Dedicated folding rig

Kalsius

Kalsius

Kalsius

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Joined
21 Sep 2005
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257
Having done some searching and digging round all the multitudes of mobo's, proc's etc I was thinking of a farm but given the cost of todays kit it made sense to sell that on and get a dedicated new rig.....

So, any suggestions for a rig to just do folding?? Have read a few posts about multi GPU rigs with 8800GT's in em with 6600 OC'd, any suggestions?
 
If you're doing dedicated folding you might as well go for a graphics card that gives you more PPD. An overclocked 8800GT will give you about 5300-5500 PPD, but there are better ones out there.

Also depends on your budget :p
 
Budget is key.

As a base unit:

If it was me it would be a Q6600 G0 with say 8GB ram (speed not that big an issue, cheap 8500+ would probably give more headroom when you..) and overclock the Q6600 to around 3.4 for max stability. A P35 motherboard should be more than enough oomph for that.

64bit Vista (a must if you are going to do GPU crunching, the CPU useage is a fraction of what it is under XP) You could maximize your output with a couple of VMware Linux images as per the stickies.

Or I you would probably be ok with just the SMP windows client as you will need a bit of spare CPU for the GPU clients.

Then, I think no-one has got more than two GPU's running at the same time. Bang for the buck is on the 8800GT or second hand 8800GTX's, I'm pretty sure you can get two going as long as you don't set them up in SLI and you have a monitor attached to both cards (or fake with a DVi/Vga dongle)

Should be able to pump out somewhere around 10-12K PPD I would have thought with that sort of rig.


Then GPU wise thats where the budget
 
Cheers guys, dual GPU was the plan and I've already started trawling round for 8800GT's on the popular auction site....

Happy to spend up to about 400 initially, just trying to gauge what spec I'd be looking for on the core bits (cpu,mobo,ram) to then stick 2 GPU's in there and fold away!!
 
As a guide, and I'm not sure how many bits you already have, but including everything you would need starting from scratch and buying new from here I put together basket that was £583 +VAT
 
Cant get on MM yet, hence looking elsewhere but at least I have an idea of the price range, if I am just going pure GPU, does the choice of cpu/ram/mobo matter too much? I was looking at one of the bundles here on OC as a starting point.
 
Don't forget that you'll need a good PSU. Go for one that is at least 80%+ efficient, or you'll be paying more to run your cruncher than you need to (and the running costs over time will be more than you paid for the cruncher). Depending on which graphics cards you plump for, you'll also have to take these into account in your PSU size as well.

I quite like the Corsair HX Series Modular PSU's, as they are efficient, have a 5 year warranty and you only need to install the cables you actually need. I've got 7 of them so far.
 
I wouldn't go Intel. Get an AMD dual-graphics rig and don't bother with cpu folding. A pair of 8800GTs will get you over 10K alone and the added complexity of trying to run two smp units as well and managing the affinities and priorities is a hassle for a dedicated folding rig. You want fire and forget reliability and that means console GPU clients on twin gpus. Spend the money on the graphics and psu not the cpu.
 
Yeggstry said:
How much of an improvement PPD wise would you get for £20 more? I'm half tempted to upgrade myself :)
Click to expand...

8800GTX will give you fewer points than the GT, as it's based on the older core. About 4600ppd at stock. 8800GTS 512 is a better cheap upgrade, should be over 5500ppd. Was considering it myself.

Kalsius, it really depends how much time you can put into maintaining it, and whether you want the best points-per-pound or a huge output at a semi-reasonable price. For a bang-for-buck 'set it and forget it' rig I'd get two 8800GTs with the cheapest dual-core CPU you can find. Won't need more than 2GB RAM, maybe even 1GB. As magman says, get a decent PSU, both to save electric money and to reduce the chance of it blowing up! That should be cheap to buy and in terms of points-per-watt pretty cheap to run. Get Vista - depending on your luck, two GPU clients may well run a dual-core CPU at 100% under XP, where with Vista I doubt the CPU will even kick up out of SpeedStep mode if it's just running GPU clients.

On the other hand, if you're building one rig and you want the best PPD at a reasonable price, you might want to consider getting a Q6600 and doing Linux SMP folding in addition to the GPUs. This will give you about 5000ppd extra, but it will also need more RAM, run pretty hot and use 100w more leccy, in addition to being harder to maintain. I reckon sticking to the GPUs is better.
 
Mattus said:
a Q6600 and doing Linux SMP folding in addition to the GPUs. This will give you about 5000ppd extra
Click to expand...

I can't figure out how you get 5000PPD from SMP folding on 2 virtual linux machines compared to a single SMP folding client under windows...

Seems worth it but I just don't get it :confused:
 
Thanks guys, Mattus, the fire and forget is definitely the way I was looking, I've seen a few cheapish GT's around and two on a cheap AMD platform is probably the way....

Definitely on the Corsair PSU's I got one in this rig now and it is sweet as a nut!!
 
Senture said:
I can't figure out how you get 5000PPD from SMP folding on 2 virtual linux machines compared to a single SMP folding client under windows...

Seems worth it but I just don't get it :confused:
Click to expand...

At the moment, the Windows SMP client only uses the a1 core. This core scales really badly from dual-core to quad-core systems, so you might get 2000ppd on a dual but only 2800ppd on an equivalent quad. Also, Windows quads tend to get a lot of the poorer WUs which brings the PPD down a lot.

That's why you get more points running Linux VMs. In addition to the Linux client being slightly faster than the Windows one, you present a quad as two dual-core machines to the assignment servers. That way, you get decent WUs - and since each WU is only running on 2 cores, you don't get the scaling issues which you get with 4.

Additionally, Linux clients can now get WUs which use the a2 core, which uses the CPU much more effectively. When it comes out for Windows, it's likely that Windows SMP will be much faster on quads as well as more stable. Until then, dual Linux is the way to go for points.

Hope this helps :)
 
Indeed it does, thanks Mattus :D

I shal have a bash at CPU folding when this bloody Q6600 is delivered, hope Royal Fail dont lose it :\
 
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