Hi Gerry,
At 11:35 AM 1/22/00 -0800, Gerry Snyder wrote:
>First of all, let me say that it is a thrill to be helping in the GIMPS.
Welcome aboard!
>Getting more computing power for the search is the main reason my new
>linux system is a dual Celeron rather than a single.
The second processor is a cheap way to add horsepower. It will help
on many other computing tasks. An excellent decision.
>But finding a factor (or another factor) of a Mersenne number would seem
>more real.
Finding new factors isn't hard. Over half of the candidates are eliminated
by finding a factor rather than the expensive LL test. GIMPS by default
assigns slower machines to do the factoring work. Thus, it is not
uncommon for powerful machines to always get LL assignments and
never find a factor.
If you want the thrill of finding a factor, ask one of your CPUs to get
factoring work only (the Test/Primenet dialog box). You can change this
setting back at a later time.
Finding new factors of small Mersennes, so called Cunningham factors, is
getting more difficult. ECMNet and GIMPS have picked off most of the
"easy" factors. I have two CPUs running ECM full-time. The last
Cunningham factor I found was last summer. I do occasionally find new
factors of medium-sized (1200 to 100000) Mersenne numbers.
In any event, choose the type of work you find most interesting.
The goal here is to have fun while contributing to math research.
Best regards,
George
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