http://folding.stanford.edu/

The basic idea is that you run folding client(s) as background tasks and they use the CPU and/or GPU (depending on what type of clients you run) to do protein folding simulations.

Many of you have probably heard of this before. The main reason I'm making this thread is that I'm interested in starting a Runestorm folding team. Many of us have fast computers so why not use the hardware to contribute to science and at the same time compete against each other for high scores?

For those interested, check out the FAQ section on the page that I linked to above to get started. It isn't very difficult once you get the hang of it.

If there is enough interest then I'll start a team. Someone needs to kick Xav's ass for me anyway, since he's folding with 3 CPU clients and 1 GPU one (the GPU client needs one dedicated CPU core for best performance). I'm only folding with 2 CPU clients so I'm not much of a points-making machine.

Ask away if there are any questions you can't find answers to in the FAQ.

I've heard something about that some years ago, in a French science TV show about the fact we can give our processing power to scientists by the Internet, but I never researched how we can do that ...
I don't make that yet but when I will buy my future killing machine i will do that

So is anyone interested? Or should we just not make a team for RuneStorm to help save lives and humanity?

I'm already dedicating resources towards another project to save lives and humanity, but where there's guilt, there's reason. I'm in.

Alright, cool! That's three so far. Any more?

I'm in
though I don't know if I'll make lots of points...

Like Drew Carey used to say on 'Whose Line is it Anyway?' all the time: "The points don't matter". What matters is that you are helping the research of protein folding by donating spare clock cycles every second while your computer is running.

But I will admit that it is fun to have the points, they give us an idea of how much is being contributed as well as making it fun to compete against other donors.

yeah, what matters is science and helping people
but I have two questions...
1.when i pass my mouse in the icon, it says"CPU-F@H:working(30/1500)". what these numbers signify?

2.it works without Internet too?

if it don't work without Internet, how I configure my Laptop to maintain wireless connection while the Laptop is sleeping? or it isn't possible?

You only need internet to download work units and send results back (obviously), the computer can do the work itself without internet access.

30/1500 means that the computer has simulated 30 frames out of 1500 in a particular work unit. I have no idea what those frames actually represent, but my guess is that it has something to do with the amount of folding time that has been simulated for a particular protein. I think most work units simulate a few dozen nanoseconds of folding (simulating molecular dynamics is extremely heavy, hence the short time).

this means that I can put my laptop to sleep an entire night, working on the F@H, and in the next day, when it has Internet, it can send the results back?

I doubt it. Computers can't work when sleeping and neither can we. Remember that the maths involved here are insane, you wouldn't get much work done if the CPU was only utilized minimally, the computer needs to be fully running for any serious progress to be made over night.

I think the closest the computer can get to sleeping while still working at full efficiency is the screen saver.

And by the way, F@H CPU client is an idle task by default and will therefore step aside from any other task that demands CPU time, so you can game and work on your computer and won't ever notice that it is running. Though the GPU2 client isn't that fancy yet, you should turn that off before gaming.

ah, ok!
I think I'll just close the lid of the laptop then.
are screensavers necessary to LCDs? I heard they were just to CRT monitors...
yes, the CPU client is pretty efficient
I played ut2004 and don't noticed any lag.

UT2 is the ultimate test I'd say, since it demands more CPU than GPU. So if UT2 won't flinch then we can safely say that F@H is an idle task.

And nope, screen savers aren't necessary for LCDs. Fun to look at though.

and considering that I was throwing FPA9s in Portals(one at the floor, one at the sky,with about 150 bombs infinitely moving, and all exploded without any lag....

hahaha, I remember the old days that i loved to watch that labyrinth screensaver i remember that i had even made some crappy Paint images to the floors, roofs, etc!

watching the F@H viewer is nice too

For maximum folding speed you want to use the console version, since no graphics need to be rendered. Plus the GUI version can only be assigned to one CPU core, making it impossible to use more than one GUI client if you got a multi-core processor.

Oh, did we mention the FaHMon? It keeps track of all your folding clients, tells you their points, and tracks your average Points Per Day. A real nice package there.

http://www.fahmon.net/

So we got 4 people, should we make a team?

Nah, 8 - 10 is an absolute minimum in my opinion.

Xav isn't with 3 CPUs and 1 GPU? and you are with 2 CPUs, so that's in the total 8 clients(4 from Xav, 2 from you, 1 from me(perhaps 2, I'll install it in another PC) and 1 from Tyster.

But we are still only 4 in the team right now. I really want guys like UP to join in as well, he has a pretty powerful PC and a PS3 as well.

So no one wants to help science?

Sure, I'll join. I usually leave my laptop on anyway.

... because the laws of logic would dictate that you cannot help science in any other way (extreme sarcasm).
Either you are trying to impose guilt to manipulate people for your own personal reasons, which I find to be quite despicable, or you are confused about logic. Let me explain.

Let "p" be the statement: "You are running this protein folding program and dedicating a good chunk of your system resources."

let "q" be the statement: "You are helping science".

We have established: (p --> q). In plain English, this means "if p is true, then q must also be true".

However, one cannot say: (if NOT p --> NOT q).

This simply does not follow the laws of logic. If you do not see why, Google "classical logic".

You are trying to be funny, right?

@Kaboodles: Great! Just a few more to go (maybe 2 - 3 people) and I'll create the team. Until then you could just leave the team ID option blank and start folding, and reconfigure the client(s) when the team exists.

your words always are intelligent.
heh, I'm attempting to manipulate people, making them guilty... muahahahah.
though logic examples in my brother university were really strange. I remember one like this:
"If Socrates died, he is dead. but if Socrates died again, he is alive"
something like that.
sure, it can have logic in theory, but in practice it don't have any logic.
Kaboodles, you have a laptop? you use it to gaming?

To a degree, except for my assertion that guilt should not the tool of choice in getting people to do something you want them to do. Many of the posts telling people to run this client come across (in my eyes) as a guilt trip, saying "do this or you're not a good person". I may be exaggerating a little bit, but it reminds me of deplorable tactics used by many "charities". That's all, but this protein folding thing does seem to be a good use of resources if you feel like it.

Well, it certainly wasn't my intention to go on a guilt trip, dunno about Gismo though.

heh, I wasn't all that serious, but helping this project helps science. and the fact that it is easy to install, configure, etc, one can't say that it is difficult to help science.
sure, you can help science other ways, but this one is easy and don't hurt you anyway...
and what's Gismo?

A shorter version of your name. It should be Giosmo but I like Gismo better.

actually the l is a L

Even a better reason to call you Gismo then, Glosmo doesn't sound good at all.