PG announcement about Big Advanced Projects

[Xavier Zepherious]

Not to mention there are people talking on both [H] and EVGA about not folding anymore (as well as other forums), or moving to BOINC or outright protesting or even protesting here in numbers.
There are people even considering making a stand here and post concerns, petitions or overload the system with complaints so to speak.

The worst thing you can do is create BAD PR...you have to start considering how you handle things like this.
go slower with changes if you have to. Fix the points system before you make announcements like this

losing people in droves is not your answer.

from the last point change you think you would have learned (we get a black eye)..some leave
now this time we are kicked in the rocks between the timbers...more leave - the rest are cautious about what's coming next (like a stab to the heart)

the fact that the largest and biggest team users are discussing things like this should should give you pause. Use the DAB properly...be open transparant , have solutions before changes made. discuss this with the community before implementation (not just with DAB memebrs)

Yes I folded with older hardware (200 PPD) and even a old ATI card...began with boinc and came over to FAH

Im one who will stay and fold, even buying newer hardware, even with these changes. Yes Im not happy.. I'll live with it , but I can see where others might be ticked off and might leave

I knew eventually things would get updated and requirements increased (but gradually..not big steps - leave 6c/12t in at least for another year)..
or go to a client system that benchmarks systems and determines what it should run (if it can complete them on time let them)

[Duboisi]

.....but as before, the key determining issue will be making the deadlines (especially since some people often spoof the number of cores the client detects anyway).....

Would be highly appreciated if you can announce the new deadlines asap. TQ.

[Grandpa_01]

Yet F@H keeps growing 6 Petaflops obvously they are doing something right. viewtopic.php?f=16&t=20011

[codysluder]

Lots of people will be affected by this change. Several of them have posted in this topic have gotten pretty emotional and part of me wants to tell them what I think of their outbursts, but this forum prohibits personal attacks, so I'll keep quiet about that and stick to the facts.

[7im]

.....but as before, the key determining issue will be making the deadlines (especially since some people often spoof the number of cores the client detects anyway).....

Would be highly appreciated if you can announce the new deadlines asap. TQ.

Sorry, but the new WUs won't be out until January (see announcement), so no deadlines on the Psummary until then. However, it's a safe bet that if the BA8 deadlines were 4 days, the BA16 deadlines will be about half that, at 2 days.

If you could explain how this would be helpful to have exact deadline numbers now, maybe you could persuade them to give more info... Otherwise there is no need to post that info early. Either you have 16 cores (threads) or you don't.

[Nathan_P]

.....but as before, the key determining issue will be making the deadlines (especially since some people often spoof the number of cores the client detects anyway).....

Would be highly appreciated if you can announce the new deadlines asap. TQ.

Sorry, but the new WUs won't be out until January (see announcement), so no deadlines on the Psummary until then. However, it's a safe bet that if the BA8 deadlines were 4 days, the BA16 deadlines will be about half that, at 2 days.

If you could explain how this would be helpful to have exact deadline numbers now, maybe you could persuade them to give more info...

Some of us will be planing upgrades to existing equipment in order to make the new deadlines comfortably. Xeon and opteron CPU's are expensive and whilst we want to upgrade cheaply we do not want to spend money on faster CPU's only to find that it still not fast enough. e.g 16 fast xeon cores or 24 slower ones

[codysluder]

Xavier: you ask good questions but you, like many others, are focusing on the wrong aspects of the announcement. The important aspect isn't about "cores," it's about deadlines. Also, it isn't about a change to the points system, it's about keeping BA focused the top end hardware, which was the whole focus of BA when it was introduced.

With respects to the questions about "cores" vs. threads, the client reports something called "cores" to the server The client is not changing. If your operating system says you have 6 cores or 8 cores or 16 cores, the server will continue to use that number to make it's assignments. There''s nothing in the announcement saying that the client is being changed. What the PG previously called "cores" will still mean exactly what it means now, not something like "physical cores" that the client does not detect. Better yet, maybe they could detect "Floating Point Units" someday. It's a better method of evaluating F@h's performance and it would apply equally to chips from both Intel and AMD. The word "core" has lost most of its meaning now because the marketing people have decided it makes for good advertising. They're using it as a way to mislead the non-geeks into buying their product instead of something from the competition.)

the fact that a dual xeon(4c/8t) at stock is slower than a sandy-e 6 core overclocked doesn't make this a fair system either it should be based on time to complete the WU...not on the hardware of your system

Quite true, but that takes a major design change to do that. Many others have suggested ways to do that and maybe something like that will be designed into a future client and into the servers someday, but it's not that easy to make a major change like that. They haven't completed the transition of the uniprocessor projects to the QRB system and they haven't even started switching the GPU projects to the QRB system yet. Those changes have already been announced and it may take them another year to finish those changes before embarking on other changes to the points system.

What I was referring to in my previous post is that IF your are gonna make changes have the solutions in hand and posted for everyone to see (like exactly what the point system will be)
rather than taking your word your fixing it and then you mess it up again infuriating more people

the solution - new points system worked out ahead of time to alleviate concerns of people....all we got is we are looking at fixing it.

They are not changing the points system in January.

seems we were not notified of changes and our DAB person caught of guard
the whole intent of the system is for feedback both ways... listen not to just those on the board but to the users too

I don't think you can blame PG for that one. You'll have to ask your DAB person about that.

next time have it all worked out before springing bad news on us all....ie bad news- good news

like
bad news - bigadv times are made shorter so older machines like 2600k won't finish in time
good news - is we have a improve SMP points change and here it is...and post it

I'd put it more like this:
(neutral) news item: the definition of top-tier machines has changed and we need to realign F@h's deadlines accordingly. [As stated in the Blog]
bad news: Those of you who had an overclocked i7 or a hacked X6 when they were rare have been able to run BA. That hardware has become commonplace and the new deadlines will exclude them from the top-tier projects.
(neutral) news item: We are not changing the points system a this time.

[7im]

...
Some of us will be planing upgrades to existing equipment in order to make the new deadlines comfortably. Xeon and opteron CPU's are expensive and whilst we want to upgrade cheaply we do not want to spend money on faster CPU's only to find that it still not fast enough. e.g 16 fast xeon cores or 24 slower ones

Good answer. Until there is an official statement on that, start your research based on an expectation of halved deadline lengths as before. Use your own team's benchmark numbers to find system configs that fit the bill. Then when there is an official release, you can adjust up or down slightly to make it work. I don't know when PG will be able to comment on new deadlines, but I expect it will be sooner than later.

[codysluder]

If you could explain how this would be helpful to have exact deadline numbers now, maybe you could persuade them to give more info... Otherwise there is no need to post that info early. Either you have 16 cores (threads) or you don't.

That makes a lot of sense. The number of "cores" is a really lame tool to measure performance but it is the only tool they have. It's reasonable to assume that the same deadline will be used if a project contains twice as much processing per WU. They're saying they expect you to have twice as much moxie in your system as what was needed when bigadv was introduced to qualify as a top-tier machine.

Although I'm being facetious, I don't see how it will help if they tell you that Project 12345 will have deadlines of 10.00 16.70. My guess is that the current projects will be phased out and replaced with new projects that can be aimed at the newly defined top-tier hardware.



I really agree with these statements:

I have to believe that those complaining about this change were not around when bigadv kicked off or they wouldn't be saying this. These WU's are supposed to be cutting edge stuff, not things that a single $200 desktop cpu can do. The fact that you don't have a 16 core cpu is the whole point, they need to be able to write tough bigadv WU's without worrying that they will get stranded on some thread spoofed quad core.

... there has been downward creep occuring in the BA field - BA should continue to be the very top percent of machines and over time that percent has grown and grown. It's a simple fact of computer evolution. As a result, SMP work production has declined and BA work units have come into short supply. In order to rectify the situation there needs to be an adjustment and a recalibration of the system - what good is it if 40% of SMP capable machines are running BA if BA only represents 10% of Pande's science? It's better for all if the recalibration brings those numbers back into line and the seriously fast machines start hitting BA after BA.

[codysluder]

you have the Donar Advisory Board (DAB) ...
you are suppose to talk to them they get feedback from community and it gets sent back thru them to FAH
You make the discussions open transparent - with plenty of lead time

In this case you could have explained the new points system or have something worked out(with DAB and community) to explain to us BEFORE announcing the changes and BEFORE implementation
By including Us in the discussion from the get go you would alleviate concerns and probably get better ideas and solutions
At the least you would have better PR

Once again, there is no "new points system", and they changes have been announced BEFORE implementation.

If you're part of one of the top teams, you have a representative. Your team talks to that representative and he represents your interests. In the political area, I vote for people who represent me in both public and private discussions with other representatives. Some important decisions are announced by The President after closed discussions with our representatives. Other decisions come out of Congress after long acrimonious public debates. The DAB is more like the former than the latter. The team forums are more like congress, especially on subjects where the Speaker of the House and the Vice President (who represent the two houses of Congress AND who currently represent different political parties) happen to disagree. At least in this case, anybody could see that some folks would find this change difficult to accept, so closed discussions made sense, even if some representatives were more open about the DAB discussions than others.

[Nathan_P]

...
Some of us will be planing upgrades to existing equipment in order to make the new deadlines comfortably. Xeon and opteron CPU's are expensive and whilst we want to upgrade cheaply we do not want to spend money on faster CPU's only to find that it still not fast enough. e.g 16 fast xeon cores or 24 slower ones

Good answer. Until there is an official statement on that, start your research based on an expectation of halved deadline lengths as before. Use your own team's benchmark numbers to find system configs that fit the bill. Then when there is an official release, you can adjust up or down slightly to make it work. I don't know when PG will be able to comment on new deadlines, but I expect it will be sooner than later.

I should have said threads. Well i already have 24 slow ones and 24 fast ones, the question now is how fast do I need them to be or will the slow ones still cut it. Time do do some research.

[Punchy]

Catch-22. The DAB reps can't discuss topics with their constituents without revealing the topics under discussion in the DAB, while the DAB discussions are closed. Only by leaking what's being discussed can they actually get feedback on current topics.
Somehow the DAB needs to become more transparent, just as the beta forum did.

[Nathan_P]

...
Some of us will be planing upgrades to existing equipment in order to make the new deadlines comfortably. Xeon and opteron CPU's are expensive and whilst we want to upgrade cheaply we do not want to spend money on faster CPU's only to find that it still not fast enough. e.g 16 fast xeon cores or 24 slower ones

Good answer. Until there is an official statement on that, start your research based on an expectation of halved deadline lengths as before. Use your own team's benchmark numbers to find system configs that fit the bill. Then when there is an official release, you can adjust up or down slightly to make it work. I don't know when PG will be able to comment on new deadlines, but I expect it will be sooner than later.

Halving the current deadlines is going to exclude an awful lot of hardware that fits the bill.

Here is some basic and quick math

Current deadlines are 4 days, 5 days and 5.6 days for 6900/1, 6903 and 6904 respectively.
Halving them gives 2 days, 2.5 days and 2.8 days respectively.
TPF need to be lower than 28 minutes, 36 minutes and 40m15s respectively for QRB to apply

Now my fast 24 thread machine has the following TPF

13m50s for 6900/6901 Fine no problems
28m29s for 6903 Cutting it close
41m20s for 6904 Misses the deadline

Now this machine has 2 x5670 xeon processors running @2.93Ghz + turbo under linux for max performance. This is not exactly what anyone can possibly call slow. To exclude such a machine from 6904 does not bode well for many other bigadv folders running dual socket machines, as there are more than a few (including me) who have slower hex cores in their machines (e.g L5640). It would also exclude almost all 16 thread machines from 6903/4.

So reduce the deadlines by all means, that is what has been decided - however PG need to be cautious as to how far they can go.

[ChasR]

The deadlines of p6903 and p6904 have already been reduced once. I would not expect them to be halved from the current to go to 16 cores.

[Horvat]

Thank you V.J. for calrifying this question. This is a critical piece of information that will help 100,000's of donors make decisions when purchasing new equipment in the near future.