Linux-Hardware Digest #420, Volume #12 Tue, 7 Mar 00 10:13:07 EST
Contents:
Re: best graphics card? (Dan Law)
Re: best graphics card? (Dan Law)
Re: 4 Celeron motherboard? (Rolf Magnus)
Remote Display Problem. (ognomos)
Re: Proposed System Setup -- Is it possible? If so, how? (Rolf Magnus)
Re: System reqs - is P166 too small/slow? (Rolf Magnus)
Re: AGP + Linux = ? (Rolf Magnus)
Re: Network adapter and sound card on IRQ 0 (Manuif)
Re: Aladin V Chipset Question (Paul Smith)
Re: System reqs - is P166 too small/slow? (David Geelan)
Re: 3-button serial mouse (Piercarlo Grandi)
Re: Network adapter and sound card on IRQ 0 (Manuif)
Re: Aladin V Chipset Question (Adrian Davey)
Re: 4 Celeron motherboard? (Atle)
Re: 4 Celeron motherboard? (Atle)
Re: SB Live Value (Adrian Davey)
Re: 4 Celeron motherboard? (Atle)
Re: AGP + Linux = ? (mircea)
Re: 4 Celeron motherboard? (David C.)
Re: SCSI? IDE? Opinions please (Adrian Davey)
Re: not sloooow, but sluggish linux modem (J.R. Lockwood)
X graphics card settings for toshiba 3110ct ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: 4 Celeron motherboard? (David C.)
Re: 4 Celeron motherboard? (David C.)
Re: 4 Celeron motherboard? (Atle)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Dan Law <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.os.linux,comp.os.linux.x,uk.comp.os.linux
Subject: Re: best graphics card?
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 12:26:58 +0000
Lien-Fei Alex Chu wrote:
> Hi Dan:
>
> I will suggest ATI All in WOnder 128. I am not sure if this fits your need.
> But, it works great for me under Linux. This card is "hardware support" DVD.
> This card work pretty good under Linux. You might have to do a little work to
> get it up and running, but you will not have trouble finding the documentation
> for that. However, I "do not " know if the driver under Linux for that card
> suppport the "DVD" feature.
> You can check up the follong website.
>
> http://www4.ncsu.edu/~distclai/rage128-howto.html
>
> Good luck.
>
> Alex.
>
> Dan Law wrote:
>
> > Dirk Mueller wrote:
> >
> > > Dan Law wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Can anyone recommend a graphics card supported by Linux (well, XFree86)
> > > > that would have a high quality mpeg decoder that can be used in DVD
> > > > playback on a pc monitor?
Thanks for the advice... I'll look into purchasing that one... I wonder how the
picture quality is? Probably better than mine... The site you mentioned looks
really helpful. Thanks!
-Dan
------------------------------
From: Dan Law <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.os.linux,comp.os.linux.x,uk.comp.os.linux
Subject: Re: best graphics card?
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 12:33:13 +0000
Chris Beauchamp wrote:
> Dan Law wrote:
> >
> > Can anyone recommend a graphics card supported by Linux (well, XFree86)
> > that would have a high quality mpeg decoder that can be used in DVD
> > playback on a pc monitor? I would probably use Windows for DVD playing -
> > I have until now anyway (although I do have the LiVID development
> > stuff). I already have a player with a PCI mpeg decoder card and,
> > separately, a voodoo 3 graphics card, but I see that new AGP graphics
> > cards exist that have decoders built in that would probably provide
> > cleaner playback, such as ATI and Diamond.
> >
>
> I've got a Hollywood Plus PCI card, which, yes, is separate, but I get
> good picture quality (AFAICT - how does one measure such things? - nice
> and smooth on a PII 350) - mine is plugged into a Voodoo 3 card too (in
> fact, a Voodoo 3500TV, which I bought in the mistaken assumption that it
> included a DVD decoder (which it doesn't), but in fact its just DVD
> assist, which is a kind of digital pass thru internal connector, for
> which I've found _no_ DVD cards which support it! Its a nice card,
> though, so I'm not _too_ unhappy ;-) Sigma Designs appear to be making
> noises about supporting linux, so they may be a good bet. Then again,
> they are so far just noises... [do _any_ cards have Linux support yet?]
>
> > My current drive/decoder is a Jammin DVD II and the picture quality is
> > VERY poor, in part because of the series VGA connection, and in part
> > because the decoder is just weak... My computer is a PIII 450 running RH
> > 6.1. Also, all of my DVDs are region 1 & I live in the UK, just to make
>
> I believe there are instruction on the H. Plus to disable region coding,
> out there somewhere! I did a search on yahoo and found some stuff, but
> didn't bother, since all my DVDs (all 3 of them) are European.
>
> HTH
>
> Chris
>
> --
> Chris Beauchamp
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> http://www.macs.co.uk
> "These are my opinions, my company has their own"
I hear the Hollywood is the best pci card to get... Do you have to make a
serial connection with your vga cable? When I do that it really degrades my
signal & the computer screen becomes slightly dimmer & blurry - not so
noticeable when playing a dvd but very noticeable when in 1280x1024 -
especially when you try without the dvd connection for comparison. The main
problem with my current decoder is that it renders colour gradients terribly
- like looking at a 256 colour screen with a bit of extra blue & yellow
thrown in for good measure. Pretty awful, really. Playing a video from a very
old vcr into my tv card has a MUCH better picture. But then the dvd does have
a remote control that works...
-Dan
------------------------------
From: Rolf Magnus <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: 4 Celeron motherboard?
Date: Tue, 7 Mar 2000 13:49:56 +0100
Reply-To: "Rolf Magnus" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Atle wrote...
>Does anyone run Linux on anything other than the 2 Celeron Abit board?
>Please tell me about it!
Dual P-II 400 MHz on an Asus P2B-DS with on-board Ultra2-SCSI. Very
reliable, no problems. You can also get a Slot-1 board and plug adaptors
with Celerons in. You can also mix CPUs with different clock multipliers.
>And: What is rthe most powerful x86-based Linux machine available today?
>Is there a 2xP3 or 2xAthlon being tested anywhere?
Perhaps a 4xXeon or something. But I don't exactly know if the P-III-Xeons
also support more than 2 CPUs.
Rolf Magnus
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (ognomos)
Subject: Remote Display Problem.
Date: 7 Mar 2000 13:02:26 GMT
I've been trying to get X-windows programs running on a remote machine
to display on my local Redhat linux box.The remote computer was running
Sun 5.6
OS, and the coonection was ppp. I set the display variable remotely with
$ export DISPLAY=my ip adress:0
after I telnetted into the remote machine.
I tried an insecure
$ xhost +
to get a display, but not even that worked.I got the error message:
Xt error: Could not open display <my ip address>
Has anyone else running linux come across this problem? Any ideas as to
why I'm not getting a display? Could it be a hardware problem? I have an
old VGA monitor and S3 graphics VGA graphics card.Any help would be much
appreciated.
------------------------------
From: Rolf Magnus <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Proposed System Setup -- Is it possible? If so, how?
Date: Tue, 7 Mar 2000 14:08:44 +0100
Reply-To: "Rolf Magnus" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Dances With Crows wrote...
>those OSes can read is FAT16. Linux can read everything, but NT can't
>read FAT32 and 98 can't read NTFS.
Natively not, but at http://www.sysinternals.com you can d'l an ntfs driver
for Win9x and a fat32 driver for NT4. The free versions of those drivers do
only read access though.
Rolf Magnus
------------------------------
From: Rolf Magnus <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: System reqs - is P166 too small/slow?
Date: Tue, 7 Mar 2000 14:14:29 +0100
Reply-To: "Rolf Magnus" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Iceman wrote...
>going to say "But I heard Linux was faster than Windows on
>an older machine." And it's true..until you run X, etc. Any
>GUI--regardless of the OS--will put greater demands on the
>system.
Well, on my old 486 with 20 megs of ram, X runs good, but I don't use kde on
it. I use window maker.
Rolf Magnus
------------------------------
From: Rolf Magnus <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: AGP + Linux = ?
Date: Tue, 7 Mar 2000 14:16:16 +0100
Reply-To: "Rolf Magnus" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Gregory M. Hebel wrote...
>> Is there any kernel support for the the AGP port such as
>> filling in the GART / memory management / chipset init etc?
> AFAIK, Linux sees the AGP slot as a PCI slot. As long as
>your BIOS is configured correctly with all the tweaks you
>want/need, you shouldn't have to do anything in Linux, kernel
>or otherwise.
But there is something about AGP in the 2.3.x kernels. I think, last I ran a
2.3 kernel, I saw something about gart in the dmesg.
Rolf Magnus
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Network adapter and sound card on IRQ 0
From: Manuif <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 05:23:26 -0800
Michael,
thank for your answer. I will have a look into my bios setup and
hopefully find an option that helps solving my problem.
Best greetings (und nochmals danke),
Manuel.
* Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com The Internet's Discussion Network *
The fastest and easiest way to search and participate in Usenet - Free!
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 7 Mar 2000 21:17:21 +0800
From: Paul Smith <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Aladin V Chipset Question
I recently bought a P5A which works great under linux (get the patch
from www.ali.com.tw but check the latest Kernel first), but why do you
want this MB for an old K5? It's overkill. There should be plenty of
second-hand MBs available which would suit.
John Duffy wrote:
>
> Hi.
>
> Will motherboards using chipsets other than Intel work under Linux?
>
> I am thinking about buying a Super 7 board, either the Gigabyte GA-5AX or the
> ASUS P5A, for a second Linux box with an AMD K5 PR100 CPU.
>
> Both of these boards use Aladin V chipsets.
>
> Regards
>
> John Duffy
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
------------------------------
From: David Geelan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: System reqs - is P166 too small/slow?
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 21:32:57 +0800
G'day all who replied to my message (hope you all get this!)
In the end I decided to skip installing in a DOS/Windows partition and
make
myself a Linux partition and swap partition instead. Probably overkill,
but I ended up putting on a 250 MB swap file. Everything seems to be
working quite well: it ain't my PIII-450 but it's at least as usable as
the 166 is in Windoze. So thanx for taking the trouble to write - it's
appreciated.
L8r,
David Geelan
------------------------------
Crossposted-To: uk.comp.os.linux
Subject: Re: 3-button serial mouse
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Piercarlo Grandi)
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 13:40:08 GMT
>>> On Fri, 03 Mar 2000 11:21:53 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Alex
>>> Butcher) said:
news0200> [ ... ] Some mice are dual mode (usually Microsoft and
news0200> MouseSystems) and default to 2-button Microsoft mode UNLESS a
news0200> mouse button is held during power-up. [ ... ]
If one has such a mouse the best option by far is to just buy another
mouse; I especially recommend those that have a little switch on the
bottom (or wherever) to switch them between MS compatible, 2 button
mode, and 3 button mode. With mice currently having prices in the 3-5
pounds range, hassling over setup or 3-button simulation mode is a waste
of time.
However I actually decided to splurge and got myself an excellent (and
expensive, 15-20 pounds) Logitech wheel mouse. The wheel, like on
Microsoft mice, acts also as the third button, and the Logitech protocol
is well supported. The wheel itself is also somewhat useful (not quite
using it as a third button), with the X-windows 'imwheel' daemon.
------------------------------
Subject: Re: Network adapter and sound card on IRQ 0
From: Manuif <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 05:55:28 -0800
Thank you again very very much, it has worked. Sometimes - I
think - it is quite crazy with the computer. Now I am working at
this problem for more than 1 Month with no result. I even
installed the ALSA sound drivers to solve it. And now you tell me
that it is only one single option in my BIOS that was wrong!
Stupid world.
Manuel
* Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com The Internet's Discussion Network *
The fastest and easiest way to search and participate in Usenet - Free!
------------------------------
From: Adrian Davey <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Aladin V Chipset Question
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 13:58:54 +0000
Paul Smith wrote:
>
> I recently bought a P5A which works great under linux (get the patch
> from www.ali.com.tw but check the latest Kernel first), but why do you
> want this MB for an old K5? It's overkill. There should be plenty of
> second-hand MBs available which would suit.
I too use a P5A and i'm currently on 2.2.13 patched with the
linux-ide-10b3.tgz from the above address. I tried 2.2.15-2.5.0 from
RedHat 6.2beta and it didn't have built in support in the kernel from
installation and making the kernel showed no sign of support. Hopefully
in the actual 2.2.15 there will be, not totally likely as the patch is
still known as a beta.
It's not too hard to patch it anyway.
With this m'board why use only a K5, K6-2s are so cheap now, for the
price you would pay for this board you would be better off getting a
cheaper board and a better chip,IMO.
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
<pointless_html_tag>
linux 2.2.13(ish) on cpu #0, up time -a lot-
av load: user -a bit, sys -a bit more
</pointless_html_tag>
------------------------------
From: Atle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: 4 Celeron motherboard?
Date: Mon, 06 Mar 2000 16:50:35 +0100
"Lee Sau Dan ~{@nJX6X~}" wrote:
>
> >>>>> "Atle" == Atle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
> >> My experience from dual cpu PC:s with Linux is that reliability
> >> is worse than for a single cpu system. If one processor locks
> >> up, the whole system locks up. I have newer seen any console
> >> message like... "CPU 1 out of order, continiuing with only CPU
> >> 0" in linux. Fot the SMP DEC-10:s (from the middle/late
> >> 1970:s) you could see this, but then it was the hardware that
> >> was mostly unreliable.
> Atle> Sorry - I was assuming each processor could be set up with
> Atle> its own meory and window to the bus.
>
> What you assumed is not SMP, but multiple machines.
Well, I know there is a BeOs available for networked machines, but I
didn;t really consider these for the reasons you point out under. And I
cannot say I agree with the idea that an added network node is the
simples solution. It may be the easiest and cheapest seen from the
perspective of getting something up & running fast with no hazzle. So
far so good.
But that was not what I was looking for - I am willing to tweak and
twiddle if necessary - I am not looking for a fast solution - I am
looking for something that could continue the idea behind the S-100
machines of the _very_ early 1980s ... in this perspective, an added
network node is a brute-force-solution that totally lacks elegance.
Once some standard is laid down for how CPUs are to communicate over a
bus, be it PCI or any other (VLB could have done quite nicely for me),
the simplest (and really - the cheapest) solution should be to plug in a
new processor, possibly recompile, and GO!
>
> want. You should find a DISTRIBUTED operating system, such as Sprite,
> Amoeba and Mach. I'm not sure if these distributed OS are still in
> research stage or has become productive.
I know the GNU kernel that Richard Stallman is (was?) working on was
supposed to be 'based on' Mach. Linux is the greatest hack of all times
(arguably) but wasn't intended to be the 'perfect example' of an OS. It
just exploded, and now we're more or less stuck with it. It is
unbreakable (compared to the braindead OSes for PC's that you generally
see pre-installed) - so people will be reluctant to change.
This is not my biggest worry, either. Actually, I am looking to
contribute, if someone want some help. I don;t feel up to implementing a
whole new kernel by myself, like Linux did - at least started - but I
would like to help.
So - what I am _ULTIMATELY_ looking for, is a
more-than-2-CPU-motherboard that is cheap enough to be a development
system for GNU-stuff - all you get is gratitude ...
>
> Yeah. The professionals know what's the state of the art. So, they
> build SMP systems, not multi-node (each node having its OWN memory,
> OWN bus and also OWN disks) systems.
Hmm .... state-of-the-art ....
>
> Multi-node system are there and are nothing new. IBM SP2 is an
> example.
None of this is new. The system I was thinking of dates back more than
20 years ...
> Why should they do that?
For pure $-related reasons: Plug in a new processor and double your
BogoMIPS ....
Atle
------------------------------
From: Atle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: 4 Celeron motherboard?
Date: Mon, 06 Mar 2000 16:51:49 +0100
Rolf Magnus wrote:
> Dual P-II 400 MHz on an Asus P2B-DS with on-board Ultra2-SCSI. Very
> reliable, no problems. You can also get a Slot-1 board and plug adaptors
> with Celerons in. You can also mix CPUs with different clock multipliers.
This is one of the boards I have found interesting.
There is also an Intel board, but with a braindead graphics-card ...
Atle
------------------------------
From: Adrian Davey <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: SB Live Value
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 14:03:30 +0000
jigga wrote:
>
> I have the Value card with the digital din but cannot get CD sound. I can
> get MP3's to play though. Has anybody gotten this setup to work. Am
> running Mandrake 7.0
>
> --
> Posted via CNET Help.com
> http://www.help.com/
I'm on RedHat 6.2beta and the way i got it to work is to compile the
latest emu10k1-2000xxxx.tar.gz from the creative opensource site. this
gives you a much better mixer in gnome which is what you need.
try http://opensource.creative.com for the latest drivers.
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
<pointless_html_tag>
linux 2.2.13(ish) on cpu #0, up time -a lot-
av load: user -a bit, sys -a bit more
</pointless_html_tag>
------------------------------
From: Atle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: 4 Celeron motherboard?
Date: Mon, 06 Mar 2000 16:54:59 +0100
"David C." wrote:
>
> Multiple-CPU systems already exist, for more than just Celeron :-).
Could you give me a reference, please? I know there was a 4x486 system
being sold as a mega-server a few years ago, but I am unable to find
anything with more than 2 CPU sockets.
I know I have to go for a dual-CPU card this time around, so:
What would you recommend - 2xSlot1 or 2xSocket370?
>
> Linux already supports them. I've been running Linux on my dual-PPro
> box (Micron Millennia Pro2 - Micronics W6Li motherboard) for several
> months with no problems.
Do you have some details about this? Could you drop me a mail with some
specs?
Thanx, Atle
------------------------------
From: mircea <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: AGP + Linux = ?
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 09:18:40 -0500
anthony wrote:
>
> Hi
>
> Is there any kernel support for the the AGP port such as
> filling in the GART / memory management / chipset init etc?
>
> Grepping with agp on kernel 2.2.5.15 doesn't show anything.
>
http://glx.on.openprojects.net
You may also want to try a more recent kernel than 2.2.5!
MST
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (David C.)
Subject: Re: 4 Celeron motherboard?
Date: 07 Mar 2000 09:34:27 -0500
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Lee Sau Dan ~{@nJX6X~}) writes:
> >>>>> "David" == David C <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
> >> This is too ideal. The actual senario could be as bad as: One
> >> processor hangs and corrupts its kernel. This makes it become
> >> crazy, so crazy that it starts intervening the other
> >> processors, corrupting the in-memory code being executed by
> >> other processors. The other processors become crazy, too, and
> >> drives the remaining processor crazy.
>
> David> But these kinds of problems don't happen from abberant user
> David> code. Only broken kernel code can cause this kind of
> David> problem - and there's no way to protect a system against
> David> broken kernel code if the hardware is SMP.
>
> I'm not talking about a broken OS kernel. I'm talking about a broken
> *CPU*, which goes crazy and hence may spit on the memory space where
> the OS kernel code resides. Even a 100% perfect kernel can be
> corrupted this way, driving other processors on the SMP system to go
> crazy.
If you've got a hardware fault of that nature, then you're screwed.
Period.
Unless you want to go for a _VERY_ expensive system with redundancy and
fault protection built-in to each board, there is nothing you can do
about this kind of failure.
If you require hardware like that, I suggest you ignore anything PC
compatible and start talking to a sales rep from Sun, IBM or HP.
-- David
------------------------------
From: Adrian Davey <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: SCSI? IDE? Opinions please
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 13:46:50 +0000
Hi y'all,
Being a home user and a student I use IDE for hdc and an IDE CDRW, it's
fine for everything i do, I use an IBM 27Gig 7200rpm using only UDMA/33
not 66 and it speeds along. With 256Mb of ram, swap is not so much of an
issue for the load i put on the pc. When i do a cd i do leave the pc
alone so it writes cleanly, it only takes 17mins max so i go and have a
coffee, its good to get away from the screen every so often! If you
need to continue using your pc another way is to use 2 PCs.. networked.
Lets face it who hasn't got enough bits to make a second crap pc? If it
is able to run linux its good enough.
I'll be doing this as soon as my bro gives me my spare crapy pc back.
Should make mp3 encoding faster. One pc does the ripping at max speed
while they share the encoding, nice cheap way of doing things the scsi
way/speed.
Conclusion:
If you're in a server status or need feck loads of data manipulation go
scsi. else save money use IDE.
[Side Note]
CD writing note...One very cool thing about Linux i just found out
about is that with enough space you can make an iso image of the disk
and then mount it to see if it is the way you want it , then if not use
parts of the image to make a new image and repeat until it is perfect.
Very useful when backuping up cds and adding more data.
All comments are IMHO.
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
<pointless_html_tag>
linux 2.2.13(ish) on cpu #0, up time -a lot-
av load: user -a bit, sys -a bit more
</pointless_html_tag>
------------------------------
From: J.R. Lockwood <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: not sloooow, but sluggish linux modem
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 14:30:07 GMT
Someone recently gave me similar advice. What I found during a slow
session was:
1) 0 dropped ppp packets
2) 0 serial overrun
3) about 4% "error" packets
1) and 2) being 0 seems to eliminate a lot of possibilities.
If more information is necessary, I can post the output later.
best,
J.R.
Svend Garnaes wrote:
>
> Try running
>
> /sbin/ifconfig ppp0 (or whichever ppp interface applies)
>
> near the end of a sluggish online session (i.e. while the
> interface is still up) to see if your problem has anything
> to do with transmit or receive errors. This may provide a
> clue as to the possible sure. If in doubt, post the output
> for the group to see.
>
> HTH
>
> Svend
--
Posted via CNET Help.com
http://www.help.com/
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: X graphics card settings for toshiba 3110ct
Date: Tue, 07 Mar 2000 14:38:48 GMT
Hi,
I just got a toshiba 3110ct ultra-portable. I can't get X to run
properly. Following advice from a site entitled 'linux on laptops',
I set the monitor type to 'custom', thus choosing the 600x800 svga
type server, and also set the refresh rate to the range 50-90, but
when the hardware is probed, it fails with a 'can not read clock'
message. If I bypass that message and continue, when I run startx
X fails to run.
Can someone help me with this please?
Thanks,
Edmond
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (David C.)
Subject: Re: 4 Celeron motherboard?
Date: 07 Mar 2000 10:04:52 -0500
Atle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> "David C." wrote:
>>
>> Multiple-CPU systems already exist, for more than just Celeron :-).
>
> Could you give me a reference, please? I know there was a 4x486 system
> being sold as a mega-server a few years ago, but I am unable to find
> anything with more than 2 CPU sockets.
Go visit the web pages for Compaq, Dell, Micron and other major system
vendors. Go straight to the most expensive server systems, because
that's where you'll find these kinds of systems. The new ones being
shipped today are based on the P3/Xeon - that's Intel's current flagship
processor, and the only one currently being sold for the 4-way and 8-way
CPU market.
Here's one from Dell:
http://www.dell.com/us/en/biz/products/spec_rkopt_8450_servers.htm
Here's one from Compaq:
http://www.compaq.com/products/servers/proliant8500/index.html
There are many others from other vendors as well.
I don't know how well Linux performs when there are more than two CPUs,
however. Perhaps others can answer that.
> I know I have to go for a dual-CPU card this time around, so:
> What would you recommend - 2xSlot1 or 2xSocket370?
I don't think it makes much difference. Both are about equivalent, IMO.
I think the faster cache of the Celeron almost completely compensates
for the fact that it has 1/4 as much cache as a P2/P3. If you plan on
using the P3's SIMD instructions, then you obviously need slot-1. If
you don't, then I don't think it matters.
If you think you might upgrade from Celeron to P3, then you may want a
slot-1 board to make the upgrade easier.
>> Linux already supports them. I've been running Linux on my dual-PPro
>> box (Micron Millennia Pro2 - Micronics W6Li motherboard) for several
>> months with no problems.
>
> Do you have some details about this? Could you drop me a mail with
> some specs?
The Millennia Pro2 has been discontinued for several years. (My comment
about "several months" is because I only added the second CPU a few
months ago - it was running with only one up until then.) The Pentium
Pro is not a chip vendors are pushing these days, due to the fact that
it is expensive and tops out at 200MHz.
FWIW, this is the support page and manual for the board:
http://www.micronics.com/motherboards/pentium_pro/288.html
http://www.micronics.com/documentation/w6li.pdf
The version of the board shipped by Micron was without the SCSI port,
but with the audio.
The PPro itself was a very good server chip in its day. Up to 200MHz.
Pentium (non-MMX) instruction set. 256K, 512K or 1M of full-speed cache
on-board. Up to 4-way SMP.
The Pentium-II Overdrive chip is designed to replace PPro chips. It
runs at a fixed 333Mhz (5x 66Mhz), has MMX support, and 1M of full-speed
cache. It only supports 2-way SMP, though.
-- David
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (David C.)
Subject: Re: 4 Celeron motherboard?
Date: 07 Mar 2000 10:06:03 -0500
Rolf Magnus <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
> Perhaps a 4xXeon or something. But I don't exactly know if the
> P-III-Xeons also support more than 2 CPUs.
The Xeon supports up to 8 CPUs, if the motherboard has support for it.
I know that Dell and Compaq ship systems that support this
configuration. I suspect that others do too.
-- David
------------------------------
From: Atle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: 4 Celeron motherboard?
Date: Mon, 06 Mar 2000 17:51:23 +0100
"David C." wrote:
>
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Lee Sau Dan ~{@nJX6X~}) writes:
> > >>>>> "David" == David C <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
>
> Unless you want to go for a _VERY_ expensive system with redundancy and
> fault protection built-in to each board, there is nothing you can do
> about this kind of failure.
I know that some memory boards can remap faulty flip-flops or dynamic
cells, but this is limited, I don't know how many extra bytes of RAM
that can be remapped this way, but I myself wouldn't try to implement 1%
like this, unless the error-rate was very high.
But self-repairing processors? This sounds like sci-fi. What is being
repaired, except for registers and stuff like that?
Surely, they don't put in code to reprogram microcode in case of an
error in the multiplication instructions or something on that
complexity-level?
I suppose error-recovery must be centered on some extremely vulnerable
places, like registers.
I suppose on a very expensive processor, that you might have error
recovery take place on registers.
And even then ....
I don't look for a system like that. What I am looking for, used to be
called 'supermicro' - but I haven't heard that term for 10 years, at
least.
Does anyone here remember the Viasyn/CompuPro machones? You could get
processor cards for them with any kind of microprocessor: 32032, 8086,
186, 286, 386, 68000, Z80 etc. The last time I heard about this machine
(I gave it away to a hobbyist) there were 386 slave processors
available.
But, of course, it was sadly out of date, resembling a dinosaur with its
gigantic (compared to a PC) case and 16-bit bus.
The Sky-bus extension was implemented, but I never actually saw examples
of it .... the bus was limited to 50MHz, but that was done when standard
was 8Mhs!! The equivalent would be a processor with 16 Athlons running
at 3Ghz each in today's terms!
That would be called a 'Real Computer' by anyone!
Atle
------------------------------
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