Vista or XP on a dedicated GPU+SMP folder?

[Freezer7Pro]

I'm going to set up another (almost) dedicated folder soon, but I'm a bit unsure on the OS.

The specs:

AMD Ahtlon X2 4800+ clocked at around 3GHz
HD3870 512MB GDDR4, might OC to around 800/2500, depending on if Vista likes RivaTuner.
3GB DDR667 CL5
nForce 570 SLI mobo

From my experience, the ATI GPU client uses just as much power in Vista as in XP, so I'm not sure if it would be worth the troubles with Vista on it (Many of the games I/my friends will play on it occasionally aren't too fond of Vista)

I haven't used the ATI client in a while, though, so maybe things have changed? Care to enlighten me a bit?

[toTOW]

I don't think you'll have enough free CPU to be able to run SMP on this CPU ... you might have to use an uniprocessor client instead.

[Freezer7Pro]

I don't think you'll have enough free CPU to be able to run SMP on this CPU ... you might have to use an uniprocessor client instead.

Seeing how my E7200@stock could handle SMP on one core with a lot of headroom, I think a core of a 3GHz AMD should do about the same.

[weedacres]

I can not speak for the ATI gpu but have tried this with an X2 6000+ and an Nvidia 8800GT.

Running any cpu folding on the same core that is feeding the gpu client kills the gpu folding performance. I've tried running smp and it cuts the gpu ppd in half or more. Switching to the uni folding client, if I don't set affinity to cpu 0 (instead of 0 &1 which is the default) while the gpu is set to cpu 1 then it kills gpu performance as well. I've tried various combination's of this on both dual and quad core machines with the same result.

[Freezer7Pro]

I can not speak for the ATI gpu but have tried this with an X2 6000+ and an Nvidia 8800GT.

Running any cpu folding on the same core that is feeding the gpu client kills the gpu folding performance. I've tried running smp and it cuts the gpu ppd in half or more. Switching to the uni folding client, if I don't set affinity to cpu 0 (instead of 0 &1 which is the default) while the gpu is set to cpu 1 then it kills gpu performance as well. I've tried various combination's of this on both dual and quad core machines with the same result.

You need to set the priority of the GPU client higher than that of the CPU client. I'm currently running SMP on both cores and GPU on one core, with my 8800GT doing 6k and the E7200@3.8 doing 1.7-2k.

And I say it again, as I have in many other places, giving the SMP client one core to run on will work. It just runs at half the speed compared to using two cores. That might not work on XP, however. Long time since the last time I ran fah on XP.

I'm supposed to be the one looking for help here. Could we get back on topic? This isn't about if SMP will run or not, it's about if I should install Windows Vista Ultimate or Windows XP Professional.

[osgorth]

My vote goes to Vista. Works great, and CPU usage is much lower for Nvidias at least, not sure about ATI.
If you choose that route, make sure you disable "User Access Control" (in Control Panel->User Accounts) because that will prevent the SMP client from working properly. Not to mention it's totally annoying as well.

[mikeb12]

I deleted my post that was here. it was referencing nvidia client and intel, not ati and amd... sorry, wrong thread...

I do have an amd and nvidia if it helps...
like osgorth said. Vista will allow the nvidia client to turn full ppd with minimal cpu usage.
I'm running smp/gpu on a x2 4600 with a 9600gso (budget build) and it turns full ppd.
notice fahcore_11 doesn't need a full core to allow the 9600gso to turn full ppd in Vista. in XP it needed an entire core.
in this scenario the 2665 smp wu's finish in about 3 days... the 2665 smp deadline and eta is in the ss below.

[Freezer7Pro]

Well, nVidia clients can't help here, as it's an ATI card I'll be running, and the ATI client is totally different when it comes to power consumption, afaik. It doesn't matter if the CPU can't handle SMP, I don't care about that as of now. I don't even have the hardware yet. I'm asking if I should run Visa or XP on it, and for what reasons. I'm an experienced user with both, but Vista is a lot more of a hassle to set up, due to everything having to get disabled.

So, should I run VISTA or XP, and WHY?

[osgorth]

I'd still go with Vista, because it's a more mature system, put bluntly. XP is a "dead" OS, and any and all future improvements and additions will be tailored for Vista (and Win 7 when it arrives) first and foremost.

I don't think it's too much of a hassle these days. I'm generally happy just turning off UAC, the rest works fine out of the box imho.

But given that you are familiar with both, just stick to the one you prefer. Right now, for folding purposes, they're equal if you overlook the CPU usage requirements, and that Vista has problems with >5 GPUs apparently (I haven't tested this myself).

[sdack]

I, too, say to use Vista. It improves GPU folding.

I had no reason to drop Windows XP except for going 64-bit and perhaps for having DirectX 10. I was hoping I could skip Vista, just like I skipped Windows ME and 2000, but with the GPU client using less resources I switched to Vista. I am running Vista x64 now for 2 days and there are a few things that still trouble me but the GPU client runs ~10% faster. Under XP (32-bit) one core was always 100% busy and with Vista is the GPU client now using only 4%-5% of CPU time. Interestingly though did the performance of the SMP client dropped by ~10%. I do not know if this difference is because of the switch to the MPICH SMP client and previously being the DEINO SMP client, or if the GPU client has a greater impact on the architecture than before and therefore the SMP client slows down. One cannot use the DEINO client for Vista x64. So I will not be able to find out as I am not going back to XP again. Both clients together however produce more points than before and the influence of the SMP client on the GPU client can be reduced by tweaking the affinities and priorities.

Should you be switching to Vista then here are two links that I found useful for tweaking Vista itself:

http://www.speedyvista.com/
http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=2238

The very first thing you should do under Vista is to disable UAC - User Account Control (like osgorth points out). It is quite annoying and some software fails to install correctly (probably because everyone turns UAC off and stops bothering with it). You find the option in Control Panel->User Accounts->Turn User Account Control on or off.

My final comment on Vista: It still tries to kiss your feet like all M$ products do, but it also feels like it is leaning further to UNIX by having more depth.

Cheers,
Sven

[Freezer7Pro]

I, too, say to use Vista. It improves GPU folding.

I had no reason to drop Windows XP except for going 64-bit and perhaps for having DirectX 10. I was hoping I could skip Vista, just like I skipped Windows ME and 2000, but with the GPU client using less resources I switched to Vista. I am running Vista x64 now for 2 days and there are a few things that still trouble me but the GPU client runs ~10% faster. Under XP (32-bit) one core was always 100% busy and with Vista is the GPU client now using only 4%-5% of CPU time. Interestingly though did the performance of the SMP client dropped by ~10%. I do not know if this difference is because of the switch to the MPICH SMP client and previously being the DEINO SMP client, or if the GPU client has a greater impact on the architecture than before and therefore the SMP client slows down. One cannot use the DEINO client for Vista x64. So I will not be able to find out as I am not going back to XP again. Both clients together however produce more points than before and the influence of the SMP client on the GPU client can be reduced by tweaking the affinities and priorities.

Should you be switching to Vista then here are two links that I found useful for tweaking Vista itself:

http://www.speedyvista.com/
http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=2238

The very first thing you should do under Vista is to disable UAC - User Account Control (like osgorth points out). It is quite annoying and some software fails to install correctly (probably because everyone turns UAC off and stops bothering with it). You find the option in Control Panel->User Accounts->Turn User Account Control on or off.

My final comment on Vista: It still tries to kiss your feet like all M$ products do, but it also feels like it is leaning further to UNIX by having more depth.

Cheers,
Sven

You can't be an experienced user without knowing how to turn UAC off

About VIsta being more in-depth, I don't quite agree. It's very hard to gain access to many features.

[bruce]

I've been visiting family the last few days and have taken on a task of installing a home network for them. They have an old laptop with Win98 and a newer desktop with WinXP. Both of their machines will be sharing printers, files, and a router and internet connection. Since they're active on the XP machine most of the time, I started to work on things from my Vista laptop. I finally gave up and worked directly from their machines. Even with UAC off, every time I connected, Vista would turn off network access or interpose a firewall or find some other way to force me to repeatedly tell it that I did want resources on both of those machines to be visible to me. I never did see the Win98 machine in network neighborhood.

I would never recommend Vista -- it is just too insistent that I need to be protected from networking features that I know are safe.

[sdack]

I did some tweaking of my new Vista machine and I have now turned off almost every feature that makes Vista what it is (Aero, SuperFetch, ReadyBoost, and hundreds more). Now my SMP client shows a performance improvement, too (~6%). From what I see under its hood is Vista x64 an improvement over XP because you get a true 64-bit OS (64-bit drivers and more than 4GB of RAM).

[mikeb12]

if you're running the gpu client, the desktop is sluggish unless you enable aero. I know it sounds counter productive to enable a os feature that requires more resource, but try it and you'll see. aero takes the sluggishness out of the desktop when the gpu client is running. it has something to do with how the os interfaces the desktop.. go figure-vista

[Freezer7Pro]

if you're running the gpu client, the desktop is sluggish unless you enable aero. I know it sounds counter productive to enable a os feature that requires more resource, but try it and you'll see. aero takes the sluggishness out of the desktop when the gpu client is running. it has something to do with how the os interfaces the desktop.. go figure-vista

I've noticed that too, but enabling Aero without blur doesn't decrease my PPD one bit.