Posts by Clark

1) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75467)
Posted 24 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
As per HWMonitor the voltages seem quite stable but the power seems to fluctuate. To be sure I used multi-meter to check the CPU Core supply( 4 pin connector) and it was a stable 12 volts.
Visual Inspection of motherboard yields no abnormalities either.
If you have available or can borrow easiest is to swap in a known good part.
I think I don't have any compatible hardware to test these parts.
2) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75439)
Posted 22 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
I observed some strange things:
1) Whenever I reboot my computer the clock speed is stuck at 1.7Ghz and doesn't go up even under full load. Even the GPU runs at 300MHz instead of 800Mhz.
2) Shutting down the computer and turning of the mains supply and then let the capacitors discharge and then power on the system the clock speed stays at 4.1GHz (Even on 100% CPU-GPU load regardless of the tasks running) and sometimes repeating the same procedure yields the other issue of throttling to 3GHz under GPU load. GPU is running at 800MHz always in this scenario.

I suspect that the PSU may be bad or the motherboard itself may be faulty. Need some insight on this strange behavior!
3) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75406)
Posted 20 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
Well I had different opinion on running GPU along with CPU. I thought it would be worthwhile to have 3 tasks running simultaneously but now it seems the GPU is compromising the output of CPU to such an extent that the output of GPU is not really worth it. Never knew that RAM bandwidth could be a problem.

So do you suggest to suspend the iGPU completely in order to get most out of my CPUs or should I let it run as it is and keep with the issues? All I want is to contribute as much possible from my computer as it can provide.
4) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75385)
Posted 19 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
As you suggested, I did try overclocking it manually by disabling the turbo core and adjusting the clock multiplier by AMD's OverDrive. It seems to have no effect on the earlier issue as the clock speed is still 3Ghz while the multiplier is set to 41x (4.1Ghz).
Read the resources provided by you and did a bit of searching myself and found out this to be a common issue among APU users.

One thing that I noticed is that my WUs from some projects take exceptionally long to complete and the credit granted is not at par with the CPU time provided. Could be due to clock speed instability?
5) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75316)
Posted 14 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
I would imagine that PrimeGrid is performing almost exclusively integer mathematics, allowing the CPU's floating point unit to draw close to zero power.
PrimeGrid task is running on the GPU and two other tasks (Asteroids@home) are running on the CPU.
6) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75308)
Posted 14 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
So you mean to say that collectively CPU and GPU draw much more power on full load than they are designed for? Aren't these chips designed and tested to be on full load at all times?

Also this doesn't explain the fact that I was able to run PrimeGrid task and two CPU tasks at the same time with CPU and GPU both under 100% utilization without CPU being "power throttled".
7) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75212)
Posted 12 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
My system too stays at maximum speed after suspending BOINC. This is also true when I only suspend GPU.
8) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75203)
Posted 11 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
Thermal throttling should not be an issue as CPU temps are way under its thermal limits when running full load and as for the GPU it seems it doesn't have an appropriate thermal sensor as I get absurd readings.
I use AMD OverDrive and HWMonitor for monitoring various parameters. One discrepancy is present between the CPU load percent provided by the HWMonitor/AMD OverDrive and Windows Task Manager. I have noticed that when the clock speed is fluctuating Windows Task Manager states that CPU is loaded only 80% whereas HWMonitor and AMD OverDrive report 100% CPU load. Clock speed shown by Task Manger and HWMonitor/AMD OverDrive is identical.
Also when I have a stable clock speed both Task Manager and HWMonitor report 100% CPU load.
I think maybe somehow Windows 10 is creating this issue, it thinks that the CPU is not fully loaded and hence reduces the CPU clock speed.

I don't know if this is related but it was super annoying, today when I rebooted my computer and then ran BOINC the clock speed was around 1.7 Ghz, Task Manager shows 45% load whereas HWMonitor 100% load. This was resolved by completely shutting down the computer and then turning it back on. (CPU was under its thermal limits)
9) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75168)
Posted 10 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
Ok, so did a bit of troubleshooting myself and decided to test out other GPU applications. To do this I got myself enrolled with the PrimeGrid project as they have applications for AMD GPUs.

Now currently a PrimeGrid task is running on GPU and two pogs tasks are running on CPU cores and to my surprise the clock speed is now stable. It has dropped only to 3.9GHz for a very short period which I guess is okay. So I think this issue was with SETI@home's GPU applications.
10) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75146)
Posted 8 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
Juha, the OS power plan is already set to maximum performance and I tried disabling turbo core from AMD OverDrive and setting the clock speed to 4.1Ghz but still it was not stable and dipped as low as 3GHz.

Raistmer, could you tell me the software which I can use to eliminate CPU frequency fluctuation?
11) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75074)
Posted 3 Jan 2017 by Clark
Post:
I have AMD Overdrive installed on my computer and according to it the APU is working well in its thermal limits.
Thermal margin is about 50℃, I don't think that it's thermal throttling because when a 2 CPU task(Cosmology@home) runs along with a GPU task I get a stable 4.1 GHz. This erratic clock speed is present only when two different CPU tasks are running with a GPU task or only GPU task is running.
12) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75041)
Posted 31 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
The CPU frequency goes as low as 3.0GHz and as high as 4.1GHz and it keeps fluctuating between this range. This is only resolved when I do not run any GPU tasks, then its a solid 4.1GHz.
If that's the case, check that you aren't throttling BOINC (Use at most N% of CPU Time < 100%)

I tried it on 50% and 100% but still the frequency keeps on fluctuating on both settings, also if I run the GPU task exclusively then also the frequency fluctuates. The GPU task is from seti@home, maybe application specific issue?
13) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75039)
Posted 31 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
Done what you suggested, but still the frequency dips and is not stable.
14) Message boards : Questions and problems : Running tasks on an APU (Message 75035)
Posted 31 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
I am running BOINC 7.6.33 on Windows 10 64-bit on an APU (A6-6400k).
Now the issue is that when I add projects I get both CPU and GPU tasks and as this APU has 2 CPU cores and 1 GPU, I am able to run 3 tasks at a time (2 on CPU and 1 on GPU). Somehow when I run all three tasks my CPU frequency keeps on changing and is not stable, but when I only run the CPU tasks the frequency is stable.

All I want is that my system runs at full potential at all times and that unstable frequency does not look good to me. I want to run both CPU and GPU tasks at my system's maximum potential.
15) Message boards : Questions and problems : BOINC and VirtualBox issues (Message 74896)
Posted 22 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
Output:
WARNING: The vboxdrv kernel module is not loaded. Either there is no module
available for the current kernel (4.4.0-57-generic) or it failed to
load. Please recompile the kernel module and install it by

sudo /sbin/vboxconfig

You will not be able to start VMs until this problem is fixed.
5.1.10r112026

I think the trouble's not worth it. Doing all that stuff just to get 32-bit VM tasks is not nearly worth it, besides other VM projects don't have 32-bit tasks so until I get a VT-X system I am gonna run it without VM projects.

Thanks for your help as I did learn something out of this.

Just out of curiosity, would a windows installation be better to run BOINC?
16) Message boards : Questions and problems : BOINC and VirtualBox issues (Message 74885)
Posted 21 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
An interesting thing happened today. I received a kernel update - it's now 4.4.0.57 I guess - and after the reboot I get the same old error from BOINC: Virtual Box not installed so now what should I do??

P.S. Nothing was changed by me only the kernel was upgraded.
17) Message boards : Questions and problems : BOINC and VirtualBox issues (Message 74878)
Posted 21 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
The other option is to use a modified BOINC client. I think all that needs to be done is swap the platforms.

How to do this? What I did was that I changed paltform in the sched_request for vLHC@home from x86_64 to i686 and still didn't make any difference.
18) Message boards : Questions and problems : BOINC and VirtualBox issues (Message 74858)
Posted 20 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
I really would like to run a VM project on my machine (vLHC@home) and for the 64-bit OS I never gave a thought to it the only thing I wanted was to run latest software on my old PC to get the most of it.

If you could help me to get 32-bit tasks from the vLHC@home server on my current installation it would be great, also just for your information I recently got a 32-bit task from SETI@home, don't know if it helps but thought of mentioning it.


P.S. I have activated the 32-bit libraries in my 64-bit Lubuntu. It seems newer versions of ubuntu are multiarch and don't need to specifically install 32-bit libraries which is I think proved by the fact that I got a 32-bit task from SETI.
19) Message boards : Questions and problems : BOINC and VirtualBox issues (Message 74826)
Posted 18 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
Okay an update on the issue: From your post I gathered that installing 32-bit versions of the apps would solve my issues and after doing that it seems to have solved the issue of the error message virtualbox not installed.

Now when I add vLHC@home (as only they have 32bit vbox applications) I don't receive any tasks.Here's the event log:

Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:26 AM IST | | Starting BOINC client version 7.6.31 for x86_64-pc-linux-gnu
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:26 AM IST | | log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:26 AM IST | | Libraries: libcurl/7.47.0 OpenSSL/1.0.2g zlib/1.2.8 libidn/1.32 librtmp/2.3
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:26 AM IST | | Data directory: /var/lib/boinc-client
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:26 AM IST | | No usable GPUs found
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Host name: DC
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Processor: 2 GenuineIntel Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E7300 @ 2.66GHz [Family 6 Model 23 Stepping 6]
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Processor features: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl est tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm sse4_1 lahf_lm dtherm
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | OS: Linux: 4.4.0-53-generic
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Memory: 1.94 GB physical, 3.72 GB virtual
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Disk: 32.89 GB total, 27.24 GB free
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Local time is UTC +5 hours
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | VirtualBox version: 5.1.10r112026
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Config: GUI RPCs allowed from:
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | No general preferences found - using defaults
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Reading preferences override file
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Preferences:
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | max memory usage when active: 995.33MB
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | max memory usage when idle: 1791.59MB
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | max disk usage: 25.00GB
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | (to change preferences, visit a project web site or select Preferences in the Manager)
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | gui_rpc_auth.cfg is empty - no GUI RPC password protection
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | This computer is not attached to any projects
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:53:32 AM IST | | Visit http://boinc.berkeley.edu for instructions
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:55:41 AM IST | | Fetching configuration file from http://lhcathome2.cern.ch/vLHCathome/get_project_config.php
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:03 AM IST | | Running CPU benchmarks
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:03 AM IST | | Suspending computation - CPU benchmarks in progress
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:34 AM IST | | Benchmark results:
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:34 AM IST | | Number of CPUs: 2
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:34 AM IST | | 2252 floating point MIPS (Whetstone) per CPU
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:34 AM IST | | 5944 integer MIPS (Dhrystone) per CPU
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:34 AM IST | | Resuming computation
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:35 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | Master file download succeeded
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:40 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | Sending scheduler request: Project initialization.
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:40 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | Requesting new tasks for CPU
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:42 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:42 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | No tasks sent
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:42 AM IST | | (to change preferences, visit a project web site or select Preferences in the Manager)
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:52 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:52 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | Requesting new tasks for CPU
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:54 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Sun 18 Dec 2016 09:56:54 AM IST | VirtualLHC@home | No tasks sent
Sun 18 Dec 2016 10:00:14 AM IST | | Fetching configuration file from http://climateprediction.net/get_project_config.php
Sun 18 Dec 2016 10:03:06 AM IST | climateprediction.net | Master file download succeeded
Sun 18 Dec 2016 10:03:11 AM IST | climateprediction.net | Sending scheduler request: Project initialization.
Sun 18 Dec 2016 10:03:11 AM IST | climateprediction.net | Requesting new tasks for CPU
Sun 18 Dec 2016 10:03:13 AM IST | climateprediction.net | Scheduler request completed: got 0 new tasks
Sun 18 Dec 2016 10:03:13 AM IST | climateprediction.net | Project has no tasks available


If vLHC@home did not have any tasks available I should have got a message similar to the climateprediction.net i.e."Project has no tasks available". Instead I get "no tasks sent". Seems like an issue to me, please help!
20) Message boards : Questions and problems : BOINC and VirtualBox issues (Message 74825)
Posted 18 Dec 2016 by Clark
Post:
Maybe I should install 32-bit versions of boinc and virtualbox if that's possible? So that I may atleast run vLHC@home tasks.
Rebooting and user thing didn't work.


Next 20

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.