Wow gosh guys. It's been a long time......

[YoDude9999]

since I've been here.

If you've been watching the stat page, most of you know I've never stopped crunching for the Team, but things did slow down for me quite a lot for some time. Back in the day, when you guys mostly saw me last, I was preparing to do some very serious crunching with 4 boxes stuffed with some awesome hardware that was supposed to yield me roughly 2~3m credits/day. Everything was going splendidly until almost the very day I turned them all on. Of course back then 2~3m credits/day was considered quite high as well, but alas, not so much now.

What a disappointment that turned out to be. Aqua went off line forever, Collatz reduced their credits, M/W followed suit and Prime Grid cut theirs in half. Moo went rouge for a while and DitR, well I dunno with those guys. Once those two went nuts I decided to take them out of the loop and just dropped them. $%*@%$ Man-o-man I was pizzed off with that. Of course it didn't all happen at exactly the same time but it was close enough together to be very discouraging.

Nevertheless, I kept on crunching for the Team with what I could. In short time, my hardware proved to not be able to handle the workload as well as expected. Aside from the loss of overall credits, too much heat generated in the boxes forced me to remove some of the hardware. Another problem was that my home electric bill was going way! overboard and the price to do this work was becoming a real financial issue. Regardless of all that, I've always had at least one box running for the team, pretty much non-stop.

Well, now, I'm here to tell you the good news. I've finally found a graphics card that'll double my output, runs cool enough that I can run at least two of them in one box, hopefully without overheating problems, are not overly expensive and so I can afford a small several of them to use at work and at home and start getting my credit output, theoretically, at least back in the ball park for what I was shooting for. Although not as high as I would like, but I'm thinking at least half of what I was originally shooting for, which would be about 1.5~2m credits/day and all at an electrical bill that's less than ever! It's not all ready yet, but it IS in the works of things. I already have one box online, another will be next week. Within the next 2 months, I expect another roughly 2x credit output.

Keep the faith boys, Yo is here to help the team!
Oh and by the way, setiusa.org now faithfully steers every one here!

Steve-

[NJCaNS]

YoDude, Welcome back. Like you I've been keeping a low profile due to life but still crunchin' for the team. I see you've been working out. :-) Nice.

[Duke of Buckingham]

http://www.dilsecomments.com/graphics/Welcome-Back-2811.gif

[YoDude9999]

Thanks guys!

[myshortpencil]

YoDude, I've been looking everywhere for that picture! :) BTW, which graphics card did you settle on?

[zombie67]

Welcome back!

[c303a]

Welcome back to the boards. It's good to see you again and I hope you stick around for a long time.

[Al]

Welcome back, we missed your...
Yo!

[Fire$torm]

Hey YoDude! Long time no see. Welcome back. :-bd


Welcome back, we missed your...
Yo!

And your avatar... :P

[John P. Myers]

Welcome back! And grats on your new cool & efficient GPU, whatever it is :p

[YoDude9999]

YoDude, I've been looking everywhere for that picture! :) BTW, which graphics card did you settle on?

We have a project going on at work that required a new computer and a halfway decent graphics card. One of the other engineering guys chose a card from Tiger that seemed to fill the bill. The only real requirement was that it run DirectX 9.0 [insert belly laugh here]. It was an EVGA GTX660 that rang in at around $200. When I looked at the specs on the box, I was mildly impressed with them.

A couple days later I went to the EVGA site and started comparing the card specs to the ones I already have. At that point considering the price and seeing that the credit yield of the 660 should be just about double what I've been running for the last week or so, convinced me to try one at home. So I ordered one.

Sure enough, the credit output turned out to be almost exactly double of what I was getting with my old card, a GTX460 and the 660 runs *much* cooler than the 460 does. Originally, I had bought 3 of the 460's and loaded my home computer with them but found they ran way too hot so I had to remove two of them. That box has faithfully been crunching all this time, but my credit output was in the toilet.

At work I have two boxes fitted with the 460's. One of them is an old dog HP I had bought years ago. It has been a pretty good cruncher *after* I upgraded the power supply and dropped in a ATI 5970. It was running strictly Collatz for some time and then the darn thing just wouldn't be cooperative any longer. It started rebooting or get the BSOD or whatever but not run consistently for any length of time. It ran pretty much okay in the winter but once it started warming up, it just couldn't take it. That box was offline more than it was online, so it just wasn't worth the bother so much. This was happening a year ago and I kept trying to get that box to crunch but it was more work than it was worth.

I finally got tweaked with it and decided to put one of my, *spare*, 460's into it and figured while I'm at it, I'll drop the other into my workstation as well. So I did that and got them both up and running without issue. However that old HP just doesn't like the heat at all, so I downloaded the EVGA Precision app and tweaked in the GPU fan settings and added another case fan to the system and all seems wonderful with that system except for the fan noise the system makes now! The workstation system seems to be just fine with the 460 but.....

After seeing the results I have gotten with the 660, I've decided to convert all three computers over to the 660 card and already have a second card on order that will replace the 460 that's in that old HP. My hopes are that this combination of hardware in that system will finally overcome its heat issues and still prove to be a viable cruncher. The workstation will get one as well within the next month or so I'm thinking, but the delay with a third card is one of finances. I'm trying to keep all my credit cards paid off in full. So, that means, buy a card, pay it off, buy a card, pay it off. This is why it'll be another couple months before I'm running full tilt again. I'm now at the point of, no more hardware until the current CC bill is paid off. Once that happens I'll be putting out another $400 some buckazoids towards two more 660's. One for the workstation at work, then other as a second card for the computer at home.

Then guess what? I still have two more systems are screaming at me to bring them back online as well. One of them will go back to work, at work and I'm thinking it'll have two 660's in it and the last system will have another and live at home depending on how the electric bill shows up over the next couple months.

[YoDude9999]

Thanks Zombie, it's good to see you again!

[YoDude9999]

Welcome back!

I have no intentions of leaving the board or the Team, I just haven't been around the boards much, but thanks!

[DrPop]

Hi Yo! Man, we missed all your good banter! ;) Great to have you on the boards again. I would see your output from time to time when I looked at our team stats on Free-DC, so I knew you were still with us, but just not "here" on the boards. Glad to have you back, thanks for the note.:cool:

[YoDude9999]

Well it seems I've gotten some of my quote messed up, sorry if that causes anyone any confusion. It sure is confusing to me!

[YoDude9999]

Hi Yo! Man, we missed all your good banter! ;) Great to have you on the boards again. I would see your output from time to time when I looked at our team stats on Free-DC, so I knew you were still with us, but just not "here" on the boards. Glad to have you back, thanks for the note.:cool:

It's good to be back Dr. Thank you!

[myshortpencil]

...A couple days later I went to the EVGA site and started comparing the card specs to the ones I already have. At that point considering the price and seeing that the credit yield of the 660 should be just about double what I've been running for the last week or so, convinced me to try one at home. So I ordered one.

...

Thanks, YoDude. I run a 660, myself. :)

[Fire$torm]

Hmmm, 660s are under 2 bills. EK water block under 1 bill.

Maybe by Christmas.....

[John P. Myers]

Hmmm, 660s are under 2 bills. EK water block under 1 bill.

Maybe by Christmas.....

Nah by xmas there should be 860's that outperform a 660 at half the wattage :p

[YoDude9999]

Hmmm, 660s are under 2 bills. EK water block under 1 bill.

Maybe by Christmas.....

So far my results with this card is, no water block necessary. I did D/L the EVGA Precision app and have it installed on my home computer as well as my HP at work and found that tweaking the fan settings a bit and putting it into auto control works quite well so far. At home my GPU temp hovers right around 60~62c even at idle it sits about 54c so I don't feel I'm stressing the GPU in any way. I've run MW, Collatz and PG for several WU's during warmer parts of the day. At that temp the fan is running about 67% with it being about 80* inside.

[rgathright]

WELCOME BACK YODUDE!

If you have any spare cpu cycles... please consider helping us out at http://asteroidsathome.net/boinc/top_teams.php

[Fire$torm]

Nah by xmas there should be 860's that outperform a 660 at half the wattage :p

So true. So that means the 660s should drop in price. Then maybe I could get two and do a cool water block bridge between them.... $$$$$$$$$


So far my results with this card is, no water block necessary. I did D/L the EVGA Precision app and have it installed on my home computer as well as my HP at work and found that tweaking the fan settings a bit and putting it into auto control works quite well so far. At home my GPU temp hovers right around 60~62c even at idle it sits about 54c so I don't feel I'm stressing the GPU in any way. I've run MW, Collatz and PG for several WU's during warmer parts of the day. At that temp the fan is running about 67% with it being about 80* inside.

I see your point, but I'm sorta dedicated already to water cooling my desktop (http://www.setiusa.us/showthread.php?6678-Project-Kooler-H220-as-the-Gateway-Drug-to-Open-Loop-Cooling). Plus wc should allow me to bump the clocks higher then I could on air.

[YoDude9999]

So true. So that means the 660s should drop in price. Then maybe I could get two and do a cool water block bridge between them.... $$$$$$$$$



I see your point, but I'm sorta dedicated already to water cooling my desktop (http://www.setiusa.us/showthread.php?6678-Project-Kooler-H220-as-the-Gateway-Drug-to-Open-Loop-Cooling). Plus wc should allow me to bump the clocks higher then I could on air.

Oh trust me, I love a liquid cooled system. Right now though, unless I stuff 3 of those 660's in there [at home], I don't see a need for it and it does get a bit more expensive to do it that way. I'm really trying to keep things at a minimum cost wise per credit output, but if the need arises, I may consider it with a fully stuffed box. I could have done that with the 460's in the full stuffed box but I'm glad I didn't, just because it would have been more money.

It would seem there's probably a good bit of room to overclock these cards. I've only tinkered with OCing the one I have at home. As I recall, I think I got about an extra 20% out of it, but I can't say for sure, as the Tequila was tastin' pretty good at the time:) Oh and that was without over volting it as well.
At this point in time, the card seems as though it barely working hard at all. The way I figure it, if it ain't runnin' at least 75c it's not working hard enough LOL.:cool: