thinking of building a 24/7 folding machine, suggestions?

You obviously do not pay your own electricity bill.

Running a program like this when your computer is on anyway is all good and well, but when it comes to building dedicated quad core rigs for folding, well, then it will cost you quite a bit over time. There are other, more efficient ways to support a good cause than folding like this, but that's just my opinion.

 

I wasted electricity like a mofo when I lived with my parents too. Hell, I'm home right now and I never turn off anything. But once you move out as a poor student you'll soon notice the value of being a bit careful with the power consumption...

 

Maybe you should look at doing some folding on GPU - it smokes some of the fastest CPU's. A Q6600 with a couple of mid range GPU's would be a very capable cruncher.

 

20 Dell Vostro 400's Quad 2.4Ghz. This is an old picture. Folding 24/7




Mike
aka: The Commander
:banana::biggun:

 

Looks like fake... Can you post link to your folding@home profile?

 

Ok, checked... But I would still like to see his folding@home profile.

 

I fold for Team XPS Team #80856 I fold as Leganfuh. I started folding 2/10/08

http://www.hardfolding.com/index.php?go=38&id=588350&tnum=80856

As far as electric bill compare June 07 to June 08



Mike
aka "The Commander"


(1) XPS720
Windows Vista Ultimate
Intel® Core™2 Quad Q6600 2.40 GHz 1066 Mhz, 4Gb Crucial DDR2 PC2-6400 800MHz SLI-Ready
Qty.(1) Seagate Barracuda 250Gb Hard Drive, Qty.(2) Seagate Barracuda 500Gb Hard Drive
nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX 786Mb Memory, Dual Drives: 16X DVD-RW & 16X DVD-Rom
Dell 24" Widescreen Flat Panel LCD Monitor


(20) Vostro 400's
Intel® Core™2 Quad Q6600 2.40GHz 1066MHz, Windows XP Home Edition
2GB Dell DDR2 PC-6400 800MHz, 128MB NVIDIA® GeForce® 8300GS
250GB Serial ATA Hard Drive, Dual Drives: 16X DVD-RW Burner & 48X CD Burner/DVD
Dell 20" Widescreen Flat Panel LCD Monitor

 

Ok...

May I ask you how did you afford those PC's, does someone pay you for folding and is folding only purpose of those PC's?

 

May I ask you how did you afford those PC's?
With hard work and good credit.

Does someone pay you for folding?
If by pay, you mean money, then no. If you the satisfation you feel when your helping Humanity, then yes.

Is folding only purpose of those PC's?
Their only purpose is to fold 24/7 and complete as many WU's as possible.

Also the will be sporting nVidia GeForce 8800GT 512Mb. video cards as my budget allows.

Mike
aka "The Commander"


(1) XPS720
Windows Vista Ultimate
Intel® Core™2 Quad Q6600 2.40 GHz 1066 Mhz, 4Gb Crucial DDR2 PC2-6400 800MHz SLI-Ready
Qty.(1) Seagate Barracuda 250Gb Hard Drive, Qty.(2) Seagate Barracuda 500Gb Hard Drive
nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX 786Mb Memory, Dual Drives: 16X DVD-RW & 16X DVD-Rom
Dell 24" Widescreen Flat Panel LCD Monitor


(20) Vostro 400's
Intel® Core™2 Quad Q6600 2.40GHz 1066MHz, Windows XP Home Edition
2GB Dell DDR2 PC-6400 800MHz, 128MB NVIDIA® GeForce® 8300GS
250GB Serial ATA Hard Drive, Dual Drives: 16X DVD-RW Burner & 48X CD Burner/DVD
Dell 20" Widescreen Flat Panel LCD Monitor

 

Ok, thanks.

Keep up the good work!

 

Wow...that is ALOT of folding PC's . It almost looks like a bloody render farm!

 

Wow! Any chance you'd switch over to the guru3d team Legafuh? :nerd:

 

Another very nice idea of Crossfire! :thumbup:

 

I'd second the whole GPU folding.. especially now that they have released multi gpu folding support.

If you want serious folding..

get 3x8800GT's.. those go around $170 each

Then get an motherboard with 3 PCI-Express slots.. i got a nice one myself the ASUS P5N-32E SLI, this has 2x16 and 1x8 slots.. although the speed of the interface wont really matter when it comes to folding.. so this is a good motherboard.. comes in around $170-$230

Toss in 2GB memory.. memory so cheap these days and folding requires next to none.. so should be more than fine.

And a CPU.. if you plan to be folding on this using Windows XP you should get a Quad Core.. Q6600 (2.4GHz, 1066MHz FSB and 8MB L2 Cache) is probably a good choice.. if you will be using windows vista the GPU2 Folding client uses much less CPU power and can easily be run by a smaller core 2 duo.. like the E6550.. runs 2.33ghz standard, 4mb l2 cache and 1333MHz FSB..

The E6650 would set ya back around $190
the Q6600 would be a bit more.. say around $210

These are all danish prices tho and hardware in denmark i guess is just a tad more expensive that most other places.. taxes etc. so you'd probably be able to get this a lot cheaper wherever you're from..

Ofc you'd need a cheap harddrive and a cdrom drive etc. to hook up too it.. you may have some laying around or not.. anyway.. doesn't cost a lot these days.. and then theres the windows license etc..

But with a setup like that

Motherboard: ASUS P5N-32E SLI
CPU: Core 2 Duo E6550
Memory: 2gb noname
GPU: 3x8800GT 512MB's

You'd be pushing 5k PPD on each of the 3 cards. for a total of 15k.



Personally for lack of money and hardware im folding on a similar machine
only with a 9800GTX and a 8500GT.. pushing 5700 + 700 PPD..

If i had the money i'd get another 2 9800GTX's .. that way i'd also have 3-way sli going for me for gaming.. which i also use this rig for.. and i'd be able to push 17K PPD