Folding@Home Server Notice

[Kougar]

Stanford is having some problem with the heat wave and enough power to cool the server room. They have had to shut down some servers. You may notice some WUs do not get sent and kept in queue to get sent at a later time.

If you find one of your F@H programs giving an unable to connect message or a notice of a 503 error during it's connection attempt-but you have confirmed the system is online-then this is likely why. I've already run into this myself on my machine. :wink:

After a certain point of failing to connect the program will send the completed WU to a alternate server for holding, where it will then be sent to the originating server when it comes back online. So, if this happens you can expect some delays with your own stats being updated until the WU is finally processed.

[GIBSON]

LOL, that' a pretty extraordinary situation

[Das Capitolin]

It has been very hot all over the US, but according to the government it has nothing to do with greenhouse effects of lacking ozone. I wonder how Stanford feels about that? Maybe an DS ozone software could be next. :confused:

At least the WU's eventually go through.

[Kougar]

Actually, I thought the government's stance was that it WAS due to an increased greenhouse effect due to the highest levels of carbon dioxide ever recorded in the atmosphere? And most of the general US population was of the mind that this isn't the case, but it is instead just a natural cycle of climate change and the earth is just entering a warmer period.

If you want to narrow the entire Global Warming debate down to the core argument, it is this question: "Is the planet simply naturally entering it's own warming phase, or are we directly causing the warming ourselves?" Of course I would say the latter, but I've been shocked how many people tell me to my face they pretty much believed in the former, that it was just some natural warming phase. :roll: And whoever doesn't think the earth is getting warmer simply has their head stuck in the ground. ;)

[vfrex]

You know, I was just thinking yesterday whether we would start to see some limitations on the "spread" of computers and their integration into daily lives due to the effects of heat on electronics. If current heatwaves ARE a result of a long term cycle (whether man-made or natural) and are here to stay for the next number of years, I wonder if the internet as we know it will change. How many other server rooms/data centers will start to reach a point where power delivery/cooling systems fail them, where day to day operations are not possible during these extended waves. I suppose the diversification in locations of computing stations will help to eliminate complete complete outages, but the heat issues are pretty widespread at this point.

[Kougar]

You know, I was just thinking yesterday whether we would start to see some limitations on the "spread" of computers and their integration into daily lives due to the effects of heat on electronics. If current heatwaves ARE a result of a long term cycle (whether man-made or natural) and are here to stay for the next number of years, I wonder if the internet as we know it will change. How many other server rooms/data centers will start to reach a point where power delivery/cooling systems fail them, where day to day operations are not possible during these extended waves. I suppose the diversification in locations of computing stations will help to eliminate complete complete outages, but the heat issues are pretty widespread at this point.

It seems to be that usually when some problem or brick wall is approaching, human ingenuity reawakens and finds a solution or a detour around the wall sidestepping it... There are plenty of options to make datacenters less of a heat problem, and AMD's X2's were starting to attack that problem. Their 35 TDP X2 3800+ still is, and finally Intel has a low heat generating chip too. Intel may even see a boom in Woodcrest sales due to many large datacenters deciding they want a greater than a doubling in computational performance at half the power/TDP and therefore cooling load.

But really I think if heat was becoming a major longterm problem, the easiest solution would be to simply outsource elsewhere or move the center north and lay some new backbone lines. That should at least work for the next 200 years ;)

[Bio-Hazard]

They have been having this same problem off and on for years..............;)
I remember having 3 and 4 WU's in line to be sent off, no big deal, they will catch up sooner or later.

[Kougar]

They have been having this same problem off and on for years..............;)
I remember having 3 and 4 WU's in line to be sent off, no big deal, they will catch up sooner or later.

I'm not quite as confident about those WUs! I STILL have some sitting non-uploaded on some of my F@H clients, and I think after the next reboot I will use the "-send all" flag to try and force them to upload all completed WUs... I really don't want any of them expiring.

[Bio-Hazard]

I just had one send last night that was waiting for around a day and another one just finished a few minutes ago that got sent just fine.