Timeouts - Where are they heading, and should we report them

[BobWilliams757]

With the influx of the higher end GPUs in the last couple of years, it seems some of the timeouts are tightening up quite a bit. Though this is understandable, my question is essentially, should we report when any certain GPU/iGPU is running short of making the timeouts?

For the record, not a complaint, and I really don't care about points. I've seen posts concerning the time it takes to classify GPU's, and why lesser GPU's in a class might not make the timeout while others make it just fine. I also understand that the people making things happen have limited time for all these various projects and the support it takes. I'd just rather not risk WU's being issued more than once on a regular basis if it can be avoided. Though I have a meager iGPU that averages probably in the 70-75K range for the last 16 months or so, it seems the rate of missing timeouts has gone up greatly in the last couple months. Of those 16 or so months, I've only dumped 1 WU, in accordance with the rules and policies. But there are series of WU's that are being reassigned and causing duplicate work to be done on a somewhat regular basis in some cases.

I'd gladly report those instances if it can help, but don't want to report it if it just frustrates those already spread thin.

It would seem to me that there are so many newer and very fast GPU's in use that the researchers could put stricter limits on GPU species to ensure that work isn't done more than once, and more importantly the science advances more quickly. But I also understand that if the ID/species/specs make that difficult than it's just another project for someone already busy.


I do get it. Time marches on and technology advances. But it seems I'm seeing more on the forum here, and more often when checking WU status, that more and more hardware is not capable of the timeouts lately. If it comes to that, I'll just CPU fold here and there until I can find the right GPU for my situation. But more than anything, I was wondering if the tightening timeouts should be reported at all, or if the trend is moving towards speeding all work up and making more hardware obsolete for folding sooner rather than later.



Another slightly related question.... while checking WU status I obviously saw where WU's had been assigned to a second user if I exceeded timeout, as expected. But I came across a couple of instances of WU's being assigned to a second user well before the timeout... in some cases another user picked up the same WU about halfway or so into the timeout time I initially received. I've never noticed this in the past, and curious what might cause it.



And to end on a positive, I saw the update about measures being taken to prevent the cherry picking of WU's and support it 100%. I hope that trend continues.

[aetch]

Personal opinion

If you're getting work units that your computer cannot complete within the timeout period then you should absolutely be reporting it.
The researcher has a number of options available to alleviate timeout issues:-
*). extend the timeout/expiration date/time.
*). configure the work unit to avoid your species of card
*). move your card to a species where it will receive lighter work units
*). blacklist your card so it receives no more work units

The main drawback with the GPU.txt file is that the GPUs are ranked by capability alone.
FAH have been running a project for sometime to try and change to a system of benchmarking where your card's capabilities and performance are taken into account.

Equally, if your card cannot complete work units then you have the option to withdraw it from service.

That said, I am concerned about the size of some of the CPU projects currently running.
Projects 19682-6 are really big.
My Ryzen can churn through them in about 12 hours and I'm quite happy to keep getting work units I finish in hours, it makes servicing and shutdowns of my machines a bit easier to plan as I can align all the slots to finish within a small window of time.
I thought those were big but I have seen a couple of monsters on the horizon and I'd be looking for the researchers to break them down into smaller projects or for a way for me to opt-out of them. I really don't want to tie up my processor on a single work unit for 40-48 hours.

[psaam0001]

I'm sure my Ryzen 9 3950X will be happy to get some solid runs that take a day or two to complete (versus several 2-5 hour long WU's per day)... Provided the completion times are reasonable.

Paul

[BobWilliams757]

Personal opinion

If you're getting work units that your computer cannot complete within the timeout period then you should absolutely be reporting it.
The researcher has a number of options available to alleviate timeout issues:-
*). extend the timeout/expiration date/time.
*). configure the work unit to avoid your species of card
*). move your card to a species where it will receive lighter work units
*). blacklist your card so it receives no more work units

The main drawback with the GPU.txt file is that the GPUs are ranked by capability alone.
FAH have been running a project for sometime to try and change to a system of benchmarking where your card's capabilities and performance are taken into account.

Equally, if your card cannot complete work units then you have the option to withdraw it from service.

That said, I am concerned about the size of some of the CPU projects currently running.
Projects 19682-6 are really big.
My Ryzen can churn through them in about 12 hours and I'm quite happy to keep getting work units I finish in hours, it makes servicing and shutdowns of my machines a bit easier to plan as I can align all the slots to finish within a small window of time.
I thought those were big but I have seen a couple of monsters on the horizon and I'd be looking for the researchers to break them down into smaller projects or for a way for me to opt-out of them. I really don't want to tie up my processor on a single work unit for 40-48 hours.

Agreed with your suggestions if reported, but I've seen a number of them mentioned in various sections of the forum with no change that I know of. I guess if there are no changes or anyone that notices it and comments soon, I'll post them up in the GPU issues section and see what happens. It seems to be one particular series that is impacted a number of people apparently.

I wish I would have picked up a decent video card when prices weren't crazy. But that was my question on long term trends. If it keeps moving towards requiring faster hardware, I might have to just CPU fold here and there and give up the GPU folding. But it's nice having a low power option that can just run in the background quietly and without really having to worry about it.

And yep... seems like the CPU project are getting bigger as well. I hope they don't start pushing the non gamer/power user CPU's out earlier too... seems like with a better way to assign things the user base would be much larger and more science could be done.