undergrad senior project idea, help

[Robert G. Brown]

On Fri, 6 Sep 2002, Matt Osborne wrote:

> On Fri, 6 Sep 2002, Robert G. Brown wrote:
> > It is lovely to recycle old boxen for learning/demo purposes, but it is
> > also important to be aware of a couple of gotcha's.  One is that it gets
> > harder and harder to run modern kernels on really old boxes, as they
> ......
> > maintenance is our LARGEST expense by far in our bleeding-edge efficient
> > admin environment).  We'll probably retire them all in the next 6-12
> > months.
> >
> >    rgb
> >
> > --
> > Robert G. Brown	                       http://www.phy.duke.edu/~rgb/
> > Duke University Dept. of Physics, Box 90305
> > Durham, N.C. 27708-0305
> > Phone: 1-919-660-2567  Fax: 919-660-2525     email:rgb at phy.duke.edu
> >
> 
> Thanks for the details, really informative. Do you know of any easy way to
> measure or determine the power drawn by a system besides calculating each
> component's? Also, I notice that you and Mark Hahn are from the Physics

  a) Buy an inline power meter.  Not terribly cheap for good ones (a
few $100).
  b) Measure line voltage and line current (you'll need the full
waveform, so use a scope) and do some integration ;-).
  c) Install nodes on a circuit (with circuit breaker) until it pops.
Use nominal values of voltage and circuit breaker current to guestimate
power (real power will be about 0.6 the VA for non PFC supplies).

> area. Is there a particular set of problems within Physics that you use
> for your Beowulf or a website that might have some info? I really enjoy
> working with the Physics dept. here so I thought I would ask.

Oh, I have a problem that is like the SETI at home or RC5 in that more
CPU equals happier me.  If you want to contribute by running jobs for me
for the next umpty-months, I'll wrap it to make this possible.  It's
pretty boring running though -- no fancy graphics or the like, just lots
of good, solid work.

   rgb

> 
> Regards,
> Matt Osborne
> 

-- 
Robert G. Brown	                       http://www.phy.duke.edu/~rgb/
Duke University Dept. of Physics, Box 90305
Durham, N.C. 27708-0305
Phone: 1-919-660-2567  Fax: 919-660-2525     email:rgb at phy.duke.edu