I am running climateprediction.net on BOINC manager 5.10.20. It seems to be running fine, but there is one problem. The screensaver shows only a blank, black and white globe with no graphics. On the left side, it says to use the CTRL key plus various other keys to turn on the graphic features of the screensaver. When I first hit CTRL, however, the screensaver kicks off and I am back at my desktop.

Along with this issue, I can go into BOINC manager, then go to the "tasks" tab, highlight "climateprediction.net" in the project list (it's the only one I have), and then hit "show graphics" at the left. This gives me a small window with a replica of the screensaver. Here, I am able to hit the various keys to adjust the globe graphics and see the results (i.e. turn on temperature, start/stop globe rotation, etc.). I have tried setting it to the view I want, and then closing it, but it always reverts back to the blank, non-rotating globe. When I go back and perform the same steps noted in this paragraph, it is again back to the blank globe.

Is there some way to "save" my settings? It used to work a year or two ago, but I think it stopped working once when I upgraded to the latest BOINC Manager (not sure which version that was).

Restarting BOINC may fix the blank globe issue, sometimes the graphics get messed up when changing phases.

The BOINC client was updated so that the crtl key will now exit the screensaver. The only way to adjust settings is via the web based project specific preferences.

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BOINC WIKI

BOINCing since 2002/12/8

Hi,

Sorry to say it, but I had problems with climateprediction as well.
I ran it on my last computer, and it crashed the system regularly.
I found if I NEVER loaded the screensaver, it would run.
- unfortunate, since it had a neat graphic.

I was told it was not compatible with AMD, my graphics card, and something else I forget. I was not treated politely by their support, but I liked the project for other reasons, so I ran it in that limited fashion in spite of this.

The project units are huge, (thousands of hours) but you get credit in more manageable chunks. I gave up when the application errored out, after about 1000 hours.

I don't know if I'll run it again. They need some PR.

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The CPDN screensaver sometimes has problems with the graphics chips integrated onto the motherboard because they don't fully support the standards. Updating the graphics drivers for the chipset may improve the situation, although it doesn't always.

Many people don't run the screensaver because it just wastes CPU time (again, particularly with integrated graphics. My Dell uses 50% of its CPU time just displaying the screensaver if I turn it on).

With regard to the earlier question about adjusting the view, make sure that 'Save Camera on exit' is set to Yes, and 'Use Defaults' is set to No, in the project preferences. (I think it's that way around, anyway, I don't use the graphics often enough to remember).

You can now select shorter models via the project preferences (the HadSM3 or 'slab' model) which run in 200-500 hours (depending on the speed of the PC). I actually prefer the longer ones.

The coupled model (HadCM3), which sounds like the one you had before, uploads a summary of its climate data every year, and a much more detailed upload each ten model years. As a result a crash, while frustrating, isn't actually a disaster. Some people take backups of Boinc so they can continue running the model if a crash occurs.

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