Folding@Home Update Adds Remote Play, Screensaver Mode

Sony has announced a new update to its Folding@home distributed computing project, adding new functionality like PSP remote play, new simulations and visuals, and a new screensaver mode that increases the performance of the sim and lets the PlayStation 3 consume "slightly less power." Sony says that in the five months since the application's release more than a half million users have downloaded the program and delivered "up to 600 teraflops", bringing the project "closer to its goal of achieving a petaflop, an important milestone." The full feature and functionality upgrade list includes using the PSP to display application data, including the world map and the specific protein being modeled, further simulations that will aid in research of diseases like Alzheimer's, and the new screensaver mode. The protein visualization has also been enchanced with "improved shading, highlighting and focus effects," including 'Tapioca', 'Caviar', 'Licorice', and 'Backbone', all of which render the protein in new ways to emphasize "specific sections of the protein that are of the most scientific interest to researchers." Finally the new version adds "Advanced Participation Mode", which Sony says will let Stanford University "send simulations of varying computational lengths to PS3 users," recommended only for "contributors who run Folding@home for at least eight hours per day." Said SCEA CEO Jack Tretton, "We take a lot of pride in the fact that more than half a million PS3 users worldwide have dedicated a portion of their machine's capabilities towards helping Stanford University and their Folding@home team research many of the diseases that inflict our society today. He added, "It is one thing for us to provide the technology to make this possible; it is quite another to have gamers from all over the world proactively sign up for this program to make a difference in our global community. We couldn't be more pleased with the results we have seen to date in this collaborative effort."