The problem is that BOINC is only running one seti_client at a time. The cpu benchmark reports 2 CPUs correctly. I've tried restarting and rebooting but it makes no difference. After looking in the .xml each WU seems to require 33MB of RAM so that shouldn't be limiting either even though the computer only has 128MB (+128MB swap).

I have a linux box with dual Celeron 366Mhz running kernel 2.6.6 and BOINC 4.08 (same problem with 4.05).

Adding climateprediction.net will utilize 2 CPUs and running just climate prediction will cause the comp to run 2 of those. But as for seti it refuses to run more than one at a time. Any thoughts as to the cause?

Firstly, you're lucky to get ONE work unit. Perhaps trying out climateprediction.net will add another work unit to your boinc setup.

Secondly, have you checked your Boinc General preferences?

I think it might default to 1.
"On multiprocessors, use at most 1 processors"

http://setiweb.ssl.berkeley.edu/sah/prefs.php?subset=global

You may have to click the 'edit preferences' link below all your settings and adjust.

When I detatched Climateprediction (as it would take about 450 days to run :P )
BOINC downloaded a new seti workunit and started running to in parallell as it should.

My prefs where set the right way. There was just something fishy going about.

It's working fine now except that every time I restart boinc the core client runs at 100% CPU for about 12-15 minutes. I have no idea what it is doing but according to "top" it spends 66% in system and 34%in user.

After that the core client starts to idle as it should and runs perfectly.

Cheers

btw alex, I looked at you profile... have you tried boincview? it's only for windows but works great