Configure increased usage when idle

[Toxeia]

Just started with F@H because I needed a screen saver and thought this one was kind of rad.

I was hoping that I could configure Folding to run medium or low when the PC is in use, but when idle it would increase to full power. I'm not sure if this is possible. What I have been able to do (or I think I accomplished) is configured it to use CPU when the machine is in use, but to also use the GPU when the machine is idle. I configured this by opening the advanced control, going to configure, editing the GPU slot, and at the bottom changed the boolean for "idle" to true. It disabled my GPU on the folding web control, so I'm guessing it's set up correctly but I wanted to be sure. The slider is still currently set to full/while in use. I still need to use this for running virtual machines and gaming but would like to contribute to the best of my ability if possible.

Not sure if any of this matters given my question, but thought I'd share just in case. Maybe there's a piece of hardware I'm running you wouldn't recommend doing this with.
Machine stats:
CPU: i7-5820k @ 4.2GHz, 6 core (12 thread)
RAM: 64GB DD4, 2400MHz (8 sticks in quad channel)
GPU: MSI 980TI Gaming Edition
OS: Windows 10 Pro
Network: 35mbit/5mbit

[djvardy]

I was searching the forum for an answer to this very question. It would be really good if the software could increase processing effort when otherwise idle; this should increase the work done? It could be set to light when busy and full on idle as default on installation?

David

[davidcoton]

There is no good way to control the GPU resources, other than running FAH or not. "Run on idle" is the best that can be done. The limitations are with GPU scheduling and are beyond the FAH software's control.

CPU folding runs at low priority, and will automatically and gracefully back off when you use the CPUs for something else. There is no need to set anything except the maximum to use when the resources are available.

[djvardy]

I think I see what you mean. I wasn't worried about GPU, just CPU.
So, (just to make sure I've got this right) do I set it to 'Full' or 'Full - on idle'?
If set to 'Full' it will then release processing power as required?
Cheers,
David

[jrweiss]

When set on Full, F@H will release the CPU when other processes demand it. There may be a perceptible delay, depending on the computer and the other processes running. If you have a multi-core CPU, you can eliminate the delay by reducing the number of CPU cores used. For an octacore or quad with hyperthreadding, configuring CPU6 (use 6 cores instead of all 8) should leave enough idle CPU power for instant response while F@H is releasing the rest.

[bruce]

Jrweiss is right, but I'd change one word: "imperceptible"

I've never been able to detect that delay except with customized software. Yes, if your system is low on RAM, it may have to page in the foreground activity you're expecting to respond, which takes longer than just focusing the attention of one of the CPUs on the higher priority task, but FAH for CPUs runs at the lowest possible OS priority, so anything else will interrupt it immediately.

GPUs don't have the concept of priority, so a simple mouse click or a minor screen update may have a noticeable delay because it has to wait until a convenient time to be processed. Thus if you're seeing a noticeable delay, the first thing to try is modify the GPU slot(s) to use "on idle" or temporarily pause the GPU and see if that helps. (If it does, there are other things that can be explored.)

[7im]

What donors have traditionally done in this instance is set the Power Slider to Full Power, and let the CPU slot run on all but one CPU core (to feed data to the GPU client). [Avoid 7 CPUs] And then right-click on the GPU slot, and set that to fold while Idle. Since the GPU is either On or Off, there is no Medium setting, per se.

If you still notice lag on the PC, set the CPU client to run on 10 cores (threads). Or even 8 if still an issue.