Proposal: Community Built Boxen

[EvilAlchemist]

I have noticed that several teams have a "Adopt A Rig" type program.
Where by the community donated parts a "builder" per say.
Once the system is running, it goes to a community member to use as a dedicated folder.

Sounds good in theory, but it does have a few draw backs.
1) Older hardware that is a little out of date (Like XP 2200 - P3's)
2) Compatibility - Getting hardware from so many users / types of systems.


I think it would be good for the [H] to try a modified version of the program.

Here are two ways I think we could make this work.

Option 1)
Have users send there donated system components.
Based on what is recieved, we ask users to help find parts that are compatible.
Example - > Member A donates a 775 Motherboard - > Members asked to help get parts that will work with that system (All parts shipped to builder)
Once system is running -> a poll / request thread is started for users to get the boxen a home.


Option 2)
Have users send there donated system components.
Based on what is received, we ask users to help find parts that are compatable.
Example - > Member A donates a 775 Motherboard - > Members asked to help get parts that will work with that system or donate a little money to a general fund
If the correct parts can't be donated, they are purchased.
This would allow the builder to take advantage of rebates and such.
Once system is running -> a poll / request thread is started for users to get the boxen a home.
The up side to this method is members could give a couple bucks each.
Allowing the pooling of money and resources

Of course, the boxen would be required to fold under a user name specified by the program
Example - [H] Boxen 1 or something to were the points are given to the team.
IF that user can no loger house the unit, it will be shipped to anther user the commuty agrees on or back to the builder till a new home can be found.




*****NOTE*****

The following idea has not been cleared / approved by the admins.
This is just to gauge general interest and support for the idea.
If enough support is present and the plan is feasible, it will be presented to the admins for approval.

 

[Jon855]

You don't need an approval to uptake a little project of your own. Go for it, just that if you want the backing of [H] themselves, seek approval...

Nice idea... I do have an incomplete rig that I could toss in as a prize and so on. Currently I'll have to clean it out and etc, etc... it's like covered in some odd ooze and stuff like that.

 

[relic]

We used to do this at the [H] folding swap meets.
Gaiden drove away with a station wagon full of parts at one of them.

The secret is to used "recently retired" parts. Not P3s and XPs but Pentium Ds and c2duos replaced by quads, etc.
PSUs are always helpful. Any PCI video, NICs, a 775 mobo...any ATX case for those than can't run naked.

Been there, done that, wrote the book.
We give them to folks who have free electricity or low utility bills.

 

[Air Cooled 420]

Sounds interesting to me, I have lots of parts laying around.
Bits and pieces to help build a full boxen.

 

[EvilAlchemist]

I think it can be done .... and it would work well ...

For it really to work we need two things

1) A good flow of parts and ppls to donate

2) If we can't find some parts .. or ppl don't have what we need ..this is where the $ donation comes in .. this is the part that will need the approval from the admins ...
THe donations would also help offset some of the completed boxen shipping costs.

I want to make sure that we have enough community support to build a few boxen ..
and get them good homes .....

I think it will be easy enough to get at least 4 boxen up and running in no time ...
I am more then hapy to build the boxen ......and house the parts until the build

just need to make sure the communty is with me on this project

 

[digital_exhaust]

For what it's worth.. I have space and am willing to donate power.... it's not free but I can power a boxen or two and it won't kill me...assuming there is serious interest in this..

I'll have to scrounge around and see what I can dig up as far as parts are concerned, but I'm willing to donate what I have.

I do have a few hard drives I'm not using...

If it's something you guys are interested in trying, I'm in...

 

[Jon855]

I also can offer power for them as it cost me nothing to run anything. I will also make sure that VNCing and Remoting is accessible - in the Rockville/MD area if anybody is close to my area, feel free.

 

[SmokeRngs]

I have cheap power but that's about all I can donate at this point. Just about every rig I can put together (including PIIIs) is already running or will be running shortly. My last electric bill showed actual usage of less than $72.00 for the month (although I'm on budget billing so I pay the same every month anyway) and that was without the furnace or a/c running. However, it should end up being less than $100/month actual usage on my electric bill and I can handle that.

If my figures are correct, 3 overclocked quads, an overclocked X2 and 2-3 older single core systems were about $34-$38 of that bill. I have cheap power. I'm not going to be hurt at all as long as my power bill stays around $100/month and after this summer that won't even matter.

The only caveat is that any single core systems I'm paying to run crunch on WCG while any multicore systems run the F@H SMP client.

I don't need an OS as there are Linux clients for both projects. Otherwise, the system needs to be "complete" as in the essentials for crunching. This would be case (as I can't run nekkid boxen), mobo, CPU, RAM, heatsink/fan, PSU and hard drive. Integrated NIC would be nice but I do have a couple PCI and one or two ISA NICs not currently in use.

I'm not exactly rolling in the money at the moment but I will help out on shipping as much as possible and I will not claim ownership rights to the hardware for full or partial systems unless you wish to give them away. Since I would be supplying the power to run the systems I would like to have the points for running the system but something can be arranged for sharing of the points if it's a full system or most of a system which can be arranged before anything is shipped.

I'm afraid I can't do much more than that but if someone wants to take me up on the offer, I'm more than willing.

 

[EvilAlchemist]

Homes for the boxen I don't think will be an issue.

The points thing will be ....
I think in all fairness, the boxen have it's own name - "[H]Boxen1" and so on...
If the community give the parts, no one user should get the points ....
The boxen must be used as a dedicated folding rig only.

The boxen would become the propery of the [H]
The Community would decide the person who gets to house the boxen.

If that person no longet wishes to give the boxen a home, it would be shipped back to the current admin of the program to be refurbed and given a new home with a new user.

This is just mean as a way to maximize the points as a team.

 

[Sunin]

EA the prob with that is its expensive to ship. Your talking upward of $40 or more to ship a heavy package like that.

 

[Xilikon]

EA the prob with that is its expensive to ship. Your talking upward of $40 or more to ship a heavy package like that.

That's the main problem with that idea but it's a nice one. If someone is willing to donate some for shipping as well, it could work

 

[capreppy]

If my figures are correct, 3 overclocked quads, an overclocked X2 and 2-3 older single core systems were about $34-$38 of that bill.

Even though you're running on cheap power, this is still very good empirical data. I'm looking to ramp up and would like to know what it'll cost monthly to get my farm up and running.

Once I am able to start my new job, I would be willing to donate some fundage (I'll have to figure out how much later). We'll need to establish a single point of contact (POC) to handle all of this as it'll get messy quickly if we're sending money and parts to and fro.

 

[Kendrak]

I'm on board!

If we find a worthy person I'm willing to get some basic open box part(s) from the egg and ship them to the person. Or donate some boxen parts that I might have left over...

 

[digital_exhaust]

I'm on board!

If we find a worthy person I'm willing to get some basic open box part(s) from the egg and ship them to the person. Or donate some boxen parts that I might have left over...

Thanks man... I really do think this is something that can work if we do it as a team

 

[Kendrak]

I'm thinking a college student with free dorm electric. With orders to fold on the boxen till he donates it to another [H] or it fries.

Under penalty of Kyle's wrath

 

[EvilAlchemist]

This weekend, a few of us have been working to get this off the ground here pretty soon.

Many thanks to Digital_Exaust & Kendrak for all your help thus far

We have gotten the Q&A section and most of the guideless/rules of the program set down and now making some final revisions to make sure evrything is clear and who is doing what.

Also send a PM to Kyle about certain area so make sure we are okay to process with certain areas.
I do want to thank those who have PM'ed me with part available and other ways to help the program.
As soon as we can get the details worked out, and one issue approved, we should be be a go with the program in about 1 week.

If all goes according to plan, we will start an offical thread and list what we need.
I will keep you updated as I know details

 

[gwarren007]

To pay for shiping we could use paypal (and a pp debit card )
pp id suggested:
Hardboxen or
hardboxenftw

 

[Tigerbiten]

Does anybody know when shipping-import duty is from the UK to the States.

I've around .............
16 MoBo's, 2x Asus P5K's, 5x Abit IP-95's, 5x MSI K8's, 2x Tyan dual K8's, 2x MSI K7D Master's.
CPU's to go with them are 1x Q6600 B3, 6x E6600's, 5x +3800's, 2x 285's, 2x 250's, 4x +2400MP's.
Memory. Theres around 30 sticks of memory to add to the list.
Plus a couple of nic cards, scsi cards, etc, etc.

For duty reasons I'll put around £5 an item, so the whole lot will come to £350-£400.
So does anybody have any idea what that will come to.

The idea is the top end bits can be made up into prizes, mid range part can be sold on to raise cash, low end stuff given away at shipping costs.

Luck ................

 

[Jon855]

Does anybody know when shipping-import duty is from the UK to the States.

I've around .............
16 MoBo's, 2x Asus P5K's, 5x Abit IP-95's, 5x MSI K8's, 2x Tyan dual K8's, 2x MSI K7D Master's.
CPU's to go with them are 1x Q6600 B3, 6x E6600's, 5x +3800's, 2x 285's, 2x 250's, 4x +2400MP's.
Memory. Theres around 30 sticks of memory to add to the list.
Plus a couple of nic cards, scsi cards, etc, etc.

For duty reasons I'll put around £5 an item, so the whole lot will come to £350-£400.
So does anybody have any idea what that will come to.

The idea is the top end bits can be made up into prizes, mid range part can be sold on to raise cash, low end stuff given away at shipping costs.

Luck ................

Who can see this coming? -> Why are you not folding with them right now? They better not be sitting all over in their boxes doing nothing... But damn, that's quite a healthy amount of porn you have there.

Seems this all can be done however this will be a tough test/measure of our ability to couple a big project like this. I like it, I get wet just thinking about this.

 

[Xilikon]

Jon855, the goal of Tigerbiten is to have the most power within a 2 KWH limit. The extra hardware is the old stuff he tossed out to be upgraded to the new quads boxens.

 

[Jon855]

Jon855, the goal of Tigerbiten is to have the most power within a 2 KWH limit. The extra hardware is the old stuff he tossed out to be upgraded to the new quads boxens.

Aha, that's dandy fine then.

 

[BillR]

Homes for the boxen I don't think will be an issue.

The points thing will be ....
I think in all fairness, the boxen have it's own name - "[H]Boxen1" and so on...
If the community give the parts, no one user should get the points ....
The boxen must be used as a dedicated folding rig only.

The boxen would become the propery of the [H]
The Community would decide the person who gets to house the boxen.

If that person no longet wishes to give the boxen a home, it would be shipped back to the current admin of the program to be refurbed and given a new home with a new user.

This is just mean as a way to maximize the points as a team.

Personally I think this is a good idea but also being the negative guy I am I do see potential for Murphy’s Law to kick in here.

First and foremost is the idea of “The boxen would become the property of the [H]” could become an issue. Kyle is the [H] and honestly with no offence meant I really think Kyle would have to approve this one in writing.

Extreme example, a house fire and blame is given to the box belonging to the [H] any normal insurance company would look at the [H] and Kyle. Sorry but that is just the natural flow of liability.

In my humble opinion the person paying for the power should get the points. They are paying for the power after all so some justification needs to be a consideration. In no way am I implying anyone here would abuse the privilege but it simply makes sense.

Yes, naming them [H] box 1~1000 would and should take care of any accountability issue however it doesn’t solve the above problem.

So far I like the swap meet idea and of course at the price of gas these days it would have to be regional or by state or whatever. The big plus here is a swap meet eliminates all of the above problems and the folders as well as folding still are the big winners.

As for me I may be a contributor but I’m maxed our on my power bill so adding another box simply isn’t an issue.

Just a few thoughts on the issue, you can all yell at me now

 

[EvilAlchemist]

I want to address each of these from the projects planners point of view. Most of the parts were discussed today on the conference call between team getting this project off the ground.

First and foremost is the idea of “The boxen would become the property of the [H]” could become an issue. Kyle is the [H] and honestly with no offence meant I really think Kyle would have to approve this one in writing.

This part could be reworded. It is ment to impy that once hardware is dontaed to this program, it can't be given back 6 months down the road, since it will be in a boxen.

Extreme example, a house fire and blame is given to the box belonging to the [H] any normal insurance company would look at the [H] and Kyle. Sorry but that is just the natural flow of liability..

If an event like that happens, the person would tell the community.
They would not have to repay for the boxen or something like that.
As long as every user, that runs a boxen does not have a house fire .....

In my humble opinion the person paying for the power should get the points. They are paying for the power after all so some justification needs to be a consideration. In no way am I implying anyone here would abuse the privilege but it simply makes sense.
..

A few have suggested that but here is the way the project team are looking at it.
This is a team effort, not a free boxen giveway.
The community donateds the parts, the person running the boxen donated the resources to run the boxen.

In a very short time, it would start to turn into a give-me program .. when everyone wants a free boxen ... cause they want their stats to look good ... esp due to some of the hardware that is being offered to the program.

BillR, I know you are a team guy ... not just in it for personal points .. but some are .. and that is not what the goal of this project is ....

This area has been discussed for a while today on the conference call, and we have agreed that the boxen must fold under the team name we assign.

If they want to give a boxen a home, that's great .. but it is under the program rules.

We are not giving out free boxen to users, it is a way to help the team - which is why we are here.

 

[Tobit]

BillR, I know you are a team guy ... not just in it for personal points .. but some are .. and that is not what the goal of this project is ....

I'm in it for the tamales.

 

[digital_exhaust]

Extreme example, a house fire and blame is given to the box belonging to the [H] any normal insurance company would look at the [H] and Kyle. Sorry but that is just the natural flow of liability

I understand your point here but..... the idea behind the project is that it is based on a volunteer basis... so if your not willing to assume the liability of the boxen while it's in your possession, don't volunteer. Simple.

The whole idea behind this that there are many members here who want to contribute but can't due to financial restrictions. This program will give members who are in this for the right reasons an opportunity to donate what they can (a home for the box and power) and the science will still get done... And the points will be credited to team 33 at the same time on a semi-anonymous level...

That's my point of view anyhow....this could be a really good thing for our community and the team.... and the cause.

Fold On brothers and sisters...... Fold On!!!

 

[BillR]

I want to address each of these from the projects planners point of view. Most of the parts were discussed today on the conference call between team getting this project off the ground.



This part could be reworded. It is ment to impy that once hardware is dontaed to this program, it can't be given back 6 months down the road, since it will be in a boxen.



If an event like that happens, the person would tell the community.
They would not have to repay for the boxen or something like that.
As long as every user, that runs a boxen does not have a house fire .....



A few have suggested that but here is the way the project team are looking at it.
This is a team effort, not a free boxen giveway.
The community donateds the parts, the person running the boxen donated the resources to run the boxen.

In a very short time, it would start to turn into a give-me program .. when everyone wants a free boxen ... cause they want their stats to look good ... esp due to some of the hardware that is being offered to the program.

BillR, I know you are a team guy ... not just in it for personal points .. but some are .. and that is not what the goal of this project is ....

This area has been discussed for a while today on the conference call, and we have agreed that the boxen must fold under the team name we assign.

If they want to give a boxen a home, that's great .. but it is under the program rules.

We are not giving out free boxen to users, it is a way to help the team - which is why we are here.

I understand your point here but..... the idea behind the project is that it is based on a volunteer basis... so if your not willing to assume the liability of the boxen while it's in your possession, don't volunteer. Simple.

The whole idea behind this that there are many members here who want to contribute but can't due to financial restrictions. This program will give members who are in this for the right reasons an opportunity to donate what they can (a home for the box and power) and the science will still get done... And the points will be credited to team 33 at the same time on a semi-anonymous level...

That's my point of view anyhow....this could be a really good thing for our community and the team.... and the cause.

Fold On brothers and sisters...... Fold On!!!

Ok and cool, it’s not a point’s thing for me and the team and community are my main concern.

Allow a brief Illustration. I sell you a new TV. Said TV catches fire and does damage in the house. The insurance companies start the law suite and I can’t think of a time when the selling dealer wasn’t named #1 on the long list of people to sue. From the dealer to the reping company and on to the distributor and finally the manufacture.

It is this reason I was forced to carry totally asinine insurance thresh holds.

Although technically out of the business world I still carry a 2 million umbrella policy to CYA in case I am caught in a similar situation.

All I said was before you or under the name of the [H] Kyle will need to approve that section of the plan.

Believe me when I tell you I support what you all are trying to accomplish and you have my support. There are times however, like it or not an individual can’t simply claim responsibility and end up with everything hunky dory.

That aside the goal is noble and I’m all for it. Just needs tweaking abit

 

[zmjone2992]

I'll do it. I still live in the dorm apartments, free electricity for me. And I fold regularly but just with one box. Also I have pretty beefy ups as well.

 

[EvilAlchemist]

Okay, We have the main program thread setup.