BOINC

Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC) is a distributed computing platform for contributing spare CPU cycles to science projects. This guide describes how to install BOINC on a Raspberry Pi running Raspberry Pi OS, with its data directory hosted on an external ext4 disk to protect the SD card from excessive writes.

This configuration assumes a Raspberry Pi 3B (or similar) and treats BOINC as a background task, ensuring it does not interfere with other services like Samba, SSH, or Webmin.

Assumptions

Install BOINC

sudo apt update
sudo apt install boinc-client

Stop the service to configure the data location:

sudo systemctl stop boinc-client

Move data to the external disk

We bind-mount the external directory so the BOINC service can continue using its default path (/var/lib/boinc-client).

1. Prepare directory

sudo mkdir /mnt/1TB/boinc-data
sudo chown boinc:boinc /mnt/1TB/boinc-data

2. Copy existing data

sudo rsync -aHAX /var/lib/boinc-client/ /mnt/1TB/boinc-data/
sudo chown -R boinc:boinc /mnt/1TB/boinc-data

3. Setup Bind-Mount

Preserve the original directory temporarily:

sudo mv /var/lib/boinc-client /var/lib/boinc-client.original
sudo mkdir /var/lib/boinc-client

Add the bind mount to /etc/fstab:

/mnt/1TB/boinc-data  /var/lib/boinc-client  none  bind,nofail,x-systemd.requires-mounts-for=/mnt/1TB  0  0

Apply and verify:

sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo mount /var/lib/boinc-client
findmnt /var/lib/boinc-client

4. Ensure BOINC requires the external disk

Configure systemd so BOINC only starts if the external disk is mounted:

sudo systemctl edit boinc-client

Add these lines:

[Unit]
RequiresMountsFor=/var/lib/boinc-client
ConditionPathIsMountPoint=/var/lib/boinc-client

Restart and verify:

sudo systemctl start boinc-client
systemctl status boinc-client

Once confirmed, remove the temporary backup:

sudo rm -rf /var/lib/boinc-client.original

Configure remote access

Enable headless management from another computer.

1. Remove GUI-RPC password

sudo sh -c ': > /etc/boinc-client/gui_rpc_auth.cfg'

Or edit the file in nano and remove the password line.

2. Restrict access

Edit /etc/boinc-client/remote_hosts.cfg and add the IP addresses of the computers authorized to control the Pi:

192.168.1.20
192.168.1.30

I like to add an address range in case DHCP assigns a different IP to my client.

Restart BOINC to apply:

sudo systemctl restart boinc-client

Note: You can now connect using the BOINC Manager GUI from the allowed computers by entering the Pi’s IP address and leaving the password blank.

Command-line control

While the GUI is preferred, you can use boinccmd for quick checks:

boinccmd --get_state

Keep BOINC from overwhelming the Pi

Since the Pi 3B has limited resources, we configure BOINC to stay in the background.

Suggested Configuration

Apply these settings via the BOINC Manager “Computing Preferences”:

Setting Recommendation
Max CPUs 2 of 4 (50%)
CPU Time 75%
Suspend when busy Enable if non-BOINC usage > 25%
Memory Limit to 50%
Suspend behavior Do not leave apps in memory 
graph LR
    A[Start Task] --> B{CPU Load > 25%?}
    B -- Yes --> C[Suspend BOINC]
    B -- No --> D[BOINC Runs]
    C --> E{Load Drops?}
    E -- Yes --> D

Design Decisions