From owner-freebsd-questions Mon Apr 27 22:43:10 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id WAA21974 for freebsd-questions-outgoing; Mon, 27 Apr 1998 22:43:10 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from pollux.loco.net (lucy.bedford.net [206.99.145.54]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id WAA21861 for ; Mon, 27 Apr 1998 22:43:00 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from listread@bedford.net) Received: (from listread@localhost) by pollux.loco.net (8.8.8/8.8.8) id BAA05103; Tue, 28 Apr 1998 01:30:25 -0400 (EDT) (envelope-from listread) Message-Id: <199804280530.BAA05103@pollux.loco.net> Subject: Re: Hardware Concerns. In-Reply-To: <3.0.5.32.19980427140130.00870bf0@joshua.sns.org> from Dan at "Apr 27, 98 02:01:30 pm" To: dan@sns.org (Dan) Date: Tue, 28 Apr 1998 01:30:25 -0400 (EDT) Cc: questions@FreeBSD.ORG From: CyberPeasant Reply-To: djv@bedford.net X-no-archive: yes X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL38 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG > > Hi! I am working on some specs for a machine I am going to build, and I > have been unable to resolve the following 3 concerns. I would really > appreciate some input from others who may have stumbled across similar issues. > > 1) The system will never be used for X or any other graphical application, > I would like to keep costs down by using a very basic VGA card. Is there a > major difference in system performance if I used a ISA card instead of a > PCI card? Is there a minimum specification that should be observed? No. Use anything you want. text-only is so easy as to be an indetecible load on a system. I'm assuming that almost nothing will be going to the console. If you're trying to save money, this is not a big savings, really. Of course, an old basic VGA card from the dumpster is $0. > 2) When selecting RAM, does parity vs. non-parity memory affect the system > in any way (stability, performance, etc.)? Most definitely. Selecting a motherboard that supports not just parity, but ECC (error correcting) memory should be a high priority. A machine without at least parity detection should not be considered reliable. They're for toys. The more memory, the more you need ECC. I have a sneaky feeling that an awful lot of crashing W95/WNT boxes can be explained by the cheap hardware in them, in particular the use of huge amounts of memory without any parity checking at all. There is no real performance difference, except that a machine with undetected memory errors will do unpredictably evil things. Don't let a vendor BS you on this. > 3) What differnces exist between MMX and non-MMX CPU's of the same speed > (with regards to FreeBSD)? Which is prefered? Many say that MMX is a kind of snake oil. Since you are not planning on doing multi-media, and since the gcc compiler, to my incomplete knowledge, does not generate MMX instructions, (perhaps one could code them in assembler), I would say that this doesn't matter. > Dan > dan@sns.org Dave -- <----. mailto/pgpfinger: djv@bedford.net <----|=================================== <----' Crathva fxrjre To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message