100% CPU utilisation on Mac Book Pro

Message boards : Questions and problems : 100% CPU utilisation on Mac Book Pro
Message board moderation

To post messages, you must log in.

AuthorMessage
Anders Marius Jørgensen

Send message
Joined: 30 Apr 17
Posts: 1
Denmark
Message 77690 - Posted: 30 Apr 2017, 8:51:54 UTC

Dear all,

Sorry for this newbie question.

The Boinc client often utilising the CPU 100% (7-8 processes call wcgrid_mcm1_7.36_x86_64-apple-darwin are using 97% each)
As a result the fans are running at full speed.
I have configured client to use at most 1% of the CPU.

How can I force the Boinc client only to use 1% of the CPU

p.s Boinc client version 7.6.34. Mac Book Pro running Mac OS Sierra

p.p.s. The projects running are World Community Grid (Mapping Cancer Markers)

Regards
Anders
ID: 77690 · Report as offensive
Profile Jord
Volunteer tester
Help desk expert
Avatar

Send message
Joined: 29 Aug 05
Posts: 15477
Netherlands
Message 77691 - Posted: 30 Apr 2017, 9:55:12 UTC - in response to Message 77690.  

The science applications at the projects will use the processor 100%, but are set to be at the lowest priority, meaning that anything else with a higher priority will take their CPU cycles fully away from the science applications.

Using the throttle function in BOINC you tell BOINC to suspend for N seconds every 10 seconds, meaning that at 50% BOINC suspends for 5 seconds, runs for 5 seconds. At 1% utilization you tell BOINC to run for 1 second every 100 seconds. You can just as well suspend BOINC, because no science will be done this way, none of the tasks you have will run before their deadline, you're just using electricity for nothing.

Unless there is a third-party add-on through which you can set the CPU utilization in whole percentages, you won't get BOINC to run at a sustained CPU percentage. I know of no such add-on for the Mac, only for Windows (TThrottle).

You can better set the BOINC to not use all the CPU cores via the "Use at most N% of the CPUs" if you want to cool things down. Settings this to 99% for instance uses all but one CPU core. If you have an 8 core CPU, or a 4 core with hyperthreading, setting this value to 50% will use just half the cores, leaving the others free and this way not heating up the system so much.

Lastly, clean the dust from the fans. Make sure it has enough room to breathe. Laptops/notebooks are notorious for overheating because they cannot call in enough cool air to cool all the elements inside due to ineffective fan holes on the underside/backside. Or because they're clogged up with dust. Or because by putting the notebook down, you clog up the fan holes. Using a cooling pad is probably a good solution here.
ID: 77691 · Report as offensive
Richard Haselgrove
Volunteer tester
Help desk expert

Send message
Joined: 5 Oct 06
Posts: 5077
United Kingdom
Message 77693 - Posted: 30 Apr 2017, 10:11:28 UTC - in response to Message 77691.  

The science applications at the projects will use the processor 100%, but are set to be at the lowest priority, meaning that anything else with a higher priority will take their CPU cycles fully away from the science applications.

Using the throttle function in BOINC you tell BOINC to suspend for N seconds every 10 seconds, meaning that at 50% BOINC suspends for 5 seconds, runs for 5 seconds. At 1% utilization you tell BOINC to run for 1 second every 100 seconds. You can just as well suspend BOINC, because no science will be done this way, none of the tasks you have will run before their deadline, you're just using electricity for nothing.
BOINC itself will continue to run continuously even at that 1% setting: but BOINC uses very little CPU time to perform its management and supervisory function.

It will send instructions to the WCG application to run for 1 second, and then suspend for 99 seconds: if your CPU monitor continues to see 100% utilisation by the WCG apps during the 99 second 'idle' time, then it's possible that the Mac version of the WCG app is failing to respond to these 'command and control' messages.
ID: 77693 · Report as offensive
Profile Jord
Volunteer tester
Help desk expert
Avatar

Send message
Joined: 29 Aug 05
Posts: 15477
Netherlands
Message 77694 - Posted: 30 Apr 2017, 11:10:42 UTC - in response to Message 77693.  

... if your CPU monitor continues to see 100% utilisation by the WCG apps during the 99 second 'idle' time, then it's possible that the Mac version of the WCG app is failing to respond to these 'command and control' messages.
Or Activity is set to "Run always" which will ignore any such preferences as throttling/amount of CPUs set. Needs to be set to "Run based on preferences."
ID: 77694 · Report as offensive
Richard Haselgrove
Volunteer tester
Help desk expert

Send message
Joined: 5 Oct 06
Posts: 5077
United Kingdom
Message 77698 - Posted: 30 Apr 2017, 14:14:00 UTC - in response to Message 77695.  

Far as I know, there's no WCG custom version of BOINC for Linux or OS-X, only for Windows. They simply host a copy on their download page of the latest 'recommended', that is, the code vetted version, becauuuuse their uptime is tad over Berkeley's.
It wasn't the BOINC client behaviour that I was worried about, but the signal handler in the BOINC API code that's compiled into the science application: it's the API which gives the science application the ability to react to the various commands (suspend, resume, exit and so on) that the client sends it.

Of course, as Jord points out, the commonest reason for not reacting to a signal is when no signal is sent because of a "run always" user preference...
ID: 77698 · Report as offensive

Message boards : Questions and problems : 100% CPU utilisation on Mac Book Pro

Copyright © 2024 University of California.
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation.