- Joined
- Mar 5, 2002
- Messages
- 25,750
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Regular visitors to the PC Review forums will surely have noticed the presence of Captain Crunchie (aka Muckshifter) and his crunching team. For those of you who would rather not trawl through endless threads about it, here is a brief summary:
PCR had it's first encounter with 'crunching' when a team of members joined an initiative called Find-A-Drug. Unfortunately, that program recently drew to a close, and our poor team was left without a cause to crunch for. But at last, after a brief encounter with Folding @ Home, we have finally found a worthwhile cause to crunch for: The World Community Grid.
'But what is crunching?' I hear you cry. Fear not, I shall explain.
Find-A-Drug, Folding @ Home and World Community Grid all have the same aims: to solve medical problems through using the processing power of computers. This is where you come in... It would costs a great deal of money for these research companies to buy the processing power required, and so they ask for help from the general public. By simply downloading the relevant software, anyone can let their computer 'crunch' data, with the aim of finding such things as a cure for cancer. The program runs in the background while your computer is switched on, and you can go about your normal daily business without noticing any difference.
As well as the enormously good feeling of doing something to help others, there is fun to be had. There are teams of crunchers the world over, indeed, PCR has one: 'The PCReview Crew II' with World Community Grid. Members of this team crunch away, their data is automatically submitted, and a leader-board emerges. It's always good to try and beat the winner with your crunching power!
So how can you help? We are always on the look out for volunteer crunchers. You can join the team by firstly downloading the software (it is available for both Windows and Linux). Having done that, the next step is to register yourself on their website and join a team! Couldn't be more simple!
If you don't wish to crunch, there are still things you can do to help. We have established a new initiative, where people can donate unwanted computer components to the team: Adopt-a-Rig. These components will be used to build more PCs, solely dedicated to crunching for the team. If you are interested in helping this very worthy cause, then contact muckshifter via a PM, mark your PM title "crunchin", or I may just ignore your PM.
A big thank you from The PCReview Crew II
PCR had it's first encounter with 'crunching' when a team of members joined an initiative called Find-A-Drug. Unfortunately, that program recently drew to a close, and our poor team was left without a cause to crunch for. But at last, after a brief encounter with Folding @ Home, we have finally found a worthwhile cause to crunch for: The World Community Grid.
'But what is crunching?' I hear you cry. Fear not, I shall explain.
Find-A-Drug, Folding @ Home and World Community Grid all have the same aims: to solve medical problems through using the processing power of computers. This is where you come in... It would costs a great deal of money for these research companies to buy the processing power required, and so they ask for help from the general public. By simply downloading the relevant software, anyone can let their computer 'crunch' data, with the aim of finding such things as a cure for cancer. The program runs in the background while your computer is switched on, and you can go about your normal daily business without noticing any difference.
As well as the enormously good feeling of doing something to help others, there is fun to be had. There are teams of crunchers the world over, indeed, PCR has one: 'The PCReview Crew II' with World Community Grid. Members of this team crunch away, their data is automatically submitted, and a leader-board emerges. It's always good to try and beat the winner with your crunching power!
So how can you help? We are always on the look out for volunteer crunchers. You can join the team by firstly downloading the software (it is available for both Windows and Linux). Having done that, the next step is to register yourself on their website and join a team! Couldn't be more simple!
If you don't wish to crunch, there are still things you can do to help. We have established a new initiative, where people can donate unwanted computer components to the team: Adopt-a-Rig. These components will be used to build more PCs, solely dedicated to crunching for the team. If you are interested in helping this very worthy cause, then contact muckshifter via a PM, mark your PM title "crunchin", or I may just ignore your PM.
A big thank you from The PCReview Crew II
