Why Folding On School Computers Isn't Such A Ridiculous Idea

[vanished]

I thought about this with consoles when in idle but people said it was a stupid idea .

 

Hm... talk about an untapped potential.  That would be interesting, but I see a few possible issues

1. afaik F@H does not currently run on any console, so a new version (well, 2 actually) would have to be made (for PS4 and XBONE)

2. Beyond that, I think it wouldn't just be a case of running a program - it would have to be integrated into the "OS" which would be a big deal.  I say this because people treat consoles differently than computers; they get turned on and off as needed by the second and often unexpectedly.  For F@H to really work, what used to turn it off would have to simply set an idle mode where F@H starts up.  And dealing with the unexpected unpluggings and so on would be a pain...

3. I'm not sure how the new ones handle heat, but there was a time when certain consoles simply could not operate indefinitely at full load without dying from it.

 

I'd love to be proven wrong on any of these points so please do if you think you can, but I don't think this is as easy as opportunity as the school idea, despite the fact that it may have a similar or even larger impact if it worked.

[EvilWiffles]

Hm... talk about an untapped potential.  That would be interesting, but I see a few possible issues

1. afaik F@H does not currently run on any console, so a new version (well, 2 actually) would have to be made (for PS4 and XBONE)

2. Beyond that, I think it wouldn't just be a case of running a program - it would have to be integrated into the "OS" which would be a big deal.  I say this because people treat consoles differently than computers; they get turned on and off as needed by the second and often unexpectedly.  For F@H to really work, what used to turn it off would have to simply set an idle mode where F@H starts up.  And dealing with the unexpected unpluggings and so on would be a pain...

3. I'm not sure how the new ones handle heat, but there was a time when certain consoles simply could not operate indefinitely at full load without dying from it.

 

I'd love to be proven wrong on any of these points so please do if you think you can, but I don't think this is as easy as opportunity as the school idea, despite the fact that it may have a similar or even larger impact if it worked.

 

 

Yeah, the heat and all wouldn't be so great but as spoken about before on this thread, having F@H running mid load would be better. PS3's use to be able to fold, back when you could install Linux and all that, it was pretty impressive to see as well.

[You_are_a_cunt]

My old highschool's been running SETI@Home for 8 years now (ever since I convinced the faculty to do it back when I was a freshman) and so far none of the computers have failed due to the load (then again they've failed because of stupid kids that more or less intentionally borked them in one way or another).

 

Even if they're running for 5-6 hours/day during breaks or when there isn't anyone in the labs, once you have 100-odd PCs working about you'll be gettin' that sweet credit pretty fast (if that's really all you care about).

[RaspberryPi]

school uses windows

Yes, but is chrome installed or just IE?

[P e r s e p h o n e]

Regardless of the complications that may arise the fact still remains that we have an enormous amount of computational power not being utilized. It seems like a waste to let increasingly outdated hardware stay underutilized. I think it's a pretty sensible idea, and we can simply throttle the crap out of them to keep power and temps reasonable. In which case there's more that these computers can do other than protein folding. On top of that its overall impact on the cost to subsidize the extra electricity necessary to run this program should be negligible. Electricity is obviously classified as a utility and thus quite cheap... Now if only we didn't run so much of it on oil.

[Elapo]

It's neither efficient nor effective..

But a slow CPU is better than none 

Is it though? You'd be finding a cure for cancer while melting the icecaps.

Folding on old harware isn't worth it IMHO.

 

Regardless of the complications that may arise the fact still remains that we have an enormous amount of computational power not being utilized. It seems like a waste to let increasingly outdated hardware stay underutilized. I think it's a pretty sensible idea, and we can simply throttle the crap out of them to keep power and temps reasonable. In which case there's more that these computers can do other than protein folding. On top of that its overall impact on the cost to subsidize the extra electricity necessary to run this program should be negligible. Electricity is obviously classified as a utility and thus quite cheap... Now if only we didn't run so much of it on oil.

This! Many people seem to be ignoring this fact. It's great that you want to help research which can lead to cures for certain incurable diseases, but destroying the environment in the process won't make it worth.