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Date:      Mon, 27 Jul 1998 10:47:51 -0400 (EDT)
From:      Mark turpin <mturpin@shadow.spel.com>
To:        Steven Plite <splite@purdue.edu>
Cc:        Nicholas Lee <nj.lee@kiwa.co.nz>, freebsd-hardware@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Intel Providence deal at computer123
Message-ID:  <Pine.BSF.3.96.980727104024.1225C-100000@shadow.spel.com>
In-Reply-To: <19980726231242.A26777@cynix.ecn.purdue.edu>

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On Sun, 26 Jul 1998, Steven Plite wrote:

> I haven't been terribly impressed with Clifford Tech so far.  Shipment
> packaging was sloppy, the rotor of one of the CPU fans had popped out
> and was floating around inside the board's static bag.  I haven't called
> them yet to get it replaced.  It also took them two weeks to ship my order.
> 
> The motherboards are pulls (from Toshiba Equium 6200Ms probably, since
> the one I've installed has a Toshiba logo on boot up) and don't include
> the ATX IO shield to cover the ports.  I have no idea where to get one
> to fit the PR440FX, since it's a bit odd in port layout.  But at least
> the boards look clean, and they came with a photocopied jumper diagram,
> which is good as Intel's manual only gives settings for 180 and 200MHz.
> 
> The CPUs are pulls as well, and look a bit worn.  They did ship them with
> (cheap) fan/heatsinks, but without any thermal grease (which you can get
> at Radio Shack.)
> 
	Mine shipped the same way..  Bad box, cheap fan, no thermal
grease.  The boards are pulls from a toshiba, probably last years model
which didn't sell well.  The boards were probably pulled at the factory
and replaced with a pentium II board. Then sold at surplus. 

> That said, the one board I've installed works so far, though all I've run
> on it is DOS and a -current boot floppy.  I'll try loading a -current snap
> tonight.
> 
> Bottom line is: you get what you pay for.  Or rather, you don't get what
> you don't pay for.  I don't know that I'd trust this gear to a production
> box, but they should be fine in test boxes, which is where mine's going.
> 
> As for the 166/512 vs. 180/256 question, I haven't done any comparitive
> testing and am unlikely to have time to do so.  But, if you can afford
> the cost delta, the 166/512 would be preferable.  Twice the L2 cache
> and 10% faster memory bus are good, and they would probably overclock
> to 180MHz (or more) easily if the 14MHz delta in clock speed bothers
> you. :-)
> 

	I don't think that anything is WRONG with the boards.  I would
have no problem putting this in a production environment.  I've already
installed 2.1.6 with no problems. My department doesn't have a huge budget
so sales like this are great for us.


Mark Turpin - mturpin@spel.com

Main Street Technology Centre
Bedford, VA


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