BOINC and ATI GPU [Success]

[Trog Dog]

I've just installed this gpu (HD4650) and followed the X server config guide and am using the gpu for display so I know the gpu is ok and the system recognises it. What do I need to do (what packages need to be installed) for boinc to recognise it - the startup log keeps stating no usable gpus found. So far I've installed ati-drivers and added boinc to the video group but still no joy.

Edit: Updated title as not specific to HD4650
Edit: Updated title - now we can crunch with boinc as a service

[Trog Dog]

Step 1 - emerge ati code with OpenCL support
Edit /etc/make.conf

Code: Select all

VIDEO_CARDS="fglrx"

Add OpenCL support

Code: Select all

echo "x11-drivers/ati-drivers opencl" >> /etc/portage/package.use
echo "dev-util/opencl-headers" >> /etc/portage/package.keyword

Re-emerge all packages with new USE flags

Code: Select all

emerge -avDN world

Step 2 - Set OpenGL to ATI

Code: Select all

# eselect opengl set ati

Step 3 - Configure X for fglrx

Code: Select all

# aticonfig --initial
# aticonfig --initial=check

Step 4 - Add OpenCL symlinks

Code: Select all

ln -s /usr/lib32/libOpenCL.so.1 /usr/lib32/libOpenCL.so 
ln -s /usr/lib64/libOpenCL.so.1 /usr/lib64/libOpenCL.so

Step 5 - Create a symlink to libaticalrt.so

Code: Select all

ln -snf /usr/lib64/libaticalrt.so /var/lib/boinc/libaticalrt.so

Step 6 - Edit /etc/conf.d/boinc
you want to change the boinc references to your username

# Owner of BOINC process (must be existing)
USER="boinc"
GROUP="boinc"

eg.

Code: Select all

USER="trogdog"
GROUP="trogdog"

Step 7 - Edit /etc/init.d/boinc
we want the boinc service to be the last thing that starts

Code: Select all

after xdm local

depend() {
# we can use dns and net, but we can also in most cases live without them
use dns net
after xdm local
}

Step 8 - Check that boinc will indeed recognise your gpu

Code: Select all

/etc/init.d/boinc start

Edits to follow

Edit: modified video_cards flag and need to emerge ati-drivers - thanks to Goverp
Edit: removed Step 5 - Add boinc user to video group
Edit: removed need to reconfigure X - step 4 covers this
Edit: removed trailing ) for HD5000, updated firware blobs for HD 6XXX
Edit: removed need to emerge radeon-ucode and recompile kernel with firmware blobs - thanks to a post by Veldrin
Edit: added OpenCL support as of ati-drivers-11.11 (required to crunch primegrid wu's and likely others in the future)
Edit: added steps 5 through 8

[Goverp]

...
Edit /etc/make.conf

Code: Select all

VIDEO_CARDS="radeon"

...

You want VIDEO_CARDS="fglrx". "radeon" is for the open-source video drivers in xf86-video-ati.

FWIW, mostly the VIDEO_CARDS is used by the xorg-server ebuild to decide which driver to install - i.e. saves you doing "emerge ati-drivers" (which would be the one selected by fglrx). I think some other ebuilds use it, such as mesa. Your system works because you've explicitly emerged the drivers you want, and the VIDEO_CARDS setting just makes xorg-server dependent on xf86-video-ati, which you're ignoring.

Also FWIW, I have a similar software setup and configuration as per your description, but BOINC stubbornly ignores my HD 3200. I always assumed it was a hardware issue! Did you find any diagnostics to help work out how to get yours going?

[Trog Dog]

Thanks Goverp I'll make those changes tonight.

To test if BOINC can use your gpu stop any instances of BOINC, open a root terminal (# boinc_client) or a user terminal (~ sudo boinc_client) - this must be done inside X (eg gnome-terminal, etc). This will start a new instance of BOINC - not attached to any projects - and one of the last lines of output you should see is your gpu being recognised. If that's the case kill this instance of BOINC and then

Code: Select all

boinc_client --dir /var/lib/boinc

that will restart BOINC using your existing projects, wu's etc and recognise your gpu.

[Goverp]

Most odd. When I start boinc or boinc_client (same Inode, actually) from the command line, it sees the GPU:

Code: Select all

[---] Starting BOINC client version 6.10.58 for x86_64-pc-linux-gnu
[---] log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task                                                                                                                 
[---] Libraries: libcurl/7.20.0 OpenSSL/1.0.0c zlib/1.2.3                                                                                                   
[---] Data directory: /var/lib/boinc                                                                                                                        
[---] Processor: 4 AuthenticAMD AMD Phenom(tm) 9150e Quad-Core Processor [Family 16 Model 2 Stepping 3]                                                     
[---] Processor: 512.00 KB cache                                                                                                                            
[---] Processor features: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc rep_good nonstop_tsc extd_apicid pni monitor cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_leg                                                             
[---] OS: Linux: 2.6.36-gentoo-r5lxc                                                                                                                        
[---] Memory: 1.71 GB physical, 12.00 GB virtual                                                                                                            
[---] Disk: 46.93 GB total, 43.91 GB free                                                                                                                   
[---] Local time is UTC +0 hours                                                                                                                            
[---] ATI GPU 0: ATI Radeon HD 2300/2400/3200 (RV610) (CAL version 1.4.880, 256MB, 50 GFLOPS peak)                                                          
[World Community Grid] URL http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/; Computer ID 819821; resource share 100                                                       
[World Community Grid] General prefs: from World Community Grid (last modified 13-Aug-2008 08:23:33)
[World Community Grid] Host location: none
[World Community Grid] General prefs: using your defaults
[---] Reading preferences override file
[---] Preferences:
[---]    max memory usage when active: 579.26MB
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [---]    max memory usage when idle: 1158.52MB
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [---]    max disk usage: 4.69GB
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [---]    max CPUs used: 3
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [---]    suspend work if non-BOINC CPU load exceeds 66 %
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [---]    (to change preferences, visit the web site of an attached project, or select Preferences in the Manager)
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [---] Not using a proxy
Initialization completed
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [World Community Grid] Restarting task HFCC_L3_02551369_L3_0000_0 using hfcc version 611
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [World Community Grid] Restarting task HFCC_L3_02575383_L3_0000_0 using hfcc version 611
20-Jan-2011 11:42:14 [World Community Grid] Restarting task HFCC_L3_02572405_L3_0000_0 using hfcc version 611

But when I start it via "/etc/init.d/boinc start" it doesn't:

Code: Select all

[---] Starting BOINC client version 6.10.58 for x86_64-pc-linux-gnu
 [---] log flags: file_xfer, sched_ops, task
 [---] Libraries: libcurl/7.20.0 OpenSSL/1.0.0c zlib/1.2.3
 [---] Data directory: /var/lib/boinc
 [---] Processor: 4 AuthenticAMD AMD Phenom(tm) 9150e Quad-Core Processor [Family 16 Model 2 Stepping 3]
 [---] Processor: 512.00 KB cache
 [---] Processor features: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dno
 [---] OS: Linux: 2.6.36-gentoo-r5lxc
 [---] Memory: 1.71 GB physical, 12.00 GB virtual
 [---] Disk: 46.93 GB total, 43.91 GB free
 [---] Local time is UTC +0 hours
d
 [---] No usable GPUs found
 [World Community Grid] URL http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/; Computer ID 819821; resource share 100
 [World Community Grid] General prefs: from World Community Grid (last modified 13-Aug-2008 08:23:33)
 [World Community Grid] Host location: none
 [World Community Grid] General prefs: using your defaults
 [---] Reading preferences override file
 [---] Preferences:
 [---]    max memory usage when active: 579.26MB
 [---]    max memory usage when idle: 1158.52MB
 [---]    max disk usage: 4.69GB
 [---]    max CPUs used: 3
 [---]    suspend work if non-BOINC CPU load exceeds 66 %
 [---]    (to change preferences, visit the web site of an attached project, or select Preferences in the Manager)
 [---] Not using a proxy
eted
 [World Community Grid] Restarting task HFCC_L3_02551369_L3_0000_0 using hfcc version 611
 [World Community Grid] Restarting task HFCC_L3_02575383_L3_0000_0 using hfcc version 611
 [World Community Grid] Restarting task HFCC_L3_02572405_L3_0000_0 using hfcc version 611
 [World Community Grid] Task HFCC_L3_02551369_L3_0000_0 exited with zero status but no 'finished' file
 [World Community Grid] If this happens repeatedly you may need to reset the project.
 [World Community Grid] Restarting task HFCC_L3_02551369_L3_0000_0 using hfcc version 611
 [World Community Grid] Task HFCC_L3_02575383_L3_0000_0 exited with zero status but no 'finished' file
 [World Community Grid] If this happens repeatedly you may need to reset the project.
 [World Community Grid] Task HFCC_L3_02572405_L3_0000_0 exited with zero status but no 'finished' file
 [World Community Grid] If this happens repeatedly you may need to reset the project.
 [World Community Grid] Restarting task HFCC_L3_02572405_L3_0000_0 using hfcc version 611

I've stared at /etc/init.d/boinc and /etc/conf.d/boinc, but I can't see anything to cause this behaviour. And eyeballing "locate boinc | less" just shows a nice clean installation of the current BOINC application.

[Trog Dog]

Yeah - it's been reported that adding xhost local:boinc to the init script in ubuntu and archlinux fixes the problem

Code: Select all

start()
{
log_begin_msg "Starting $DESC: $NAME"
if is_running; then
log_progress_msg "already running"
else
sleep 5
xhost local:boinc &> /dev/null
start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --background --pidfile $PIDFILE \
--make-pidfile --user $BOINC_USER --chuid $BOINC_USER \
--chdir $BOINC_DIR --exec $BOINC_CLIENT -- $BOINC_OPTS
fi
log_end_msg 0

I tried

Code: Select all

    else
        CHRT="eval /usr/bin/chrt ${SCHED_PARAM}"
    fi
# added to get boinc to see gpu
sleep 15
xhost local:boinc &> /dev/null
# end of additions
        ${CHRT} start-stop-daemon \
                --start --quiet --chdir "${RUNTIMEDIR}" \
--background \
                --make-pidfile \
                --pidfile "${PIDFILE}" \
                --chuid "${USER}:${GROUP}" \
                --nicelevel "${NICELEVEL}" \

but no joy. I don't know enough about init scripts and the X environment, but I'm going to keep trying.

[Trog Dog]

Redundant Step - Now covered in 2nd post in thread


Slightly OT but to crunch with the primegrid gpu app you need libOpenCL.so this is available in the ati-stream-sdk-bin package from the pentoo overlay.

Steps invloved are

1. Install layman and subversion

2. Install the pentoo overlay

Code: Select all

layman -L
layman -a pentoo
echo "source /var/lib/layman/make.conf" >> /etc/make.conf

3. Install ati-stream-sdk

Code: Select all

emerge ati-stream-sdk-bin
eselect opencl set ati

[Trog Dog]

Redundant Step - Now covered in 2nd post in thread

Success - I'm now able to have BOINC start automatically on boot from within X - having it recognise the GPU. These instructions are Gnome specific and require that the user is auto logged in by gdm.

1. Stop BOINC starting as a service

Code: Select all

# rc-update del boinc default

2. Make your user owner of all BOINCs files

Code: Select all

#chown -vR trogdog /var/lib/boinc

3. Create a Startup Application

Gnome Menu Bar - System/Preferences/Startup Applications

Click Add
Name: BOINC Autostart
Command: gnome-terminal -x boinc_client --dir /var/lib/boinc
Comment: Runs BOINC in terminal window

4. Reboot

[trigggl]

@Trog Dog,

Do you have xhost installed? I didn't.

Nevermind, didn't matter.

[Trog Dog]

Yeah xhost is installed.

[trigggl]

Hey, with your help, you got me crunching. Thanks for the instructions above. If this isn't a sticky, it should be.

[Trog Dog]

Once I find a way to run boinc as a service - and recognise the gpu I'll write it up in documentation, tips & tricks thread & over in boinc gpu thread

[Trog Dog]

Thanks to a post by Veldrin in this thread it seems that the radeon-ucode is not required, and recompiling without this on my three boxes hasn't led to any problems.

[Trog Dog]

Redundant Step - Now covered by 2nd post in thread

Slightly OT but to crunch with the primegrid gpu app you need libOpenCL.so this is available in the ati-stream-sdk-bin package from the pentoo overlay.

Steps invloved are

1. Install layman and subversion

2. Install the pentoo overlay

Code: Select all

layman -L
layman -a pentoo
echo "source /var/lib/layman/make.conf" >> /etc/make.conf

3. Install ati-stream-sdk

Code: Select all

emerge ati-stream-sdk-bin
eselect opencl set ati

big_gie has written an updated ebuild for the ati-stream package see [post=6772852]here[/post]. To swap to this new ebuild you will need to
1. Stop boinc
2. Unmerge ati-stream-sdk-bin
3. Add the nbigaouette overlay
4. Unmask and emerge opencl-headers (unless you have or want nvidia-cuda-toolkit installed)

Code: Select all

echo ">=dev-util/opencl-headers-1.1-r6 ~amd64" >> /etc/portage/package.keyword

5. Unmask and emerge amdstream
6. Update eselect-opencl to big_gie's fork
7. Run eselect opencl and set amd as the default

Code: Select all

eselect opencl set amd

8. Restart boinc

[djperks]

Great post
Thanks for the help

[Trog Dog]

no probs, glad it helped you

[Trog Dog]

Slightly OT but to crunch with the primegrid gpu app you need libOpenCL.so this is available in the ati-stream-sdk-bin package from the pentoo overlay.

[snip]

big_gie has written an updated ebuild for the ati-stream package see [post=6772852]here[/post]. To swap to this new ebuild you will need to
1. Stop boinc
2. Unmerge ati-stream-sdk-bin
3. Add the nbigaouette overlay
4. Unmask and emerge opencl-headers (unless you have or want nvidia-cuda-toolkit installed)

Code: Select all

echo ">=dev-util/opencl-headers-1.1-r6 ~amd64" >> /etc/portage/package.keyword

5. Unmask and emerge amdstream
6. Update eselect-opencl to big_gie's fork
7. Run eselect opencl and set amd as the default

Code: Select all

eselect opencl set amd

8. Restart boinc

As of ati-drivers-11.11 opencl is now available with the opencl use flag.

To move from the amdstream package from nbigaouette's overlay to the opencl provided by ati-drivers

1. Stop boinc
2. Unmerge amdstream and eselect-opencl
3. Remove the remnants

Code: Select all

rm /etc/env.d/03opencl
rm /usr/lib32/libOpenCL.so
rm /usr/lib64/libOpenCL.so

4. Specify the opencl use flag for ati-drivers

Code: Select all

echo "x11-drivers/ati-drivers opencl" >> /etc/portage/package.use

5. Update ati-drivers

Code: Select all

emerge -1 ati-drivers

6. Create new symbolic links

Code: Select all

ln -s /usr/lib32/libOpenCL.so.1 /usr/lib32/libOpenCL.so
ln -s /usr/lib64/libOpenCL.so.1 /usr/lib64/libOpenCL.so

7. Restart boinc

[Trog Dog]

Success! After nearly 12 months of on and off fiddling I've finally worked out how to run boinc as a daemon and have it recognise the ATI/AMD gpu.

1. Stop boinc
2. Create a symlink to libaticalrt.so

Code: Select all

ln -snf /usr/lib64/libaticalrt.so /var/lib/boinc/libaticalrt.so

3. Edit /etc/conf.d/boinc
you want to change the boinc references to your username

# Owner of BOINC process (must be existing)
USER="boinc"
GROUP="boinc"

eg.

Code: Select all

USER="trogdog"
GROUP="trogdog"

4. Edit /etc/init.d/boinc
we want the boinc service to be the last thing that starts

Code: Select all

after xdm local

depend() {
# we can use dns and net, but we can also in most cases live without them
use dns net
after xdm local
}

5. Check that boinc will indeed recognise your gpu

Code: Select all

/etc/init.d/boinc start

If all is well add boinc to your default runlevel

Code: Select all

rc-update add boinc default

6. Check that this works on a reboot Note if you're using the autostart terminal workaround I posted previously remember to disable that before rebooting

Happy crunching and merry christmas

[trigggl]

11.11 doesn't seem to want to crunch Milkyway. They all error out after 1 or 2 seconds.

[Trog Dog]

you got a hd4xxx series gpu? same thing happens with collatz, POEM now has a gpu app (openCL) which will work, as does primegrid

[trigggl]

you got a hd4xxx series gpu? same thing happens with collatz, POEM now has a gpu app (openCL) which will work, as does primegrid

It's a 4870. The reason I got it was so I could crunch Milkyway. I recently installed the OpenCL for the Primegrid Challenge, but otherwise I don't really need it. I think you have to have a more recent version of BOINC to crunch the POEM app.

[Trog Dog]

see if you can downgrade your ati-drivers, the latest upgrade broke compatibility with the 4xxx series and milkyway and collatz - both those apps are the old CAL apps which ATI/AMD no longer supports, 5XXX and above weren't affected but how long this will last? I wouldn't hold my breath.

Code: Select all

emerge -pv =x11-drivers/ati-drivers-11.10

you'll probably have to downgrade xorg too

If you want to upgrade boinc to the latest 7 series the modifications to the current ebuild are trivial, and I can post the details.

[trigggl]

see if you can downgrade your ati-drivers, the latest upgrade broke compatibility with the 4xxx series and milkyway and collatz - both those apps are the old CAL apps which ATI/AMD no longer supports, 5XXX and above weren't affected but how long this will last? I wouldn't hold my breath.

Code: Select all

emerge -pv =x11-drivers/ati-drivers-11.10

you'll probably have to downgrade xorg too

If you want to upgrade boinc to the latest 7 series the modifications to the current ebuild are trivial, and I can post the details.

I masked >=x11-drivers/ati-drivers-11.11 and it took me down to around 11.8. The downgrade of xorg is automatic. I guess if(when) Milkyway switches to OpenCL, I'll remove the mask.

[Trog Dog]

I masked >=x11-drivers/ati-drivers-11.11 and it took me down to around 11.8. The downgrade of xorg is automatic. I guess if(when) Milkyway switches to OpenCL, I'll remove the mask.

If any future version of ati-drivers starts to work with milkyway again I'll let you know (11.12 certainly doesn't)

[trigggl]

12.1 works.