5th of September

Farm status
CPU only
Running Rosetta work

Intel GPUs
Off

Nvidia GPUs
Off

Raspberry Pis
Three running Rosetta and Einstein (50/50). Ten running Einstein

For news on the Raspberry Pis see Marks Rpi Cluster


The last week
We had a couple of warm days (it got up to 30 degrees C) where only the Raspberry Pis were running. It is only the start of spring. I have since got the CPU only machines going on Rosetta work.


New additions
I have ordered parts for two new machines, some of which have already arrived. One will be a replacement for the proxy server and the other is intended to be used as a HT Condor submit node.

Proxy server

Case	Fractal Design Node 1100 (from old one)
PSU	Seasonic (from old one)
Motherboard	Asus B550M-K
CPU	Ryzen 3300X
Cooler	Noctua NH U9S
Memory	HyperX Predator DDR4-3200 2 x 8GB (spare)
Network	2.5GbE NIC (spare)
Storage	512GB Samsung 970Pro (from old one)

Submit node

Case	Fractal Design Meshify C
PSU	Seasonic G series 360w (spare)
Motherboard	Asus X570-P/CSM
CPU	Ryzen 3600 (spare)
Cooler	Noctua NH U9S
Memory	Kingston DDR4-2400 ECC 2 x 16GB
Network	10GbE Asus XG-C100C (spare)
Storage	512GB Samsung 970Pro and 2 x 8TB Toshiba X300 HDD (spare)

The ECC memory seems to be stuck at the courier depot. They say they attempted to deliver yesterday, but with 3 people at home none of us heard anything. They usually leave a card in the letterbox but didn't this time so I suspect they didn't even try.

As you can see I have reused parts where possible to keep the cost down. I might get a Meshify C Mini case for the proxy server rather than reusing the old case. I have 3 Toshiba X300 drives as spares but the case only has two 3.5" HDD bays.


Update: 10 Sep 2020
The ECC memory turned up the following day without me having to do anything. The other parts have arrived. I forgot the X570-P motherboard so had to place another order for it and the Meshify C Mini case. I am now waiting on them to arrive.

August 30

Farm status
CPU only
Running Einstein work.

Intel GPUs
Idle

Nvidia GPUs
Off

Raspberry Pis
Running Einstein and the occasional Rosetta work.

For news on the Raspberry Pis see Marks Rpi Cluster


Radio BOINC Network
They do regular podcasts about BOINC and the various projects. To quote their website "BOINC Radio is a participatory podcast hosted on the BOINC Network Discord server". You can join in and ask questions if you want, or just listen to the podcasts at your leisure. Their website is https://www.boinc.network/


Idling along
The weather is warming up. Its almost Spring in Sydney so the farm is idle during the day and processing overnight when its cooler.

As mentioned in my last post the workload is transitioning from all Rosetta to a mix of Rosetta and other projects.

23rd of August

Farm status
CPU only
All running Rosetta work.

Intel GPUs
All running Rosetta work.

Nvidia GPUs
Off.

Raspberry Pis
Three running Rosetta. Ten running Einstein work.

For news on the Raspberry Pis see Marks Rpi Cluster


Other news
Replacement KVM's and cables arrived. I swapped out one of the old KVM's and I can now see! It still has an issue with the colors on one of the machines but if I wiggle the VGA plug on the DVI to VGA adapter it works, so I think that might be the adapter. It looks like I have to get another couple of DVI to VGA adapters.

Rosetta doesn't seem to be doing much Covid-19 related work these days. They have moved onto other research judging from the names of the work units. In the next week or two I will resume the other projects that I paused. I will still run Rosetta work but it will get less resource share.

Oh and there is an Asteroid designated 2018VP1 that could have a potential impact with the earth on the 2nd of November. Its only 2 meters in diameter and currently rated as a 0.41% chance according to NASA. That might change as they make more observations.

16th of August

Farm status
CPU only
Running Rosetta work.

Intel GPU
Idle. Did some Asteroids and Rosetta.

Nvidia GPU
Off.

Raspberry Pis
Three running Rosetta. Ten running Einstein work.

For news on the Raspberry Pis see Marks Rpi Cluster


I can't see
I went to install some software from a USB key on the Intel GPU machines but the 8 port KVM (Keyboard Video Mouse) switch has stopped working. When powered on it doesn't display its usual 00 and I can't select any of the computers. I have ordered a couple of replacements (working on the assumption the other one will also stop working soon). They are both around 5 years old.

I had an idea there might be a problem last week as the colors started going off on two of the machines when I select them. Thinking it might have been the cables I ordered a set of 4 cables earlier in the week, but given I can't select any computer now means its the KVM that is faulty rather than the cables.

Fortunately I can ssh into them and do the install using the command line. Its a lot simpler to drag and drop files using a GUI than it is using the command line.


Idling
The weather has been warm during the day so I have had to set the Intel GPU machines to idle during the day and have them working overnight. It is still winter in Sydney.

I am trying to keep the two Ryzen 3900X machines running 24/7 as they do as much work as the six Intel GPU machines.

I managed to get to position 50 in the Rosetta Top Participants list before NBN came around on Thursday last week. Since then my results per day have fallen dramatically.