Multi-Core Folding

[NikoDG]

Hey, I have a 3830K hexa-core multithreaded chip. What I'm wondering is, using the SMP F@H client, how many cores can I afford to fold on without losing performance in most games? I was thinking three, as that still leaves two cores for games, and one core for the OS and background applications.

[Silas13013]

I run my smp client on my 2600k on all 8 threads with no huge performance loss. Granted, I haven't tried BF3 while folding but it runs SCII and HD movies and such without any performance loss at 1920x1200.

[Savan]

I have a 1090t and I run it on all cores. If I find a game is having trouble while folding is running I just turn it off before I launch the game and start it back up once Im done.

[NightDiver]

Running 8 cores on my 8120 dont effect game play either. FPS may drop a couple points, but games stay playable.

[ARandomOWL]

Does the SMP client still run as low priority by default? If so, it will give up CPU cycles for other programs and shouldn't slow them down much if at all.

[CheeseMan42]

When I ran folding I would just turn it off when I was gaming. Though that was usually on a single or dual core CPU.

[malmsteenisgod]

Does the SMP client still run as low priority by default? If so, it will give up CPU cycles for other programs and shouldn't slow them down much if at all.

 

Yes the SMP client (or all folding clients as far as I know) will run at low priority. So when you're gaming it will devote more resources to the game than to folding. You will still lose some FPS but I usually find that it isn't much. If it does get too annoying then I usually just stop folding until I'm done playing.

 

Alternatively you could download FAH Tracker V2. I prefer using this as it's a GUI client and you don't have to deal with CMD prompt. But anyways, it has a Gaming Pause feature that when enabled will pause your clients when it detects that a game is running and continue once the game is closed.

[Guest_Jim_*]

I have mine set to fold on 3 of my four cores, use as much as 85% of the cores, and gave it "low" priority, instead of the default idle. What this adds up to is my client holds onto more resources than others. I find for several AAA games I do need to stop it because the FPS drop is actually a lag for me, which really makes some games unplayable. However, there are still a number of games that aren't affected. Torchlight never had a problem with it, and neither does Supreme Commander 2, which is a AAA game.

 

My point here is the client can impact games, but won't always. Best thing to do would be to just open the game and see how it runs. If it runs fine while the CPU folds, let it fold. If not then obviously close the client when gaming. This may lower your PPD, but unless you game for half a day, everyday, the work units should always be finished before their deadline.