P106 for Folding@home?

[Gorgon]

4 hours ago, ZexMaxwell said:

I bought a P106-090 to up my folding@home game. without any modifications to drivers and registry, F@H controller sees the GPU and works. 

 

its already known that Nvidia disable driver support on newer versions. but what i would like to do is to re-enable support for physX, since i already have a dedicated GPU for gaming. it would be even better to get the P106 onto Precision X1 for fan control and/or temperature monitoring.

Nice!  Keep us updated on your progress

[ZePompom]

Hello.

 

 

Silly question, does a P106-90 requires special drivers for Folding?

 

I can't find drivers for P100-90, it doesn't seem listed on nvidia website on the drivers download page.

 

Does that mean it's not supported anymore? Or can I just take the regular driver for GTX 1050 Ti and it'll works just fine with the P106-90?

 

 

Thank you in advance for your help.

 

 

(P.S : I'm already in LTT team, contributing with my GTX 1660, but I would like to revive an old PC to turn it into a modest GPU folding rig by replacing its HD 4770 by something modern. Considered GT 1030 and GTX 1650 Super, but P106-90 seem to be perfect for the job and are cheap. But I can't find any info about driver wich makes me kinda anxious about ordering one)

[LazyDev]

44 minutes ago, ZePompom said:

Hello.

 

 

Silly question, does a P106-90 requires special drivers for Folding?

 

I can't find drivers for P100-90, it doesn't seem listed on nvidia website on the drivers download page.

 

Does that mean it's not supported anymore? Or can I just take the regular driver for GTX 1050 Ti and it'll works just fine with the P106-90?

 

 

Thank you in advance for your help.

 

 

(P.S : I'm already in LTT team, contributing with my GTX 1660, but I would like to revive an old PC to turn it into a modest GPU folding rig by replacing its HD 4770 by something modern. Considered GT 1030 and GTX 1650 Super, but P106-90 seem to be perfect for the job and are cheap. But I can't find any info about driver wich makes me kinda anxious about ordering one)

This still works to this day, perfectly. Not sure on the PPD, as I'm currently experiencing a PCI-e bandwidth issue.

 

 

[ZePompom]

23 minutes ago, LazyDev said:

This still works to this day, perfectly. Not sure on the PPD, as I'm currently experiencing a PCI-e bandwidth issue.

 

 

Nice! Thanks!

 

You use the (regular?) latest nvidia drivers or you had to install a specific version?

 

 

EDIT : I think I found something : https://www.nv-drivers.eu/mining-drivers.html

 

I guess that imply latest drivers doesn't support this card anymore.

[LazyDev]

8 minutes ago, ZePompom said:

Nice! Thanks!

 

You use the (regular?) latest nvidia drivers or you had to install a specific version?

 

 

EDIT : I think I found something : https://www.nv-drivers.eu/mining-drivers.html

 

I guess that imply latest drivers doesn't support this card anymore.

Currently using the latest drivers. I've not read anything about those mining drivers. The P106-90 is plug and play, just like any other GTX 1060, as it's the same chip.

[ZePompom]

*Forgot to quote*

[ZePompom]

5 minutes ago, LazyDev said:

Currently using the latest drivers. I've not read anything about those mining drivers. The P106-90 is plug and play, just like any other GTX 1060, as it's the same chip.

That's really cool, thanks!

 

Just ordered one then, around 50€

 

Now I have to hope it won't bottleneck too hard with these old gen PCI Express slots ^^

 

Worst case if it bottleneck like hell in the old PC (for example because like the GT 1030 it doesn't use the full 16x connectors but only few of them), I'll put the P106 as second Card in my main PC, even if it'll be a headache (technically I have a second PCI E 16x slot but it's so cramped I would have to buy a PCI riser costing as much than the card ^^' )

[LazyDev]

5 minutes ago, ZePompom said:

That's really cool, thanks!

 

Just ordered one then, around 50€

 

Now I have to hope it won't bottleneck too hard with these old gen PCI Express slots ^^

 

Worst case is it bottleneck like hell in the old PC, I'll put the P106 as second Card in my main PC, even if it'll be a headache (technically I have a second PCI E 16x slot but it's so cramped I would have to buy a PCI riser costing as much than the card ^^' )

This is plugged into an old Intel motherboard, with an I7 860.

[ZePompom]

1 minute ago, LazyDev said:

This is plugged into an old Intel motherboard, with an I7 860.

Nice.

PCI E 1.0 or 2.0 in your case?

 

I saw my GTX 1660 uses around 25% of its PCIE 16x 3.0 when doing FAH, so the same card should be around 100% in PCIE 16x 1.0, but I was unable to try yet.

I'm suspicious now that I know some manufacturer provide 16x plug to their card but only wire it for 4x or 8x and the other lanes are unwired ...

Because 16x in 1.0 should be ok only if all 16 lanes are used, if only 4 or 8 are used, the datatransfer speed won't be enough on a 1.0 PCI slot.

[LazyDev]

I'm pretty sure this old board is PCI-e 2.0. It's definitely near the limit for the GPU.

 

I'm going to be experimenting with an Asus B250 motherboard that I have. I doubt I'll be able to fill all slots due to the CPU limitation.

 

Edit:

The I7 860 has a max bus speed of 2.5 GT/s, which is PCI-e 1.1.

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/41316/intel-core-i7-860-processor-8m-cache-2-80-ghz.html

[ZePompom]

1 minute ago, LazyDev said:

I'm pretty sure this old board is PCI-e 2.0. It's definitely near the limit for the GPU.

 

I'm going to be experimenting with an Asus B250 motherboard that I have. I doubt I'll be able to fill all slots due to the CPU limitation.

 

Ok so I'm screwed XD

 

It'll bottleneck on mine, but still better than a GT 1030 I guess, for the same price.

 

It seem your P106-90 is detected as a PCIe x4, so exactly what I was worried about (well, except the drivers), it doesn't use the full capabilities of the 16x slot. So even if technically a 16x should be enough in PCIe 1.0, since the GPU only uses 4 lanes among the 16, it won't be enough in the end and it'll bottleneck pretty hard

 

Thanks a lot for the infos though ^^

 

If it bottleneck too hard, well ... guess I'll have to order a PCIe 4x PCI riser and find some room in my daily use PC then.

[LazyDev]

5 minutes ago, ZePompom said:

 

Ok so I'm screwed XD

 

It'll bottleneck on mine, but still better than a GT 1030 I guess, for the same price.

 

It seem your P106-90 is detected as a PCIe x4, so exactly what I was worried about (well, except the drivers), it doesn't use the full capabilities of the 16x slot. So even if technically a 16x should be enough in PCIe 1.0, since the GPU only uses 4 lanes among the 16, it won't be enough in the end and it'll bottleneck pretty hard

 

Thanks a lot for the infos though ^^

 

If it bottleneck too hard, well ... guess I'll have to order a PCIe 4x PCI riser and find some room in my daily use PC then.

If the P106 is been bottle necked, it's by the I7, which maxes out at PCI-e 1.1. If Techpowerup is correct, only 74% of the bus is been used, so the CPU isn't been bottlenecked, but I don't know how Folding at Home affects the use of a CPU core.

 

Edit

 

It's hard to believe that a 960 is outperformaing the GP106 GPU, but it's hard to say if it's bottlenecked, or the project is complex. Assumptions can only be made from the PPD. It's still a worthy GPU, tho. It's extremely cheap and plentiful thanks to the 2018 cryptocurrency crash.

 

[ZePompom]

21 minutes ago, LazyDev said:

If the P106 is been bottle necked, it's by the I7, which maxes out at PCI-e 1.1. If Techpowerup is correct, only 74% of the bus is been used, so the CPU isn't been bottlenecked, but I don't know how Folding at Home affects the use of a CPU core.

 

Ok.

 

If it's the case it should be ok then, if your 72% PCI Bus Use is in 1.1, it should be similar in 1.0.

 

The CPU of the PC I plan to use is a E5300, bot it won't fold, only the GPU will.

 

It's a PC I assembled on a budget for my sister around 2009 if I remember right. When it was out of date and she replaced it she gave it to me.

 

If I can give him some horsepower for FAH with this P106-90, It'll be nice. Better than gathering dust.4

 

 

Thank you again!

[LazyDev]

@ZePompom, My GTX 1060 failed this morning, for no reason. The PPD for a P106-090 seems to be around 350K.

 

[ZePompom]

17 minutes ago, LazyDev said:

@ZePompom, My GTX 1060 failed this morning, for no reason. The PPD for a P106-090 seems to be around 350K.

 

That's very good for a 50$ card! I hope it'll work! I plan to try on linux first and if I can't make it work switch to win 10.

[cs9k]

Very good indeed!  I could only manage about 250k/200k with Zotac P106-90's as 2nd and 3rd cards in my Z68 i7 3770k@4.6gHz system.

 

I'm not sure if it's a pci-e bottleneck with them only using 1.1 @ x4, but I'd consider keeping them if I could get 350k out of each.  Did you do anything special, @LazyDev?  I see that the PPD was much lower when there were 3 gpu's in your system.

[LazyDev]

3 hours ago, cs9k said:

Very good indeed!  I could only manage about 250k/200k with Zotac P106-90's as 2nd and 3rd cards in my Z68 i7 3770k@4.6gHz system.

 

I'm not sure if it's a pci-e bottleneck with them only using 1.1 @ x4, but I'd consider keeping them if I could get 350k out of each.  Did you do anything special, @LazyDev?  I see that the PPD was much lower when there were 3 gpu's in your system.

I'm not sure if it's because I'm pushing my GPU's, but they've seemed to settle at around 200K PPD. It could also be a PCI-E bottleneck.

[cs9k]

Ah, that's a bit disappointing of the p106-90's.  Back to ebay they go~

[LazyDev]

4 hours ago, cs9k said:

Ah, that's a bit disappointing of the p106-90's.  Back to ebay they go~

@cs9k Not so hasty. My systems are far sub par. I'm currently looking for a cheaper solution at this time.

 

One of the P106-090's on a PCH X1 slot.

 

 

1060 3GB (Same GPU) plugged into the X16 slot at X1.

 

 

Interestingly, using CPU lanes seems to be far more efficient than using PCH lanes, at least, for the motherboard in use. That been said, the P106-090 has the same GPU as the 1060, so the PPD should be the same, within margin. Just my systems are not effective on the PCI-E bandwidth. These screenshots now show that my P106's are bandwidth bottlenecked.

[CWP]

When dealing with the P106s, you will also need to look at the ending as well. According to TechPowerUp, the -090 has the same CUDA cores as a 1050 Ti, while the -100 looks exactly like a 1060, specs-wise. As such, the folding performance would be on par with the respective cards.

 

I do not have a -090 to play with, but I can say that my -100 is doing around 450-500kPPD, even when plugged into a PCIe 1.1 x16 slot.

[cs9k]

Ah ha, there's the detail that I missed.  I knew the -90 had 3gb, the -100 6gb.  I also knew the -100 was a 1060... I just didn't catch that the -90's cuda cores more closely matched the 1050(Ti) instead of the 1060 3gb.  So the numbers I was getting from my two -90's more or less fall in line with PPD numbers I'm seeing from 1050/1050ti's.

 

Ah well, that's what I get for jumping the gun.

 

Also, thanks for the additional information, LazyDev.  Unfortunately, 250,000ish ppd was about the best I ever saw in a cpu-lane 8x slot with my -90, which is spot on given the cuda cores.  Given the low PPD potential of the -90's, it unfortunately is not worth the power draw and heat in my case, as summer in Texas draws near.  For now, I'm looking for efficiency. 

 

I thought I'd done the research on the -90's, but alas...

[ZePompom]

Received the 1st of my P106-90 (ordered two but one seem to take its time ... hopingit's not lost), unfortunately, not compatible with the motherboard I bought them for ^^'

 

Une long and 3 shorts beeps, Motherboard doesn't want to boot.

(p5kpl-am epu, also tried on a p5k-e, not better)

 

So now I'm working on plan B, aka putting them in my much more modern main/gaming PC with my GTX 1660, instead than in a dedicated folding rig.

 

 

The GTX 1660 uses the PCIe 3.0 16x slot, what remains on my MB are a fake 16x (in fact a 4x in disguise) and a x1 slots, both in PCIe 2.0.

 

If I believe the last screenshots, it still should be enough to get around 200k ppd per card, right? :-S

 

 

Ordered two different PCi risers (both slots are in places too cramped to directly plug a video card in it)

 

One floppy-style riser, in 4x to 4x

https://www.ebay.com/itm/182650655153

 

And a "mining" riser, 1x to 16x, using USB cable.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/PCI-E-Express-1x-To-16x-Extender-Riser-Card-Adapter-Power-Cable/184203430895?hash=item2ae3614bef:g:FHkAAOSw2uheZejH

 

 

Waiting to get them to do some testing. hoping it'll work this time

[LavenderPhantom78139]

26 minutes ago, ZePompom said:

Received the 1st of my P106-90 (ordered two but one seem to take its time ... hopingit's not lost), unfortunately, not compatible with the motherboard I bought them for ^^'

 

Une long and 3 shorts beeps, Motherboard doesn't want to boot.

(p5kpl-am epu, also tried on a p5k-e, not better)

 

So now I'm working on plan B, aka putting them in my much more modern main/gaming PC with my GTX 1660, instead than in a dedicated folding rig.

 

 

The GTX 1660 uses the PCIe 3.0 16x slot, what remains on my MB are a fake 16x (in fact a 4x in disguise) and a x1 slots, both in PCIe 2.0.

 

If I believe the last screenshots, it still should be enough to get around 200k ppd per card, right? :-S

 

 

Ordered two different PCi risers (both slots are in places too cramped to directly plug a video card in it)

 

One floppy-style riser, in 4x to 4x

https://www.ebay.com/itm/182650655153

 

And a "mining" riser, 1x to 16x, using USB cable.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/PCI-E-Express-1x-To-16x-Extender-Riser-Card-Adapter-Power-Cable/184203430895?hash=item2ae3614bef:g:FHkAAOSw2uheZejH

 

 

Waiting to get them to do some testing. hoping it'll work this time

My 1060 3gb is in a pcie 2.0 x4 slot and gets 380k ppd

[ZePompom]

19 hours ago, LavenderPhantom78139 said:

My 1060 3gb is in a pcie 2.0 x4 slot and gets 380k ppd

Tanks!

 

I'm not worried about the 4x riser (well, not about the speed, more about its construction quality ...), more about the 1x, but LazyDev's screenshots are showing it should be ok.

(82% bus interface load on a PCIe 1x 1.1 with a P106-90. So should be more than ok with a PCIe 1x 2.0)

[ZePompom]

Finally have a working one. 150k PPDs with USB PCIe 1x riser

 

Got refunded for the other one I got and who appear to be defective (cause BSOD on win 10, freezes on Linux, found rust on its metal grill).

 

Nos considering getting a folding rig with a GTX 1650 SUPER as main GPU and the P106 as backup.

 

Thank you all for your help!