How do I reconfigure the console client options?

From FaHWiki

Contents 1 General 2 Adding -config via a client shortcut. 3 Running -config via the Run Command. 4 Configuration Options

General

There are several methods to accomplish this task.

Note: If the location of the Folding@home executable contains a space anywhere, the location must be enclosed with quotation marks, and the required switches added after the closing quote.

Adding -config via a client shortcut.

• Stop the FAH process (Control+C the client or stop the FAH service) or you may lose your work
• Right click on your FAH shortcut
• Select Properties
• In the Target: field type in -config or -configonly* at the end of the line (leave a space between)
• Click Apply
• Click OK
• Double Click the shortcut
• Answer the questions

NOTE: In Windows, if you have more than one client, you may need the -local command line flag along with -config or -configonly (separated by a space)

Visual Aid:

You will either have to remove the config switch from the shortcut, or only use this shortcut when you want to reconfigure the client.

It is ok to make multiple sortcuts that do any of several things.

Just remember to rename the shortcut for its purpose. That way you will be able to tell what it is for.

IE.... Start FAH, Config FAH, Queue Info, Send All, ect....

Running -config via the Run Command.

• Stop the FAH process (Control+C the client or stop the FAH service) or you may lose your work
• Click Start
• Click Run
• Click Browse
• Locate the client executable
• Add the -config or -configonly* switch
• Click OK
• Answer the questions

Visual Aid:

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*You can also use the -configonly switch in either of these cases. -configonly will run the client through the configuration changes and then exit the client (this is probably what you want if you are running FAH as a service), -config will move on to WUs after the configuration changes are complete.

Configuration Options

These options are shown as if the client is being configured for the first time. The default settings and some of the questions will change when running configuration again later. Some settings are based on previous answers, or on new answers to the same question when reconfigured. Also note these questions are from the v5.04 console client, and will be different for other versions.

• User name [default]? Just enter the user name with which you want to appear in the donator statistics or let it to default if you're not interested in having a user name. You can check here to see if a given user name is already in use.
• Team Number [0]? You can choose to be part of a team (for many reasons: inside team competition, promotion of a team, ...), just enter its number. There are a lot of teams so you can probably find one that matches your interests. Or you can even create your own team.
• Launch automatically at machine statup, installing this as a service (yes/no) [no]? The folding client can be configured to automatically run in the background (no window) when you start your computer (even if no user is logged in). You won't have any visual feedback of the client running, but there are some thrid party tools available to monitor the client. If it's your first time installing the client, you should answer no and let the client run a few days to be sure that everything is working correctly before setting the client as a service.
  

Note: If you have already configured the service you can permanently remove it here, too. If the service is configured, this question changes to: Do not launch this program automatically, remove the service (yes/no)? and answering yes will uninstall the service. Additional Note: The above notwithstanding, it seems the behavior on some machines / with some configurations is to continue to pose the question about installing the service even if the service is already installed. In that case, respond "no" to keep your current settings. If you respond "yes," it will install a SECOND service for the same work directory, which is not what you want. If this happens you will have to manually disable one of the services.

• Ask before fetching/sending work (no/yes) [no]? By default, the client automatically connects to the internet when it needs to download or upload a WU. Answer yes only if you really want the client to prompt you each time it needs to connect to the internet.

Note: If you answer yes to the "Install as Service" question earlier in the setup, the client will not ask this "Prompt to Connect" setup question. When the client runs as a service, the client does not interact with the desktop, so the client can not prompt you for a connnection. That is why this featured is disabled while running the client as a service.

• Use Internet Explorer Settings (no/yes) [no]? The client has 3 different methods to connect to the internet depending on your answer on this question (and eventually the next one). The 3 methods are:
  • Direct connection (answer no and no). This is the recommended method.
  • Connection using the settings configured in Internet Explorer (answer yes). Many reports indicate that changes in Windows and IE 6 & 7, from the latest Windows Updates (patches), have blocked communication with the F@h servers. DO NOT use this setting unless absolutely necessary.
  • Connection through a proxy (answer no and yes). This may be necessary in some company networks: if this is the case, you may need to ask your network administrator the answers to the following questions.

If no, then answer this additional question...

• Use proxy (yes/no) [no]?

If yes, then answer these additional questions...

• Proxy Name [localhost]?
• Proxy Port [8080]?
• Use username & password with proxy (yes/no)?

If yes, then answer these additional questions...

• Proxy Username?
• Proxy Password?

Back to answering the usual questions...

• Allow receipt of work assignments and return of work results greater than 5MB in size (such work units may have large memory demands (no/yes) [no]? By default, the client gets assigned only WUs that won't need a lot of network bandwidth or ressources. If it's not a problem for you, answer yes and you may be assigned these larger WUs that have bonus points.

Note: This option changed to (small/normal/big) in the v6.x client. (<5MB, 5-10MB, >10MB)

• Change advanced options (yes/no) [no]? Answer yes to this question if you need to change the answer to one of the following questions.

If yes, then answer these additional questions...

• Core Priority (idle/low) [idle]? By default, the core runs at the lowest possible priority (idle) so that you won't notice it running in the background. You can slightly increase the priority if you wan't but you shouldn't see any difference.
• CPU usage requested (5-100) [100]? By default, the core uses all the unused CPU cycles of your computer, but you probably won't notice it. So leave the CPU usage at 100%. One reason to lower the CPU usage: on some laptops, the cooling system is not very good, so lowering the CPU usage will prevent your computer to heat too much.
• Disable highly optimized assembly code (no/yes) [no]? Leave this option to no. Several years ago it was useful because some earlier AMD CPU had a flaw in their SIMD implementation, leading to crashes, but now it's past history.
• Pause if battery power is being used (useful for laptops) (no/yes) [no]? This option can be useful for laptops if you don't wan't your battery to be emptied too rapidly when the laptop is unplugged.
• Interval, in minutes, between checkpoints (3-30) [15]? Some cores can perform intermediate checkpoints to save their progression between frames. There's no need to change this setting to a low value, the checkpoint can take a few seconds during which calculations are stopped.
• Memory, in MB, to indicate (xxxx available) [xxxx]? The clients reports the amount of installed memory to the folding servers so that you get assigned a WU that fits largely in this amount of memory. This setting can be useful on multi-processors (HT, dual-core, or true multi-processors) computers on which you can run several clients so that each client will only report a fraction of the installed memory: for example with a quad-processors computer, install 4 clients and configure them to report only 1/4 of the memory.
• Request work units without deadlines (no/yes) [no]? For most of the WUs, the faster they are returned to the folding servers, the better; hence the existence of deadlines. If you are installing the client on an old computer, consider answering yes to this question to get deadlineless WUs. Note, however, that there is currently a shortage of deadlineless WU's; it is strongly recommended to keep this option disabled, as there is no guarantee of future deadlineless WU supply, nor are these WU's as helpful to the projects being conducted. Whatever deadlineless WU's there are will probably be claimed anyway by clients that are no longer being actively monitored, which may have been installed when deadlineless WU's were more acceptable.

NOTE: DO NOT USE THIS SETTING. If you request deadlineless WUs, you will be issued only deadlineless WUs. There are no deadlineless WUs available and there may never be again. Accepting deadlineless WUs will cause your client to stop working for an indefinite period. (forever?)

If yes, then answer this additional question...

• Minimze networking (no/yes) [no]? If you have requested deadlineless WUs, you can download up to 10 WUs before processing them. This is useful if you don't connect often to the internet, or if you download WUs to feed an other computer (see Sneakernetting and Sneakernetting with Qgen). This option is not available for work units with deadlines.

Back to answering the usual questions...

• Set -advmethods flag always, requesting new advanced scientific cores and/or work units if available (no/yes) [no]? Some options can be specified using flags on the command line, this option is equivalent to the -advmethods flag. With it, you may get late beta testing WUs, they may have some problems.
• Ignore any deadline information (mainly useful if system clock frequently has errors) (no/yes) [no]? Since deadlines are really important for Folding At Home, the client will discard WUs if the deadline is passed.
• Machine ID (1-8) [1]? Machine ID is only useful if you want to run several clients on the same machine (useful for dual CPU, dual core, ...): each client running on the same machine must have a different MachineID.

Note: This option changed to (1-16) in the v6.x client.