not know what exactly is going on. Just One of the possibilities is azure running out of resources. Another is them tightening the rules and I was just lucky to sneak in last moment. For those in Europe, another attempt would be to try 'northeurope' in all places where I had 'eastus' (the cost is just a couple cents higher so use 0.34)

[Gnomuz]

Thanks for the quick reply !

I'm afraid things are different when you try from Europe, I'm in France. I upgraded 24 hours ago, so the time to get complete access shouldn't be the issue.

I have tried, among others, the 'northeurope' region without success. I have seen ToTow reported the same issue sometime ago, being unable to create any spot instance on Azure.
If I'm courageous enough tomorrow (not sure ...), I'll try from scratch with a new Microsoft account using a VPN from the US, just to make sure whether it's a resource issue in azure or the location is the key.
We'll see !
Happy new year, btw

[Knish]

Oh you're both in France, interesting... maybe I can save you some steps if you go through the motions for "requesting quota increase" that the guide says to skip, but not actually doing it, so just to see that your Spot VM quota in certain regions is still 10 like it is for me.

tweeting with azuresupport they only say that getting spot vm is not guaranteed, so assuming your quota says 10 vcpu, it might just be that demand is high enough that we can't get it at the moment. Perhaps try 8 to 12 hrs later in case the time you were trying before was during peak times

[edit] support said there's no additional restrictions placed on France

[toTOW]

Thanks a lot Knish for this detailed how-to. GCP was a no-brainer, the VM is happily folding at 1 million PPD.

As for Azure, it's another story. Following your guide, I got an error message when trying to create a NC6s v3 spot instance : 'The requested size for resource ... is currently not available in location 'eastus' zones '' [...] Please try another size or deploy to a different location or zones'
When I try to create the instance with '--priority Regular', I get an error message about exceeded quota on vCPUs, which is normal, as the quota is 0 and 6 are required.

I then went through the price list, and tried the same in all regions where the instance NC6s v3 was listed with prices for Spot. Same result in all regions.

Am I doing something wrong, or do we have to conclude your great idea to help science is somehow blocked on Azure side ?

Thanks in advance for your attention.

I got the same issue ... also saw some weird things in the two different interfaces that show the subscriptions : the portal showed everything correct (pay as you go subscription) but the old page (https://account.azure.com/Subscriptions) was still showing a Free account ...

And yes, the Spot quota is 10 in all regions.

edit : Knish> My Offer ID is MS-AZR-0044P ... is it what you have for yours ?

[Knish]

> My Offer ID is MS-AZR-0044P ... is it what you have for yours ?

Curiouser and curiouser! I could only find my Plan listed as Azure Plan, which according to https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/suppo ... r-details/ would correlate to 0017G. Yours seems to still be in "Free Tier" which suggests you haven't upgraded to pay-as-u-go yet, but you said you did. I will have to ask support about this.

[Gnomuz]

Same as toTOW here, the offer is labelled "Pay-As-You-Go" on the new portal "Free Trial" on the old deprecated portal and despite the offer ID is MS-AZR-0044P on both.

Btw, yesterday evening I requested a quota increase in northeurope and centralus through 2 different requests. The european one was honored, which means they probably see me as 'PAYG', where the US one was refused because they see me on 'Free Trial' and told me to switch to 'PAYG'. Go figure ...

[Gnomuz]

Hello again,

I checked again the email I received for my refused request to increase vCPUs quota in region 'eastus'. It states "I am sending this email to inform that since you are still using your free credit. Unfortunately; we will not be able to fulfill your request you must upgrade to PAYG before you can request additional quota or increase quota limit."

My understanding is that, even if the account has been upgraded to PAYG, we would have to fully use the 200$ free credit before being able to request, for instance, a quota increase. Maybe the same constraint exists for creating a Spot VM, as opposed to a Regular VM. That would make sense from Azure perspective, even if that would be bad news for us all. And don't ask me why the very same request was accepted by another support engineer for region 'northeurope' ...

I hope that can help you better understand the root issue and find a workaround !

[toTOW]

All my quota increase requests have been accepted, but I think our subscriptions are stuck somewhere between free trial and pay as you go ...

But since we can't use support, we're fucked.

[Knish]

Btw, yesterday evening I requested a quota increase in northeurope and centralus through 2 different requests. The european one was honored, which means they probably see me as 'PAYG', where the US one was refused because they see me on 'Free Trial' and told me to switch to 'PAYG'. Go figure ...

how weird! Does that mean you were successful in creating a VM in northeurope?

[Gnomuz]

Once the vCPUs quota increased from 0 to 6, I was able to create a regular NC6s_v3 VM in 'northeurope', but when trying to create a spot one, I still got the same error message. Pity, because the prices are low for the moment (0.33$ /h for the spot instances with a 90% rebate).

[toTOW]

I'm seeing the same ... as soon as you select spot instance, it doesn't validate (Code : InvalidTemplateDeployment) ...

[Knish]

So there is a wait for the free trial to be over before 0044P changes, but this I have found only applies if you want to transfer your subscription to someone else. I see nothing about restrictions during the first 30 day free trial. In fact the payasyougo upgrade should unlock the rest of azure services, and since the default is 10 Spot vCPUs, this "should" get us going.

twitter azuresupport recommends submitting a subscription management request via https://msft.it/6013peeV9 to confirm the status of the subscription. Make sure to note down(copy/paste) your sub id as you'll need to enter it later down the line

to help you out, you can select these options:
Issue type = subscription management
Subscription = yours should already be selected
Summary = offer id does not reflect upgraded account
Problem type = Purchase, sign up, or upgrade issues
Problem subtype = unable to convert subscription

hit next

here's where copy paste of your sub id comes in handy
issue description = Upgraded to PayAsYouGo, but Spot VM still seems blocked despite having a quota of 10 spot vcpu
severity = C
contact - your preference for email vs phone
check rest of your contact info and select the proper country, then create

Best of luck