Thread 'A Real Stumper'

Message boards : BOINC client : A Real Stumper
Message board moderation

To post messages, you must log in.

AuthorMessage
ephman

Send message
Joined: 22 Dec 05
Posts: 9
United States
Message 10363 - Posted: 19 May 2007, 16:00:18 UTC

hi,

here's the scoop. i'm running ubuntu fiesty on my intel 1.7 ghz. i'm running a few boinc 5.4.11, projects (rosetta, and climate) which maxs out the cpu. now without any changes to the system i've noticed that my cpu won't go over 600Mhz running boinc. just happened the other day. it's like the intel sidesteps the chip down. weird. however when i'm running any other programs and the cpu needs everything its got the chip works just fine and will go up to the 1.7 ghz. but when that process is over it'll go back down to the 600 mhz while running boinc. now i know it might be a boinc related issue, however, nothing changed. so whatever i reinstalled the program just in case and that didn't solve the issue. i've looked all over so this is my last hope. any suggestions?

thanks,
ephman
ID: 10363 · Report as offensive
ProfileKSMarksPsych
Avatar

Send message
Joined: 30 Oct 05
Posts: 1239
United States
Message 10366 - Posted: 19 May 2007, 19:33:43 UTC

Have you checked temps? To me it sounds like thermal throttling. But I agree it's odd that other CPU intensive programs work fine.

Maybe try running something like Prime95?
Kathryn :o)
ID: 10366 · Report as offensive
ephman

Send message
Joined: 22 Dec 05
Posts: 9
United States
Message 10369 - Posted: 19 May 2007, 22:04:19 UTC - in response to Message 10366.  
Last modified: 19 May 2007, 22:09:06 UTC

Have you checked temps? To me it sounds like thermal throttling. But I agree it's odd that other CPU intensive programs work fine.

Maybe try running something like Prime95?


my temps ran a bit high when things were normal, around 64c @ 1.7ghz, now they're a steady 47C @ 600mhz. however, when i turn off and on my computer boinc never goes beyond the 600mhz now thus never allowing the chip to get hot enough to throttle back. i don't think that linux can remember what programs cause the chip to heat up and then on reboot remember to throttle back the cpu when boinc runs. i might be wrong. i upgraded to the latest 5.8.17, and still only giving out 600mhz, not the full 1.7ghz. when i run the cpu benchmark the chip then outputs the full 1.7ghz. haven't tried the prime yet. i told you this is a strange one.

thanks for the bandwidth,
ephman
ID: 10369 · Report as offensive
ProfileKSMarksPsych
Avatar

Send message
Joined: 30 Oct 05
Posts: 1239
United States
Message 10370 - Posted: 19 May 2007, 22:17:18 UTC

I'm out of ideas then. I really don't know. Maybe a Linux guru will drop by.
Kathryn :o)
ID: 10370 · Report as offensive
dcdc

Send message
Joined: 29 Aug 06
Posts: 82
United Kingdom
Message 10391 - Posted: 20 May 2007, 12:10:52 UTC
Last modified: 20 May 2007, 12:11:11 UTC

it might be because of the priority/nice level of the boinc apps - I believe speedstep will still throttle the CPU if the intensive task is only low priority. Could you turn speedstep off, or do you use speedstep when running on batteries?
ID: 10391 · Report as offensive
ephman

Send message
Joined: 22 Dec 05
Posts: 9
United States
Message 10392 - Posted: 20 May 2007, 13:41:56 UTC - in response to Message 10391.  

it might be because of the priority/nice level of the boinc apps - I believe speedstep will still throttle the CPU if the intensive task is only low priority. Could you turn speedstep off, or do you use speedstep when running on batteries?


i don't want to turn speedstep off just yet. however for me to get the chip back up to the 1.7ghz i had to change the priority to normal from very low. seems to be working. things seem to be a little sluggish now however. i didn't want to do that because it's not a default setting from boinc, but anyhow we'll see how it works out.

thanks,
ephman

ID: 10392 · Report as offensive
ephman

Send message
Joined: 22 Dec 05
Posts: 9
United States
Message 10393 - Posted: 20 May 2007, 14:15:06 UTC - in response to Message 10392.  

it might be because of the priority/nice level of the boinc apps - I believe speedstep will still throttle the CPU if the intensive task is only low priority. Could you turn speedstep off, or do you use speedstep when running on batteries?


i don't want to turn speedstep off just yet. however for me to get the chip back up to the 1.7ghz i had to change the priority to normal from very low. seems to be working. things seem to be a little sluggish now however. i didn't want to do that because it's not a default setting from boinc, but anyhow we'll see how it works out.

thanks,
ephman



found the solution. fiesty now supports frequency scaling... tada. had to make a few changes to change the setting from on demand to performance and that was it. solid 1.7ghz now all the time. sweet.

thanks,
ephman
ID: 10393 · Report as offensive
FalconFly
Avatar

Send message
Joined: 16 Mar 07
Posts: 16
Germany
Message 10404 - Posted: 21 May 2007, 13:16:37 UTC - in response to Message 10393.  
Last modified: 21 May 2007, 13:17:48 UTC

As far as I know this is a long standing BOINC bug.

With intel Speedstep or AMD Cool&Quiet or PowerNow! enabled, BOINC apparently fails to trigger the corresponding CPU Power Management to ramp up clock levels (affects both Linux and Win32).

I've seen the respective Performance drops various times, after I forgot to either disable it or set the Power Management to "Performance"...
It seems the BOINC benchmarking does manage to trigger it in some Versions, but the Project Clients I have seen did not while running.
ID: 10404 · Report as offensive
Metod, S56RKO

Send message
Joined: 9 Sep 05
Posts: 128
Slovenia
Message 10406 - Posted: 21 May 2007, 13:34:35 UTC - in response to Message 10404.  
Last modified: 21 May 2007, 13:35:43 UTC

It seems the BOINC benchmarking does manage to trigger it in some Versions, but the Project Clients I have seen did not while running.


BOINC CC runs at normal priority (pri=0) at all times - including while it runs benchmarks. Well, perhaps some distributions change this behaviour, but Berkeley's BOINC does it like this. Project apps on the other hand run at lowest priority (pri=19).
IMHO it's actually a good thing that low priority applications don't cause CPU run at high frequency. That's intention for them being low priority - to consume only resources that would otherwise be wasted.

If one builds a mid-priority cruncher, then it's up to administrator of such machine to make appropriate changes to the CPU throttling policy.
Metod ...
ID: 10406 · Report as offensive
FalconFly
Avatar

Send message
Joined: 16 Mar 07
Posts: 16
Germany
Message 10411 - Posted: 21 May 2007, 18:20:58 UTC - in response to Message 10406.  
Last modified: 21 May 2007, 18:26:23 UTC

But that would mean benchmarking at Performance Level X, but producing at X-60% depending on P-State achieved...

IMHO that's not a feature but a bug. That BOINC is supposed at low Priority is normal, but running at too low Priority to achieve full CPU performance should be reserved as an Option in the Preferences (e.g. "Grant running Projects Priority Level X when Idle, Level Y when in use"), not be the Default.

I would like the Idea of my machinery using lowest P-State e.g. after running out of work temporarily, but throttling back to full speed as work becomes available again. As it is now, because of that use of e.g. Cool&Quiet is not possible for me, although I would certainly like to have it turned on.

A bit Off-Topic, but use of User-Definable P-States would allow for excellent Throttling according to user-defined conditions. I'd love that one in Summer and make it dependent off Temperatures, for example.
ID: 10411 · Report as offensive
Metod, S56RKO

Send message
Joined: 9 Sep 05
Posts: 128
Slovenia
Message 10431 - Posted: 23 May 2007, 14:00:47 UTC - in response to Message 10411.  

But that would mean benchmarking at Performance Level X, but producing at X-60% depending on P-State achieved...


Well, BOINC does record fraction of time available to projects: <cpu_efficiency>. When new work is requested, this value is taken into account.

IMHO that's not a feature but a bug. That BOINC is supposed at low Priority is normal, but running at too low Priority to achieve full CPU performance should be reserved as an Option in the Preferences (e.g. "Grant running Projects Priority Level X when Idle, Level Y when in use"), not be the Default.

I would like the Idea of my machinery using lowest P-State e.g. after running out of work temporarily, but throttling back to full speed as work becomes available again. As it is now, because of that use of e.g. Cool&Quiet is not possible for me, although I would certainly like to have it turned on.


One of statements made by majority of projects is that project application will use only rest resources ... those resources that would otherwise be idle. Now, if your CPU would otherwise throttle to minimum frequency, that's fine. Actually it's up to you as user or host administrator to set up minimum machine performance and BOINC will happily use all that is available.

I second your idea about user being able to set run priority. It sould be set to lowest by default though. Implementation would be a bit tricky though. Windows only gives 6 possible settings, of those I'd only consider 3 safe (normal, low, lowest), while Unixes offer 40, of those 20 safe (from 0 to 19).

A bit Off-Topic, but use of User-Definable P-States would allow for excellent Throttling according to user-defined conditions. I'd love that one in Summer and make it dependent off Temperatures, for example.


BOINC has nothing to do with P states. As it does nothing to do with raw disk access, process scheduling and memory management. I'm not going to allow BOINC play with settings of my production machines. If you'd like to play with your, you're more than welcome to create cron jobs to play with system settings.

I'm running scheduled tasks on a couple of my machines suspending them during working hours. And I can't let BOINC do it automagicaly as there are not enough venues to choose between. You could similarly change P-states or whatever based on sensor readings, calendar and level of work cache...

Metod ...
ID: 10431 · Report as offensive

Message boards : BOINC client : A Real Stumper

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.