Folding Forum

Somewhat related to my other thread about GPU folding on linux, I've noticed that the X11 UI is essentially unusable when GPU folding is active, forcing me to only attempt GPU folding on nights/weekends. The entire GUI grinds to a halt, and keystrokes take several seconds to be processed.

On my other windows machine, GPU folding seems to occur at a more reasonable system priority and the lag isn't noticeable unless I open a program which also wants to use the GPU (like steam client or something). On both machines I'm using the latest software, is this a known limitation/bug/"feature" of the linux folding@home client?

Yes, this is a known limitation of the current GPU architecture. GPUs do not contain load balancing or process priorities like a CPU does.

Consider using the fold while idle setting when lag is an issue.

The amount of lag is dependent both on the speed of the GPU and the specific project/core of the WU that was assigned to you. How does you Linux GPU compare to you Windows GPU?

As 7im suggests, if the lag is unacceptable, add the "idle" setting: Start FAHControl. Configure+Slots+Double-click GPU (or highlight it and pick Edit) + Add (at the bottom of the Extra_slot_options panel),Name=idle/value=true/OK+OK+SAVE.

I don't remember if you need to restart or not, but like a screensaver, when you move the mouse or use the kb, GPU processing will stop. It will restart after your machine is idle for XX minutes. (The value of XX depends on your OS.) You won't forget to restart FAH overnight and it might get some work done while you're at work/school/etc. As you might expect, your GPU will be somewhat less productive that running 24x7, but it no longer makes your computer unusable. [Idle is the default setting for exactly that reason.]

On my Linux machine I have a Geforce GT 630. My Windows machine has a GTX 760, which is admittedly a bit more powerful. However, monitoring GPU load on Windows also shows it capped at 100% when GPU folding, which is to be expected.

As mentioned in my other thread, the GPU units never actually complete unless I would run them 24/7, since the GT 630 isn't such a powerful card. So I've disabled GPU folding for now. =/ Thanks for the input though.

Oh, also, I should mention that idle triggering is a bit broken on linux. I guess that's a known issue based on my googling and reading around.