Hello!

Here ise my problem: I'm on core 2 duo 3GHz and Gforce 8600GT not overclocked. Os Linux mandriva 2009, boinc 6.4.5.

When I start a gpugrid workunit all the scran is not freez but very slowdown: starting, using, typing, refreshing is so slow that I sometime must suspend gpugrid. Is it normal or have I done something wrong. I saw that when I lauch top I saw that, one time, the Xserver was using 90% of one CPU and stop this when I suspend gpugrid. Today X-server stay around 13% but the task acemd take 31%, is it normal too ? How could I make the screen more friendly ? Overclock ? Other prefs ? Thanx a lot in advance!

BTW: the line of the task gpugrid in boinc indicate: (0.03 CPUs 1 CUDA) what does that mean ?

An 8600GT is not particularly fast in terms of GPUGrid. Even my 8800GT has some slight lag occasionally. This effect is less noticeable the faster your primary card is.

In terms of the (0.03 CPUs 1 CUDA), this is in reference to the CUDA task not taking an entire CPU for use -- though someone else will need to explain the 0.03 and what that exactly means, if anything.

though someone else will need to explain the 0.03 and what that exactly means, if anything.

Just an estimate, nothing else.

MrS

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Scanning for our furry friends since Jan 2002

An 8600GT is not particularly fast in terms of GPUGrid. Even my 8800GT has some slight lag occasionally. This effect is less noticeable the faster your primary card is.

Well are you telling me softly that I can't do anything to make my screen movement more smooth ? :-/

What do you think about overclocking ? My card (I think) Is a "overclock card ready".

In terms of the (0.03 CPUs 1 CUDA), this is in reference to the CUDA task not taking an entire CPU for use -- though someone else will need to explain the 0.03 and what that exactly means, if anything.

1 CUDA means that it use 100% of the GPU and 0.03 an estimation of the % cpu needed ?

Well are you telling me softly that I can't do anything to make my screen movement more smooth ? :-/

No, you really can't do much about it. You could suspend GPUGrid if it bothers you that much and only run when you aren't using the monitor. Be careful to watch the deadlines though, if you do this. My 8800GT isn't too bad for lag, but I don't know how much there is with an 8600GT and whether it can be lived with.

What do you think about overclocking ? My card (I think) Is a "overclock card ready".

I have two 8800GT's that I have manually overclocked slightly on both shader/core clocks and memory (not much, 10% or so). I also have a factory overclocked 9500GT (shader/core only) that I have bumped up the memory slightly (5% or so). You can try rivatuner to OC, but do so at your own risk. There are quite a few posts regarding this, so the best advice is to take is slow if you do. You could google your card to see what others have been able to accomplish in terms of OC with an 8600GT, but be aware that every card and environment in which it is run is different. Different results are to be expected on a case by case basis.

Well are you telling me softly that I can't do anything to make my screen movement more smooth ? :-/

Other things you can try ...

If you have back ground image, set it to a single color. Turn off effects like zooming window opening ... depending on the OS there may be a number of other settings you could fiddle with to make it a little more tolerable.

THere ARE discussions of these issues on the dev list and in other places that the devs get input from and this is one of the things in the hopper. But, there are other things that are in there first ... so don't expect a change anytime soon ...

Snooze BOINC when you need better screen and so on ... when it lags, hit snooze again ... or, as suggested, suspend BOINC while working. Last suggestion, use the settings to stop BOINC during working hours (whatever they might be) ...

Well are you telling me softly that I can't do anything to make my screen movement more smooth ? :-/

You could do it, but even if you increase your speed by 30% (not likely) it's still going to be too sluggish with such a card to use the machine interactively.

MrS

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Scanning for our furry friends since Jan 2002

Well are you telling me softly that I can't do anything to make my screen movement more smooth ? :-/

What do you think about overclocking ? My card (I think) Is a "overclock card ready".

With your card, it is not just the speed. While overclocking may help some, the 256mb is also a limiting factor that will exacerbate any screen responsiveness problems.

I don't think the memory is a problem my 8600GT has 1G and mine is choppy. I'll just suspend GPUGRID when I need speed.

the 256mb is also a limiting factor that will exacerbate any screen responsiveness problems.

Anything to back that up? With RivaTuner you can see that ~70MB of vid mem are used when GPU-Grid is running. So I don't think 256 MB is a limitation (yet).

MrS

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Scanning for our furry friends since Jan 2002

I don't think the memory is a problem my 8600GT has 1G and mine is choppy. I'll just suspend GPUGRID when I need speed.

For yours (and my 9500GT with 512mb for that matter), the choppiness is of course driven by the speed & shader count of the GPU. However, xmal's card has only 256mb and isn't just "choppy", even typing is too slow if GPUGRID is running. So, I was saying that the low memory in that case exacerbates the choppiness that might be tolerable on other higher memory 32 shader cards. For example, I typed this response on the machine with the 9500GT without any problems...

I don't think the memory is a problem my 8600GT has 1G and mine is choppy. I'll just suspend GPUGRID when I need speed.

For yours (and my 9500GT with 512mb for that matter), the choppiness is of course [...]might be tolerable on other higher memory 32 shader cards. For example, I typed this response on the machine with the 9500GT without any problems...

Thanx a lot for all your answer. Memory, I think I can't add some, but I hop that overclock could help a little (I know just a little) to reduce tha lag. I don't ask a total smooth, but just better. I notice, today, that with another Workunit, it's not so bad. Could it be a bad workunit causing this or it's a lottery for me (workunit choice)? Ill teel you the advance of my situation with overclock.

By the way, do you know the name of soft for linux to do this ? I've searched on nvidia site but found nothing :-(

Scott,

now I see your point. Well, it's subjective how one experiences the lag.. so I'm not sure if it's actually any different between the 8600 / 9600 cards with different amounts of memory.
As you may remember the 6.61 client made the lag even more pronounced. With that client (and the new WUs) typing was feeling choppy even with my 9800GTX+. Oh, and the linux client may behave different than the windows client.

xmal,

no, you can't add memory to your GPU. And there are threads about linux overclocking somewhere here. Regarding the different WUs: the models which we're running differ in complexity (i.e. more or less atoms). You can take a look at the output of your tasks, there's a line "time per step". Less complex WUs need less time per step and run more steps, so the lag (the time it takes to calculate one step) is better.

MrS

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Scanning for our furry friends since Jan 2002

xmal,no, you can't add memory to your GPU. And there are threads about linux overclocking somewhere here.

Ok, I'll search this, cool.

Regarding the different WUs: the models which we're running differ in complexity (i.e. more or less atoms). You can take a look at the output of your tasks, there's a line "time per step". Less complex WUs need less time per step and run more steps, so the lag (the time it takes to calculate one step) is better.

All right, I understand the differences between the WU now and the lag effect by the same way.
Really tanks to you, Scott and other for the help! Really!

TTYL8R