[rescue] octane question

[Big Endian]

>On a SGI newsgroup, someone mentioned that going to 3 heads is really simple
>on the cheap octanes (4+ heads with much higher resolutions is possible if you
>have lots of cash for the latest video boards).

Octanes are limited to 4 heads max (4 SI/SE/V6/V8 boards), one per XIO slot.

>Now, what I was wondering is does this work in the traditional 
>xwindows manner,
>ie mysgi:0.0, mysgi:0.1, mysgi:0.2, etc, or in the more modern 
>xinerama manner,
>ie a 4800x1200 display?

more likely the traditional way unfortunately.  I don't belive IRIX 
supports xinerama as it seems to be an XF86 only extension.

>Also, how do people here feel about the SI+tram graphics?  SI is 
>what is cheap,
>and tram's should be to outrageous.  Well, I spoke too soon.  TRAM 
>modules seem
>to be going for about $500 on ebay.

SI is an XIO Solid Impact.  Nice card, but no texture.  SI+tex is 
~HighImpact which is nice, but the texture cache(you can't call 
IMPACT trams "storage")  is a wee bit small (1mb).  If you need 
texture on an octane the MXI(SSI+ 4 trams, ~MaxImpact) or greater is 
really the only way to go but you will pay for it. (anybody know how 
much V6/V10 boards are?  I know the V8/V12s are still being sold as 
the current line up but even a V6 would kick the ASS of any MXE card).

>It seems to me that an Octane would make a much better desktop replacement
>machine (over an O2), however, for my needs texturing is important. 
>Of course,
>at those prices for TRAMs, it will be sometime before I can afford an
>acceptable one (unless I come into new information explaining why I don't
>really need a TRAM).  Besides, I either need a good method for video IO on
>linux (firewire works for capture, and laying stuff to tape, but I 
>also want to
>be able to drive a video monitor for previews), or an O2 first.

An octane would *RULE* as a desktop box... but for the heavily video 
work you'd have to spend a fortune (octane compress, octane 
personal/digital video, pci cardcage, firewire card) to get the 
capabilities that come w/ an O2.  However the octane video 
capabilities are the same relationship as the 
Indy/Indigo2+Galileo+Cosmo.  If you had about 10k to do it I would go 
w/ the octane... on a budget get the O2.  The other thing is that the 
octane video and compress boards take up one XIO slot each so if you 
have an MXI octane and those two cards you are out of XIO slots. 
This still leaves you PCI for firewire/fddi/atm/more scsi/etc but pci 
card cages are 4-500 on ebay, more if you buy from 
reputable/sgisun/etc.

daniel
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