POEM GPU

[kashi]

Do you use Crossfire though on your multiple ATI/AMD GPU computers, Dingo? With Crossfire enabled I think you don't need a dummy plug. veebee can't use Crossfire on a HD 69xx and HD 4770 because they are from different GPU generations.

[Dingo]

Yes I think they are, I would need to open the case to have a look I can't remember.

EDIT:   Yes Crossfire is enabled, looked in Catalyst Control Centre

[veebee]

Does having crossfire "enabled" , but not having the cards hooked up to each other, allow BOINC to use both ?? ??

That will make a bit of room under the No2 machine's table...(2 x 5850)

EDIT:

@ Kashi... I just cannot work out why, despite having it set up ( and setting it all up in the same sequence etc) it worked a day ago (4 WU's on both the 6950 AND the 4770 cards), yet now, it wont run ANY on EITHER card, when the SAME app_info.xml is added..

not fiddled around with, just copied, pasted to wordpad, saved as app_info.xml into the POEM project folder - as I did the first time, after which it worked..

Anyway, with Moo paying double credits, I am having a feast on it for a while... at least until Sant fixes the credit "problem".

[kashi]

Don't know, I've never used a Crossfire cable. My HD 5970 has Crossfire enabled internally and it can't be turned off.

As for your POEM set up trouble,  one possible problem is that you need to use Notepad to save or edit an app_info.xml file. If you use Wordpad it can sometimes insert formatting that will make the app_info.xml not work.

[tazzduke]

Afternoon All

I have a question, since I am doing some POEM ATI GPU work, I have not been able to get work for Albert, Seti or Seti Beta even Moo, what happens is once I attach, I get one work unit and then thats it, nothing.   I have adjusted my work cache setting from 0.25 to 10 and nothing, just get the following

03-01-12 18:30:48 | Poem@Home | update requested by user
03-01-12 18:30:51 | Poem@Home | Sending scheduler request: Requested by user.
03-01-12 18:30:51 | Poem@Home | Not reporting or requesting tasks
03-01-12 18:30:56 | Poem@Home | Scheduler request completed

I am on the latest trunk of BOINC, that is required to run POEM and Albert (which as of now is shut down for maintenance) and have Catalyst 12.1, I was wondering if anyone else is having the same or is it just me.

Regards
tazzduke

[tazzduke]

Well I just answered my own bloody question, I have gone back to running Boinc 7.0.2, and I started to get more work when I did the update, anything after 7.0.2 just doesnt work

regards
tazzduke

[kashi]

Thanks for the information tazzduke. I'll give 7.0.2 a try in a day or so, I haven't used it before. 7.0.3 is awful for work fetch, won't get any tasks until the cache is totally dry for POEM GPU and almost dry for WCG. If it rains heavily my BOINCing could be cactus.;D

Sean I remember one or two people having trouble with Mobility 4xxx with the PrimeGrid ATI OpenCL application. They tried many different Catalyst driver versions but couldn't get it to work. It was supposed to have support or beta support but for OpenCL but nobody could get it working. From reading the POEM forum, I think the same thing is happening now at POEM with any 4xxx desktop card lower than the HD 4770.

[tazzduke]

Greetings All

Further update, on the 7.0.2 version of BOINC, work fetch is running smoothly, I have a cache of Collatz, Albert and POEM, all is running smoothly, with the occasional work fetch for MOO.

Happy crunching

Regards
tazzduke

[kashi]

Yes ATI PPS sieve is OpenCL. Good that your card works on that, I can't remember the exact details of the people who couldn't get their Mobility 4xxx to run it, perhaps it was a different model to yours or they were using a different operating system.

I should try a newer Catalyst version on my 5870, some at POEM have reported higher GPU load % on more recent ones. I'm reluctant to change them for a while though as with old Catalyst 11.4 version my 5870 has zoomed my computer up 2,364 spots to 6th ranking POEM host with over 3 million credits.

I'm just running my WCG cache down before I switch to BOINC 7.0.2. The mozzie project checkpoints are far apart and I don't like to lose already crunched work by stopping BOINC. I have already lost too much WCG crunching fiddling about with app_info.xml file when POEM GPU started.

Dingo has sent some of his hot weather up here today. It's 31.8 already and it's only noon. Bloke over the road has a home weather station and says on days like today it's usually at least 2 degrees hotter here than what is reported because the Narara AWS is miles away in a slightly cooler location. I believe it too, I just went outside to bring in my clothes and I had to hurry so I didn't get scorched. Could feel it burning almost immediately, need a lead suit to go outside here near midday on days like these. At least my clothes dried super fast.;D

[tazzduke]

Well on a further note, I now am pulling work, for Seti, Seti Beta, Albert, Primegrid, Moo, Milkyway and Primegrid all on 7.0.2, hd 5850 and cat 11.12 on win 7 x64, that should keep the card happy, have set up POEM, Seti and Seti Beta, to run two jobs at once, sometimes though, seti and poem or seti and seti beta are running, as long as the work is done I am not worried.

Had a massive lightning storm pass through here in the early hours of today (Perth WA), was lucky no blackouts where I and the family live.  Kept us awake for awhile, constant flash of light from the lightning strikes (too many to count) and then we zoomed up to 36 for today.

Rigs running okay, around the 55 degrees,

Okay catch ya all later.

Regards
tazzduke

[kashi]

I downgraded to BOINC 7.0.2.

Now I can get tasks at any time not just when the cache is dry. Will only download a single batch automatically, I have to click update to fill the cache to the level set but at least I can do it now not like the annoying work fetch limitations of version 7.0.3.

[kashi]

I updated to the latest Catalyst 12.1a Preview recently which almost doubled the performance of my HD 5870. I thought the credit per task would decrease in line with the reduction in Runtime and it did. What I didn't expect is that it would gradually recover to the previous amount, so now absolutely flying in POEM.


POEM GPU needs lots of room to breathe for maximum performance, I have set BOINC at 75% of processors or 6 cores. WCG runs on 4 cores, 2 cores are used to support 4 concurrent POEM GPU tasks. The other 2 cores not assigned to BOINC run 1 core of the SkyNet and half a core of OpenCL system overhead. Total CPU load is 91-95%, GPU load is 88%.

Créditos gigante available for a while if you have a fast ATI card and are willing to spare the CPU resources.

[veebee]

Thought I would give POEM another whirl as you are talking about such good credit Kashi.

there have been 4 WU's running all day on my 6950... they are at 13 hrs  and the progress percentage is around 0.02 to 0.05 on all 4....

Is this normal ? I am not sure if it was ar POEM or another project where  iread of "short', "Long", "Really Long" etc WU's (official description n the homepage !) but this seems excessively long.

I am downloading catalyst 12.1a preview...  is there checkpointing in these poem WU's so that those 12 hrs wont be wasted (unless they already are ..)?

Hopefully the driver update will make a difference.

[kashi]

Answered your PM but for the benefit of others yes POEM GPU has checkpointing. And 13 hrs is much too long, it is a reoccurrence of the problem you had before associated with your 4770 not being recognised by BOINC. If it is not recognised by BOINC it will possibly again cause trouble even if you get tasks running on your 6950 for a short time. Either use a dummy plug or remove it is all I can again suggest.

[veebee]

All seems to be running fine now - and I was inrending to remove the 4770 as BOINC wasn't recognising it for some reason (although MSI afterburner etc saw it fine).

Just did some fiddling with another project (Test4Theory - keeps/ kept errorring out after 1 minute) and shut down client and restarted..

VOILA !      both the 6950 AND the 4770 are now crunching away... 4 WU's at a time each. 

Will be intereting to see how much one of the 4770's puts out... as there is another PCIe slot sitting there... waiting ....