Life with Playstation -- a new update to the FAH/PS3 client

In partnership with Sony, we've rolled out a new update to the Folding@home client for the PS3, now built into their "Life With Playstation" (LWP) application.  They've done a great job of building a beautiful piece of software.  Folding@home is running underneath in the background.  Noam Rimon, the lead developer on the Sony side put it well in an earlier blog post as well as a more recent post on the PS3 blog

We’re going to offer this as a free service that will be easily accessible directly from the XMB. Life with PlayStation will feed live content to your PS3 with updates on news and weather on a visually stunning and interactive global map. Imagine being able to wake up to your PS3 to see if you need to pack an umbrella for the day. Or just relax as you listen to your favorite tunes while reading up on top news from around the world.

We've also updated the science code to do the same functionality of what the GPU2 code can do today.  However, people will notice that the ns/day will go significantly down.  We want to stress that the points per day remains the same.  This means that one gets more points/ns since the calculation is more complex, so don't worry too much if your ns/day is lower.  LWP takes up a little extra compute time from the science, but not much.  Most of the decrease in ns/day is due to the fact that it's doing a much more complex calculation (which is good for the science side of this).

There's also a nice Video demo done by Noam Rimon showing the functionality of LWP:

 

We'll give further updates about this as time goes on, but we're excited to have the new science functionality in and to have a client which hopefully can even further broaden the participation of PS3 owners in Folding@home.

PS Some people have noticed that LWP seems slower.  In particular, the ns/day count is down, but that's not what it might seem. We're doing more complex science which runs slower on the PS3, so that's responsible for most of the slow down you're seeing.

For those who are interested, it's slower because we're running a more complex version of the GB implicit solvent, which is much more computationally demanding; the upside is that this would be much more accurate. This is also the main solvent model we're running on GPU2 right now. In fact, earlier PS3 results pointed us to the significance and importance of moving to this new model, so this (and GPU2) reflects what we've learned so far. However, there is a small performance hit due to all the other life with Playstation (LWP) eye candy. However, it's not very big in the end (the Cell and RSX GPU are very powerful), with most of the slow down in terms of ns/day coming from the new science code. The upshot of the LWP platform will hopefully be getting a lot more PS3 donors (but I guess time will tell there).  

So far, the response will be strong and I expect that this could in time double the FLOP count from PS3 donors in Folding@home, which itself will be pretty impressive. More importantly, with the advanced science now rolled out on both the PS3 and GPU2 platforms, we're well-poised to tackle some much more complex and interesting calculations.

Comments

[Marc Gesche Arias]

Well i don't know what i should think of this. In my opinion if LWP takes any of the computing power from Folding@Home it should be a separated program. I want Folding@Home to get ALL my computing power because personally i don't have any use for an animated globe with a bit of news and infos. I get that all with Google =)

Greetingz Marc

Folding4Life

coocoocachooPS3
Team: 67929

[Jack S.]

I like the GUI but I would love to see a few things added in there so I (and others) would be given a better reason to use this interface. I want to be able to skip, pause, or rewind my music from the interface. Also, why is there no option to check my stats from the GUI? Finally, if I could do more than just read the news items given to me in the interface, or if I could even surf the web independent of it, then I would be very motivated to keep using it.

[muziqaz]

I was very excited about this update :)
got installed, and was surprised how limiting this thing is :(
I do hope that function buttons will come back to folding channel. Options menu.
It is ok for me, I configured my ps3 folding client before life on ps, thus I fold for my team and with my nickname. but what about new users? anonymous?
anyway, I do hope sony will expand the userfriendliness of that program. :)

[frits]

Works perfect. I noticed that the setting to shutdown after the current unit is now remembered. So i can leave it on and it will automatically start folding and shutdown after the current unit.

Great. Good work :)

[Peter]

Seems less options and userfriendly than the previous version.
Also, what's the use of a powerfull Cell cpu if all goes to the more 'visualisation' of the folding program.
We need ALL the power of the Cell cpu to be addressed for maximum performance.
It's not a game, it's calculating for SCIENCE.

[g3]

Where's my stats?

[Charles L. Brown]

Dr. Panza and the team at Standford University, Thank you for listening to your donators. the new up-dates is far beyond my dreams. WOW! with the addition of the live realtime news and tempurture is an educational tool in it self. Mornings and evenings will be great my own personnal music player that give me the imformation I need and entertain me also.
Thank You again [email protected] Team: snowmen #5 and #42

[Jack Zhang]

At first, I thought LWP was a BOINC Client for PS3. Now I'm majorly disappointed it's just a Google Earth with too much eyecandy. My performance has dropped to having to fold for 25+ hours straight to get credits. If anything were to change, a BOINC client for PS3 would work wonders since it doesn't need as much graphical eyecandy and will focus all the power on the Cell.

I'm loving the new GPU2 client though, I could crunch 1 WU in 3 hours and run a optimized Seti@home app alongside to use the CPU's power. But the PS3 now taking 25+ hours is a joke and a huge step backwards. Try to find a way to get CUDA to work on the PS3 as that, with the Cell and RSX together, would add enormous power.

Overall, I liked the old client better. If better code is introduced that was designed for a GPU but is instead used for a CPU, Why aren't you using the RSX with CUDA?

(end of rant)

Jack Zhang

[BuddhaChu]

"Imagine being able to wake up to your PS3 to see if you need to pack an umbrella for the day."

This would be cool if I could enter in a city less than 1000 miles from me. I live in Oklahoma City and Houston is the closest city I can select? What does their weather or news have anything to do with where I live? I can't even pick Dallas, TX...the ninth-largest city in the US.

Completely worthless selling point in that quote above.

Where's the configuration option to uncheck "Lame"?

[Brian]

Please add back the ability to fold for a specific team. I don't understand the reason for taking this feature out.

[Brian]

I jumped the gun. I posted before watching the video. All of my questions were answered there. Great work.

[mrmccormick]

i have folded 808, but when i look at the leader board i have 0 folds

[Brandon]

Where the hell do I put in my username/team number?!?!

[Hawg]

I like the new LWP concept and it's a nice touch. Some major flaws, however, such as when you select a news headline the browser brings up the news article from the web and on my 50" high-def 1090i television the font is SO tiny I can't read it. And...they took away the ability to zoom in and out like in the normal browser. And yes the stats are hit and miss..sometimes mine show in the leaderboard, other times I show as zero.

[Powers]

Where is the stats that we used to see while folding? Where do I input the team I'm contributing to? The most detail I get is % complete.

I'm all for progress... but what gives?!

[Hawg]

You have to hold the square button down then switch to the folding channel. The "channel" format is part of the plan for future expansion of LWP

[FCK GENTASTIK]

can anyone tell me why it says ive not contributed any points on the leaderboards but ive completed 7 wu since my update and over 500 total with my 3 playstations any advice would help GENTASTIK

[Hawg]

regarding the leaderboard, yes it's a little flaky as to how it updates. Basically just keep signed into the playstation network as much as you can, and keep running the LWP program as much as you can, and eventually it will update. Don't worry if sometimes it shows your score as zero..it does that somtetimes but it will come back. Mine is still slowly becoming more and more accurate every day

[XenoSilvano]

I Love this new update!

[Ron]

I like the new interface but it no longer remembers my music preferences. So every time I exit the program I have to switch from MOOD music to my music selection. In addition I have to switch shuffle on each time. This setting is also lost every time I exit the app. Hopefully this will be addressed. Not sure if this is a Folding issue or Sony Life with PlayStation issue. hard to tell where the line is drawn now.

[billy]

i know this seems dumb but can i turn off my ps3 or will it stop folding im a noob to all of this and also can i play a game and still be folding will it make my connection lag pls help

[John Beck Real Estate]

This blog Is very informative , I am really pleased to post my comment on this blog . It helped me with ocean of knowledge so I really belive you will do much better in the future . Good job web master .

[rflulling]

This is perhaps a few days outdated... but I would like to comment,

I agree the New Client is a beautiful piece of work, and its noticeable that its Incomplete. Its obvious it was designed to hold many more services that are not yet ready.

However I also share the concern of others that the Overhead of the Graphics which was previously not effecting the Computations... is now a small issue. Is there no way to this can be avoided. For instance when my machine is in Screen saver mode, the load should be minimal, is this not true?

Secondly if the Software now uses the GPU and not the CPU then arent we wasting that power. After-all it was the CELL which tamed this landscape, and now its all but abandoned. Surely it could still serve the Grater good, or is the RSX all that matters now?

[cheap ps3]

This update is very cool on me. I like that.

[Martin Free PS3 Wizz]

I can't understand why Microsoft hasn't implemented this into their system i.e. Folding@Home. It just baffles me given that we could acheive so much more if the Xbox and Ps3 were both involved.