Guinness calls Folding@home 'Most Powerful Distributed Computing Network'
by Justin McElroy 
{ Nov 1st 2007 at 8:40AM }
The record was technically set on September 16 when Folding@home surpassed one petaflop. Fun fact: A petaflop is used to describe both computing power and the awfulness of films in which Peta Wilson has appeared. For you film historians out there, League of Extraordinary Gentlmen set a new bar at seven petaflops. Where's that award, Guinness?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
SoulBlade @ Nov 1st 2007 8:45AM
"Whatever else you feel about the PS3, you've got to admit that Folding@home, which uses the PS3's power (along with PC users) to fight disease, is awesome."
NO! Nothing can be awesome about the ps3! NOTHING!
kidding of course..
The True Gamer @ Nov 1st 2007 8:49AM
Hey, Peta can flop her rack on me anytime!
Phantom @ Nov 1st 2007 10:43AM
@d-pad
Pretty sad that major pharmaceutical companies are busy spending millions of dollars to enable 80+ years old to perform in the bedroom instead of a way to combat MRSA.
Pretty sad that d-pad is spending his/her time on some blog to shoot down a noble effort by Sony instead of being more productive at work, improve his grade, or clean his room.
d-pad @ Nov 1st 2007 11:32AM
Phantom,
Why don't you stop being an ignorant twat for a second and actually comprehend what you're reading.
Folding@Home isn't Sony's effort, it's Stanford University's. It wasn't until last August that Stanford had written software to allow the PS3 to participate in the program.
If Sony had their wish, your PS3 would barely be folding any proteins. Instead, it would be doing the thing it was designed to do which is to play games.
To me, it seems the Cell processor is sitting in the wrong machine with the wrong priorities.
I suppose I'll go clean my room now.
Noshino @ Nov 1st 2007 11:40AM
d-pad,
actually, it was a collaboration of both Sony and the Stanford ppl, hence why they thanked Sony for it, and if Im not wrong, they also said they could have done the same for the 360, but that Microsoft hadn't approach them....
So, if you are going to give credit, give it to both Stanford, and Sony for pushing it onto their system
Phantom @ Nov 1st 2007 12:41PM
@d-pad
This ignorant twat didn't say "Sony invented F@H". Sony's noble effort is by putting F@H on every PS3. Not only Sony helps raise the awareness of this project, this effort also enables PS3 owners to contribute to this project on top of watch BD/DVD & play video games.
Per your ideology, Bill Gates & his wife should spend more money & effort on Vista instead of their foundation. Nintendo on the other hand should focus more on Wii production instead of the seemingly endless charity works. Hell, all of us should spend more money on video games instead of donation to charities.
FrankTheCrank @ Nov 1st 2007 8:49AM
There's a REAL ACHIEVEMENT for you!!
JJ Rooster @ Nov 1st 2007 9:17AM
I hope they make a Trophy for that in Home. You can brag to everyone that you didn't play any games for a month and left the PS3 on folding proteins!
Pretty sad when this is one of PS3's renowned achievements.
SoulBlade @ Nov 1st 2007 9:58AM
pretty sad when you bust on a machine for helping the cause against cancer.
d-pad @ Nov 1st 2007 10:06AM
Pretty sad that the power of cell has been RESORTED to curing cancer when the initial idea was to play videogames.
SoulBlade @ Nov 1st 2007 2:16PM
The first commercial use of it was for games sure, but if it's a general processor, then it was probably designed to do a multitude of tasks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell_microprocessor
Digi Smalls @ Nov 2nd 2007 12:40PM
if folding was an Achievement i would be set.
i'm just about rounding off 600 F@H work units waiting for some games better than my 360's..
CaptainAmericaX @ Nov 1st 2007 8:53AM
And pray do tell what diseases has the ps3 found a cure for?
Snipermonky @ Nov 1st 2007 8:57AM
You can read up on the results by visiting;
http://folding.stanford.edu/English/Papers
The1 @ Nov 1st 2007 8:58AM
That's my question too!!!! The real kudos will come when that happens. I need games, sue me I do not use my PS3 for that. I would rather donate the money used while leaving my PS3 on all that time to the American Cancer Society or Red Cross.
Phranctoast @ Nov 1st 2007 9:54AM
They are working on curing SFB (shit for brains). You will be the first one contacted about the results.
ill trooper @ Nov 1st 2007 11:48AM
"I would rather donate the money used while leaving my PS3 on all that time to the American Cancer Society or Red Cross."
You wouldn't do that either, stop lyin'.
Korova @ Nov 1st 2007 6:13PM
Captn
Folding@Home discovered a new drug: CAXbanhammerin. I just wrote Joystiq a script for it, so you will see results real soon.
Oh, you might feel a little prick in you ass.
GaryM @ Nov 1st 2007 8:55AM
Fight disease by wasting electricity!
Snipermonky @ Nov 1st 2007 9:24AM
Gary you bring up the cost of electricity, however F@H was designed to run using spare CPU cycles, so as you surf the web, check your e-mail or listen to music on your computer F@H runs on the spare cycles not being used.
Not only that because desktops, PS3's, GPUs and the like are so much cheaper to run than their super computer counterparts, which are far more expensive to purchase, run and maintain, what little funding F@H receives can be focused on producing more efficient clients and further help along research.
Martin @ Nov 1st 2007 8:56AM
I think they've made about as much headway with Folding@Home as they have with Jerry's Kids. I hope that something substantial comes out of it.
Jerk Face @ Nov 1st 2007 9:06AM
"For you film historians out there, League of Extraordinary Gentlmen set a new bar at seven petaflops. Where's that award, Guinness?"
I love you, Justin McElroy.
RC @ Nov 1st 2007 9:12AM
You people are amazing. You can even troll and bitch about the PS3 when taking about a program to try and help with disease. What a bunch of ignorant fucking trolls.
CaptainAmericaX @ Nov 1st 2007 9:16AM
Show me one place where this garbage program is actually doing shit. Or has actually accomplished ANYTHING worthwhile.
NOWHERE
So keep telling yourself that you're saving the world or some shit when in reality all you're doing is wasting electricity on some bullshit program that does nothing except fold a bunch of random proteins...
Jerk Face @ Nov 1st 2007 9:27AM
Woah there, buddy. Let's just settle down now.
Snipermonky @ Nov 1st 2007 9:30AM
@ CaptainAmericaX
Could you be any more inferior? This isn't simple math were talking about here, the results you submit to Stanford can take up to a year to process! Even more so now with the surge in Work Units caused by the PS3. And if your looking for results I suggest hitting up the link
http://folding.stanford.edu/English/Papers
And if you want more, hit up the forums, Im sure they'd be glad to show you how much work they have to crunch.
samfish @ Nov 1st 2007 9:34AM
It's sad that your irrational, small-minded hatred of Sony makes it so that you can't even bring yourself to admit that the PS3 is doing SOME good with this.
You remind me of those anti-science conservative types.
They haven't found a cure of vaccine for AIDS yet, either, but people are living longer all the time due to the research done and a cure is more likely every day.
Has all that research been in vain?
According to you, yes. How very sad!
Negativecool @ Nov 1st 2007 9:38AM
It never ceases to amaze me how uninformed fanboy tools like GaryM and CaptainAmericax put a negative spin on something so clearly positive.
Boss Tempo @ Nov 1st 2007 10:52AM
Capn' couldn't be more right - whether he paints a pretty picture with it or not. If everyone on the planet ran F@H on 10 pointless consoles for 500 years, you still wouldn't scratch the surface of the amt. of data needed to cure anything.
Science - the destroyer of bunk.
Slaziman @ Nov 1st 2007 10:58AM
@samfish
That avatar is just immoral, over the top man.
Nate @ Nov 1st 2007 11:32AM
BossTempo, you're an idiot. There's a whole page of links to peer reviewed papers on what they've learned using Folding@Home. Is one of them "a cure for cancer"? Maybe not right now, but no one discovers anything that huge all at once. It's like building a car - first you have to invent the wheel, then steering, then electrical systems.... that's what they're discovering now... the steering wheel and fuel injection of the machine that will eventually cure cancer and many other diseases. Whether or not it will be the Stanford guys that do it, what they've discovered using Folding@Home will undoubtedly contribute to it.
The effort put in by all the PC users has been fantastic, and in the last 8 months, PS3 users have quadrupled the processing power of the network... these papers can take a year to get written and reviewed, so the immediate impact won't be seen for some time. But expect even more results to start coming out next year as they finish processing the results from the biggest, baddest computer farm in the world.
Koopaknight29 - (Nintendo Loyalist) @ Nov 1st 2007 11:40AM
Hey, even I can see the merits of this function. It certainly is better than letting the system idle, and it is going to a good (if lofty) cause. Who knows, one day we might actually see a breakthrough; if not because of the system, at least assisted by it.
Leave the fanboyism at the gates folks, this one isn't about video games.
ill trooper @ Nov 1st 2007 11:42AM
@ CaptainAmericaX
I don't really mind what you say about folding, it's interesting and all (my team has cracked 1500), but I wouldn't get defensive and argue with you over it.
But what I _am_ going to say is that you act like such a bitchy little troll - you just want to argue for argument's sake, because of some fanboy hate for Sony. You must shake with excitement when you see a PS3 post - you submit some sort of negative and pointless zinger every chance you can and it's boring... So much so that while you might have a good point every now and then, I rarely see it as I just can't even read what you write anymore. Worthless. Fade into the ether, little grey posts...
Korova @ Nov 1st 2007 6:02PM
Captain, you probably havent solved a complicated problem ever in your life. Thats why you have no respect for people who try.
Your mommy and your teachers probably hand everything to you are you whine and bitch for more.
Try posing a mildly complex question and answering it yourself. You might find that you need other's help, you might find that you need others to believe that your strategy will lead to a solution, you might get annoyed at people who give up on you because they dont see an immediate result.
Then you might feel great when you solve a problem or learn useful skills for future problems your encounter.
Or you might just go with the flow and be an idiot all your life and never get hurt. But dont leave America, cause idiots dont do so well outside in other countries.
On topic: folding is great. I cant wait for results.
Negativecool @ Nov 1st 2007 9:31AM
Lets hook up some Wii's and REALLY get this f'ing ball ROLLIN'!!
Vince @ Nov 1st 2007 9:39AM
this is much more a PC thing than it will ever be a PS3 thing.
Predatorian234 @ Nov 1st 2007 10:56AM
http://kotaku.com/gaming/folding@home/ps3-dominates-foldinghome-246543.php
"Take a look at those TFLOPS. That's PS3 machines delivering over 251 trillion floating point operations per second, 100 trillion more than ten times the number of active PC CPUs, and the number is growing every time I refresh the stats page. Say what you will of the PS3 as a game machine, but this is pretty spectacular to see. Warms the cockles something fierce, and I do so love warm cockles. -Michael Fahey"
The PS3 may not have cured anything yet. But it cut off like 50 more years of research.
The reason why this is amazing is because the PS3 has sped up the process 10 fold.
The Cell Processor may not have shown much for video games, but its definitely powerful. Very f-ing powerful.
I'll try to find the link, but one of the Standford Professors said that 1 $500 PS3 is doing the work of 3 $3,000 super computers. Or something like that.
It IS amazing. And those who are trolling...are f-ing pathetic.
Negativecool @ Nov 1st 2007 10:32AM
Not really sure about that:
http://arstechnica.com/journals/thumbs.ars/2007/10/31/ps3-is-just-12-of-fh-clients-but-78-of-the-new-petaflop-record
With infinitely more PC's out there than PS3's, I think it's pretty safe to say that you are wrong.
Predatorian234 @ Nov 1st 2007 11:07AM
@Negativecool
Are you talking to me? Because if so, I don't understand what your getting at with that link.
Although it is cool that PS3 only accounts for 12% of the F@H client and yet produced 78% of the power.
Negativecool @ Nov 1st 2007 12:05PM
Predatorian234-
Can you not tell by the content of my statement that I was referring to Vince?
I suppose I should have clarified, but my post actually went up before yours....then yours bumped mine. Odd.
Rob Accomando @ Nov 1st 2007 10:07AM
Sony should release a bare bones PS3 just for folding and donate them to the university or sell cheap to anyone who wants to help. No blueray, cheap gpu, etc.
darkeyez @ Nov 1st 2007 10:13AM
hey, what's with all this dissing on Peta-ness?
james @ Nov 1st 2007 10:16AM
should've made the flopping a game where you literally flop stuff..beats having it on standby
GRANTED @ Nov 1st 2007 10:26AM
This may just be a PR stunt, but a lot of biologists and chemists struggling with the limits of computational biology are really pleased with the opportunities here.
CAX, you are basically a piece of shit. But part of that comes for innocent ignorance, so let me give you a hypothetical. Say a gene is composed of 3,000 base pairs of DNA. We will call this gene SORL1, and when there's a one base-pair mutation in it, it's responsible for causing plaques in the brain (late-onset Alzheimer's). When that's transcribed, it yields a sequence of 1,000 amino acids.
each amino acid has different levels of polarity--, some are neutral, positive, negative, etc. These attract each other to different degrees. Positive ends of dipoles attract negative ends of other dipoles, so the way they are arranged in 3d space is also important. We have the math required to predict these interactions, based on amino acid type, arrangement, distance, etc.
The ultimate goal is to predict how this amino acid sequence is going to arrange itself in the brain pH of ~7, based on the relative attractiveness of each amino acid with every other 999 amino acids. factor in that most proteins denature under specific conditions (passing from the esophagus to the stomach) or change their structure under other conditions (lactic acid buildup in muscles), and you have a lot of variables to work with. adding water with different solvents in it adds a new dimension. now, try to think about ways to block/activate active sites to cause a change in protein function (by adding another protein to affect the first one), and there are--i don't know--billions and billions of calculations to make.
Immediately, this won't save the world. Immediately, this is just going to make proteins easier to understand. But, if a 1bp change in SORL1 yields alzheimer's, and you can develop a drug to stick onto the protein that it transcribes, so that the protein folds properly once again and functions as though there were no mutation, well then congrats, you have cured alzheimer's. And if you can genetically engineer rice or wheat to be disease-resistant, drought-resistant, and vitamin-enriched, then maybe you can mitigate conflict in some of the world's hotspots like middle africa. and frankly, there are thousands of potential breakthroughs here that will do more to save the world than any of us are doing by sitting on our ass playing video games.
8 ps3s have the computational power of 200 supercomputers. so, if there are 1 million ps3s out there, calculating amino acid interactions, that's equivalent to Stanford having 25 million supercomputers. 25. million. stunt or not, sony basically gave the scientists around the world a blank check in terms of computational biology. trust me--you fanboys are the only ones complaining.
CaptainAmericaX @ Nov 1st 2007 10:54AM
Wait I didn't read all that bullshit...
Again tell me what diseases this stupid program has cured.
Bottom line is that its a waste of money trying to cure AIDs. There is NO cure for the disease.
Researching meds to help people live with the disease is fine.
Although in all honesty diseases are definitely part of the environment's attempt to weed out the human population.
Survival of the fittest, etc...
Vidikron (FU) @ Nov 1st 2007 11:32AM
CAX,
You prove you're a dumbass over and over. Why do you even bother posting crap like that? There's no cure? How the hell would you know that?
Noshino @ Nov 1st 2007 11:34AM
I never thought I would say this, but I seriously want you to catch a sickness that up to date doesn't havea cure so you can see what it feels like.
and read for god's sake, are you stupid? why do you think you have eyes and a brain? its not just to watch porn (still don't know if you are using your brain or not), enlighten yourself, catch up with all these stuff, this HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH CONSOLE WARS, SO DON'T GET ALL BITCHY ABOUT IT, ITS A WIN WIN SITUATION, AT LEAST ACKNOWLEDGE IT!
SoulBlade @ Nov 1st 2007 11:37AM
they've already found some treatments that have eliminated HIV in tests. they're well on their way towards AIDs. Read a book.
borland502 (SDF - Macross Ring) @ Nov 1st 2007 11:49AM
@CAX: "Survival of the fittest, etc..."
Why do I suspect you wouldn't be in that group there Herc? And I'm glad your attitude didn't prevail back when they developed immunizations for Polio, Smallpox, etc. There is a good chance that you and many others would have been "weeded out" had they not come along.
Science, my amazingly ignorant fellow, is made up of a crap load of dead ends. It also needs new information to move forward. And if you're nihilist enough to halt progress in understanding...please weed yourself out now. Thanks.
Out of curiosity, and try to be honest, are you screwing with everyone or are you really that bitter?
Nate @ Nov 1st 2007 11:53AM
CAX, you are, without a doubt, the most proudly ignorant person I've ever seen on here.
As I and others have said, Folding At Home is not like SETI, it's not like it just goes until it finds The Cure. It's doing experiments with proteins to better understand how they work and interact.
No one invented the car in a single inspired moment from thin air. First they had to invent the wheel. Then they had to invent the smelting process to produce usable metal. Then they had to invent the process that turns crude oil into gasoline.
That's what the folding @ home program does - it does hugely complex experiments with proteins to figure out what happens when you put them in a certain situation. The knowledge gained from this could be used to make vaccines, treatments, and yes, even cures for diseases. But the cure isn't going to spontaneously pop out of the computer in some guy's basement that's been running F@H for years. It'll come from the scientists who are applying all this information in the pursuit of a cure.
Let me ask one question - who do you think is more qualified to say whether or not F@H has been successful - You, an internet troll with no scientific degree, or the PhDs working at one of the most respected scientific universities in the world?