Posts by Zydor

1) Message boards : Number crunching : 7970s Dont Run (Message 3439) Posted 29 Jul 2012 by Zydor Post: Is there lot of you that have upgraded their cards are now unable to participate here (but you would want to)? Yup :)
2) Message boards : Number crunching : Let's Discuss Various GPU(s) ~ (Message 2616) Posted 11 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: They are on 12.1 at present. Do you use a Registry Cleaner - a good one - not a freebie extravaganza :) Its always a good idea to clean up the registry before loading up the driver. Just rebooting without cleaning the registry after a reboot when recovering from a crash or blue screen will invariably leave bad entries in the registry. Using a cleaner gets rid of those bad entries. Its possible you have a build up of bad entries causing confusion. Its not a silver bullet, but its worth a go. I would recommend the utility Suite "Advanced System Optimiser" http://www.systweak.com/ or the registry cleaner "Advanced Registry Optimiser" http://www.sammsoft.com/AroDetails.aspx Cant guarantee it will work as I'm "flying blind" here, but its worth a try, you should have a Registry Optimiser in your toolkit anyway. Regards Zy
3) Message boards : Number crunching : Let's Discuss Various GPU(s) ~ (Message 2614) Posted 11 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: I can't get past 1125 Core, the slider has no more to go, Same with Afterburner. You cant do it inside the slider above 1125, you have to do it by overvolting. You can do it with afterburner, but only by going to the afterburner unofficial mode which is made for voltage changes. Afterburner Unofficial Mode must only be used by those used to voltage tweeking, the latter can be dangerous to the card (big time) if incorrectly applied, and must not be attempted by the unitiated. Afterburner Unofficial Mode is not for use by those not used to voltage changes. Regards Zy
4) Message boards : Number crunching : Let's Discuss Various GPU(s) ~ (Message 2613) Posted 11 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: 100+ is ok for VRMs, nice to get it down, but they will survive. Its 120+ thats the real no-no. As you go over 120, the minute melt starts, not before, its the temperatue threashold of the metal used in the interconnects. However you only mentioned 100+, if so, its likely all is well. Its only if its constantly over 120+ for an accumulated 3-4 months of time, that it will go. Regards Zy
5) Message boards : Number crunching : Let's Discuss Various GPU(s) ~ (Message 2603) Posted 11 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: The 7970 card will take 1.3v, dont even bother, its pushing it way too hard. You will find a Law of Diminishing Returns after 1.22v, could push it to 1.23v maybe but its no really worth going past 1.22v. The card default is 1.174v After 1.22v you have the card straining real hard for tangible gains, thats not worth the stress all round. It maybe as the software gets matured, it will be worth it, but right now it is not. I suggest setting it at 1225 GPU / 1375 Memory 1.218v. No point messing with memory voiltage, the card memory voltage regulator is the "intelligent" type, it treats your entered value as "Target Voltage" it will set Real Voltage to whatever it thinks best for the card use, no matter what you say, or the utilitiy purports to say. So by all means set a target voltage, just dont expect to get it, no matter what afterburner or any other utility says it is on screen. Regards Zy
6) Message boards : Number crunching : Let's Discuss Various GPU(s) ~ (Message 2599) Posted 10 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: I got a XFX 7970 Black Edition for my main gaming rig last night so we'll see how that does. Load 12.1 / 7.0.15 with that straight away. That combination is solid as a rock with the 7970, it runs all projects that I have tried (that have the OpenCL app - thats MW, POEM, Collatz, and Donate@Home, they are the only ones at present, lots others converting to OpenCL at the moment). Be aware, by going to 7.X.X, there's no going back to 6.X.X without a 100% COMPLETE BOINC and Projects installs - everything. Wack up the CCC sliders to 1125 GPU and the power slider to +20%, dont hesitate, the card is massively overclockable, and much much more to come via overvolting. You are dead safe staying inside CCC, and running it at CCC shown maximum. Theres a whole lot more hidden under the hood that you will only tap by overvolting - Afterburner Unofficial Mode has been tweeked for use with 7970s (get latest Beta - RC12 - from Guru3D). You MUST have the power slider at 20% inside CCC even if overvolting - the power slider is a TDP slider, not actual power as such, without that TDP increase, overvolting will not happen. Its a Beast of a card, hugely overclockable. Regards Zy
7) Message boards : Number crunching : Let's Discuss Various GPU(s) ~ (Message 2598) Posted 10 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: Even with the ATI Catalyst Drivers 12.1 and 12.2 still had some issues with getting various boards to see more then 1 5970 when only using 2 of them in a system. Ahhh .... there's a little "slight of hand" to beat the thing into submission :) Doesnt always work .... but .... more often than not. Do all the usual clean outs re control panel deinstall & Driver Sweeper cleanout, and preferably a registry cleaner after those are done+reboot. All then pristine clean. Connect the Crossfire Strap to the 5970s, load the driver - it will load ... Trick is sometimes you dont get both cards visible in CCC, but actually they are there. Alaways have a look at the start of the Notes in BAM where the card first booted up - it should show 4 separate GPUs, even if not visible in CCC, if they are, crunch away, use afterburner to control them. Back to main point .... driver now loaded with crossfire strap attatched. Make sure Crossfire is enabled in CCC (if visible), either its not (thats life), or its there. In the latter case disable crossfire, that will force the internal AMD card software to load the relevant driver set for each GPU as independent entities. Power down, take off the crossfire strap, power up, and inside CCC there will be two cards showing (it will not show all GPUs when not in crossfire, just the cards. Last but not least, always have a go with afterburner, it will often see the card when CCC doesnt. Give it a whirl, the chances afterburner it will control it fine. Another check within a check, inside CCC information click hardware, click the adaptor drop down at the bottom of primary adaptor - it will be marked down as either "Enabled Adaptor" or "Disabled adaptior". Dont let that put you off, give afterburner a twirl. Its a long way oif saying with CCC all is sometimes not what it seems - multiple GPU software never been AMD/ATI strongpoint - getting better, but more wayer yet to go under the bridge. Overall force driver loading by disabling crossfire, having just loaded the driver with strap attatched, dont believe CCC in this regard and give Afterburner a whirl. Its a hell of a mouthful that lot, but its really much simpler than it will sound - they will go in easy enough, just focus nitially on driver loading with strap attatched, then disable crossfire to force internal software loads, power down, strap off - your in :) Regards Zy
8) Message boards : Number crunching : Let's Discuss Various GPU(s) ~ (Message 2588) Posted 9 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: Yeah cooling has been a pain, but most of mine are hosted in a Data Center that's 60 degrees and I can run 250cfm fans in the cases to move air. But even stacked cards heat up. The issue with 5970s lay in the design of the VRMs (voltage regulators), they are badly placed on the board to the extent that they heat up more than the designers hoped. You will often get a 30+ degree difference in temperature between the GPU and the VRMs. The practical point is that many are so set in mindset, that they think only GPU temps need looking at, many dont bother, or even realise about the VRMs. Then when the GPU hits 90 degrees plus, conventional wisdom says ... "well thats hot, but its inside GPU armagedeon" (and it is) "so all is well". Its not well, because its likely the VRMs are at 125+ by this stage, and the absolute maximum for physical integrity of the VRMs is 120degrees, just one degree over and the interconnects on the card start to slowly evapourate. It takes around 3 months to degrade, then, one day there's nothing left to melt and the card goes poof. Watch VRMs like a hawk with 5970s, dont rely on standard GPU cooling wisdom, they have an issue and solution all their own. I've had various issues with several boards not supporting the 5970 except in the first pci-e slot Most atx size boards in the past had two PCI-E x16 Lanes, and one is always designated as the primary (on the board usually known as "slot zero"). The driver expected the card driving the monitor to be in slot zero on dual or more setups. Less stringent now with better driver sets, but one to watch if piece part building with older driver sets. I built another z68 based intel vt-d machine that has 3 slots and I'm looking now at something like a pci-e extender. I've downclocked most of the cpu's running boinc at this point and really no longer do CPU tasks on them, seems pointless to me. If you are really into play time ...... play with this if you have the finance (pricey as such, but at the end of the day the box itself is not that pricey compared to the cost of the cards). Salivate over the bigger configurations of 16-32 GPUs working over a PCI-E bus per rack mounted box, via several rack mounted boxes, to the main machine rofl :) One of the Magma offerings: http://www.magma.com/expressbox16basic.asp Have a nose around their site. Google "PCI Express Expansion Chassis" as a starter, and follow your nose from there. Recently the market has matured and smaller size options are becoming common place as the base PCI-E technology matures. I suspect there will be a rash of offerings of this hardware for 2-4 slots when PCI-E 3.0 is common place. Its not a silver bullet, has its downside, but is a neat solution for the right niche, and can often be better solutions than using riser cards - think on a PCI-E 3.0 capable laptop hooked up to one :) I'm getting the 5970's for sub 300 at this point, so they aren't that bad on price, but they hog some power. Veritable power hogs - all designed prior to the world going "green" :) I hope the 7990's aren't too detuned. They will be - the issue is as old as the hills, they still need toi get inside the 300w PCI certification limit, and without PCI certification a board or a card is heading to commercial suicide. Withe the double GPU cards, they end up having to declock formally else they dont get certification. However, they always leave it open to overclocking, even unofficially support that. Hence the faster the GPU technology gets at its core, the more overclock room gets built into the card. 7970s have massive overclock room compared to official figures because of this, and I expect 7990 to similarly be hugely "overclockable". Downside is power, it will always draw relatively more power over default settings per watt of output when overclocking from official ratings, so particular attention needs paying to PSU, else the PSU will devolt cause all kinds of wiredness (symptoms often mistakenly attributed to other things .... never forget PSU if pushing hardware hard, and the PSU is near to its limits - keep at least 15% "spare" on PSU rating, and rate it on Overclocked power draw, not the official defaullt settings power draw. Guru3D is always excellent for checking on this in their card reviews - the latter are a "must read", they are good. Regards Zy
9) Message boards : Number crunching : Let's Discuss Various GPU(s) ~ (Message 2581) Posted 9 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: Zydor currently has the top host ~ With what looks like Dual 5970's or Quad 5870s. !? Which is it. Its dual 5970s I have two boxes with Dual 5970s and if 1200w+ Power Supplies weren't so darned expensive I'd put all 4 of them in one host and go for top computer. I found cheap 5970s and think I might get a few more but not sure yet, anyone got 6870s or 6990? I had a 6990 for a few days and it wasn't working well (I didn't know about the fragmentation then and havent found any cheap 6990s since) Take a breath rofl :) The 79XX series is deploying, on time as such, and the 7990 is due april/may. When that deploys, it will push down prices of other kit, especially 5970s and 6990s. There's much to think about as soon as you slam two of the XX90s into a box, dont knee jerk it, else you could end up with an expensive mistake. Non of it is rocket science, but its more than just slamming the cards in the box. First off theres power, 1200w will eat 3x5970s and 3x6990s, maybe four depends on the o/c level and how much the CPU is overclocked. Remember dont pust power to the limit of the PSU unless you want long term trouble, keep a "reserve" there - say - 150w. Second - think - real hard - about cooling. You can fry these things quicker than an egg if you get blasee with them, they can be unforgiving. Particularly the 5970s which have the dreaded design fault on the memory voltage regulator causing overheating if you are not carefull. To o/c the 5970 and 6990, you MUST have top notch cooling in the case with good airflow, pressure fans are a real good idea .... also think through other cooling methods like third party fans for the cards, water etc .... one solution doesnt fit all, but whatever you do think carefully, I've seen far too many 5970s get fried at BOINC just because individuals decided to ignore warnings re heat and the design fault - dont join them :) Third is software, as MW showed, its a new world surfacing all on OpenCL, and much water to go under the bridge. There maybe other implications for 7990s that we are not yet aware of, and will not be until it deploys. That will affect the availability and price of second hand 5970s and 6990s. Overall the 79XX series is very power efficient compared to 5970 and 6990, especially the latter, and is clealry far more powerfull. 2x7970s will take out 4x5870s or two 5970s any day (even 3x5970s will have a hard time and probably lose) - at MW 2x7970s will take on 4x6970s, so if you are going for records/top slots, dont even think of 5970s, you will need at the least 6990s, and even 2x6990s will have problems set against 3x7970s, let alone the upcoming 7990. So my earnest advice is pause .... think through it much more ... there's a lot to work through before purchase, made more complex by the effects of the release of 79XX. NVidia is out of the equation for now in your context as their 690 will not see the light of day until mid-late Q3, my bet is not until just before Xmas at the earliest. So your choices are 6990s, 7970s or 7990s - but as hopefully the above shows ... some thought is needed. Regards Zy
10) Message boards : Number crunching : What's up with the Negative Points on BOINC Stats? (Message 2541) Posted 6 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: How's the Power Plant build in the back garden coming along :) Regards Zy
11) Message boards : Number crunching : What's up with the Negative Points on BOINC Stats? (Message 2538) Posted 5 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: Definitely not a CPID refresh .... only do that after asking at BOINCStats, it can introduce hassles if in fact there are background issues. CPID can get hairy at times, its always best left to BOINCStats to sort out automatically, albeit sometimes takes a few days to resettle. I'd give it another 3 days, then if its not back to normal post at BOINCStats. You have not - and will not - loose anything long term despite what you see on the surface. Give it 3 days, then post at BOINCStats Forum - CPID Issues Regards Zy
12) Message boards : Number crunching : ATI 12.1 - Preview (Message 2527) Posted 4 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: since the driver update Deinstall the driver, use Driver Sweeper to clean out any stubborn bits left, and reinstall the previous driver that worked for you. There are no AMD Graphics sets that have undue significance for BOINC computing for a long time, as the updates have been Games orientated. If in a quandry as to what to reload - I'd go for 11.9, thats been shown to be a stable set for the vast majority. You can get past driver sets from Guru3D or the AMD Site. Regards Zy
13) Message boards : Number crunching : ATI 12.1 - Preview (Message 2520) Posted 4 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: Great News .... on the up and up :) Good to see Kingston living up to its service claims - they are a good company. Fingers crossed for your final efforts next week :) Regards Zy
14) Message boards : Number crunching : ATI 12.1 - Preview (Message 2510) Posted 3 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: ... I unplugged some memory sticks and it didn't notice the weren't there .... Thats different ..... :) ...I put them back in and it said it found new ones but still wouldn't work, I unplugged it and walked away for the day! ... More paticience than me ... I think I would have wielded a sledgehammer, and walked away satiated if somewhat poorer rofl :) .... but more seriously ... hope you have better luck on the next try - its never pleasent going through these sagas - you have my genuine sympathy. Regards Zy
15) Message boards : Wish list : Moo Badges? (Message 2503) Posted 3 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: .....GPU Grid just rolled out some nice ones. We can do better. :) That was a resounding thud as the Guantlet hit the deck ROFL :) Regards Zy
16) Message boards : Number crunching : Not receiving work (Message 2499) Posted 2 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: A key thing to note re BOINC V7.XX, it works fundamentally differently, it really is a Major change in BOINCLand, driven (in the main), by VM Box and OpenCL needs. It deals with the files and related information in such a way that it is not compatible with 6.XX. If you go 7.XX, you stay ... you cant go back without trashing all held data on BOINC on all projects - including WUs - there is no "I'll just roll back" and keep the contents on the ProgramData/BOINC directory - not happening - if you roll back you have to be prepared to dump the lot, and start again :) So those reading the thread, have a think .... because there is no going back if you end up hating the current state of 7.XX after trying it - it is at present an Alpha Developer version of BOINC. Regards Zy
17) Message boards : Number crunching : ATI 12.1 - Preview (Message 2498) Posted 2 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: It is an FX-6100 AMD cpu and I loaded the AMD motherboard stuff from the motherboard disk, I don't usually do this and think it could be interfering. I did it this time because it is an FX Bulldozer style cpu, but I am hoping that is the problem. Knock on wood it is running for almost 12 hours now, not quite but close, with an Nvidia gpu in that is NOT crunching. It will NOT run at all with an AMD gpu in the machine, it won't even boot! A couple of other suggestions you may or may not have thought through. Bulldozer .... new processor, dont have any experience in running a Bulldozer cpu, but I have no doubt that as always there is a mad last minute flurry at the vendor end re drivers and Bios. Both of which make one hell of a difference if messed up or out of date. Work checking the Motherboard site for chipset updates, and checking the AMD Bulldozer downloads tab for any Bios updates, both of which may resolve what appear to be on the surface a wierd issue. Along the driver theme, a longer shot, but it is surprising at times how this gets forgotten. There are copious driver sets in an installation, particularly Windows System. It is worth using a reliable driver updating utility to get them all checked out - including the "2nd Eleven" such as USB, PCI-E, network etc etc etc. Can be surprising what they dig out - must use a good one though. I have used Advanced System Optimiser for around 6 months now. Its a bit glitzy, and they love creating menu options to flesh out perception of value, but its Driver Updating and Registry Optimiser are well well worth the money on their own, let alone the other utilities the package will give you. At circa Â£25, its not a lot and you gain much. They do a 15 day trial et al. When I first got it, I thought I'd give it my ultimate test, my 4 years old much abused and badly maintained laptop to chew on - if it coped with that it will cope with anything. Geeez .... it dug out over 100 drivers that needed sorting, went away and got them, and installe the lot flawlessly - and its a Vista Laptop ..... Vista! now thats a perk and take notice job :) Took about an hour in all - now its a quick once a week check of 20 secs or so. I Then entrusted my two main boxes with it, and worked great, its now in mainstream use with me. Worth a shot ..... http://www.systweak.com/Purchase-Products/ (Buy the full package, dont mess with individual bits) As with all software, there will be someone on the planet pissed because it trashed their PC .... such is the way of software life, but its worked really well for me for over 6 months, very pleased with it. It is a bit insistent on scheduling checks, and you need to beat it into submission to stop it doing that rofl:), but apart from that its real easy to use. Regards Zy
18) Message boards : Number crunching : percent column not increassing... (Message 2483) Posted 1 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: .... my problem is that in some projects the percent counter doesn't increment... What am I doing wromg?... Can mean many things from "nothing" to "everything" :) For sure if the counter doesnt move at all for hours on end something is (usually) not right. For long duration WUs on some projects it takes an "age" for the first 1% to show up. Its only an indicator not an absolute, so need to understand more symptoms to come to any conclusion that some thing is wrong. At Moo, chances are the WU crashed and its just cycling doing nothing. Need other indicators such as zero activity on CPU or GPU, no heat coming out of the box (therefore zero work happening), activity level inside any GPU monitor such as CCC .... etc Is there any additional info you can give? Regards Zy
19) Message boards : Number crunching : ATI 12.1 - Preview (Message 2478) Posted 1 Feb 2012 by Zydor Post: Yes you can move the files .... there's a but so read on ..... Just copy the Moo Project directory that is underneath the Machine Program Data directory, then paste the complete subdirectory you just copied back into the new ProgramData/BOINC/Projects. The thing to be careful about is keeping the ProgramData/Projects/MooDirectory "whole", you move that sub directory in its entirity, and just paste it into the "new" ProgramData/BOINC/Projects directory. You would do this if the machine just had a new windows install done for example, and you move it from WindowsOld to get the new one running but loose no WUs. ProgramData/BOINC/Projects/MooDirectory holds all the relevant exe files and data files to make the project work, all the BOINC stuff is in the separate BOINC directory(s). So all you are doing is moving the data to a new directory. Here's the but .... you cant do it to a new machine as the data / WUs are tied to the machine ID. I have heard of some doing it successfully, but dont know why, more often than not moving the MooDirectory to a new Machine results in trashing the WUs. A question .... looking at the posts above am I correct in saying all the trouble is with one machine? If so, it seems to me that your Windows install is corrupt, and you need to reinstall to the same hard disk. There's a 99.999% chance the hard disk is fine, it looks from afar that the Windows install is nackered and you are getting wierd effects because of that - bite the bullet and reinstall Windows to the same hard disk, then paste the relavent project directories to the new location from what will by then be WindowsOld, you can do it for all Projects. Just paste the whole ProgramData/Boinc directory from inside WindowsOld into the /ProgramData Directory of the new Windows installation, and you loose nothing from any Project. Regards Zy
20) Message boards : Number crunching : DNET Fragmentation - When is it likely to End? (Message 2460) Posted 31 Jan 2012 by Zydor Post: As always, there's also other things to consider when making these kind of decisions. I hear you, and I do understand .... I just hope they remember they owe this Site a big one :) Regards Zy

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