Does FAH want help from older or non-dedicated machines?

[DrTeeth]

I'm new to folding at home and have not yet installed the software, but I cannot feel that FaH is missing a trick. Nobody is suggesting that those running older hardware should be excluded. However, chances are that those visiting here are quite capable of downloading a more advanced client if they so wish. I am currently running BOINC and it is using all of my 8 cores, and I cannot tell it is running. Some beta work units that used my nVidia GPU made my PC run very slowly (though they processed vy quickly) and BOINC may need tweaking in that area. That the multi-core and GPU using FaH clients have been written as if they are for dedicated machines...that just puts me off FaH.

DrTeeth

[davidcoton]

Welcome to the forum, DrTeeth.

I'm not sure what you mean by

the multi-core and GPU using FaH clients have been written as if they are for dedicated machines

The CPU/SMP cores run at low priority and almost always back off when interactive programs are running. A few users report problems but I have yet to see any of these tracked to code that assumes the PC is dedicated. (The PS3 code may be different; I am not familiar with that, or with the PS3 support for prioritising processes.)

Things are different on GPUs. Neither of the supported GPU manufacturers provide support for process scheduling, so there is no satisfactory method to back off F@H on a GPU automatically in the face of conflicting demands. It sounds, from your comment, as though BOINC has the same problem with GPU code.

Have I missed something? If not, don't let the reports you have seen put you off -- try it, and report any problems you have here, so the evidence for any necessary changes is collected.

David

EDIT: insert "automatically" above. Manual pause is possible and not difficult.

[bruce]

Welcome to foldingforum.org, DrTeeth

I'm new to folding at home and have not yet installed the software, but I cannot feel that FaH is missing a trick. Nobody is suggesting that those running older hardware should be excluded. However, chances are that those visiting here are quite capable of downloading a more advanced client if they so wish. I am currently running BOINC and it is using all of my 8 cores, and I cannot tell it is running. Some beta work units that used my nVidia GPU made my PC run very slowly (though they processed vy quickly) and BOINC may need tweaking in that area. That the multi-core and GPU using FaH clients have been written as if they are for dedicated machines...that just puts me off FaH.

DrTeeth

I'm interested in your comments, particularly any information that gives you negative impressions. In fact, many of the folks who visit the forum are interested in high performance hardware but we encourage everyone to fold with whatever hardware they have. Every CPU-core that you own should be folding, no matter what.

Since your experience has been with BOINC, I should point out one very significant difference between most FAH projects and most BOINC projects: namely that FAH puts a big emphasis on the speed with which you complete work whereas BOINC puts a big emphasis on the quantity of work you complete. (Both FAH and BOINC have exceptions.) If you happen to have, say, a dual or quad CPU system, you can choose to download two or four different projects to be worked on concurrently or you can configure all 2 or all 4 CPUs to processing a single WU twice or 4x as fast. For FAH projects, the latter is significantly more valuable, hence you'll find lots of discussions emphasizing the value of multi-cored hardware over single-cored hardware. As far as I'm concerned, any WU that has been downloaded should be returned as quickly as your hardware allows -- WHATEVER that hardware is able to do. In addition to several newer/faster machines, I have several slower / (older) / single-core machines that fold 24x7 and I don't feel bad about them being slow because they're doing all they can do. Every contribution counts.

As far as statements suggesting that FAH should only run on a dedicated machine, we do suggest that whenever possible, you finish and upload the result before stopping folding. An unfinished WU sitting idle on your machine is costly. That's not the same as a dedicated machine, nor is it an absolute requirement.

GPUs are powerful devices for folding, but as has already been said, the responsiveness of the computer suffers. For many people, the choice whether to fold with a GPU or not will often be answered NO except perhaps when the computer is not being used for other things. I hope that FAH will soon have features such as a screensaver or a scheduler that makes it easy to suspend GPU folding when someone is at the keyboard, but right now that's on the wish-list, so for now, the "NO" will have to be a rational option available to most casual FAH donors.

Enough in the way of explanations. I still want to know which statements gave you the impression that FAH doesn't want time donated from older hardware? When you proceed to install FAH, which documentation is "off-putting" to the newbie?

[iceman1992]

If I may take a guess, maybe this is what DrTeeth meant, on this page http://folding.stanford.edu/English/Guide#ntoc5 it says

These clients are not set and forget, and are typically run by FAH experts and/or computer enthusiasts with computers dedicated to running only the FAH clients.

Honestly when I first started folding 2 years ago, the installation guide for the SMP client scared me away, that's why I started with the uniprocessor.

[7im]

That was true with v6. Not so much with v7. Time to temper that statement a bit...

[bruce]

Revise the statement to apply to GPUs. CPU-based folding, whether with one core or with many is now safe/easy enough for anyone though it wasn't when that FAQ was written. GPU folding isn't to that stage yet.

[DrTeeth]

I now have Folding@Home running on my main PC, and confined BOINC to my new laptop. I have to fight the urge to uninstall FaH as the work chunks are so big and take so long to complete. Are part finished units any good to the project? BOINC seems to chew through smaller packets and therefore has a high perceived satisfaction/contribution rating...it appears to be doing more. It may not be...but that is how it looks and feels. Could this (mis-)conception be hurting uptake? Are there any figures for those who start contributing and then stop after a while?

I am a dentist not http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Dr._Teeth, so appreciate the value of protein folding research.

Cheers

DrTeeth

[7im]

Only completed work units are given credit, just like only completed fillings are covered by insurance payments.

The V7 client has a nice progress bar, showing contribution, same for the estimated PPD, etc. If that is not satisfying enough, what could be done to improve that feedback?

Maybe we can find a way to have the fah client feed your twitter account and post an update after each 1% completed.

[Jesse_V]

I now have Folding@Home running on my main PC, and confined BOINC to my new laptop. I have to fight the urge to uninstall FaH as the work chunks are so big and take so long to complete. Are part finished units any good to the project? BOINC seems to chew through smaller packets and therefore has a high perceived satisfaction/contribution rating...it appears to be doing more. It may not be...but that is how it looks and feels. Could this (mis-)conception be hurting uptake? Are there any figures for those who start contributing and then stop after a while?

That's an interesting observation. Partly finished WUs are of no use, if they either error out or reach their expiration date someone else will end up completing them. Best to use the Finish button! If WUs were smaller, that would indeed increase the donor satisfaction, but would also mean increases to your Internet bandwidth, and a significant increase in server bandwidth. There's also the matter of storing more WUs. They're already dealing with terabytes of data as a result of F@h, and they have to back it all up so they don't lose anything, so storage is an issue. They even tried out the Storage@home distributed storage project to try to counter this a bit. WU size is a balance I suppose.

[bruce]

WU size is a balance I suppose.

Yes, and server load is one of several significant trade-offs. Having 100 connections that connect for N minutes each uses less server resources than having 1000 connections that connect for N/10 minutes each.

Storing the science data is truly a massive undertaking but storing lots of small segments for each Trajectory is a temporary issue. The small ones can be processed into the same string of data that would have been stored if there had been fewer segments which were each bigger so in the final analysis, that's not an important consideration.

On the other hand, storing 10 times as many credit records in the stats database does matter. The donors do care about the points they've earned which means a permanent record of every WU you've completed -- and there's no real scientific justification for keeping extra data there.

[iceman1992]

If WUs were smaller, that would indeed increase the donor satisfaction

Not necessarily so. Personally I like bigger WUs because they make me feel like I'm contributing more

I have to fight the urge to uninstall FaH as the work chunks are so big and take so long to complete. Are part finished units any good to the project? BOINC seems to chew through smaller packets and therefore has a high perceived satisfaction/contribution rating...it appears to be doing more. It may not be...

That is an interesting point of view. Work units vary widely in size. Some can take around an hour, some can take days to complete. And part finished units are no good, unfortunately. So please try not to let an unfinished WU hang around too long. If you plan to stop folding for a while, just use the finish button, so the client won't download a new unit after the current one finishes.

And to answer your first question "Does FAH want help from older or non-dedicated machines?", YES. If you have old machines and want to contribute then by all means fold FAH wants help from any kind of machines as long as they can finish WUs on time. And your machines don't have to be dedicated, but the faster you complete a WU the better for the project.

[bruce]

FAH is over 10 years old, so Distributed Computing is older than that. The original concept was probably conceived from someone walking into a large office at night and seeing hundreds of computers running screensavers. The idea was to give those computers something useful to do. (FAH originally had a screensaver version as well as a Console version and a GUI version.) An important goal was for it to do useful work without any kind of human intervention and, like a screensaver, to get completely out of the way when a human did want to use the computer for it's primary purpose. It had to be "out of sight; out of mind."

The CPU/GPU versions still do a good job in meeting those goals but over that time period, goals have changed somewhat but if you accept FAH as an out-of-sight; out-of-mind application, then who cares how long a WU is. Put it in the background, ignore it, and just let it fold.