Interesting Folding Oddity

Ok...lately I've been folding on my laptop and a few borgs, but never could get my main gaming box to work (Athlon XP @ 2.3ghz). I would try the graphical client (mainly out of the convenience of being able to easily shut it down when I really needed every last bit of CPU)...but whenever I would try to look at the visualization,my computer would lock up. In addition...for some reason, it would also keep losing my internet connection.

Now...with one last shot tonight, I installed the console client and EMIII, and lo and behold...its been not only stable as a rock, but really seems to be tearing this protein I've got a new one.

My question to you all is...what the heck was going on with the graphical client that was giving me such hell - especially since it hasn't made a peep on any of my other machines? Only thing I can possibly think of is a problem with my graphics drivers or something, but I don't have a clue...very odd. Doesn't matter to me now though, because I'm finally putting this machine to good use for the [H]orde, so that's got me psyched, but still, any thoughts?

I'm not a big fan of the graphical client either. It led to instability back in the days when I ran windows. I don't know why, I was always stable in games. Beats me.

Most of us "Old timers" gave up on the Graphic client long ago. Some have no issues, some do but almost no one has a problem with the console.

Fold on, and enjoy

Yep, my friend had problems when he ran the GUI as well... but CMD works fine for him now. I'd say just stick with the command line if you can do it.

Oh, I can do it no problem, it was always just far easier to install the other way (without having to configure everything), and by leaving it minimized all the time, there should not have been really any impact at all, so it worked fine for me, looks like I'm a permanent convert to the command line now though.

We came up with a couple batch files that allow you to start and stop F@H as a service... assuming you're running the console, and you set it up to run as a service...

I did this for my brother... just made two shortcuts on his desktop... start and stop... and he can stop it whenever he does his gaming,etc,etc.... I have the files somewhere here, I can post the commands if you're interested...


Keep on Folding!!

Here are the commands I use in my start and stop.bat files:

stop.bat -
net stop "FAH@C:+Program Files+F@H+FAH502-Console.exe"

start.bat -
net start "FAH@C:+Program Files+F@H+FAH502-Console.exe"

The section I've highlighted in green will be unique to your install of F@H so you will need to check the services to find what exactly the name of yours is.

I don't even start and stop F@H (as a service) on my main machine, even when I'm gaming. F@H will automatically let other applications use the CPU, but it'll try to get its two-cents in sometimes. I honestly don't notice the FPS difference though, and leaving it on all the time ensures that I don't forget to turn it on after gaming.

I never turn it off.... but some people feel the need to... So we figured out an easy way to start and stop it


Keep on Folding!!

iirc it is a problem with the client and graphics card/drivers. Don't remember any specifics now but I think the conclusion was that if you couldn't get it working with updated drivers etc. then the only real option was to switch to the console version. No one has ever had a simillar problem with it that I know of.

My frames drop from a capped 125 to around 80 in Enemy Territory. I have 2 shortcuts on the desktop and use them when I leave the pc or not playing.

The graphical client only ever gave me trouble in what seemed like EA Games in particular. For some reason those wouldn't necessarily have any issues, but it seemed like the DX overlay would want to give control back to the graphical client. It was strange, but ever since swapping to the console, all has been right with the world.

I've noticed a lot of dropped units on my A64 box running the graphicial client. I'll set it to stop after this unit, and switch to the console to see if that makes any difference, and report back.