My 2.8GHz QC (eight virtual cores) Mac Pro with 6GB RAM becomes unusable when BOINC is running NFS work units, yet several of the cores show less than 100% usage. I've been just living with it since I joined the project some months ago but that isn't an acceptable long-term solution.

Looking at the nice settings for the WUs they are at 19. Changing them to 20 makes my Mac Pro usable again, but that too is not practical for the long-term.

Is there likely something wrong on my end, or can it be addressed by the project?

FWIW, I believe that eon does the very same thing though I haven't caught it red handed yet.

---

Well, you didn't mention what WU's you are running, but with only 6Gig RAM, you would have problems.

The lasievef 16e WU's use up to 1.3GIG of RAM per task! You would have tons of problems running those with so many cores.... even if it did load up the cores, the virtual memory would probably be thrashing to high heaven.

I suggest you check your preferences and make sure you are NOT running those WU's at all. With only 6GIG mem, you may have some trouble running 8 of the smaller tasks as well.

lasieved - rarely used so work is rarely available, only for small numbers: YES
lasievee - work nearly always available, uses up to 0.5 GB memory: YES
lasievef - occasionally used for huge factorizations, uses up to 1 GB memory: NO

Make sure the "lasievef" task is set to "NO" in your project preferences as above.

See this: http://escatter11.fullerton.edu/nfs/forum_thread.php?id=33&nowrap=true#767

Tex1954

Thank you for the information and the link. Normally I would have much more RAM but it won't be until next year in this case.

For the project personnel I would suggest a link to the minimum or recommended system requirements on the home page for those considering running NFS.

---