FR Folding@Home Project Update -- We're Now # 60 of all teams with 15,400,000 Points

Stanford University ^ | November 19, 2006 | Texas Booster

[texas booster]

Time for a new Free Republic folding@home thread.

Our Free Republic team of 402 members comprised primarily of Free Republic members in good standing have banded together to donate their excess CPU cycles to a worthy cause. Via distributed computing, millions of computers around the world contribute directly to scientific research, in the quest for a greater understanding of diseases such as Alzheimer's, Cancer, and Mad Cow (BSE).

Currently, the team is in 60th place (with 1,052 active CPUs - 82,250 completed Work Units and 15.4 million points).

This is an entirely voluntary program, and if you want to learn more, please see the links posted below (or read one of the previous 20+ folding threads)

[texas booster]

Folding@Home FAQ for new users:

What is Folding@Home? A Stanford University project to find out how proteins fold.

Why it's important: Proteins folding wrong causes all kinds of diseases, like Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and forms of cancer. Folding@Home uses novel computational methods and large scale distributed computing, to simulate timescales thousands to millions of times longer than previously achieved. Through Folding@home, scientists now have the horsepower to study the mechanics of protein folding. With its ability to share the workload among hundred of thousands of computers economically, Folding@home can help scientists understand how proteins snap, or don't, into their predestined shapes - and may help to explain the origins of diseases such as Alzheimer's and apparently unrelated diseases. We're fueling research that could end all that.

How does it work?: You download a safe, tested program (see link below) that is certified by Stanford University. It gets work from Stanford, runs calculations using your spare computer power, and sends the results back to the University.

Is it safe? Yes! Folding@Home rarely effects computer performance in any way and won't compromise your privacy in any way. It only uses the computing power you aren't using so it doesn't slow down other programs.

How do I get started folding for Team FreeRepublic?:
1.) Download the folding program from Stanford University's folding download page (Folding@home Client Download). Type in your desired username.
2.) Type in 36120 for the team number. THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT - if you get the number wrong, you won't be folding for team FreeRepublic!
3.) The third question asks, "Launch automatically at machine startup, installing this as a service?" - We recommend you answer YES. Otherwise you will have to manually start the program after every reboot.

How can my computer help? Even if he were given exclusive access to all of the world's supercomputers, Standford still wouldn't have as much processing power as they get from the supercluster of people's desktop systems Folding@home relies on. Modern supercomputers are essentially a cluster of hundreds of processors linked by fast networking. But Stanford needed the power of hundreds of thousands of processors, not just hundreds.

There's no reason to not get involved! It's free, easy, and you can know you're helping every minute without lifting a finger.

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List of Relevant Folding Links
Why Fold - Watch This !!

Another Folding Clip

Folding@home Client Download

FreeRepublic.com Folder Stats

Extreme Overclockers Stats for FreeRepublic

Another Stats Page

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Competition (Not!!) Dummies ..Daily Kos

Dummie Folding Threads #7 #8 #9#10#11 #12

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Other Useful Stuff - Links

How much are those work units worth? And what are they?
All Projects Listed
Point Summary for Workunits

Stat Image Generator

Fahmon Third Party Monitoring Software

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Past FreeRepublic Folding threads

#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10 #11 #12 #13 #14 #15 #16 #17 #17 #18 #19 #20#21#22 #23

[Egon]

My shameless self-promotion for this thread:

If you're interested in tracking your folding machine(s) over the web, please Freepmail me.

Available features include:

• Timely snapshot of each machine's progress on it's current project
• Point values for project
• Estimated completion dates/times
• Warning indicators for machines that appear to have stopped communicating or folding
• Warnings for machines that won't make their deadline
• Team ranking status box (courtesy of EOC)
• Machine stats like PPD (points per day)
• Project comparison stats: PPD, average time taken to completion, etc.
• It's free-- and always will be
• ...other features as time permits, and people request

[texas booster]

Pings out to the newest members of the FReeper folding team!

[Paladin2]

Freepers folding proteins? Heck ya!

[texas booster]

I don't remember. Are you folding under your FReeper name or another name?

Please join fresh or move the team number to 36120.

FReepers making a difference in medical research!

[Centurion2000]

bump for later

[processing please hold]

I've tried to download again with my new user name and I get nothing. When I click on my desktop icon, it blinks off. What is my problem?

pbrown

[SoftballMominVA]

Got a huge protein right off the bat--first WU should be done Tues/Wed--Folding for the Gipper!

[texas booster]

Hmmm ...

Which F@H are you downloading? The GUI (leaves a little red flower in the lower right corner) or the console version, which is leaves a text box listing all of the work it is doing?

Is there a red flower by your clock?

[processing please hold]

I tried to download the windows xp GPU client console version. 5.05 beta.

All I get is a little white box thing on my desk top, with FAH5.05 beta. Nothing else. There is no flower or anything.

[processing please hold]

I just tried to download the GUI. The server is too busy it asked me to try again later.

[processing please hold]

It says---At present only Radeon x1900 graphics cards are supported. You may wish to consider running our standard client, which you can download at folding.stanford.edu

What ever that means.

[Drango]

You (almost everyone else)need to download the 5.03 version.

[Silly]

I hope this makes front page news, over the fold.

[processing please hold]

5.03? Thanks I'll delete all the other stuff and look for that one. Thanks.

[processing please hold]

I just remembered. I have the console version because we have power outages at least a couple times a week and it would automatically save my wu when that happened.

Would the 5.03 do that?

[Route66]

I see that Pande Lab suddenly emerged as a long term threat. This happened because they posted over 341,000 points in one day but their individual member totals don't show where this huge number of points originated. Very strange.

http://folding.extremeoverclocking.com/team_summary.php?s=&t=1

[texas booster]

Now it makes sense.

F@H 5.05 is a new client that works woth the ATI X1900 video chipset. If you don't have that exact video card then it won't run.

I run the console version 5.03 as a service on most of my systems. If you have problems with bad electricity then when you install the program, enter YES to change advanded options.

When you get to the part about saving your work, set it to 5 or 10 minutes.

[texas booster]

The point scored does look strange, doesn't it.

My best gues is that the PS3 consoles are starting to report, and if the default name and team number is left alone by the new user, then ...

Both the new ATI X1900 GPU version and the PS3 version of F@H are much faster than any standalone F@H CPU version. Thanks to the magic of code optimization and 48 parallel pipelines, users running those programs on that hardware will see a lot of points, very fast.

Maybe its time for a FReeper bulk purchase of X1900 cards (and new power supplies just to run them).

[processing please hold]

By George-I think I got it.

I'm baaaaack(albeit a different username. :-)

[texas booster]

Hey keep your old folding name - pbrown, wasn't it?

If so, you get a jump on 10,000 points.

Edit the config.txt file and make the changes, if you are running the console version.

[processing please hold]

I don't know how to keep my old pbrown name. Is that possible?

[processing please hold]

I'll try it now...the second I figure out what the config file is. :-)

[processing please hold]

Whoo Hoo. I must be gettin' smart in my old age.

I have my old name back. How do I see if it starts me where I left off when my old computer broke a leg and I had to shoot it?

[texas booster]

Are you running the GUI or the console?

If GUI, you will have a pretty red flower in the lower right corner. Right-click on the flower and up will pop a drop down list. Choose Configure and you will find your user name in a box. Edit (don't misspel) and save. Restart the computer.

If console: The easiest way is to reinstall the application, entering pbrown and 36120 at the start. Go through the advanced setup options and complete all the options as before.

You can also go to My Computer/Program Files/Folding@Home/config.txt. Use a text editor like Notepad, and only change what needs to be changed.

[processing please hold]

I just ran into a problem.

I tried to play my Halo game and it wouldn't come up. I paused my wu and it still wouldn't let my game play. Any idea why it would interfer with my game?

I'm kicking some serious covenent butt. lol

[texas booster]

Are you running the GUI or the console version?

GUI has known problems with games, due to the restrictive nature of Active X.

Completely exit the program, not just pause. Should work fine.

[processing please hold]

I'm running GUI.

That's not cool then. I guess it'll fold at night when I sleep. Dadburnit.....

Thanks.

[texas booster]

I'll ask the obvious question ...

I know Halo is fun, but you play the game 12 hours a day??

[HangThemHigh]

"Edit the config.txt file and make the changes, if you are running the console version."

I run the console version and thought I knew most of the tricks, but this is a new one on me. I've been running the console program with the -configonly flag to make changes.

I don't see a config.txt file, how about client.cfg? It seems to contain the setup info, username, team no, etc. You can just edit that file? When do the changes take effect, do you need to restart the application?

[processing please hold]

It's 11:45 now and I just restarted my wu for the night.

I get all my house chores finished. Laundry-washed, dried, folded and put away, sweeping, moping, dishes things like that. I go on FR a few times a day mainly just to check to see if the world's still spinning. Don't post nearly as much as I used too, but, I lurk.

I spend a few hours a day playing Halo. It sure is fun. I was playing Red Steel earlier with my son's wii. That, is totally awesome. :-)

[texas booster]

You have a Wii? < raging jealousy>

FWIW, I will restart my system 2 or 3 times a day just to get in the 15 minutes of game play I have earned. Of course, its a Wintel system so restarting never hurts.

[texas booster]

I have edited the client.cfg file (you are right on the name) when I have a work unit that is fairly far along and I discover that it is folding for Anonymous on Team 0. I need to stop the service first. It seems to work right after a restart.

The F@H forum has discussed keeping a preconfigured config.cfg file on a jump drive and copying it over the old client.cfg file. I don't remember my results, but I will play with it this weekend while I build up another system.

[processing please hold]

You have a Wii?

My son does. I let him hook it up to the big screen in my br. Hubby said he'll get me my own when they're released in mass in Jan. I should have reserved one like my son did. Oh well...

They are so sensitive. Don't get an itch, cough, sneeze or breath too hard or it'll kill your accuracy. lol That nun chuck is something else. You whip your wrist to open doors and pick up ammo. It's like Halo in the sense where you can only carry two weapons. It takes some getting used too that's for sure, it being so sensitive to the slightest movement in your hand...the remote. Oh well, I'll master it. Just don't ask me about my accuracy-for now.

This new computer sure is faster than my old one. My wu seems to be folding so much quicker.

[texas booster]

We now have a reason for the sudden jump by the Pande Group team.

Seems that they found a stats server that was not connecting to the update server. Popped about 29,000 completed WUs that had previously not been counted.

It happens from time to time, these mysterious results. Kinda like having a Rat precinct watcher ...

[processing please hold]

Yeehaw, I hit my 10,000 mark. Thanks for getting me back to my old WU's.

Pat

[texas booster]

I really understand .

You will see many names on the list that are either "Dad's..." or Compaq... or admin ...

I used to assign individual names to each system so I could use F@H to track remote systems. Then systematic started publicizing F@H again in November 2005. In 18 months the team climbed to #2200. Others started climbing on and we zoomed up the charts.

There is probably 120,000 points (and two systems) that will never have the imprint of TB. As you look down the list you will see lots of people (Klutz etc) that are in the same boat.

One little misspelling ...

[Route66]

Right..... :-)
Thanks for solving the mystery.

[texas booster]

Bump to new thread ...

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1741177/posts

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

I have signed up as a result of SwampFox's tagline. This is an older laptop (ca 2004) that is offline sometimes when I travel, but I leave it on when I can anyway so why not? Please add me t othe ping list. Thanks!

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

Oh and is there an FAQ page for setting advanced options? The old, DOS-looking console appealed to me more than the GUI so I downloaded that. Now that it's running, the fan on this laptop is spinning up at top speed. Will that cause a problem? I can always shut it down if so.

This is pretty inteesting, I hope it doesn't work this old CPU to death!

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

Oh and my username at F@H is vdavisson, my real name. BTTT!

[texas booster]

Since no work units have completed you can still change your F@H name. I recommend that folks use their F@h name for better privacy, but it really doen't matter much.

If you are running a laptop then keep the CPU % to 75% or 80%. Laptops can overheat and shorten their lifespan.

Back later!

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

I stopped the program and will restart when I figure out how to restrict its CPU usage. Can I restrict the CPU isage under Services on my computer?

It would make sense to do it there, since the remote setup wouldn't know what 70% on my machine was. Anyway, I'll proceed when I hear back. Thanks!

[texas booster]

I presume that you are running the console version of F@H. If so take a look at your client.cfg file with Notepad.

Edit it to the settings that you want.

My client.cfg is posted on this thread.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1742439/posts?page=102#102

Reboot and you should be fine.

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

OK I will do that tomorrow. I opened the .cfg file with Notepad but wasn't sure what settings to change or add safely, so I will take a look at yours. Am I right about setting the CPU usage to 75% under Services in Windows XP? Thanks again...

[texas booster]

You have the right idea, but when I looked under my services tabs under Administrative Tools I did not see anywhere to set the CPU usage. Let me know if you can do it from there.

Try the client.cfg tomorrow and let me know what happens.

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

Your config file has a setting CPU=75 so I assume that's a signal to the client to use no more than 75 percent of available CPU capacity. I've successfully shut down the program either by closing the console window or by going into services and stopping the service, or by logging off (of course then it starts again when I log back in) so I know how to control it running or not.

I'll let it run today and see what it does. I had let the extra SSE boost be turned and since your config file doesn't mention that, I'll read the log file to see if it's a setting that's managed here or at the host. Maybe that's spinning the fan up.

Thanks for the help!

[Don W]

here's someplace the MORONS can send their unused computer processor time (which, for those in Rio Linda means whatever gamestation they have too). 'Nuff said, I hope.

[texas booster]

Actually F@H is only running on PS3 and PCs. Maybe one day we will get the other gamers to contribute but not yet.

It is probably the third thread on the PS3 and F@H, but I don't know if it is actually running or not.

If anyone wants to set their PS3 to run F@H I would be willing to work on the setup with them.

FReepmail me!