[rescue] Advice on Octanes

[Joshua D. Boyd]

On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 04:17:17PM -0500, Joshua Snyder wrote:

> Yeah, I guess I should have been more clear, thats what I get for pounding
> out a quick e-mail between classes.  Let me try and clear up what type of
> Octane that I want I believe that lack of money is going to force me
> twards a R10k 195 with SI.  I would love a better machine but you get what
> you pay for.

Hey, there is no shame in such a machine.  Just beef the ram up to at
least 256 megs, preferably 512megs.  Might add as much as $150 later if
the machine doesn't come with enough.  Otherwise, no big deal.

> I should have been more clear I was refering to prices last year... So a
> few quick questions, All Octanes can do SMP but is there anything that I
> need to know about it?  ie. I don't have to watchout for mainboards that
> don't work right... How hard is to get upgraded graphics?  I would like to
> be able to run 1600x1200 at 85Hz but I don't care about games.

First, there is something important to remeber about SMP.  You don't
just add a second CPU like you do on most machines.  Instead you pull
the CPU module and add a dual CPU module.  Dual R10k 250s seem to be a
litle under a grand still when seperate from the machine, but great
deals can be had from time to time.

Also, I believe that to do the resolution you want you will need SSI or
SSE.  They aren't really too expensive to buy, but adding TRAM to one of
those cards is expensive unless you are both lucky and patient.