Blogpost2| My experience with Ubuntu for cuda and cupy
Installing Ubuntu
Since I have an nvidia GPU on my macbook pro, I have decided that I wanted to install Ubuntu. This would allow me to run Cupy and use the GPU for neural networks while using the Chainer framework.
First time installing
After following a tutorial online on how to partition my harddrive and install ubuntu on my macbook properly, I was super happy to see this when booting up:
So my ultimate goal was to use cupy, which is supported by cuda 10.0 (or older), and cuda 10.0 or older is supported by Ubunutu 18.04.1 (or older). I didn’t know this so I first installed the newest Ubuntu 18.04.2 and then after a while found out I couldn’t install cuda 10.0 properly. This is because on the cuda 10.0 installation guide, it says I needed the kernel version 14.15.0 (and I had 124.18.0). I tried different things to fix this problem (such as changing the kernel version to an older version) before I finally resolved to reinstalling an older Ubuntu.
Pretty much, I installed the wrong version of Ubuntu!
When I installed Ubuntu from it’s home page it was 18.04. Little did I know that I needed 18.04.1 instead of 18.04.2! So yes, I decided to reinstall.
Second time installing
The second time I installed Ubuntu, I specifically chose the 18.04.2 version and finally was able to install cuda 10.0. However, I thought to myself, I wonder how it would look like if I changed my screen resolution… Since I had an extra screen connected, I decided to play around with the different resolution possibilities.
Turns out changing the screen resolution made my whole screen black… and then green!
Everytime I rebooted it turned completely black and green on both screens :’( I googled everywhere and tried all possible solutions that were offered on Stackoverflow. I was able to access the root terminal but still, but still nothing worked. I decided to install Ubuntu once again.
Third time is the charm
I WAS SO ANNOYED AT THIS POINT. I started questioning whether I even still wanted to use Chainer anymore, perhaps it is easier to rewrite all my codes to PyTorch.. (probably it was and still is a good idea). But I thought, this is a good way to learn things. Besides, I already have put some time in this, might as well finish the job… So finally.. the third time installing Ubuntu, everything works. I was able to install cuda properly, and then cupy and then everything else. It was a relieving moment, to see I was able to import cupy into python.
UNTIL…
OUT OF MEMORRY!
Until I realized my model architecture is way too heavy for my tiny GPU… OUT OF MEMORY!!
Well…. I guess I cannot do much about this. It is nice to know how to use my GPU I guess.. And perhaps one day I should buy an external GPU.. but they’re not cheap.
Lessons learned
- Think twice or three times before installing the latest version of everything.
- Dont just change your screen resolution on ubuntu.
- Everything you do you can learn from.
Now that I have let out my frustrations on this blog, I would like to thank whomever is reading this for listening (probably nobody). This was very therapeutical to write.
Blogpost1| My planning
| date | wk | task | status |
|---|---|---|---|
| February | |||
| 02.12/02.18 | w1 | Complete adversarial images + eyetracking experiment code | ✓ |
| 02.18/02.25 | w2 | Set up experiment with the lab | ✓ |
| 02.25/03.04 | w3 | Collect data from subjects (15p) | ✓ |
| March | |||
| 03.04/03.11 | w4 | Collect data from subjects (15p) + Data Analysis | ✓ |
| 03.11/03.18 | w5 | Collect Data Analysis | ✓ |
| 03.18/03.25 | w6 | Write Internship Report | ✓ |
| 03.25/04.01 | w7 | Write Internship Report | ✓ |
| April | |||
| 04.01/04.08 | w8 | Write Internship Report | ✓ |
| 04.08/04.15 | w9 | Write Internship Report | ✓ |
| 04.15/04.22 | w10 | Hand in Internship Report (v1) | ✓ |
| 04.22/04.29 | w11 | Literature Review: Deep Learning in Neuroscience | ✓ |
| May | |||
| 04.29/05.06 | w12 | Literature Review: Deep Learning in Neuroscience | ✓ |
| 05.06/05.13 | w13 | Literature Review: Deep Learning in Neuroscience + hand in v1 | ✓ |
| 05.13/05.20 | w14 | Literature Review: Phosphenes | ✓ |
| 05.20/05.27 | w15 | Literature Review: Phosphenes + hand in v1 | ✓ |
| June | |||
| 05.29/06.03 | w16 | Work on v2 of everything | ✓ |
| 06.03/06.10 | w17 | Work on v2 of everything | ✓ |
| 06.10/06.17 | w18 | Hand in everything | ✓ |
| 06.17/07.24 | w19 | Vacation (hopefully) | ✓ |
| 07.24/07.01 | w20 | Vacation (hopefully) | ✓ |
*Update: I finished everything on time and got a 9 for my final thesis :)