Lofty Ambition

monaro800

monaro800

monaro800

Associate
Joined
21 May 2012
Posts
16
Location
Ipswich
Hi guys, Ive recently had to pull 16 servers for replacement, problem is i dont want to bin them there in mint condition, unboxed and fitted in a datacenter where they have sat working for 6 years, they really are pristine.

I want to run World Community Grid for Cancer for Children to start with, but eventually ill move to SETI again, been on and off with it for years, this time im in a postion to set them up and leave them

I Have a PCI-x expansion slot in every server, i want to locate a cheap card (that will fit in the space available) capable of folding, im not in it for PPD these will be fitted racked and left running at home crunching and providing my network storage.


Suggestions on cards? Remember i need 16 for the first batch.

Oh yeah Information

1U, SuperMicro - H8DAR8-i
2 x 2 Dual Core AMD Opteron 270 2.0Ghz 1MB L2 Per Core
32GB DDR ECC Registered and Buffered
3 x 500GB IDE Drives
750 Watt Power Supplys.

http://www.supermicro.com/Aplus/motherboard/Opteron/8131/H8DAR-8.cfm << Full Board Specs

Card needs to be no wider than the Metal EndPlates, and no more than 2cm deep
 
PCI-X is not PCI-E(xpress) - hardly any cards out there that'll fit in a PCI-X slot unfortunately, less that will fold :(
You might be able to find some PCI 8400GS' as PCI cards will work in PCI-X slots, but I'd imagine they're likely to be expensive for the performance and won't make deadlines on decent-sized GPU units. There might be some slightly better Quadro cards out there that'll work...
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
 
You can get PCI-X to PCI-E converters, but I've only seen them in the US but Startech make one.

TBH though you would probably better off trying to sell the servers and with the money buy something more suitable from both a science and power/heat POV

Yes you could also use the CPU's to crunch and forget about the GPU side, but even there I think the trade off of such low efficiency per unit crunched might be a bit hard to take after a while.

I don't want to sound like a party pooper technology wise these are Seti classic class boxes.

If you are dead set on it tho, there is a glut of uniprocessor work units at Stanford that are calling out to be folded. That would certainly satisfy your need to crunch, do good science and as long as you don't look at the points, just base your achievement on WU's crunched.
 
This year marks the 10th year of my grandads passing to Prostate Cancer, a condition i am currently fighting aswell, these servers will all go in the basement with the others, its just a question of installing Linux and BOINC and set them to work, i just figgured if i could fold aswell with them i would, but i wont be making to big a deal out of it.

For now the World Community Grid / Help Fight Cancer can have 8 of the servers and ill put 8 on OCUK BOINC, im not in it for the points or prestige, im in it for the reasons above
 
I realise that mate, I read the first post and know you are not in it for the points, and sorry to hear about your illness. I know lots of us, me included, fold for personal reasons or lost loved ones.

I wasn't for one minute minimising the effort you want to expend on the science, I just proposed that you could do more science if you sold off those machines, you could probably do more science with 1 desktop machine and a gpu than you could with all the servers combined together.

As we say around here every WU counts, and it does.

PPD is just a reflection of work carried out.

But FYI heres a cool little calculator thingie http://flyingsuicide.net/wcg/index.php

Your CPU is about the same as a Athlon64 X2 so:
Dual Opty 270 - 550 Boinc PPD / 3740 WCG PPD X 16 = 8800/59840

Not too shabby, as long as you can live with the power bills :)
 
Sorry i was a touch snappy yesterday, these meds really do a number on me.

I can live with the power bill these AMD Based servers are going to replace the old Single Xeons basement, dual processor but single core..


Just so you can see (4days in)

2 x AMD Rigs As above
1 x Phenom X4, 8GB DDR

Additional Statistics
Averages:
Avg. Run Time Per Calendar Day (y:d:h:m:s) 0:004:10:53:12
Avg. Run Time Per Result (y:d:h:m:s) 0:000:02:54:10
Avg. Points Per Hour of Run Time 150.10
Avg. Points Per Calendar Day 16,043.82
Avg. Points Per Result 435.69
Avg. Results Per Calendar Day 36.82

I know thats stats aint great but im happy with it to keep up at that pace
 
Hey guys, just discovered in my software collection 3Terra Applogic as i recall thats for running Utility Grids, would boinc run under this and tie all of them together, i know ive got enough switch and power capacity......

Or MPI??

Suggestions
 
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Oh well, then they can stay as is and just crunch away, in the meantime i think ill take the screw drivers to the PE 4600's i got sitting here, aint opened these since the day i got em gonna be dirty
 
Good on ya mate, are you going to have all 8 down in the basement? I didn't realise you were getting rid of the old ones you had down there, your earlier post sounded like you were going to be building a web farm down there! :) Hope its nice and cool in the basement, my crunchers are suffering terribly from the heat at the moment.
 
According to this the ambient temprature down there is 14deg c, hot air is vented out :)

Had a a coupple of racks now for about 10 years, if i aint working im fiddling with things and trying things you really shouldnt do, ive fryed more than enough over the years. In all i got 50 servers but only 20 running 24x7.
 
Ignorance is Bliss

Hey.

Have some issues with BOINC for CentOS, i can not force it to run in the background, i used to be able, but right now i dont recall how to do it. Ive got it to update using CRON no problem, but as soon as the ssh session is terminated so is the applications.....

Grr
 
Quick Update 8 Servers now Running

Additional Statistics
Averages:
Avg. Run Time Per Calendar Day (y:d:h:m:s) 0:008:19:35:19
Avg. Run Time Per Result (y:d:h:m:s) 0:000:02:24:35
Avg. Points Per Hour of Run Time 150.10
Avg. Points Per Calendar Day 32,043.82
Avg. Points Per Result 435.69
Avg. Results Per Calendar Day 90.82
 
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