Optimization questions

[Assimilator1]

That SETI cache seems even more hassle to setup than the WU storing program we use! :Q .
The program we use also works with the GUI version ,does SETI cache?

[CharlesWA]

Optimization questions

After reading about these Ni guys (and figuring that I might as well joind a SETI group), I figured I'd jump on board with the you all. I'll officially join the group later (and add in my 810 or so work units).

Right now I'm running Windows 98 SE on my main computer at home (PIII 450, 320 MB RAM). I've been running the screen saver verions (runs all the time), but the problem is it usuall finishes up the work unit during the day when I'm at work. Is there any way to cache a couple of work units to keep it busy all day? I've got a dial up that cannot be setup to dial on demand (stupid fax machine that must be available all day). I've also got a PII 233 Fujitsu laptop (W2K) that will be up and running in the next day or two. It's in the same boat as far as work units go. Does the command line version let you cache multiple work units? Or could I load up 2 instances of it on the same computer, thus (theoreticially) processing each at half speed, but keeping the computer busy twice as long?

Once I get a KVM switchbox I'll bring my NT 4 machine (dual P-150's) back on line. Would it be best to run NT4 workstation, server, terminal server, or W2K pro on it? I don't do anything important with it usually. Can I (should I) somehow run 2 instances of SETI on it to take advantage of both processors?

Also I'll have a K6-2 400 Mhz BeOS R5 machine machine (or at least it'll be that way once I get home and open my package from UPS!). Again, I need a KVM box, but it'll be up soon. Has anyone had any experience setting it up with SETI?

Incidently, the PIII-450 has a Millennium G200/8mb in it (Anybody want to trade a their "extra" G400 for an ASUS Riva TNT2 Ultra 32 mb card w/ ASUS TV-BOX? No extra charge for the thin layer of dust on it...). The Be machine has a Mystique 220/4mb that I'll bump to 8 just as soon as I get around to ordering the memory from Matrox. The Laptop and Dual P-150 machine are both non-Matrox.

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A few computers, some with Matrox stuff...I'll add details later.

[Jorden]

Welcome on board Charles,

MAGGI !!!!, show the man how you work with your seti-cache program

810 units would bring us close to TA again, sorry Assim

Jord.

[CharlesWA]

I'm on-board at #33. It looks like I'll have to get serious and get all my machines running... #34 is dangerously close behind me!
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Where do I get the caching program? Does it work with both the screen saver and command line version? And does the Win NT command line version work with Windows 98 SE/ME? It's been sitting there saying "Doing baseline smoothing" for several minutes (Celeron 400, Windows ME) and hasn't gotten anywhere. Is this normal for the command line version?

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A few computers, some with Matrox stuff...I'll add details later.

[This message has been edited by CharlesWA (edited 02 May 2000).]

[This message has been edited by CharlesWA (edited 02 May 2000).]

[Ees]

Charles, welcome aboard.

There are a few ways to do this.

- There are specialized "seti cache" programs. I haven't had much succes with them; maybe someone else can comment on those. You can use those programs both with the screensaver, and with the cmd-line version.
- If you'd use the cmd-line version, you can play some tricks with its parameters. The basic idea is that you setup a few seti-directories, and make a batch-file that processes them in turn (without sending the results immediately, using the "-stop_after_process" switch). After they're all done, you send all of them. No doubt, someone will post their program.

Your other question (hanging cmd-line version): it's probably running, see what happens when you start it up with "-verbose".

Martin

[MegaManX4]

Hi CharlesWA,

As Ees said, do the commandline trick. I use the "Maggi" soulution. He once made some batches, if you want i can send you them.

The are esay to handle.

Man, As we (Alpha Centauri) joined the team some Months ago with our lousy 600+ WU's, we were at place 14. Yes, times are getting harder....

Mega

[office boy]

Does it really matter..... You will never overtake the illustrious TEAM ANANDTECH

[Assimilator1]

Jorden

Woo! that's a big jump for you *gulp*....

Come get us then ,hehe

[CharlesWA]

Thanks for the tips on the command line version. If I'd been using it with several cached work units I probably would be well over 1000 by now. Oh well, it's all good now! 2 of the 4 computers at home are up, currently 3 of the 6 on my desk here at work are up (mixture of Pentium, PII and Celeron). The work computers will be up and down at various times, depending on what I need to test.

Does anyone know how to write up a script in Be? I suppose I could always read some of my Be books...

Also, I opened a thread concerning dual processors. If anyone has any tips or tricks for tweaking that I'd appreciate them!

Thanks

p.s. Where's the SETI client for my old Philips Velo 1 Win CE device!?!? Or my Atari 800XL?

[Maggi]

Hi Charles,

I use batches to send/receive 15-20 WUs in a row and also for crunching upon windows startup. (Works also on my dual P3 at work with two instances)

In my SETI dir are several subdirs, each containing the latest seti.exe and my user_info.sah so that I won't have to login 20 times ...

then in my SETI dir there is a batch called Render_SETI.bat

cd .\Kopie(01)
Seti.exe -stop_after_process
cd ..

cd .\Kopie(02)
Seti.exe -stop_after_process
cd ..

cd .\Kopie(03)
Seti.exe -stop_after_process
cd ..

(...)

cd .\Kopie(18)
Seti.exe -stop_after_process
cd ..

cd .\Kopie(19)
Seti.exe -stop_after_process
cd ..

cd .\Kopie(20)
Seti.exe -stop_after_process
cd ..

next batch is labeled Send_SETI.bat

cd .\Kopie(01)
Seti.exe -stop_after_xfer
cd ..

cd .\Kopie(02)
Seti.exe -stop_after_xfer
cd ..

(...)

cd .\Kopie(19)
Seti.exe -stop_after_xfer
cd ..

cd .\Kopie(20)
Seti.exe -stop_after_xfer
cd ..

With those two batches you can easily create temporary batches to
a.) submit/receive a bunch of WUs at once without having to connect for quite a while
b.) generate a render_cont batch, which is link it to your autostart (startup) folder and cad can be updated by cut'n'paste from front to end before rebooting.

Hope that gives you an idea and I bet such a concept could be ported to any OS that supports a CLI and offers a SETI executable.



Cheers,
Maggi

[office boy]

LOL you could just add that to your autoexec.bat *snicker*

[Maggi]

LOL

nope ... needs to be maintained within a windows environment ...

[MegaManX4]

Maggi, I did send him your batches. And if you would read more carefully you would have noticed that...
But , hopefully your extra work is not senseless, maybe some other members use this idea??

Mega

[CharlesWA]

I've got the batch stuff under control. I made up a couple of disks today at work with 2 WUs each for my machines that aren't networked there. Nothing spectacular hardware wise, but each WU counts!

It might be good to add "how to cache" or "how to optimize using the command line version" to the FAQ or somehwere. I initially looked there hoping to find something like how to setup batches.

[This message has been edited by CharlesWA (edited 04 May 2000).]

[cancer]

This maybe a little off topic but while i was rooting around the various Seti@home team pages i found a nice little 'optimizer' program that could be used with Seti commandline or the pretty screen saver version or any other program for that matter.
It called TaskInfo2000
and it works on all Windows 9x & NT platforms. It basically lists all the processes the system is doing + you have the option of prioritising all the threads(from idle to high) & terminating those pesky programs Ctrl-Alt-Del can't touch. I found it particularly handy to toss those unnecessary exe's before i go to bed so my pc can crunch seti WU that much faster. I couldn't tell you how much quicker it is unless someone decides to use it and benchmark it. I feel a little better now I've done my small bit to help our seti effort(i hope no one has already mentioned this in another post...).
Cheers.


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Aopen HX08 full tower case, Asus P3V4X bios 1.03, P!!! FC-PGA 550e @733, 160M pc100 sdram, Matrox G400MAX bios 1.4 PDesk 5.52.015, Seagate 28.5G Ultra ATA66 7200rpm HD, Pioneer 103s DVD 6X/32X drive, SB AWE64 Gold ISA sound card, SMC pci ethernet adaptor, Castlewood Orb 2.2G media drive, Nortel 100 cable modem, Mitsubishi 1995 19in monitor, occasionally use dualhead for dvd on a Sony 80cm Wega TV, MS natural keyboard, MS Intellimouse Explorer,
Win98SE 4.10.2222A, DX7a.