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Message boards : Number crunching : "current GigaFLOPs" about to reach 1,000,000!

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Message 27666 - Posted: 12 Dec 2012 | 2:30:08 UTC

When I joined (about... 1-2 months ago, the GigaFLOPs for this project were around 600K, now it's about to reach 900K, pretty impressive growth in such a short time.

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Message 27678 - Posted: 12 Dec 2012 | 18:30:11 UTC

Wintertime is the crunchers time ;)
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Message 27718 - Posted: 17 Dec 2012 | 15:07:00 UTC - in response to Message 27678.

I concur to DSKAG's post. I'm new here and got a GTX 480, so crunching right now is like a better heating in my case! Saves me some costs for the heating at least, and since my PC would run either way I'm not really losing anything about power-consumption-costs.

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Message 27731 - Posted: 19 Dec 2012 | 2:55:05 UTC - in response to Message 27718.

I concur to DSKAG's post. I'm new here and got a GTX 480, so crunching right now is like a better heating in my case! Saves me some costs for the heating at least, and since my PC would run either way I'm not really losing anything about power-consumption-costs.


I've always wondered how much of the wattage being drawn is converted right into heat...

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Message 27738 - Posted: 19 Dec 2012 | 19:15:17 UTC - in response to Message 27731.
Last modified: 19 Dec 2012 | 19:29:58 UTC

I've always wondered how much of the wattage being drawn is converted right into heat...

All of it (except the light emitted from the LEDs < 0.2W, but in the end this will be also converted to heat in the environment). Computing doesn't require power in theory, all power used during computing is required only because the devices used for computing are imperfect. There's no work done during computing in phisical sense, the work done is merely logical. So the effectiveness of computing is 0. That is why the speed of computing can be doubled every 18 months.
But computing isn't the only activity during which all the consumed energy is converted into heat: every activity is like that.

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Message 27778 - Posted: 20 Dec 2012 | 21:38:04 UTC - in response to Message 27738.

I've always wondered how much of the wattage being drawn is converted right into heat...

All of it (except the light emitted from the LEDs < 0.2W, but in the end this will be also converted to heat in the environment). Computing doesn't require power in theory, all power used during computing is required only because the devices used for computing are imperfect. There's no work done during computing in phisical sense, the work done is merely logical. So the effectiveness of computing is 0. That is why the speed of computing can be doubled every 18 months.
But computing isn't the only activity during which all the consumed energy is converted into heat: every activity is like that.


So there's no difference between plugging a rheostat set to draw the same wattage as my video card in terms of heat generation?
I get computing is "logical", but I mean there must be a percentage of the power being drawn that goes just into computing... unless every single electron passing thru the CPU/GPU generates it's own share of the total heat.
I think I just answered my own question.

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Message 27797 - Posted: 22 Dec 2012 | 8:02:30 UTC - in response to Message 27778.

I've always wondered how much of the wattage being drawn is converted right into heat...

All of it (except the light emitted from the LEDs < 0.2W, but in the end this will be also converted to heat in the environment). Computing doesn't require power in theory, all power used during computing is required only because the devices used for computing are imperfect. There's no work done during computing in phisical sense, the work done is merely logical. So the effectiveness of computing is 0. That is why the speed of computing can be doubled every 18 months.
But computing isn't the only activity during which all the consumed energy is converted into heat: every activity is like that.


So there's no difference between plugging a rheostat set to draw the same wattage as my video card in terms of heat generation?
I get computing is "logical", but I mean there must be a percentage of the power being drawn that goes just into computing... unless every single electron passing thru the CPU/GPU generates it's own share of the total heat.
I think I just answered my own question.


It could be said that heat generation is a byproduct of computing and with many crunchers are running 24/7 at 100% load they can contribute to keeping a house warm... That is unless you live in a warm country in which case it can be a problem.

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Message 27798 - Posted: 22 Dec 2012 | 8:48:45 UTC

not to mention electric heat would generally be more expensive than natural gas heat
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Message 27848 - Posted: 27 Dec 2012 | 4:04:56 UTC

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_per_watt

some interesting reading there.

I cannot find a source, but I have a memory of reading somewhere that a CPU is about 3% efficient in terms of calculations.

I.e. only 3% of the power it consumes is actually used in calculations, the rest is lost to heat.

This could be completely wrong, it is just a vague memory I have.

In winter, for me anyway, it's cheaper to have my computer running full blast (consuming about 400w/hr) and venting approx 150 cfm than to run a space heater for my room. Which is a bonus for science and my wallet! :)

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Message 27871 - Posted: 28 Dec 2012 | 20:56:29 UTC - in response to Message 27848.
Last modified: 28 Dec 2012 | 21:00:31 UTC

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_per_watt

some interesting reading there.

The point is that the "effectiveness" of computing is measured by how much logical operations can be done using 1 Watt...

I cannot find a source, but I have a memory of reading somewhere that a CPU is about 3% efficient in terms of calculations.

I.e. only 3% of the power it consumes is actually used in calculations, the rest is lost to heat.

This could be completely wrong, it is just a vague memory I have.

...and not how much power is "used in calculations", because it would mean that this much power is escaping from the physical existence to the logical existence. But the logical existence (aka data) is represented only by the arrange of matter in the physical existence, so there is no place for the energy to escape to.

Let's say we have three objects in a horizontal plane marked A B and C (in that order). The three objects held in their place by the friction between the surfaces of the plane and the objects. Their arrangement is a datum, and friction helps to preserve both. When you swap two of them to change their order to A C B (and change the datum their arrange "store"), obviously this process requires some physical work to be done to overcome the friction which holds the three objects in their place. Their surface (and the surface of the device used for swapping them) will become hotter because of friction. All work done during the change is needed only to overcome the friction, and all energy is converted to heat by friction. The work done is only to change the order of the three objects, not the datum coming from their order, however their new arrangement apparently represents a different datum. While the three objects have physical characteristics, the datum coming from their order doesn't. Because the datum is only the figurative sense of their order.

The advancement of computing is done by using smaller and smaller objects to represent information, therefore the process of changing their order (aka computing) requires less and less energy, but this "evolution" could not change the relation between physics and logic.

At the moment the objects used for representing information are electrons, they don't have temperature, but the device they reside and are processed in (the transistor) has. Inside a transistor two kind of friction exists: parasitic capacitance and resistance.
Just like in mechanical computers, all power is required only to overcome the impediments of the state changes, i.e. the parasitic capacitance and resistance of the transistors of the computing device. This power is instantly and entirely converted to heat.

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Message 28297 - Posted: 30 Jan 2013 | 1:46:25 UTC

Now over 1 petaFLOP, which would place us at 24th in the top 500 supercomputer list.

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Message 28303 - Posted: 30 Jan 2013 | 11:02:06 UTC

Aahh great thing :) grats to all of us ^^
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