Combine the power of multiple Macs

If you’re like me, then you have several systems because of how affordable PowerPC Macs are these days.  The issue many PowerPC users have in 2012 is not having enough power to do something with heavy CPU use, and still be able to multitask effectively.  These CPU hungry tasks could be anything from a script heavy site to playing video, and it's nice to be able to do other things without holding back something that needs to use a good chunk of the resources.

It’s nice to be able to browse the web or do whatever while you wait for some heavy lifting to finish up.  Whether you have a G3 or a Quad G5; having spare CPU cycles at your disposal is what will really make any computing experience all it can be.  If you have another system you can use it to take excess load and tasks off your main system. 

The easiest way to do this is with two screens, but one is enough thanks to VNC/Remote Desktop technology.  I use a combination of two screens and the built in “ScreenSharing” app in Leopard, and I do this on a daily basis with my two main Sawtooth systems.  This allows me to offload anything I want onto my 1.0 GHz system, which keeps my 1.8 GHz open for business. 

In certain ways, the VNC option is actually more efficient because it keeps everything on one screen while still offloading work to other systems.  The ScreenSharing window gives you a Mac within a Mac; somewhat similar to virtualization, but better.  What makes this method better is the other OS isn’t running on the same computer like it is in a virtual machine, so the two are not slowing each other down besides a tiny bit of resources to keep drawing the remote window.


Methods

Rather than tell you how you should do things, I will explain my methods; which can then inspire you to shape these concepts to your own personal needs.  The ideology is to spread load over systems that are not clustered, and therefore not limited to cluster software. 

An average computing session for me starts with checking my email, which is run on my secondary Sawtooth.  I keep it on a desk which is close to my main system.  Although it has it’s own LCD, I normally prefer to access it through ScreenSharing.  The main thinking behind this is that all the tasks I run on the 1.0 GHz are background 24/7 type things, and none of them need a lot of attention.

The things I run on it are:

• Apple Mail
• Transmission (bit torrent)
• Disk Drill (data recovery and SMART utility)
• iCal
• MS Word
• Noise (white/pink noise utility)
• iTunes (music server)
• Stickies
• Alarm Clock
• Meteorologist
• Frogblast (intranet client)
• HandBrake
• Media Converter
• Occasional web browsing

When not using the system via the attached 24” LCD (which is most of the time), I keep the second Sawtooth at 1024x768, which doesn’t take up too much room as a remote window.  None of the apps listed above really need higher than 1024x768, and that size window fits well into 1920x1200, while not hogging too much space.  I use command + tab rather than the dock to get to the app I want.  I also run Quicksilver on the remote system.

With all those things running on the 1.0 GHz, it allows my 1.8 GHz to be devoted to whatever I am actively doing.  I generally leave it for video playback, and web; along with the daily image editing I do in Pixelmator.  If I am watching 1080p in CorePlayer, it will use most of the CPU, so this is an occasion where anything else I want to do is done in the remote window.  If I am watching 720p or higher I use the remote window to browse the web, so it doesn’t hold back the 1.8 GHz.  If I am watching 600p or lower video, then my main system can play that fine while I browse without dropping frames.

Think of it as balancing load over multiple systems with your tasks and computing habits rather than within the code.  The remote window within a preexisting system can give you an immense ability beyond what just one can do.  As I mentioned already, the only resources the remote window uses are a very small bit of CPU and GPU to draw the window contents.  ScreenSharing never uses more than 3-4% CPU on my 1.8 GHz, and less than 2% most of the time.

Having gigabit ethernet really helps a lot, but I have gotten by fine on 100BT and .11b wifi in the past.  The advantage of gigabit is that the flow of the remote window will be much smoother. 


Not on Leopard?

If you're running Tiger then you don’t have the built in ScreenSharing app, and will need a third party alternative.  When I’m running Tiger I prefer an app called “Chicken” which is a side project from “Chicken of the VNC”.  Chicken is better, and was last updated in 2011, but Chicken of the VNC is the only 10.3 Panther option from these developers.  It has not been updated since 2006. 

I use Chicken myself when I have my Storm Trooper B&W G3 running (10.4.11), and I use it to control the 1.0 GHz Sawtooth running Leopard just as I normally would from my 1.8 GHz.


Closing thoughts

I have done this on and off for a long time now, but for the last three or more years I do this 100% of the time, and find it very productive.  Two single CPU systems working together is the ultimate dual CPU setup; since what you do on one doesn’t hold the other back.  No matter how powerful one computer is, you still cannot avoid slowing it down with every task you add to its resources. I normally just do this with two systems, but there is no limit to how many Macs you can use this way.  If the other system is in another room, then VNC is the perfect way to utilize it.



Software:
Chicken (10.4.11+) – Chicken of the VNC (10.3.9+)