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Thread: Stuff

  1. #1
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    Stuff

    So I recently decided to get back into the prime searching game after several years away from it. Participating in the current effort of the Sophie Germain LLR effort. That got me into reading on the PG message board reading a bit. Up came the discussion about double checking now being pretty much all project wide, with the reason I gather being that the latest Intel SkyLake chip having a noticeable error rate compared to previous chips and AMD's. Further reading also hinting at memory issues, fast vs slower, blah blah. So I went out yesterday and purchased an i7-6700 3.4ghz cpu with 2 sticks of 8g DDR4-2133mhz memory. MB is an Asus B150M-C. Put it together with a black label WD 7200 500g HD with win10 home-64. Ran through some sieve files to see if it was working okay and then attached it to the Sophie project. It's made it through (knock-on-wood) it's first 24 hours crunching and so far no errors. And them another guy was going on about he wasn't getting errors but he wasn't running the very large memory intensive LLR units. So his theory is that as long as the project isn't exceeding the cpu cache limits that the skylakes won't have errors more than any other cpu..... That sounds much more reasonable to me. There's issues on which memory you can run, and the another person was commenting on an issue with fast memory ie DDR4 with Asus m/b's. So anyway there it is..... I may get another cpu to also mess with regarding this issue. Maybe even a 6700k, but the prices start rising with them plus Intel doesn't include a cooling solution with the chip so that increases the chip price too. So any thoughts or words of wisdom from anyone that has read up on the error issues and prime grid initiating double checks on everything because of the SkyLakes??
    Last edited by Brucifer; 09-21-2016 at 11:26 PM.

  2. #2
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    If cache per thread is an issue than an i7 6700K -with hyperthreading off- is a serieus option in an everyday consumer mobo.
    If you buy a mobo with Intel C232 or C236 chipset, you can also try the somewhat cooler running Xeon E3 1275 v5, which should be the same price as the i7 6700K.
    You can also have the benefit (result-wise) of ECC RAM, when using the Xeon.

    BTW: Sophie Germain LLR does not strike me as giving very large memory intensive LLR units, I think you can leave the hyperthreading on.
    Last edited by Dirk Broer; 09-23-2016 at 09:08 AM.


  3. #3
    Join Date
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    I'd go with the Xeon too they are rock stable in my experience. Haven't got a Skylake i7-6700k yet due to cost and as you correctly observed there is no CPU cooler supplied. I have been using Corsair water coolers for the last dozen or so builds. I think the really challenging tasks at PrimeGrid are the Seventeen or Bust (SOB) tasks as they are huge and take a very long time to run.

    My son bought a 6700k for gaming last month so I should get a "hand me down" in about a year

    I inherited his former gaming rig, computer name Icarus, an i7-4790 with a GTX1070 that is happily earning its keep on PrimeGrid PPS-Sieve and SRBase.
    Last edited by vaughan; 09-24-2016 at 02:26 AM. Reason: add details

  4. #4
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    I was just posting the stuff about the 6700k skylake issue as it's been a discussion on the primegrid message board. They were like there's enough errors there that that's why they ended up going the route of double chicking on everything. Within the error discussions there were observations regarding problem differences between fast or slow memory. So I purchased the 6700 which was a bit cheaper with 2133 fast memory. That board has been pretty stable so far. As for the larger work units that exceed the cpu cache limits, I haven't messed with that yet.... before I do I have to acquire a good battery backup so the workunit doesn't crap out due to a power fluctuation. I don't have many (knock on wood) power disturbances here, but Murphy's Law would be bound to jump into the fray if I tried long ones without the power backup. :-) I haven't messed much with server chips since I retired from the IT world. The good stuff costs bucks and of course this is an expensive hobby. I've been impressed with the 6700, like 65watts I think it was, and it's been a good performer so far. I had purchased some i3's as a life support systems for a couple nvidia 970's. I prefer crunching with the gpu's but of course heat is an issue. I will start running some of the AP27 work units today on a 970.

    This whole drill is a new venture for me after the hospital route. Previously my main crunching effort has been in the distributed.net stuff. So this is off into the boinc world, and now starting to mess with win10 and all it's issues. Initially I was really negative about win10. The most recent revelation is to go with the win10pro rather than the home version as at least one can mitigate the update fiasco issues by deferring the updates, which is a big deal with long running work units unless you are just into pain. So I will acquire a couple copies of win10pro to experiment with that. Personally this has been a long drawn out recovery period to get the brain and interests back into the computer thing. It's been an experience to say the least but I'm just happy that things have progressed to this point. My other issue with win10 is that my niche in the IT world was network security....... well to me, windows is the largest virus out there! lol. They still haven't gotten through their collective heads that when they make stuff easy for users, they are also making it easy for "Little Johnny", the geek out there that like screwing up everything. So anyway, primegrid is the direction I've decided to get back into in the crunching world and thus the learning curve on things. :-)

    re: Win10 -- While I really prefer win7, I'm also a realist and the big push is win10. Yes there's linux, but there's also less problems with drivers in windows for the gpu stuff without adding to the gray hair I already have. I think MS is trying...... As they have obviously been taking tons of heat over the update issues that big business IT is really squawking over, otherwise they wouldn't have added the "deferred update" avenue to get around the primary objections of having fresh untried updates shoved immediately down their throat and breaking in-house networks and in-house developed software that is essential to their business. I can see MS's issue with supporting multiple versions of windows, however, computers are a tool. If MS doesn't offer a compatible tool to big business then big business will either find or develop the needed tool. There's tons of money hanging in the balance. And MS is gonna have to change or something else will come along. Same goes with the "cloud" world. Who trusts the cloud? One just doesn't let anyone hold the family jewels, and a company's data is the family jewels of the corporate world. And it's not only the safe storage of the data in the cloud. there's many unresolved legal issues relating to security/privacy/ownership that are as of yet unresolved and slowly working their way thorugh the legal system, both here in the US and throughout the world. So anyways, I'm giving win10 the old college try. :-) It does have some good points too.
    Last edited by Brucifer; 09-24-2016 at 08:59 PM.

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