Redbacks: emu's Budget Cruncher Farm Build

[Movieman]

but seriously tho.. all our dangerous creatures are either small(-ish) - u can step on them to terminate - or in the sea..
u yanks on the other hand.. bears, mountain lions, wolfs - waaay bigger, waaay more formidable

Not here where I live..Out in western USA they have grizzly(brown) bear that can go 1200lbs and they will have you for a mid day snack..

Ahahahahhahaahahhahahahahhahah F14 shaped flies. That's awesome.

Still, you have a much better chance here with the snakes, spiders and werewolves than some depressed and deranged dude with a gun. With a population of 300 million, there are going to be a larger amount of such loonies and yeah =[.

I'll let you in on a fact the anti gun people never talk about and have yet to come up with an arguement against:
In the state where I live,New Hampshire, with it's motto of 'Live Free or Die" and one of the most liberal states in terms of gun ownership we have the lowest crime levels. Why you ask?
Because the crooks KNOW that if they try and break into your house or hijack your car they are damned likely to find someone with a gun that knows how to use it.
I've owned guns for over 30 years and only drawn a weapon one time, but that one time having the pistol with me probably saved my life as the other guy drew a 5" knife.. Then I drew the pistol.. He ran..
In Massachusetts that borders New Hampshire they have very strict gun ownership laws.. so all the crooks go there as they know they won't find a wolf in a house but a defenseless sheep and Massachusetts crime rates are 20-30 times what we have in New Hampshire.
Owning a weapon brings with it a responsibility that we take very seriously.

Bah! Sook!

At least 10% of our young survive, how dangerous can it be!

I rest my case!

[MomijiTMO]

I'm not against guns at all but I think there needs to be some kind of mental test to assess the person's state of mind. You have low crime rates and that's nice and all that but the source of crime comes down to the distribution of wealth in suburbs. I don't think having no guns is going to eliminate crime, nor do I believe it will increase it. I do however think it will decrease crime because people won't feel like they can do this or that with a knife etc.

I haven't really had a gun talk with a US citizen before and I'm sure we'll never come to an agreement. My view isn't to disarm people but to heavily discriminate.



EDIT

I saw this while out for lunch on my phone. Massive lol.

A SEA search is continuing for a man who has not been seen since leaping into the ocean off Redcliffe north of Brisbane to escape police.
The man, believed to be aged in 20s, made the watery dash for freedom about 1:20am after being pulled over by police conducting random breath tests in Flinders Parade.

He ran about 100m before wading into the water at Queen's Beach.

Police said he was last seen treading water about 100m offshore.

A search and rescue helicopter began a spotlight search for the man about 2am, and water police vessels and coastguard boats commenced a search about 4am.

Five boats are continuing the search as well as a helicopter.

Police said despite the failure to locate the man, they were reasonably confident he was okay.

``The tidal movements have not been too dramatic. The tide was going out when this occurred but it moved quite slowly,'' said Redcliffe Police Inspector Mark Jones.

``It is possible he has made landfall and is safe and well.''

He said police were making enquiries about the man's identity with several people including the registered owner of the car.

[emuexport]

To get this thread back on topic I have some pics of my bike (have photos of it at work) I promise to update with PC related goodness when I get home tonight.

emu

[MomijiTMO]

I don't see no butt imprints. You must ride longer


Man oh man, I am really missing out on a tonne of fun aren't I?

[emuexport]

I don't see no butt imprints. You must ride longer
Man oh man, I am really missing out on a tonne of fun aren't I?

I think so I'm kicking myself for not getting into bikes earlier.

This is before I bought the bike you should see it now all covered in dirt and I washed and waxed it on Saturday before the ride. The most important thing I have noticed so far is to assume that everyone is out to kill you on the road and that should keep you more or less safe!

[karl_eller]

The most important thing I have noticed so far is to assume that everyone is out to kill you on the road and that should keep you more or less safe!

I ride REAL bikes (ie ones that use your legs ), and this is indeed good advice. God damn car drivers can't see anything smaller than them.

Eller

[D_A]

It's reasonable assumption these days whether you're on two or four wheels.

Nice looking ride, mate.

[emuexport]

It's reasonable assumption these days whether you're on two or four wheels.

Nice looking ride, mate.

Cheers. Bit like a mini-monster but without the power. Does have a loud aftermarket exhaust that makes its bark worse than its bite!

[Movieman]

I ride REAL bikes (ie ones that use your legs ), and this is indeed good advice. God damn car drivers can't see anything smaller than them.

Eller

Years ago I was riding an old Honda 450..
Had a car just "tick" my left angle and push it into the cooling fins on the motor. Leg went numb immediately, blood started to flow from the brain to the injured part, had all I could do to keep from passing out long enough to get the bike to the side of the road..
Yea, the car drivers subconciously don't see you as a threat and their mind really doesn't "see" you..
End of that story was I got to the side of the road, laid the bike down and I stretched out on the sidewalk with my head downhill for 15 minutes to get my senses back. Then road the bike 2 miles to a GF house and passed out on the sofa for 4-5 hours.. Just from a little "tick" from a 3500lb car..

[emuexport]

So as this thread has derailed a bit (not that I mind in the least as it makes for good reading and pics! ) here are some pics and updates. I also have some questions on llinux so hopefully one of the gurus (ie no more than me) can help!?!?!?!

So here is a pic of where it will go in the garage and a pic of the $30AUD shelving unit that has such a a critical task.


Old vs New Q6600s lol how'd they get a Quad that small.


One of my 2nd hand Q6600s going to a better place!


What can I say it was in the shop and I needed a cooler to play with till more WC kit arrives.


Two crunchers crunching on the coffee table where they spent most of Sunday and today!

They just finished uploading there results a moment ago.

And my solution to not drilling holes in a rental property for crunching.

TADA!!

Seems to work but only time will tell!

Now for my questions:
1. What version of LInux are people using as I am using Ubuntu 8.10 and cant get it to auto-start Boinc for me any clues. Yes I have googled it but I am a bit of a noob when it comes to Linux.
2. What temp monitoring program can I use in Linux? Links?
3. Is there any problem with installing linux to a USB disk say an 8GB one?
4. Please point out any suggestions/ideas etc that you may have I need all the help I can get.

Update on parts:
Received 3rd Q6600 this afternoon (Bought 2nd one on the weekend)
Received P45-TR2S DFI Dark motherboard (I think I will put this in my main rig and pull out the IP35-Pro (Abit one)
Received Gigabyte P35-DS3R mobo
Bought another Earthwatts drive, home plug - ethernet over power and lotsa cat cables!

More pics to follow soon. I'm off for dinner and to finish putting the shelving together.

[D_A]

Now for my questions:
1. What version of LInux are people using as I am using Ubuntu 8.10 and cant get it to auto-start Boinc for me any clues. Yes I have googled it but I am a bit of a noob when it comes to Linux.
2. What temp monitoring program can I use in Linux? Links?
3. Is there any problem with installing linux to a USB disk say an 8GB one?
4. Please point out any suggestions/ideas etc that you may have I need all the help I can get.

1. Ubuntu 8.04 64 and 32 bit depending on machines. If you downloaded BOINC from Berkley click through System -> Preferences -> Sessions -> Add then enter "Boinc Client" in the Name field (it doesn't matter so long as it has something), then in the Command field blick Browse and navigate to the BOINC folder and pick the run_client script and accept all the way out. Done.
If you installed it from the repositories it should already be set up as a service, job done. You'll need to reboot for it to start on it's own though.

2. lmsensors and sensors applet (both in the repositories). After you've installed them both using Synaptic open a terminal and type:
sudo sensors-detect
It will ask you a bunch of questions, just say 'Y' to everything EXCEPT the one about editing your /etc/modules file. Do that manually. Just type:
sudo gedit /etc/modules
and copy and paste the lines the script told you at the end of the file. Save, close and reboot and you're done there. The sensors applet is something you can add to the display bar thingy at the edges of the desktop. Just right click and scroll through the menu till you find "hardware sensors". Add it to the deskbar and you're away. Right click to play with the settings.

3.Yes. It's a pain in the ass but it is possible, even to the point of being transportable (within reason) which Windows won't do. Not recommended, but possible.

[emuexport]

Thanks D_A but how do I tell wether it is running or not? Do I just use the system monitor?

Sorry for the newb question but when I am happy with the OC I just want to set and forget these.

Also with regards to OC what apps are available for stress testing your OC can I use my favorite app intelburntest?

cheers,
emu

[D_A]

For stress testing there's an app called 'CPUburn' that's also in the repositories. It's a command line tool but it will SERIOUSLY run your temps up. After installing open a terminal and type man CPUburn for all the command options. (and press 'q' to get out of the man page ) For testing your RAM use Memtest that's in the GRUB boot menu.

I use the system monitor applet in my deskbar, with colours, sample timing and width of the graph set to suit myself. Here's a screen cap:
Attachment 89987
I have the green indication NICE usage (NICE is like thread priority. BOINC runs at '19' which means it's the last thing to run before idling) red for SYSTEM and blue for USER. Next to that is the hardware sensors applet (the applets can be anywhere on the deskbar btw and they're movable) showing GPU temperature, CPU core 0, core 1 and the last one is the frequency scaling applet which lets you mess with your CPU frequency (mine's an indicator only as I have scaling disabled to stop it from ramping down).

Do a search in Synaptic (search for 'cpu' ) and you'll find a few utilities for messing with clock speeds of both your CPU and nVidia vid cards.

[emuexport]

Oh noes!!!!

I dont know what I have done but one of my boxes wont auto start boinc

I'm going to let it finish all its wu's then I'll reinstall it.

Have the third quad setup just need to install OS etc and the shelving is done as well but i just need to work out how to mount the drives and PSU without taking up much space.

emu

[D_A]

Check in System -> Administration -> Services and see if it's listed and if so if it's ticked to run (assuming you installed from repositories) otherwise be sure you got the path right when you set it up in the System -> Preferences -> Sessions dialog (if you downloaded and installed from the BOINC site).

[emuexport]

Well I moved back to xubuntu as I couldnt get ubuntu and boinc to work together atm. But I'm not sure why my boinc benchmarks are so low compared to Vista 32bit or 64bit (I do realise that they aren't that great on linux after a google)

I dont think I am crunching fast enough as I am not getting enough points per Quad any idea? Or should I just install windoze and give up on linux?! I do plan on doing more testing but running outta time atm with Christmas fast approaching.

Help an emu out. If you have Linux can you explain what you run and how? Maybe I can get some more ideas.

emu

[Lu523]

Check you pm.

[D_A]

Well I moved back to xubuntu as I couldnt get ubuntu and boinc to work together atm. But I'm not sure why my boinc benchmarks are so low compared to Vista 32bit or 64bit (I do realise that they aren't that great on linux after a google)

I dont think I am crunching fast enough as I am not getting enough points per Quad any idea? Or should I just install windoze and give up on linux?! I do plan on doing more testing but running outta time atm with Christmas fast approaching.

Help an emu out. If you have Linux can you explain what you run and how? Maybe I can get some more ideas.

emu

PM me your phone number and we can arrange some talk-time to see if we can sort out what's going on.

[64dragon]

here's my linux boinc bench http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...&postcount=574

heres my vista boinc bench http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...&postcount=524

[emuexport]

Thanks 64Dragon.

I definitely dont get those numbers even remotely so maybe it is installing 32bit boinc via the packages manager? I'll try and find out on Sunday when I have time.

and D_A I'll send you a PM and we can sort out something if I cant fix it by manually installing the 64bit version.

[emuexport]

Alright I finally sorted out my 4th quad. Turned out some high spec ram I got was not registering properly on the mobo! I'll post pics soon of my crunch farm but it is a bit untidy atm

so Boinc Benchmark on a fresh install of Ubuntu 8.10 64bit with a 64 bit version of Boinc 6.2.15 I get the following results with a Q6600@3.6GHz and only one 2GB stick at 800MHz (dont ask why one stick I'll get to it tomorrow)

Whets: 2399
Dhry: 6691

I think its being penalised as its only running in single mode atm. Bloody bios wont post with 4 GB atm so I'll pick up some cheap stuff tomorrow.

Now with 2 x 2GB and 3600MHz on the Q6600 ram @ 6400

Whets: 2975
Dhrys: 8400

Turns out I had a bad bit of ram!

[[XC] mysticmerlin]

That Whets looks rly low for a Q66 @ 3.6 imo. Though some one on the team here did a test of Dual v Single channel on the ram and it was very small gain with Dual. iirc

Anywho on Q # 4

[emuexport]

I think so too so I am not sure what is going on?!?! I will try out XP x64 and see how that goes.

Cheers on Q6600 no 4 in the redback farm! Should have no 5 up and running next week! Just waiting on the 2nd hand Q6600 to arrive.

And dont think I didnt notice the collective nudging me out of 9th place rofl

[D_A]

That's definitely low for a Q66 @ 3.6. Sommat not right there.

...

Have you disabled frequency scaling? BOINC runs at such a low priority on linux that if you leave that enabled it the system will throttle down and give you crap benchmarks and completion times. At least it did on my Optys. Turned off the throttling stuff in the BIOS and removed the services in the OS and it picked up a heap.

[karl_eller]

My Q6600 at 3.6 Ghz on Server 2k8 64-bit gets:
Whetstone: 3372
Dhrystone: 10019

Even assuming Linux 64-bit scores a little bit lower than Vista/Server2k8, you still should be getting higher than what you got...

Eller