LTT Official Folding Month 2018!!!

[imreloadin]

Just now, Ben Quigley said:

What do you mean? ASICs can't fold...

That's what I was thinking, saw on the curecoin forum that people can "mine" with asics still, so is the actual "curecoin" separated from folding then? And you can just exchange points for coins or something lol?

[GOTSpectrum]

5 minutes ago, imreloadin said:

That's what I was thinking, saw on the curecoin forum that people can "mine" with asics still, so is the actual "curecoin" separated from folding then? And you can just exchange points for coins or something lol?

That is beyond my level of knowledge unfortunately.

[palespartan]

1 hour ago, imreloadin said:

That's what I was thinking, saw on the curecoin forum that people can "mine" with asics still, so is the actual "curecoin" separated from folding then? And you can just exchange points for coins or something lol?

To my understanding they have their own mining software that only works on folding compatible hardware. And they use I think 50-50 between mining for their coin and folding power (might be changeable) their whole shtick is kind of what I based the folding week we did a while back on. The idea is that if you're mining why not put the hardware to good use. But they have the mindset of doing so and still mining but the currency is worthless so really it just kills your folding power. But the concept isn't bad it was kind of a way to take advantage of the crypto market and use their hardware to actually help humanity so like a robinhood that cures cancer and uses electricity.

[Opencircuit74]

2 hours ago, Ben Quigley said:

That is beyond my level of knowledge unfortunately.

I dabbled in quite a bit of this before the crypto boom, and made a few bucks off it.

 

It uses people's old SHA-256 mining hardware to mine for the coins, and gives them a percentage (I think it was 15 or 20%) of what they mine. Then it takes the people who use GPUs and gives them another part of what the mining hardware mined, I think it was 65% or something. Then it distributes the amount of coins each person earned at the end of the day.

 

I actually made a hypothetical miner while the craze was going on, and It would make itself back in 3 months with 2 1080 tis. Still have the analytics and PCPP lists... That's not possible anymore, but at least I broke my school's terms of use to make $20 folding on their computers. Good Times.

 

Anyway, my 1070Ti's going to take a hack at this for the month, I've still got a couple of days to figure out how to get the most ppd for the least heat and noise.

[GOTSpectrum]

3 minutes ago, Opencircuit74 said:

I dabbled in quite a bit of this before the crypto boom, and made a few bucks off it.

 

It uses people's old SHA-256 mining hardware to mine for the coins, and gives them a percentage (I think it was 15 or 20%) of what they mine. Then it takes the people who use GPUs and gives them another part of what the mining hardware mined, I think it was 65% or something. Then it distributes the amount of coins each person earned at the end of the day.

 

I actually made a hypothetical miner while the craze was going on, and It would make itself back in 3 months with 2 1080 tis. Still have the analytics and PCPP lists... That's not possible anymore, but at least I broke my school's terms of use to make $20 folding on their computers. Good Times.

 

Anyway, my 1070Ti's going to take a hack at this for the month, I've still got a couple of days to figure out how to get the most ppd for the least heat and noise.

Talk to @Gorgon he's been doing some pretty extensive research into PPD Vs wattage. Also, WELCOME ABOARD!

[Opencircuit74]

1 minute ago, Ben Quigley said:

Talk to @Gorgon he's been doing some pretty extensive research into PPD Vs wattage. Also, WELCOME ABOARD!

Thanks, will do. I also have 2 7970s, but I don't know if they will be worth it. Maybe I'll run them with really low voltages or something.

[GOTSpectrum]

Just now, Opencircuit74 said:

Thanks, will do. I also have 2 7970s, but I don't know if they will be worth it. Maybe I'll run them with really low voltages or something.

I'm running a 7950 but mostly because it's being used for heating hehe.

[Metallus97]

1 minute ago, Opencircuit74 said:

Thanks, will do. I also have 2 7970s, but I don't know if they will be worth it. Maybe I'll run them with really low voltages or something.

every GPU is worth it!

But yes, I strongly suggest undervaluing them . My 290x are running with -50mv stable 

[Metallus97]

Just now, Metallus97 said:

every GPU is worth it!

But yes, I strongly suggest undervolting them . My 290x are running with -50mv stable 

 

[palespartan]

49 minutes ago, Opencircuit74 said:

Thanks, will do. I also have 2 7970s, but I don't know if they will be worth it. Maybe I'll run them with really low voltages or something.

This isn't mining. Its all worth it. I had a 580 lightning edition folding for a long time. so long as you don't go broke on the power bill then fold on everything.

[Opencircuit74]

8 minutes ago, palespartan said:

This isn't mining. Its all worth it. I had a 580 lightning edition folding for a long time. so long as you don't go broke on the power bill then fold on everything.

Heat. Lots of heat having 3 systems with 150W+GPUs running at the same time. The 7970s I will run, but at very reduced voltages. Maybe combined they will have the performance of 1-1.25 of them.

[palespartan]

2 minutes ago, Opencircuit74 said:

Heat. Lots of heat having 3 systems with 150W+GPUs running at the same time. The 7970s I will run, but at very reduced voltages. Maybe combined they will have the performance of 1-1.25 of them.

Yeah I avoided that problem by putting different rigs in different rooms and stuff.

[Gorgon]

43 minutes ago, Ben Quigley said:

Talk to @Gorgon he's been doing some pretty extensive research into PPD Vs wattage. Also, WELCOME ABOARD!

TLDR: 750,000PPD - 950,000 PPD full-tilt but I can and do dial that down to 600,000PPD to reduce noise and heat by decreasing my power limit (hint: at a lower power limit you can usually run a larger GPU Clock Offset than at higher Power Limits)

 

I run Linux but the principles are the same under Windows. I'll focus on Windows as I suspect most people are using that OS for folding.

 

You achieve more PPD in much the same way as you get a higher framerate while gaming and like gaming it is a few steps that will get you most of the way there and a few final tweaks that will give you further smaller boosts.

 

With Pascals using GPU Boost 3 you are trying to get the highest GPU Shader Clock rates. As your clockrate increases the GPU produces much more heat. Like a CPU there are thermal limits in place but you need to use a tool like MSI Afterburner or EVGA Precision Pro to monitor your GPU Clockspeed, Temperature and Fan Speed. I usually run GPU-Z at the same time as it shows much the same things but in a more compact view.

 

How much PPD you can produce ultimately comes down to how fast you can clock the GPU and to a lesser extent how faster you can push your Memory (AKA a GPU Overclock and a Memory Overclock)

The first thing you need to do is to establish a baseline. While folding for a few workunits note your high and low PPDs.  At the same time run your monitoring tool(s) and note your GPU Clock Speeds, Fan Speeds and GPU Temperature.

 

With a few WUs under your belt:

 

Increase your Power Limit All the Way Up.

Disable Automatic Fan Control and run your GPU fan at 100% while testing.

 

Keep Running Folding at Home and note the change in PPD and the corresponding GPU Clocks and Temperature. If the Temperature starts getting in the mid to high 80s back off the power limit. You likely have a clogged GPU Cooler or insufficient airflow through your case.

 

Once your able to run at the maximum power limit for sustained periods with a comfortable GPU temperature you can start decreasing the FAN speed and watch the temperatures. Again, just because one WU runs at 78C the next may push you into the 80s. Personally, I don't like running my fans past about 70% for long periods. One of my GTX1060s is a less expensive Gigabyte unit and I find anything over 65% on that one I start hearing a rattle so I let one of the kids take that to College for Gaming

 

The Power Limit Increase and ensuring adequate heat removal will give you the Biggest Boost in PPD.

 

To get the next step in PPD you need to try increasing the GPU clock assuming you have some thermal headroom left. Or if your not comfortable pushing it you can just leave things as they are and try setting a custom fan curve or adjusting the Fan Speed Manually to offset Heat and Noise.

 

How far you can push the clock is limited by how cool you can run the card. Pascal cards will start downclocking a bit between 60-70C, more aggressively at 70-80C and after about 83C quite a bit.

 

FAHBench can be used to test rather than the Folding Client so when you hit the wall and start producing errors your not failing Work Units (WUs). Remember that like in Gaming just because it works one step down from failure does not mean it wont start failing, usually in the middle of the night or when your away for a day. So be a little conservative and if a +250MHz clock works back it off a bit.

 

Run FAHBench for at least 10 Minutes at each clock step while trying to find where you lose in the Silicone Lottery. Once you have hit the wall back off and try a longer test, say 20 minutes or so. If that survives I'd suggest backing it off a "titch" more to give you some leeway. the 1070 Ti tends to adjust clock in 13MHz steps so I tend to round down to the nearest 13MHz step. I can fold for weeks with a +182MHz GPU Clock Offset with no failed Work Units. My 1060s are not as fortunate. +117MHz for one and only +75MHz for another.

 

Run Some Work Units for a while and look at the Logs in the Advanced control and make sure you are being awarded points and WUs arent failing. If you get failed WUs back it off one or two 13MHz steps.

 

Once you have a stable GPU Clock Offset you can try increasing the Memory Clock Offset but I've noticed marginal gains ( + 1 -2 %) doing this but others seem to think it helps especially with AMD cards perhaps?

 

Here increase in 200MHz steps or so. I had to go to a +1300MHz before FAHBench crashed and I saw very little difference in the score compared to GPU Clock Offsets. +1300MHz seemed an insane speed for GDDR5(X?) so I'm just running at +400MHz.

 

Again, once you have a stable Memory Clock Offset in FAHBench run some real Work Units and watch your logs and monitoring.

 

Keep a log of what you adjusted and what the outcomes were.

 

Once you find something that works save it as a preset in MSI Afterburner or EVGA Precision Pro. Or save a number of them so you can dial up your folding as you see fit (after November of course. We expect you to be running full tilt until then

[Gorgon]

My Home "Data Centre" LHS is the Dual GPU Linux Rig. RHS is my FreeNAS. My Single GPU Linux folding rig is on the other side of the room as I'm running low on Power

[GOTSpectrum]

T-3 Days. Folding Month 2018 

 

Well there have been yet another bunch of people join up, we are at one off from hitting the big 130! Thank you everyone who has shown support, the team has exploded, the production of the team even more so. You are all getting right into the last few days of tinker time, give your rigs the spit shine they need and make she she keep on purring! We are on track for our first 50mil point day in many years thanks to the effort of you guys and the machines you have at your disposal. Give yourselves a pat on the back for just how well you have all mobilised to earn more badges help support the community.

We have seen quite a lot of movement in the bottom half of the top 20 producers but the top half for the most part have remained mostly static, will that change, will someone come in and knock LedendaryPoet from the top spot? Only time will tell! Don't forgot to follow the thread/Blog if you haven't done so yet to keep getting yourself these wonderful updates.

 

Happy folding folks,

 

Ben.

[iLostMyXbox21]

how well will this syetem do folding? (probably not well)

 

ryzen 5 2600

2x4gb ddr4 2400mhz ram

gtx 1060 6gb

[Gorgon]

Before the Storm

In my 4' x 8' Man Cave

[GOTSpectrum]

1 minute ago, Gorgon said:

Before the Storm

In my 4' x 8' Man Cave

I wish I had your level of funding my dude!

[Gorgon]

4 minutes ago, iLostMyXbox21 said:

how well will this syetem do folding? (probably not well)

 

ryzen 5 2600

2x4gb ddr4 2400mhz ram

gtx 1060 6gb

350,000PPD - 450,000PPD for the GTX and probably 50,000PPD for the CPU

 

Every bit helps!

[Gorgon]

1 minute ago, Ben Quigley said:

I wish I had your level of funding my dude!

Says the Dude with the 1080Ti that's kicking my butt!

 

I'm starting off small. Next step is another 1070Ti or a 2070 ... sometime next year

[GOTSpectrum]

Just now, Gorgon said:

Says the Dude with the 1080Ti that's kicking my butt!

 

I'm starting off small. Next step is another 1070Ti or a 2070 ... sometime next year

It took borrowing money and getting a refund on my Vega that blew up to afford that. Plus it was like almost £300 off... That helped too...

[Gorgon]

Yeah,

 

I got pretty much all these parts over 6 months waiting for sales. Was running the Mobo in a Define R4 Case I got for $50Cdn used until the Define S went on sale.

 

"She that must be obeyed" and I have achieved Detente (or is that MAD). She spends $2,000 a year on small purchases and I spend about the same on my "toys"

[GOTSpectrum]

1 minute ago, Gorgon said:

Yeah,

 

I got pretty much all these parts over 6 months waiting for sales. Was running the Mobo in a Define R4 Case I got for $50Cdn used until the Define S went on sale.

 

"She that must be obeyed" and I have achieved Detente (or is that MAD). She spends $2,000 a year on small purchases and I spend about the same on my "toys"

Hahaha, it was my partner who lent me the money. They are very accepting of my hobbies. We are brewing a beer together on Wednesday actually! 

[iLostMyXbox21]

11 minutes ago, Gorgon said:

350,000PPD - 450,000PPD for the GTX and probably 50,000PPD for the CPU

 

Every bit helps!

uhhh... layman's terms?

[GOTSpectrum]

1 minute ago, iLostMyXbox21 said:

uhhh... layman's terms?

You'd be in the top 30 producers for the team.