Folding Forum

Hello. I have a few questions about running Folding@home on my Macbook Air. On the Folding@home Web Control page, I've set the power to light, and to fold only when idle. Do the "Energy Saver" settings on my MacBook Air affect the Folding@home program in any way? The default settings for "Power Adapter" Is After 10 minutes the computer & the display will sleep. Will Folding@home continue to run as intended, regardless of either of these settings, or must I set the them (or at least the computer) to never sleep? I was also wondering if Folding@home will run with the Macbook Air's lid shut, (I'm not sure if that will just shut the entire program down, or if it still continues running in the background) And if so, would that cause any issues, even if Folding@home is set on the light power setting?


System Specs:
MacBook Air: (13-inch, Mid 2012)
Processor: 1.8 GHz Intel Core i5
Memory: 4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3
Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 4000 1024 MB
OSX: Yosemite Version 10.10.1

With folding set to idle light, and all other options default, your MBA will fold only when plugged in and the display is asleep or the login window is active.
System sleep will be disabled when folding or slots are "waiting for idle".

Closing the lid will put the system to sleep and stop folding, unless you've connected an external display.
Even at light, 2 cpu cores will be used 100%, generating significant heat. I would not fold with the lid closed.

So, If I am understanding you correctly, even if the computer and the display are set to sleep after 10 minutes (default) in the Energy Saver "Power Adapter settings" in my Macbook Air, FAH will still run in the background when set to "Run only when idle", because it disables/bypasses/ignores whatever those settings are set to? The reason I ask this, is because I want to be sure my Macs' built in energy saving settings are not causing the entire computer to go to sleep, thus stoping FAH from folding. On the FAH Web control page, it does mention that closing out the web page will not stop folding, but there isn't anything on the FAH Web control page that mentions anything about a computers energy saving/sleep settings, and if there "Should" or "Shouldn't" be any necessary adjustments made to those settings, so that FAH will work when the system is idle. I think there should be something on that page that mentions this. If someone new downloads this program, installs it, and gets to the web control page and decides they want FAH to run when the computer is idle, One of the first questions on their minds are probably going to be, "My computer is set to go to sleep in X amount of minutes, will this thing still be running?"

I don't have a Mac book so this is what i understand, not what I've tested.

FAH does not run if the computer actually sleeps, though screen sleep is fine. To compensatefor this, FAH software disables power saving computer sleep.

Whenever a computer is working, it generates heat & dissipating that is more difficult on a laptio than a desktop. Closing the lid is a bad thea unless it forces a sleep or a shutdown.