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Set Up BOINC with ATI (AMD) Videocard under Slackware

This howto is used based on Slackware64 14.0 and boinc 7.2.33 x64, and ATI HD 4350 (RV710) videocard.

Firstly - install a fresh slackware64 14.0. Then we download the latest BOINC client from here

Put the file boinc_7.2.33_x86_64-pc-linux-gnu.sh in your user home directory, from who we plan start the boinc client/

note: from the same user we must start x window system, because otherwise BOINC will not see GPU

Then do:

sh boinc_7.2.33_x86_64-pc-linux-gnu.sh

After that in our home directory there will be the “BOINC” subdirectory, which contains all the binaries we want. Now is the time to prepare a video card.

Download catalyst 13.1 drivers from AMD/ATI site (the latest version is 13.1 - it supports legacy old 4350 video cards)

http://www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/amd-driver-installer-catalyst-13.1-linux-x86.x86_64.zip

Then we must also download SDK 2.9 from here to get OpenCL support for video card:

Now under root unzip catalyst 13.1 and type:

sh  amd-driver-installer-catalyst-13.1-legacy-linux-x86.x86_64.run

and install it.

After that untar AMD-APP-SDK-v2.8-lnx32.tgz, and install it.

Now you need to run a window manager from selected user (startx from a command line interface), then in KDE (or whichever window manager you choose), open a terminal, cd into ~/BOINC/ and type

./boinc

You should see something like:

bash-4.2$ boinc

boinc: /lib64/libssl.so.1.0.0: no version information available (required by boinc)

boinc: /usr/lib64/libcurl.so.4: no version information available (required by boinc)

boinc: /lib64/libcrypto.so.1.0.0: no version information available (required by boinc)

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] cc_config.xml not found - using defaults

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Starting BOINC client version 7.2.33 for x86_64-pc-linux-gnu

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Libraries: libcurl/7.27.0 OpenSSL/1.0.1c zlib/1.2.6 libidn/1.25

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Data directory: /home/someuser/BOINC

boinc: /lib64/libssl.so.1.0.0: no version information available (required by boinc)

boinc: /usr/lib64/libcurl.so.4: no version information available (required by boinc)

boinc: /lib64/libcrypto.so.1.0.0: no version information available (required by boinc)

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] CAL: ATI GPU 0: ATI Radeon HD 4350/4550 (R710) (CAL version 1.4.1734, 512MB, 439MB available, 192 GFLOPS peak)

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] OpenCL: AMD/ATI GPU 0: ATI Radeon HD 4350/4550 (R710) (driver version CAL 1.4.1734, device version OpenCL 1.0 AMD-APP (937.2), 512MB, 439MB available, 192 GFLOPS peak)

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] OpenCL CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU     E4500  @ 2.20GHz (OpenCL driver vendor: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., driver version 2.0 (sse2), device version OpenCL 1.2 AMD-APP (937.2))

getaddrinfo: Success

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Host name: TESTslk64_14

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Processor: 2 GenuineIntel Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU     E4500  @ 2.20GHz [Family 6 Model 15 Stepping 13]

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Processor features: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl est tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm lahf_lm dtherm

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] OS: Linux: 3.2.29

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Memory: 3.79 GB physical, 1.91 GB virtual

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Disk: 36.67 GB total, 17.73 GB free

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Local time is UTC +2 hours

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [rosetta@home] URL http://boinc.bakerlab.org/rosetta/; Computer ID 777; resource share 100

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [Milkyway@Home] URL http://milkyway.cs.rpi.edu/milkyway/; Computer ID 7777; resource share 100

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [Einstein@Home] URL http://einstein.phys.uwm.edu/; Computer ID 777777; resource share 100

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [Poem@Home] URL http://boinc.fzk.de/poem/; Computer ID 77777777; resource share 100

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [SETI@home] URL http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/; Computer ID 777777777777; resource share 100

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] General prefs: from http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/ (last modified 01-Jan-1970 03:00:01)

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Host location: none

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] General prefs: using your defaults

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Reading preferences override file

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Preferences:

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---]    max memory usage when active: 1163.31MB

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---]    max memory usage when idle: 1744.96MB

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---]    max disk usage: 2.00GB

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---]    max CPUs used: 1

31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---]    suspend work if non-BOINC CPU load exceeds 50%    
                                                                                                          
31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---]    (to change preferences, visit a project web site or select Preferences in the Manager)        
                                                              
31-Jan-2014 15:42:41 [---] Not using a proxy             
                                                                                                                                 
31-Jan-2014 15:42:42 Initialization completed                  
                                                                                                                           
31-Jan-2014 15:42:42 [Milkyway@Home] Restarting task de_modfit_16_3s_bpl_128wrap_1_1390392603_1849719_0 using milkyway_separation__modified_fit version 128 in slot 1   
                  
getaddrinfo: Success

31-Jan-2014 15:42:42 [Milkyway@Home] Sending scheduler request: To fetch work.

31-Jan-2014 15:42:42 [Milkyway@Home] Requesting new tasks for CPU and ATI

31-Jan-2014 15:42:45 [Milkyway@Home] Scheduler request completed: got 1 new tasks

getaddrinfo: Success

How to attach BOINC to project manager

After that you have a working BOINC installation. To start participating in projects, go to setiathome.berlkeley.edu, or bam.boincstats.com (if you plan to participate with more than one project), and register. In the second case (via bam.boinc.com) you can attach your project as follows:

  • In one terminal window run ./boinc .
  • Open another terminal window with the same user, and in the BOINC directory type:
./boinccmd --join_acct_mgr http://bam.boincstats.com boincstats_username boincstats_password
  • in first console (where you ran ./boinc) you see messages like “account manager attached, project xxx attached, start to download,etc”….

If you want to edit boinc preferences, you can create the file global_prefs_override.xml in your boinc directory containing the following:

<global_preferences>
   <run_on_batteries>0</run_on_batteries>
   <run_if_user_active>1</run_if_user_active>
   <run_gpu_if_user_active>1</run_gpu_if_user_active>
   <suspend_cpu_usage>50.000000</suspend_cpu_usage>
   <start_hour>0.000000</start_hour>
   <end_hour>0.000000</end_hour>
   <net_start_hour>0.000000</net_start_hour>
   <net_end_hour>0.000000</net_end_hour>
   <leave_apps_in_memory>0</leave_apps_in_memory>
   <confirm_before_connecting>0</confirm_before_connecting>
   <hangup_if_dialed>0</hangup_if_dialed>
   <dont_verify_images>0</dont_verify_images>
   <work_buf_min_days>2.100000</work_buf_min_days>
   <work_buf_additional_days>0.250000</work_buf_additional_days>
   <max_ncpus_pct>75.000000</max_ncpus_pct>
   <cpu_scheduling_period_minutes>300.000000</cpu_scheduling_period_minutes>
   <disk_interval>360.000000</disk_interval>
   <disk_max_used_gb>2.000000</disk_max_used_gb>
   <disk_max_used_pct>75.000000</disk_max_used_pct>
   <disk_min_free_gb>0.950000</disk_min_free_gb>
   <vm_max_used_pct>10.000000</vm_max_used_pct>
   <ram_max_used_busy_pct>30.000000</ram_max_used_busy_pct>
   <ram_max_used_idle_pct>45.000000</ram_max_used_idle_pct>
   <max_bytes_sec_up>0.000000</max_bytes_sec_up>
   <max_bytes_sec_down>0.000000</max_bytes_sec_down>
   <cpu_usage_limit>80.000000</cpu_usage_limit>
   <daily_xfer_limit_mb>0.000000</daily_xfer_limit_mb>
   <daily_xfer_period_days>0</daily_xfer_period_days>
</global_preferences>

ATI GPU without X window manager

If you do not want to use X Window manager (say, on a server), but want to use ATI GPU in boinc, you can go that way:

In the home directory of the account you want to run boinc from, make a script called dummy_wm.boinc:

#!/bin/sh
/home/boinc/BOINC/boinc --dir /home/boinc/BOINC >/home/boinc/BOINC/boinc.log 2>/home/boinc/BOINC/berror.log

make that script executable:

chmod +x dummy_wm.boinc

Then in the same directory create a script called xserv_boinc.scr:

xinit /home/boinc/dummy_wm.boinc

Make it executable too:

chmod +x xserv_boinc.scr

Now you must run that script (dummy_wm.boinc) as shown below to keep it running. If you log in in your server via ssh, for example, and run that script, boinc will be running, but when you log out, it will stop. To keep the task running after you log out, start it as follows:

at -v -f /home/boinc/xserv_boinc.scr now+1min

It will start the task after 1 minute from now.

You can check the running status by checking log files:

/home/boinc/BOINC/boinc.log

and

/home/boinc/BOINC/berror.log

You can always get some info about tasks with the following command:

 /home/boinc/BOINC/boinccmd --get_simple_gui_info

 /home/boinc/BOINC/boinccmd --get_tasks

ATI VideoCard stats info

You can also get some info about your video card state via commands (must be executed under the root account):

 DISPLAY=:0 aticonfig --odgc

and

 DISPLAY=:0 aticonfig --odgt

Sources

 howtos:software:boinc_gpu_ati_slackware ()