CPU-oriented projects?

Marecki · April 6, 2020

I've just realized that I have some servers at work that are idling due to COVID situation, and I could likely get permission to use them for some kind of distributed computing research project. However while they have powerful Xeon CPUs, they don't have any GPUs, and nowadays everything seems to be running on the latter, if not exclusively then at least much faster. Is there any project that is CPU focused?

steelo · April 6, 2020

6 minutes ago, Marecki said:

I've just realized that I have some servers at work that are idling due to COVID situation, and I could likely get permission to use them for some kind of distributed computing research project. However while they have powerful Xeon CPUs, they don't have any GPUs, and everything seems to be running on the latter, if not exclusively then at least much faster. Is there any project that is CPU focused?

This is very new to me, but I (think) at least some the COVID-19 projects are CPU based... I was using my CPU for a while, but with it only being a Ryzen 6c/12t, it was giving me crap points and somewhat slowing my GPU down...I think I've read that they recommend you have at least a 24c CPU for CPU only projects and even then the points won't be able to compare to GPU projects. However, it's for a good cause and better than letting your servers just run idle.

Anyways, I think there is plenty of projects for your Xeon CPU's to work on...

Gorgon · April 6, 2020

1 hour ago, Marecki said:

I've just realized that I have some servers at work that are idling due to COVID situation, and I could likely get permission to use them for some kind of distributed computing research project. However while they have powerful Xeon CPUs, they don't have any GPUs, and nowadays everything seems to be running on the latter, if not exclusively then at least much faster. Is there any project that is CPU focused?

There are a ton of Work Units (WUs) for CPU. The vast majority of folders use just GPUs as you get the most Points per Day (PPD) but many of the COVID-specific WUs coming out are CPU jobs as those models require more complex math not suited to GPUs.