Options for a REALLY slow computer?

[mls]

Opus4

You can delete this post if you like since it's slightly off topic...

I'm half tempted to get a 350 just to see how it might work in an old Pentium 2 - 266MHz machine I have left lying around here, but I just can't justify the cost of a 350 just to experiement with while so many others are still having so many problems with it in much higher systems.

I had my p2 really super tweaked. It actually could play DVD's with only a slight amount of stutter every now and then. That makes me think a 350 or Xcard might actually work ok in that machine with the lower CPU usage of hardware decoding.

Any comments? PM me if you would rather delete this.

[Opus4]

Originally posted by mls
Opus4

You can delete this post if you like since it's slightly off topic...

Better yet, I'll simply split it off to a new thread. (You never know if someone else might be interested.)

Originally posted by mls
I'm half tempted to get a 350 just to see how it might work in an old Pentium 2 - 266MHz machine I have left lying around here, but I just can't justify the cost of a 350 just to experiement with while so many others are still having so many problems with it in much higher systems.

I had my p2 really super tweaked. It actually could play DVD's with only a slight amount of stutter every now and then. That makes me think a 350 or Xcard might actually work ok in that machine with the lower CPU usage of hardware decoding.

I think it depends on your reasons for using such an old system. In my case (p2-400), I didn't want to spend the money upgrading it when I first started looking into building a TV computer. I knew that if it worked well I would _eventually_ dump it and build a modern system, but I knew no one in the area who had such a system set up, so I had no idea whether a computer really would work well for TV viewing. In fact, one friend out of the area kept telling me that the TV image would be really bad. To shorten the story, all I _needed_ to buy (if I remember correctly) to make this system work was an Xcard, a ATA/133 controller, and a firewire/usb2/LAN combo card -- well under $200. Once my old system was set up, it was usable (slow, but usable). From my results with it, I knew that I would definitely replace it & it was just a matter of when I felt like spending the money. And most, if not all, of those extras will be used again, so they weren't a wasted expense.

So... do you just want to play, or do you actually _want_ to use a really slow computer? Don't forget that you'll need more than a hardware decoder: you'll most likely also need a new IDE controller, at a minimum. Since you already know SageTV is more than viable for TV viewing, I would skip it & buy a new system. I know you saw this post about a bare system for starting a cheap computer. That doesn't sound too bad for putting together a minimal system for SageTV-only usage.

As for my system parts on a truck somewhere... now, I just need to find another USB radio, since the new system doesn't have an ISA slot for my old FM card -- can you imagine that!? Oh well, at least I'm not trying to use that 20MB drive that might still be sitting around here somewhere...

- Andy

[mls]

Originally posted by Opus4
I think it depends on your reasons for using such an old system.

After 20 years of messing with computers (mostly as a side hobby) I've collected "lot of leftover junk". If it still worked, and might be of some use either for myself or in someone elses computer I just kept collecting parts out of machines as time went on.

Sometimes an old, slow computer can be a great learning tool. For example, I've got an old 80486 machine (before the Pentium) that I used for several months testing (and learning) about how Routers and Firewalls operate by running
Smoothwall
on it.

In fact, one friend out of the area kept telling me that the TV image would be really bad.

My first experience with TV on a computer was back with that old 80486 machine with one of the early ATI All-in-Wonder PCI Pro 8Meg video cards.

Because it was not a Pentium CPU, the software would not allow me to record anything (besides, that machine would have been to slow to do so anyway).

However, the TV looked great on a 15" monitor back then. That card later got moved to a Pentium II - 266MHz machine were I could not only watch TV, but could at least make some attempt at recording it also.

Those old AIW cards captured in AVI format and used quite a bit of drive space compared to MPEG now. The machine was to slow to do any high resolution or frame rates, but I still was amazed at how good it looked.

Then, ATI changed to AIW Rage 128 Pro cards and a friend of mine got one. I could NOT BELIEVE how horribly that looked!

Later, I myself got a Radeon AIW 9000, and although somewhat better than the Rage card, I still was very disappointed with the quality.

Within I couple weeks I was already doing research on the web to find ANYTHING that would do a better job of video capture. That eventually brought me to Hauppauge. Now we finally had something decent for video quality and it required far less CPU power too.

Was just so amazed at how well that worked that I started researching TV recording software, which of course led me to SageTV (which has got to be the best one I've every used).

And most, if not all, of those extras will be used again, so they weren't a wasted expense.

As mentioned above, some of that old stuff can be used as a learning tool. I can't say anything is a wasted expense unless someone just bought it on the spur of the moment without thinking about what use it really has.

At this point in time (after 20 years of messing with computers) there are only 2 things I think I wasted money on.

One is the ATI AIW 9000. I really wanted a 9600 for dual DVI output, but all the stores had around here were "gaming" video cards, so ended up with the AIW 9000 which fortunately I can at least use for TV output with SageTV while running other stuff on the Desktop to a monitor (otherwise I'd toss the AIW 9000).

The other one, although a REAL SUPER DUPER learning experiece is the Roslyn capture card. I *REALLY* should not have had to have spent 2 months of my time figuring out how to make that thing work right when the PVR-250 cards just plain worked right out of the box. But, heck, I think I've finally beat that thing (although I'm still ready to toss it and put in a 250 instead).

So... do you just want to play, or do you actually _want_ to use a really slow computer?

Since I became disabled I've got a LOT of time to "play" with computers (when/if my arthritis and back problems don't bother me).

I've found that testing things on older slower computers can often give one a better idea of what is really going wrong. If one can tweak things to make it work on an old beater, then it's usually much easier to get it to work on any newer/faster machine.

I've learned a LOT thru the years simply because I tried to make things work on old/slower computers that I would never have learned if I could have just went out and bought the next greatest one available at the time. Unfortunately, not many people have the time or patience to go thru that kind of learning process.

Oh well, at least I'm not trying to use that 20MB drive that might still be sitting around here somewhere...

My 20, 32, 40, and 80MB drives got lost along the way with all the moving. No idea where I would use those now anyway since they were not IDE drives (long time ago MFM/RFM type drives). However, I do still have a 1GB, 4GB, 6GB IDE drives that I occasionally still do "play" around with (see Smoothwall coment above).

For the most part, now with the last couple computers I've built I work with 40, 60, and 120GB drives in removable drive trays. Makes it a LOT easier to switch back and forth between Win98SE and XP for testing things (on seperate drives) while still keeping good, fully functional versions or backups on other drives.

I have developed my own weird way of doing backups and "cloning" 98 and XP to other drives if/when I need to to test things. Unfortunately, my methods are probably not what an "average" computer user would do, nor would they even have removable drive bays in their computer to start with (a must have now for any I build).

Welp, way off of anything to do with SageTV (or are we?) and far to long winded, but should be interesting to see what others have to say?

[Worf]

I recently tried an old Gateway 266 motherboard with my 350 and Sage. My EPIA M1000 died on me and I needed to get something working while I send it in. I didn't have an IDE card to support my 160 gig HD so I mapped a network drive to another computer and installed the drive there instead. Things did not work well at all. The Sage interface was extremely slow. I could eventually get a show to playback, but it would frequently lockup doing a ff or rewind. The biggest problem was corrupt recordings. It would record correctly for a few minutes, but then would record all blocky and jumpy. I had the same problem with the EPIA, but not as frequent. I though maybe my 350 was going bad. I finally borrowed a 2.4 gig machine from a friend and moved my setup there. All the problems went away. An older machine may work fine, but in my experience a 266 just wasn't enough.

[mls]

Originally posted by Worf
The biggest problem was corrupt recordings. It would record correctly for a few minutes, but then would record all blocky and jumpy.

Now I gotta love that comment! Isn't that almost exactly the same sort of problems you find scattered all over this forum?

Maybe if we can get a few more to post there "old outdated" computer type problems it will help take some of the tension off of those now having problems

If nothing else, just for nostalgia to give them some idea of what we once had to go thru just so they don't feel like they are all alone

[Gemini1706]

how about Pentium III 1GHz with 256MB PC100 ram?

Good enough to do sagetv without stuterring..?

[Opus4]

I could just about play 2GB/hr recordings on that p2-400 w/o hardware decoding -- cpu usage was high, but not always 100%. I would think a p3-1000 would do fine for almost any recording rate, but maybe someone with such a machine could confirm it...

- Andy