Mac software for the GIMP
 

I was looking into installing a GIMPs client for my Mac and I wasn't sure what to do. I found glucas, but it appears to only do lucas lehmer tests and not be able to report to primenet. Am I missing something? Is there another program to use on Mac OS X?

Andrew

Re: Mac software for the GIMP
 

[quote="adpowers"]I was looking into installing a GIMPs client for my Mac and I wasn't sure what to do. I found glucas, but it appears to only do lucas lehmer tests and not be able to report to primenet. Am I missing something? Is there another program to use on Mac OS X?

Andrew[/quote]


Glucas is one program you could use for the Mac, the other is Mlucas. Anyway, they're not automated like the Prime95 clients, but you can still use Primenet to get and report results using the manual test pages. Perahps this link will help you out: http://glucas.sourceforge.net/glucas/Introduction-to-Glucas.html#Introduction%20to%20Glucas

Okay, thanks. How fast would a 1 Ghz PPC processor perform compared to an x86 (lets say a P4)? I was just wondering if it would be worth it to run Glucas on my Mac or if I should to d.net OGR (I am a big fan of GIMPS, but if it is a pain to get exponents and it doesn't perform very well, then I would rather do OGR which, if I heard right, rocks on PPC).

[quote="adpowers"]Okay, thanks. How fast would a 1 Ghz PPC processor perform compared to an x86 (lets say a P4)? I was just wondering if it would be worth it to run Glucas on my Mac or if I should to d.net OGR (I am a big fan of GIMPS, but if it is a pain to get exponents and it doesn't perform very well, then I would rather do OGR which, if I heard right, rocks on PPC).[/quote]

A G4 runs a tad slower than a PIII of similar Mhz doing LL's. I'm running Glucas on a Powerbook G4/800 doing double checks, and it runs fine (it's no P4 Northwood, but respectable). If you're running a PowerMac, it should do better because they have more cache and faster memory than the PowerBooks.

I was thinking of a nice referb new type dual G4/1Ghz around spring for myself. :cool:

The manual forms are no bother, Glucas will take the worktodo.ini format and output a format that is compatable with Primenet. You just can't set-it-and-forget-it.

Recent "Switcher" here, though my day job is a network admin in a Microsoft shop. But both my boss and myself both run Mac's w/Jaguar as our main home machines. :D

RC72 started up today so you might consider that... The G4 does really well with that...

http://n0cgi.distributed.net/faq/cache/270.html

Yeah, I heard about that. I ran RC5-64 a few years ago (before I heard about GIMPs, after I tried SETI), but now I think it is pointless. I didn't know until recently that the PPC was amazing for RC5-64. Does it perform really well (compared to x86) at OGR as well? OGR is better than the RC5 projects in my opinion, but I want to make sure the PPC will get good performance or I won't run anything (it's on a laptop).

Yes PPC's do well at OGR as well though the performance boost is not as much as with RC5.

[quote="Xyzzy"]RC72 started up today so you might consider that... The G4 does really well with that...

http://n0cgi.distributed.net/faq/cache/270.html[/quote]

All we need now is for the Altivec enhancements to be ported, so that we can use core #5, then they will really get going ....... ;)

Hmmm - IIRC the G4 was a tossup to a little slower than the P-III or Athlon at same clock rate on OGR - vs. total domination of *anything* else per clock on RC5 (3x Athlon ballpark IIRC).

Am I misremembering the stats page?

(Goes back to look)

Yup, I was thinking of the G3 it appears. G4 is a little faster than an Athlon per clock - perhaps as much as 20% - but when Athlons clock almost twice as fast....

Seems to me that unless you're REALLY protective of your cpu (in which case you probably wouldn't be posting here) you should be running SOME kind of DC project on your computer. Simply because another kind of computer can do it faster seems like a very poor excuse for NOT running it. Sure, a person with the same number in another brand stamped on the side of their machine will pass you in the stats, but your computer is certainly fast enough to finish a WU in a reasonable amount of time.

Well, I would really like to run some GIMPS client, but it seems like a hassle to have to use the manual update feature. Also, since it is on a laptop, I don't want to have to worry about it using battery life (some programs have options to stop while on battery, but I would rather not worry about it). Also, it is a TiBook which, as some of you may know, can get rather hot. I would like to avoid listening to the fairly loud fan and keep my lap at least semi-warm (not hot). Sure, it will help my stats, but I already have 3 Pentium 4 machines on my team (all at least 2 Ghz) which is good enough for me now. Also, while it would be nice to kick the butts of all the 2Ghz+ P4s in RC5, it is a useless project and I would rather just stick with my favorite project, GIMPS.

Andrew

PS: I hope I am not sounding redundant.

My machine is a TiBook/800 and I'm lucky I don't have the loud fan problem (yet?). Fan usually doesn't kick on if the underside has a gap for cooling. If I'm on battery and put the machine on the arm of the couch, the fan will turn on every once and a while. At my desk though, I never notice it.

It was getting a little warm though the keyboard, so I picked up a Kensington "Fly Fan", a USB fan. With the rear of the laptop raised a centimeter, and the fan blowing down under the machine near the power plug, it never got warm to the touch.

But, the fly fan is a bit noisy, so I'm going to be picking up some cheap PC heat sinks (inch or less in height) and cutting/gluing them together into a laptop stand (to raise the rear up a bit for easier typing). That should allow for quite good passive cooling so I can use the fan at work instead. :)