Hello,

I'm not sure where to find this, so I am asking here. If this has already been asked a bazillion times, please point me where to look.

Will the BOINC manager take advantage of multi-core processors? If so, will a 4-core run 4 times as fast? Or will it run 4 clients at the normal speed?

Also, if so, all platforms? Or only sparc? Intel? AMD? And which OS?

I'm trying to figure out how to maximize performance.

Again, URL pointers are appreciated.

Thanks,
Erik

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Reno, NV
Team: SETI.USA

BOINC is designed to allow for hyper-threading and multi-cores, and there is a setting in 'general preferences' that enables you to control how many processors are used. BOINC sees HT as two separate processors. For BOINC purposes, each 'processor' runs independently.

Of course, this is a illusion. An HT processor cannot run two applications as fast as one, but experience in CPDN with HT in the early days was that there was an output gain of about 10 - 15% from running two WUs in parallel rather than sequentially.

This is a non technical answer, and actual experience will vary with OS, processor, and project. If you look on various boards you will find discussions of this. There is a CPDN one here.

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I think it will also be held back by the OS. If you had Windows XP Pro on a workstation with two dual core processors, only two 'processors' would get used because of OS limits.

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Got it. Thanks!

AM running a 840ee 3.2, 3 gig mem, HT enabled, XP pro, and ir runs all 4 very nicely. You will not get the same speed running all 4 as you would if you just ran 2, do not have any figures but as an example; if you run 2 WUs at 1 hr and four at 1 1/2 hrs, you will be a 1/2 ahead running 4....

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BOINC Wiki

What happens if you run two dual core AMD processors? HT isn't really a second processor. I can't find information on Microsoft about if they are using cores or physical processors in the computation.

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840ee is a dual processor with HT. Win XP counts it as 4 cpus....

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BOINC Wiki

I don't think Windows is really counting it as 4. That's why I am wondering what will happen with 2 true, dual core chips. The task manager counts the HT but when you watch the processor usage it doesn't match on some tasks. I was just accessing a CD and moving data files with a 2.8 P4 and it was showing 50% in the graph but in the listing, 96% idle. When Microsoft say Xp is for up to two processors, do they count cores or physical chips?

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BOINC is designed to allow for hyper-threading and multi-cores, and there is a setting in 'general preferences' that enables you to control how many processors are used.

I am looking for this as well, and cannot find it?!?

I am running on dual dual core HT servers, and I notice a spike in only 1 of 8 CPU scale's in task manager.

Using latest 5.2.13 and cannot find any option to control processors. Any pointers? This would greatly increase output using 4 CPU's instead of 1.

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It's on your Account page on the projects web site.
Look in General Preferences.