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Is a PIII worth it?

B

Billz

Limp Gawd
Joined
Sep 5, 2005
Messages
200
Hi, I have folded before and have now moved to college. Since I have free power, and I have a couple PIII's just sitting around between 450Mhz and 1Ghz, I was wondering if it was even possible to fold with these anymore. As power isn't an option, I am wondering what is the slowest cpu and speed that is still possible to fold? Whats the slowest computer you have folding? I'd be interested to hear if anyone else is in a similar situation.

Thanks,

Bill
 
Billz said:
Hi, I have folded before and have now moved to college. Since I have free power, and I have a couple PIII's just sitting around between the 450Mhz and above, I was wondering if it was even possible to fold with these anymore. As power isn't an option, I am wondering what is the slowest cpu and speed that is still possible to fold? Whats the slowest computer you have folding? I'd be interested to hear if anyone else is in a similar situation.

Thanks,

Bill
Click to expand...

If you put them just to fold, it's worthless since it will give you points per day in the single digits. A C2D can push up to 4 digits ;)

The only time you can fold on them is if they are running anyway as a firewall server or file server.

 
Food for a thought - you could run WCG instead and I think we do have a team over there.

 
If you're using them for something else at the same time (router, file server, computer for the kids, etc), then I would consider it worth it. Otherwise, I'd suggest you sell it and use the money towards a more productive and cooler machine.
 
Billz said:
Hi, I have folded before and have now moved to college. Since I have free power, and I have a couple PIII's just sitting around between 450Mhz and 1Ghz, I was wondering if it was even possible to fold with these anymore. As power isn't an option, I am wondering what is the slowest cpu and speed that is still possible to fold? Whats the slowest computer you have folding? I'd be interested to hear if anyone else is in a similar situation.

Thanks,

Bill
Click to expand...

free power!!! I would fold on a calculator if it was free power!! Any help toward the goal is great. Run what you can.
 
Mohonri said:
If you're using them for something else at the same time (router, file server, computer for the kids, etc), then I would consider it worth it. Otherwise, I'd suggest you sell it and use the money towards a more productive and cooler machine.
Click to expand...

I second this approach. Easier on the power bill as well.
 
I don't understand why?

Free power+complete boxen+linux setup (unless they each have xp already)=Free points!!:eek:

Running WCG would require XP to be installed which costs a license.

Personally, if I was ever that lucky to have a consistant source of free power, i would do a dedicated rack setup for folding. Send out invites to everyone who wants to park their system there. Require that the only payment to me be the cost of shipping it back to them when they either want the system back or when the free power is gone.:cool:
 
ICE_9 said:
Personally, if I was ever that lucky to have a consistant source of free power, i would do a dedicated rack setup for folding. Send out invites to everyone who wants to park their system there. Require that the only payment to me be the cost of shipping it back to them when they either want the system back or when the free power is gone.:cool:
Click to expand...

P2P power: The next big crackdown on campus.


 
I really wish I could do solar at the house. My electric company will not help with the bill and I would be stuck with a $22k bill for the system I want.:(
 
ICE_9 said:
I really wish I could do solar at the house. My electric company will not help with the bill and I would be stuck with a $22k bill for the system I want.:(
Click to expand...
You probably get tax credits in any case, but still, that's a whole heap o' money you'll be spending, and it won't pay off for something like 20 years. I'd rather have a small nuclear reactor :).
 
7im said:
AGP slot in that P3?

Throw in an x1950 AGP for $150 and boost the PPD through the roof.
Click to expand...

That's a great idea with free power but will the x1950 run in an old P3's AGP slot? The PSU might be an issue too.




 
Hell yes you should fold on it. 9 ppd is better than 0, it'll still be able to fold proteins which is what F@H is all about.
 
Until recently, I was running F@H on a PIII 800 for a good long time. The PPD wasn't the greatest, around 30-35 I think on the regular gromacs. However, they were points, results and were turned in on time. I have since converted the box to a Linux fileserver with VMWare running a couple of Windows programs that need to run 24/7 but require little to no processing time.

It seems to do rather well with the WCG client under Linux. Yes, there is a WCG Linux client and I haven't had a problem with it. It has now been running for over a week since the last reboot unattended with no problems.

I switched it over to the WCG client because it would not really affect my PPD on F@H and I've been wanting to try WCG for a while. This was the perfect opportunity to do so.

You have "free" power so I see no reason not to run the WCG client on the PIIIs. The point scales are completely different between the two projects but the PIIII does "seem" more "useful" on WCG rather than F@H. It does take some extra configuration to actually get it to run at 100% of the CPU, though. The graphical manager is usually required to do this. This option is included with the default Linux install of the graphical client. I don't remember for sure but I believe the same option is also provided with the default GUI client for Windows. It's been months since I tried it and it was only for a couple of WUs on my C2D. It did slice through them like a hot knife through butter, though.

At this time, I'm putting anything sub 1Ghz on WCG as it "feels" as if it's doing more work that way since I'm not used to the points system it uses. The PIII 800 is the only thing sub 1Ghz I'm running at the moment, though. The next slowest is an XP1700+ Palamino running at 1.65Ghz. It's pushing around 85PPD on the double gromacs and around 65 PPD or so on the regular gromacs. In comparison, my P4 2.8 at work does maybe 100PPD on gromacs and around 160-180PPD on double gromacs.

If you don't need the PIII boxen for anything else, it might be worth trying to get some money for them if they will bring you enough money to build a single system which is a good bit faster. However, it's doubtful you would get enough to put together a decent x2 or C2D system which is about the only thing I would put money into at this point.

 
I have p2's and 3's as smoothwall boxes behind are main smoothwall box that I run F@H on .. every little bit helps whatever you decide to run on it :)

 
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