I am testing running Folding@Home on my Sapphire HD3850 GPU, running it together with BOINC.

Using my Intel P4 3.0GHz HT system for it.
As said, the Sapphire HD3850 512MB AGP-8x.
BOINC 6.4.5 with 100% CPUs.
FAH Win32-GPU-6.23
ATI Catalyst 8.7 drivers.
GPU-Z 0.3.0 to check on the GPU.

I must say, I like the feature on the FAH client to set the maximum amount of CPU cycles you want the client to use. BOINC could use something like that! I set FAH not locked on a CPU, Checkpointing every 3 minutes and maximum CPU usage 40%. See my task manager for how that works out.

FAH stays under 33% of CPU usage.
GPU load is in bursts, between 0% and 80%. See screen grab.

All I need to remember is to start FAH before I start BOINC, as else BOINC saturates the CPUs already. ;-)

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I know, I shouldn't post that here, but what the heck... if you're interested in crunching FAH on your GPU as well, but are worried if it's supported on your card, look at:

nVidia: CUDA 2.0 compatible nVidia cards.
ATI: Only ATI Radeon HD 2xxx/3xxx/4xxx and ATI FireGL Vx6xx GPUs are supported.

Minimum Drivers needed.
ATI Catalyst 8.7
nVidia CUDA 2.0 (177.35 and above)

Take a look at their FAQ to see what you can use it on as well (PS3, SMP).


In the mean time I'll install the 8.12 Catalysts later on and see if that makes any difference on the crunching. I am at least already at 22%.

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It's going quite quickly.

The task is one of 10,000 iterations.
[09:43:08] Completed 1%
[09:48:48] Completed 2%
[09:54:51] Completed 3%
[10:00:31] Completed 4%
[10:06:51] Completed 5%
[10:12:54] Completed 6%
[10:19:19] Completed 7%
[10:25:41] Completed 8%
[10:31:37] Completed 9%
[10:36:52] Completed 10%
[10:41:50] Completed 11%
[10:46:56] Completed 12%
[10:52:14] Completed 13%
[10:57:27] Completed 14%
[11:02:15] Completed 15%
[11:07:07] Completed 16%
[11:11:58] Completed 17%
[11:16:50] Completed 18%
[11:21:37] Completed 19%
[11:26:40] Completed 20%
[11:31:32] Completed 21%
[11:36:27] Completed 22%
[11:41:25] Completed 23%
[11:46:57] Completed 24%
[11:52:20] Completed 25%
[11:57:44] Completed 26%
[12:02:51] Completed 27%
[12:08:05] Completed 28%
[12:13:30] Completed 29%
[12:19:13] Completed 30%
[12:24:19] Completed 31%
[12:29:24] Completed 32%
[12:34:29] Completed 33%
[12:39:21] Completed 34%
[12:44:12] Completed 35%
[12:49:29] Completed 36%
[12:54:48] Completed 37%
[13:00:06] Completed 38%
[13:05:33] Completed 39%
[13:11:03] Completed 40%
[13:16:31] Completed 41%
[13:20:58] Completed 42%
[13:26:18] Completed 43%
[13:31:37] Completed 44%
[13:37:19] Completed 45%
[13:42:44] Completed 46%
[13:48:12] Completed 47%
[13:54:05] Completed 48%
[14:00:28] Completed 49%
[14:06:51] Completed 50%
[14:12:46] Completed 51%
[14:18:37] Completed 52%
[14:24:23] Completed 53%
[14:30:18] Completed 54%

Those time stamps are off by an hour... but it'll show the progress quite nicely.

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Update:

[14:35:51] Completed 55%
[14:41:47] Completed 56%
[14:48:21] Completed 57%
[14:55:17] Completed 58%
[15:01:59] Completed 59%
[15:07:01] Completed 60%
[15:11:38] Completed 61%
[15:16:18] Completed 62%
[15:20:58] Completed 63%
[15:24:33] + Working...
[15:26:02] Completed 64%
[15:31:12] Completed 65%
[15:36:46] Completed 66%
[15:43:38] Completed 67%
[15:50:36] Completed 68%
[15:56:39] Completed 69%
[16:02:19] Completed 70%
[16:08:17] Completed 71%
[16:14:17] Completed 72%
[16:21:43] Completed 73%
[16:28:18] Completed 74%
[16:35:17] Completed 75%
[16:41:21] Completed 76%
[16:47:37] Completed 77%
[16:53:49] Completed 78%
[16:59:48] Completed 79%
[17:05:44] Completed 80%
[17:11:46] Completed 81%

When this one's done I will uninstall the Catalysts 8.7 and install the catalysts 8.12 ... if only because it will increase game speed in Fallout 3 by a whopping 15%. :-)

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Update:

[17:17:46] Completed 82%
[17:23:39] Completed 83%
[17:29:30] Completed 84%
[17:35:25] Completed 85%
[17:41:26] Completed 86%
[17:47:35] Completed 87%
[17:53:04] Completed 88%
[17:58:16] Completed 89%
[18:03:31] Completed 90%
[18:08:47] Completed 91%
[18:14:12] Completed 92%
[18:20:10] Completed 93%
[18:25:46] Completed 94%
[18:31:31] Completed 95%
[18:37:07] Completed 96%
[18:42:33] Completed 97%
[18:48:09] Completed 98%
[18:53:41] Completed 99%
[18:59:15] Completed 100%

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I am testing running Folding@Home on my Sapphire HD3850 GPU, running it together with BOINC.

Using my Intel P4 3.0GHz HT system for it.
As said, the Sapphire HD3850 512MB AGP-8x.
BOINC 6.4.5 with 100% CPUs.
FAH Win32-GPU-6.23
ATI Catalyst 8.7 drivers.
GPU-Z 0.3.0 to check on the GPU.

I must say, I like the feature on the FAH client to set the maximum amount of CPU cycles you want the client to use. BOINC could use something like that! I set FAH not locked on a CPU, Checkpointing every 3 minutes and maximum CPU usage 40%. See my task manager for how that works out.

FAH stays under 33% of CPU usage.
GPU load is in bursts, between 0% and 80%. See screen grab.

All I need to remember is to start FAH before I start BOINC, as else BOINC saturates the CPUs already. ;-)

I was just surfing for something along this line. Thinking maybe I could use my vid card to do FAH while my CPU does BOINC on my desktop... problem is I run Ubuntu most of the time on my desktop (BOINC installed under windows just has a couple CPDN work units, Ubuntu has my 'standard' 16 projects attached). U know of anybody that's attempted this under Linux?

PS: But... think I should see about getting FAH on my 3870 under windoze with BOINC first... then I'll at least have some understanding of how FAH works first.

Got a good link that I should start with?

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- da shu @ HeliOS,
"A child's exposure to technology should never be predicated on an ability to afford it."

PS: But... think I should see about getting FAH on my 3870 under windoze with BOINC first... then I'll at least have some understanding of how FAH works first.

Got a good link that I should start with?

Look at their FAQ. There are only Windows clients for the GPU for now. With possible Mac and Linux clients in the future. But not yet.

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