Long-term effect of running GPU tasks on every-day PC
19 Feb 2022 11:43:13 UTC
Topic 227014
(moderation:
Hi everyone
I recently bought a new middle-range laptop with a RTX3060 for studies and a bit of gaming.
For now, I can't afford to have a dedicated machine for crunching (still a student) but I would still like to do my part.
I heard that GPUs used for crypto currency mining can get damaged (reduced performance) after a while, I guess because they are running at 100% all the time.
What would be the long-term effect of running GPU tasks at low load (10-20%) for me ? Will it have a significant impact in 3-4 years ? Should I only run CPU tasks ?
Thanks
I have a desktop i7-3770k
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I have a desktop i7-3770k computer running 24/7 for the last 10 years. The GTX 1660Ti in it has been crunching full time for the last 2-1/2 years. The GTX 750 Ti in another computer has been crunching full time since 2014.
My laptops on the other hand last about 3-5 years crunching nearly full time. Most of the wear and tear is from traveling to exotic places and not doing a good enough job at keeping the air vents unobstructed (pillows do not make good tables). My laptops with discrete GPUs ran fine and gave me lots of credits. The integrated GPUs, however, run too hot (and too slow) to be good crunching GPUs. If your laptop has a discrete GPU and is mainly used in a low dust environment as a desktop alternative it should do fine crunching.
YMMV
If you can find a laptop
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If you can find a laptop "cooling" table for not much money it will help keep your laptop cool while it is "at home". If you suspend gpu crunching anytime you are active on the laptop it will make it "more responsive" and will give it a break.
This can be setup in the settings so you don't have to "remember" it.
Assume you will wear it out like the previous post described. If you still want to do your bit. You might only run the GPU on a part-time basis and (maybe) extend the working life of the laptop. Running only cpu tasks with E@H is possible. I can promise your RAC won't be much. I can't promise it will make any difference to the working life of the Laptop.
Maximum CPU cores/threads should probably be 87.5% Set the amount you download into the 0.1 range(s).
Don't try to mix E@H cpu and gpu tasks. They don't play well together without near daily manual intervention or a customized BOINC manager.
Your computer is "hidden" (by default). If you need more specific advice you will need to make that limited information public.
HTH,
Tom M
A Proud member of the O.F.A. (Old Farts Association). Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.® (Garrison Keillor)
A year and a half ago I
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A year and a half ago I bought an Asus ROG laptop with a 1660Ti gpu with 4gb of onboard ram in it, I ran on this and most other projects for almost a full year with no problems until one day it wouldn't turn on at all!! I called Asus and they honored the 1 year full warranty, it was 6 days short of 1 full year when it died, and ended up replacing the motherboard and now it works fine. It rarely travels with me and has been sitting on laptop cooler with more than a few fines in it, it has never ever gotten hot except when running the gpu and then not outside the normal temps like when someone games, which I do not. Since getting the laptop back, it took a total of about 10 days from death to me having it up and running again, I had to wait a few days before sending it off, they gave me a week, because I needed to backup the hard drive first and it's the memory stick type and I needed to order an adapter off of Amazon so I could plug it into a 2nd pc and back it up. Asus said it has to be as it was initially sold so the hard drive had to be in it, it's a good thing I did back it up as they put a brand new version of Win 11 on it wiping out everything I had on the drive before sending it back to me. I was able to backup their version and then restore it to the way it was before and everything works just fine now. I do NOT use the gpu for crunching anymore and the pc is running nice and cool and I now use desktop pc's for gpu crunching.
i I have an HP laptop
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i I have an HP laptop running SuSE Linux Leap 15.0 24/7 since 2014. It has an AMD E-450 cpu with Radeon graphics I've never been able to start so it runs only CPU tasks. It is now running QuChemPedIA@home which is a Linux project so it does not need VirtualBox.
Tullio
You could use EVGA
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You could use EVGA Precision to set a max temp for the GPU
mikey schrieb:it was 6 days
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Exactly what happened with mine. I didn't even use this notebook for crunching, only for gaming and work. It didn't even survive two years and it was hot all the time (not the measured CPU / GPU temps, but you could feel it on the outside).
Notebooks aren't made for this, if you need that money, don't do it... Even when the GPU seems to be properly cooled, other hardware (just like the motherboard) might get too hot.
Ymmv Sounds like a good
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Ymmv
Sounds like a good summary. Basically if you decide to go ahead on a regular basis see if you can locate Boinc temperature throttling tool I remember for boinc.
Since heat kills this will give you a chance at reducing that burned out feeling on your laptop.
Tom M
A Proud member of the O.F.A. (Old Farts Association). Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.® (Garrison Keillor)
Tom M wrote: see if you can
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TThrottle is an application which will from moment to moment throttle Einstein usage to keep GPU temperature within the limit you choose to set.
if you're using Windows and
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if you're using Windows and an Nvidia GPU, you can set temperature limits in software like MSI Afterburner or EVGA Precision X1. they will throttle the core clocks of the GPU to stay under defined temp limits.
both of these options will be vastly superior in overall performance than a constant start/stop of the tasks themselves with something like TThrottle
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In general laptops and Boinc
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In general laptops and Boinc doesn't go well together. However if your laptop has good cooling and the temperatures don't get too hot - use all sensors for that because it might not be the GPU or CPU that is the hottest - it should be fine.
You might need to clean the fans every month or so depending on the dust level. Also consider those fans do wear out and you'll need new ones after a while, depending on the quality and computing time they last 1-4 years before they have to be replaced.
I have an HP Z-Book Fury as an laptop now, this thing is made for heavy use and everything is designed for it including the cooling solution. Yet I wouldn't let it crunch 24/7 time without the bottom cover removed and a massive 30cm Noctua fan below it - for which I built a case to fit below the laptop in a way that almost no air can escape to the sides and the whole airflow goes trough the fan duct and over hot surfaces.
Another option is - if you live in a country with cold winter - to open the window and let it run at cold ambient air temperatures, that gets the temperatures down so beautifully, not very comfortable though...
I had too many laptops die on me when the temperatures were constantly above 90°C so watch those temperatures and decide based on that.