PrimeGrid's 2018 Challenge Series
Year of the Dog Challenge
Mar 16 18:00:00 to Mar 23 18:00:00 (UTC)
 
Year of the Dog

2018 is a Year of the Dog. In Chinese astrology, each year is related to a Chinese zodiac animal according to the 12-year cycle. 2018 is an Earth Dog Year, starting on 16th February 2018 and ending on 4th February 2019. Earth Dog's are Communicative, serious, and responsible in work. Famous Earth Dog's include Madonna and Michael Jackson.

The second Challenge of the 2018 Challenge series is a 7 day challenge to celebrate the Year of the Dog. The challenge is being offered on the 321 Prime Search (LLR) application.

To participate in the Challenge, please select only the 321 Prime Search LLR (321) project in your PrimeGrid preferences section. The challenge will begin 16th March 2018 18:00 UTC and end 23rd March 2018 18:00 UTC.

Application builds are available for Linux 32 and 64 bit, Windows 32 and 64 bit and MacIntel. Intel CPUs with AVX capabilities (Sandy Bridge, Ivy Bridge, Haswell, Broadwell, Skylake, Kaby Lake, Coffee Lake) will have a very large advantage, and Intel CPUs with FMA3 (Haswell, Broadwell, Skylake, Kaby Lake, Coffee Lake) will be the fastest.

ATTENTION: The primality program LLR is CPU intensive; so, it is vital to have a stable system with good cooling. It does not tolerate "even the slightest of errors." Please see this post for more details on how you can "stress test" your computer. Tasks on one CPU core will take ~48 hours on fast/newer computers and 6+ days on slower/older computers. If your computer is highly overclocked, please consider "stress testing" it. Sieving is an excellent alternative for computers that are not able to LLR. :)

Highly overclocked Haswell, Broadwell, Skylake, Kaby Lake or Coffee Lake (i.e., Intel Core i7, i5, and i3 -4xxx or better) computers running the application will see fastest times. Note that 321 is running the latest FMA3 version of LLR which takes full advantage of the features of these newer CPUs. It's faster than the previous LLR app and draws more power and produces more heat. If you have a Haswell, Broadwell, Skylake, Kaby Lake or Coffee Lake CPU, especially if it's overclocked or has overclocked memory, and haven't run the new FMA3 LLR before, we strongly suggest running it before the challenge while you are monitoring the temperatures.

Please, please, please make sure your machines are up to the task.

Multi-threading optimisation instructions

Those looking to maximise their computer's performance during this challenge, or when running LLR in general, may find this information useful.
 

• Your mileage may vary. Before the challenge starts, take some time and experiment and see what works best on your computer.
• If you have an Intel CPU with hyperthreading, either turn off the hyperthreading in the BIOS, or set BOINC to use 50% of the processors.
  
  • If you're using a GPU for other tasks, it may be beneficial to leave hyperthreading on in the BIOS and instead tell BOINC to use 50% of the CPU's. This will allow one of the hyperthreads to service the GPU.
   
  
• Use LLR's multithreaded mode. It requires a little bit of setup, but it's worth the effort. Follow these steps:
  
  • The first time BOINC downloads an 321 task, it may act a little strange and download 4 tasks instead of 1. The run times on this first set of tasks may look a bit strange too. This is normal. This will also occur anytime BOINC downloads more than one task at a time. This can be avoided by setting "Use at most [ 1 ] % of the CPUs" before you download 321 tasks. After one task was downloaded, increase the percentage.
  • Some people have observed that when using multithreaded LLR, hyperthreading is actually beneficial. We encourage you to experiment and see what works best for you.
   
  

Time zone converter:

The World Clock - Time Zone Converter

NOTE: The countdown clock on the front page uses the host computer time. Therefore, if your computer time is off, so will the countdown clock. For precise timing, use the UTC Time in the data section at the very top, above the countdown clock.

Ready on my end.

I will be there, got my folding out of the way hoping the first Sprint is GPU.

OMG I thought it was 9:00 AM DOH!!
Old fart alert!

It seems my 4790k likes the 4t's. Looking like a little over 3 hours on Linux. Previously only tested in windows where 4 hours was the norm.

I think I saw it get up 4.2 when turbo kicked in in Windows. I have it set to default speed with turbo enabled. I don't have good monitoring software for Linux and it run's warm with the single fan AIO.

Jumping on this. I wish I could get 1 task to saturate all 16 cores, it just won't do it lol.. Running 2x8core it is then. Can't let 25% of my power go to waste!

lol, yeah. I haven't had much time for the forums lately. Got a new job at the end of last year, the free time has gone the way of the dodo. 

planetclown

yodap
Good to see you devlin!

+1 and congrats on the new job

 Congrats!! I remember working all the time. Lots of OT and working a 2nd job at night.
Can burn out quickly.
Good to see you and thanks for joining in.
Don't be a stranger.

After 5 of 7 days:


Challenge: Year of the Dog
App: 7 (321-LLR)
(As of 2018-03-21 18:31:14 UTC)

47523 tasks have been sent out. [CPU/GPU/anonymous_platform: 47205 (99%) / 0 (0%) / 318 (1%)]

Of those tasks that have been sent out:

5666 (12%) came back with some kind of an error. [5664 (12%) / 0 (0%) / 2 (0%)]
33306 (70%) have returned a successful result. [33030 (70%) / 0 (0%) / 276 (1%)]
8551 (18%) are still in progress. [8511 (18%) / 0 (0%) / 40 (0%)]

Of the tasks that have been returned successfully:

5789 (17%) are pending validation. [5736 (17%) / 0 (0%) / 53 (0%)]
27341 (82%) have been successfully validated. [27118 (81%) / 0 (0%) / 223 (1%)]
106 (0%) were invalid. [106 (0%) / 0 (0%) / 0 (0%)]
70 (0%) are inconclusive. [70 (0%) / 0 (0%) / 0 (0%)]

The current leading edge (i.e., latest work unit for which work has actually been sent out to a host) is n=14086716. The leading edge was at n=13851056 at the beginning of the challenge. Since the challenge started, the leading edge has advanced 1.70% as much as it had prior to the challenge!


No primes yet, but there's still 48 hours to go. Will you be the lucky one?