Current optimal client settings., Science in the fast lane.

[Macaholic]

             Edited 25 June 2007

OK.  I have spent quite a bit of time tweaking different machines over the last few weeks with all the different units coming from Stanford.  Here are my findings and recommendations as of today.

Uniprocessor client

1.  G5s; -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  Set the "Type of work units to get" as Standard.  1 CLI client per processor.  Usually Tinkers run best here, but currently ALL timeless unit servers are empty.

2.  G4s; -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  1 CLI client per processor.  We all know Tinkers can be slow for these machines.  Pretty self-explanatory.  This setting will yield a Regular Gromac 90% of the time, with an occasional DGromac or 5MB bonus unit thrown in for excitement!

3.  G3s; -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  Set the "Type of work units to get" as Standard.  1 CLI client per processor.  This should get you a Gromac.

4.  P4 (Northwood) HT 800FSB 512MB Dual Channel RAM; -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  Run 2 CLI clients will get you 2 DGromacs and the machine can handle it for folding only.  If other things are going on with the machine then I would recommend 1 CLI client with the above flags and leave 5MB OFF on the other.  This will get 1 DGromac and 1 Regular Gromac or GBGromac.

5.  Dual Xeon (Prestonia and Gallatin) HT 400FSB or 533FSB 1GB Dual Channel RAM; -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  Run 4 CLI clients total if you are FOLDING ONLY.  2 set as just mentioned.  On the other 2 CLI clients set the flags as above, but again, leave 5MB OFF on these two.  I have set clients 1 and 3 as 5MB ON, with 2 and 4 as 5MB OFF.  This puts 2 DGromacs and 2 Regular Gromacs, 2 DGromacs, or 2 GBGromacs running.  Run 3 CLI clients total if you use the machine for other work.  Client 1 set as mentioned at the beginning.  Client 2 set with the same flags, but 5MB OFF.  Client 3 with only -forceasm, -verbosity 9, and in the advanced settings select units with NO DEADLINES.  This should net 1 DGromac, 1 Regular Gromac or GBGromac, and 1 Tinker.

6.  AMD Dual Athlon MP and XP; -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  Run 1 CLI client per processor.  Tinkers, GBGromacs, and PMDs run best here.  If not, Regular Gromacs or Big Gromacs will come down and they are just fine.

7.  AMD Athlon 64; -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  Run 1 CLI client.  Most likely to get Gromac or DGromac.

8. Pentium M; -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  1 CLI client.

9.  Intel Core Solo, Core Duo, and Core 2 Duo; (Windows XP) -advmethods, 5MB ON, -forceasm, -verbosity 9. Run 1 CLI client per core.  Most likely to get Gromac or DGromac.  (OS X) -advmethods, -forceasm, -verbosity 9.  Set the "Type of work units to get" to Standard.  Run 1 CLI client per core.  With current Mac cores running emulated through Rosetta, it is best to run units that do not require a specialized instruction set, i.e. Tinkers are best, but all the timeless unit servers are empty at present time.

SMP client

1. Athlon 64 X2/Opteron; 1 SMP client native Linux recommended first, Windows recommended second, VMware Linux recommended third.  In general, always add -verbosity 9 to your client in order to gather the most information in the log file when troubleshooting is needed.

2. Core Duo and Core 2 Duo iMac, Mac mini, MacBook, and MacBook Pro; 1 SMP client.

3. Intel Xeon (Woodcrest) Dual Dual-Core Mac Pro; 1 SMP client.

4. Intel Xeon (Clovertown) Dual Quad-Core Mac Pro; 2 SMP clients.

5. Core 2 Duo PC Dual-Core (E6300, E6400, etc.); 1 SMP client native Linux recommended first, Windows recommended second, VMware Linux recommended third.

6. Core 2 Extreme or Core 2 Quad PC Single Quad-Core (QX6700, Q6600, etc.); 1 SMP client native Linux recommended first, Windows recommended second, VMware Linux recommended third (split into 2 virtual machines running 2 processors each).

7. Dual Xeon (Woodcrest or Conroe) PC Dual Dual-Core (5130, 3070, etc.); 1 SMP client native Linux recommended first, Windows recommended second, VMware Linux recommended third (split into 2 virtual machines running 2 processors each).

8. Dual Xeon (Clovertown) PC Dual Quad-Core (E5320, E5335, etc.); 2 SMP clients native Linux recommended first, Windows recommended second, VMware Linux recommended third (split into 4 virtual machines running 2 processors each)
 
Even though the SMP client is an open beta at present time, it is still HIGHLY RECOMMENDED that Mac Pro and Core 2 Duo owners run the SMP client in OS X since it is native.  Sure it has a few small wrinkles in it, but you can help iron them out and gain some native speed.

With regards to running Linux in VMware, please be sure you have plenty of RAM available (i.e. on a Q6600 quad core you would need at least 2GB of RAM to consider running this machine for the native Windows, VMware, Linux, and SMP clients).  Just a little reminder for those that meet the criterion.  The instruction guide is here.

GPU client

When running the GPU client you must forfeit an entire processor (if you have a single core processor) or single core (if you have a multiple core machine) per client in order to keep the GPU "fed".  Keep this in mind when setting up your clients.  Once again, the -forceasm and -verbosity 9 flags are HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for troubleshooting issues.

PS3 client

Not much to say here except that you need only run a single PS3 client to keep your PS3 folding happily.  

Any questions or input from other machines not mentioned would be welcomed in the link to the thread associated with this pinned item that is found below.  This will be updated on a regular basis as unit loads shift.  Keep on folding on!

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