I just started using BOINC again recently and there is something I am not sure I ever really knew. When I set BOINC to use only a percent of CPUs (i.e. on an SMP system), can it still use 100% when I am doing nothing with my computer, or do I have to set BOINC to use '0%' then, so it presumably uses whatever it can use? I want to make BOINC use a small percentage of my CPUs all the time unless I suspend it, and '100%' (or close) if that works (considering that system processes, and maybe other, less important, stuff in the background, take a small percentage of CPU capacity), when I am not using it. Is there any way to do that?

No, there is no such option in the client or the manager.

It is on the to do list for a future version of BOINC.

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You can use the While computer is in use and set a idle time for. e.g. 5 minutes.
So if you don't use your computer for 5 minutes it can go to 100%.

You can set the "While processor usage is less than" e.g. 10% that lets BOINC run if the computer isn't working on something else.

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TThrottle The way to control your CPU and GPU temperature.
BoincTasks The best view of BOINC.
My other activities

Thanks.