Windows 8 - Folding!

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pjkenned

[H]ard|Gawd
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Jan 8, 2010
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Doing a bit of stability testing on the new Windows 8 installation. 12.10 on the FAH client looks like it is doing its thing... really slowly with a a3 core...

Can post a guide to Hyper-V Ubuntu 12.10 setup if folks are interested.
 
I'm doing a fairly basic installation so not much. Screen is there by default which is nice.
 
? Are you running a Hyper-V Ubuntu virtual client inside Win8? Or am I reading that backwards...
 
From what I have seen and heard, Windows 8 is the worst graphical program loader released so far.
 
On tablets it's being reviewed as one of the best graphical program loaders ever released.
 
402blownstroker said:
From what I have seen and heard, Windows 8 is the worst graphical program loader released so far.
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Have you tried it? I use a 30" HP ZR30w as my main monitor with 2x Korean 27" IPS sidecars. Windows 8 is significantly better with those, USB 3.0 support SMB 3.0 and etc.

Now the Metro is a pain in the but. I would actually LOVE to have metro up 24x7 on one screen then use the other two for work. That way I can have a screen dedicated to feeds and such.

I digress... still real Hyper-V support on a desktop OS is AWESOME! No more having to install VirtualBox or something. Big advantage with Hyper-V is that if you use VPN software adding VirtualBox can cause issues. Hyper-V integrates really well. Only bad thing is that stuff like OpenSolaris compatibility sucks.
 
D'oh sorry I missed this. Responded to your PM. Will work on writing the guide and it will be out next week (content this week is already set)
 
is it really faster to fold in a ubuntu vm then it is to just fold on windows 8?

i'm folding on windows 8 just now so i'm curious
 
I don't know if it still is faster to run Linux. For me, it makes it super easy to partition CPU capacity. If you are trying to use 100% CPU for folding, it may differ.

Doozer - Scheduled to go live on STH Tuesday.
 
I was curious about the differences as well and did some side by side by virtual side comparisons last night:

Core i7 Desktop Rig in my Sig.

Native Windows 8 x64:
Project 8056
TPF: ~1:38
PPD: ~8600

Ubuntu 12.10 x64
Project 8055
TPF: ~1:23
PPD: ~15900

Hyper-V Ubuntu x64
Project: 8055
TPF: 1:24
PPD: ~15600

So I get about >98% Native Linux performance in Hyper-V, not bad. It would probably run faster if I closed the client window and just let it run as a service. The linux version of F@H is definitely better optimized.
 
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That's what folks saw with VirtualBox a long time back so it makes sense.
 
thats awesome, i'll be throwing up some ubuntu vm's later tonight then!
 
I have increased the virtual core count to 8 on my dual Xeon server and it has scaled appropriately. I am getting 98-99% native performance when I leave it alone with everything closed down and monitoring on the native host with FHM.

Has anyone ever tried a VM with 16/32/48/64 cores? Hyper-V or otherwise? Not a great deal of information on the web, just snarky comments.
 
RushiMP said:
I was curious about the differences as well and did some side by side by virtual side comparisons last night:

Core i7 Desktop Rig in my Sig.

Native Windows 8 x64:
Project 8056
TPF: ~1:38
PPD: ~8600

Ubuntu 12.10 x64
Project 8055
TPF: ~1:23
PPD: ~15900

Hyper-V Ubuntu x64
Project: 8055
TPF: 1:24
PPD: ~15600

So I get about >98% Native Linux performance in Hyper-V, not bad. It would probably run faster if I closed the client window and just let it run as a service. The linux version of F@H is definitely better optimized.
Click to expand...

Do you have some Ubuntu 12.04 x64 vs Ubuntu 12.10 x64 figures ? I am curious to see if kernel 3.5 brought some performance compared to 3.2 (there are some mixed opinions over the forums right now)
 
I have not tried the LTS release yet, I am currently screwing around with Lubuntu, making an even more stripped down version to run headless and in VM.
 
RushiMP said:
I have not tried the LTS release yet, I am currently screwing around with Lubuntu, making an even more stripped down version to run headless and in VM.
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why not ubuntu server or some other cli only OS? You can always install a GUI if you really need.
 
lilfiend said:
why not ubuntu server or some other cli only OS? You can always install a GUI if you really need.
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This is what I run on my linux box that does zfs and folding. I will have to look at some results over time to see how the different kernels fare, as I have been on 12.10 for a little while now.
 
pjkenned said:
still real Hyper-V support on a desktop OS is AWESOME! No more having to install VirtualBox or something. Big advantage with Hyper-V is that if you use VPN software adding VirtualBox can cause issues. Hyper-V integrates really well. Only bad thing is that stuff like OpenSolaris compatibility sucks.
Click to expand...

The fact hyper-v is included is interesting. I also like the changes made to the file copy operations as well as native handling for iso/vhd files. I've still not installed it.

However, if win8 takes off, we can pre-make ubuntu vhd's for n00bs....
 
Yea.... that would be super easy. I have no issue hosting. I just don't use HFM or anything anymore.

I could make a vhd ready to go in 5 min, but you would have to configure hfm and basic setup yourself.
 
pjkenned said:
Can post a guide to Hyper-V Ubuntu 12.10 setup if folks are interested.
Doozer said:
Please :)
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

Doozer - just for you - Setting up Ubuntu 12.10 on Windows 8 Hyper-V

Quick notes for F@H:
1. That gives you all that you need for a base Ubuntu install. At that point you can follow musky's guide to do the setup depending on if you use Ubuntu Desktop or Server.
2. After the Ubuntu desktop screen, I have a reminder that you need to allocate more CPU if you want to fold:
At this point you are ready to go. One caveat is that we did not adjust CPU allocations. Right now the virtual machine has a single virtual CPU. You need to shutdown a Windows 8 Hyper-V virtual machine before editing this setting. We do recommend making this change before one attempts to start their main workload.
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3. I decided to make things really easy on myself and just install fah into the user root directory. I can literally SSH in and just type ./fah6 as an example to fold. Since you have a Windows machine wrapping it, not sure that you will need much else for that VM.
 
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