About how long does it take to generate plots?
40..60Gb/hr on a windows box
Any faster on linux?
~2x
Linux rules
OMG, I just had THE worst time with linux because of the prospect of plotting ~2x faster.
So, here's how it went:
Was plotting around 3200 nonces/minute on Windows 7 (4 cores)
Decided to try my hand at Ubuntu...
Downloaded an image, burned it, booted it, installed it to a spare drive
Got Java installed and was feeling very accomplished...
Tried to figured out how to use dcct's plot generator (which failed miserably).
Posts in the forum stated that you need to "make" the plot app...
Much Googling led me to needing additional build tools needing to be installed to be able to "make" the program, which I don't see mentioned anywhere (sudo apt-get install build-essential gcc).
Made the app by doing a CD to the location of dcct's plot generator I downloaded, then issued the "make" command...
...and I get a wall of error text spitting out.
Much more Googling, led me to issue a "uname -a" command only to find out that my build was "i686" (which is apparently 32-bit only) instead of the required x86_64 (which is 64-bit).
*sigh*
all that time wasted...
Downloaded a new Ubuntu image, this time I made sure it was 64bit
Booted the new image and go to install, but something is strange...
The license agreement was missing data, Mouse would randomly stop working and I had ZERO network connectivity
{Completely baffled why the 32bit Ubuntu had no issues, but 64bit is FUBARd}
*Much more Googling ensues*
Tried a bunch of suggested things for networking, tried a wifi dongle... even manual settings. zero connectivity.
*MUCH Much more Googling ensues*
Found a post stating that "IOMMU" (whatever the heck that is) likely needs to be enabled in BIOS.
Found & enabled "IOMMU" in my BIOS
HOLY COW! The 64bit version now has NO ISSUES! Amazing!
{Now feeling super duper accomplished!}
I repeat all the original steps (installing java, build tools, etc)
I go to "make" dcct's plot generator again, and it fails... *sigh*
*more Googling reveals that it's because the secodary drive (my plot drive) is in read only mode
{WTF?! why would I NOT want to write to it?!}
*Googling is getting REALLY old at this point*
Finally found information on how to remount the drive as writable...
"make" the plot generator (and it finally worked this time!)
issued the commands to start plot generation....
and it is now plotting!!!!
{Much excitement!}
.......... SLOWER THAN WINDOWS! (@ 2400 nonces/minute)
*sigh*
TL;DR - Wasted the better part of an entire day trying to get "~2x faster plotting" working by using Linux instead of Windows. Ended up being much more work than it was worth, because the Linux install is plotting SLOWER than Windows.
Windows: ~3200 nonces/minute (4 cores)
Linux: ~2400 nonces/minute (4 cores)
It's your opinion that Linux rules, but that has not been my experience lately