[Novalug] I need a linux lawyer.

JRR energy.wwind@cox.net
Mon Nov 9 15:02:42 EST 2009


A rare but possible problem that would make a machine slower than 
molasses in  Springtime..
Every PC has a 1000 hz interrupt clock.  If the crystal for the Iclock 
is intermittent, / getting
ready to fail you could experience random bouts of extremely slow 
performance,
JRR

Jay Hart wrote:
> If you have a S2446N board, the latest BIOS FW rev is 1.05, dated 05/27/04.
>
> See what rev you have on bootup.
>
> Jay
>
>   
>> Jay Hart wrote:
>>     
>>> Alan,
>>>
>>> Just a few thoughts if possible:
>>>
>>> 1. Did you build your PC from scratch, or buy it?
>>>       
>> The only pre-built PC I've ever bought was my eeepc laptop. It's
>> probably about 1/3rd as powerful as this machine.
>>
>>     
>>> 2. If you built it, please tell us what components you procured.
>>>       
>> It's a Tyan TigerMPX S2466. (K7 generation).
>>
>> Has two 1.2ghz Athlon MP processors.
>>
>> 3GB of PC2100 (IIRC), DDR266 ECC registered ram. (basically server memory).
>>
>> Only has AGP4, video card is Nvidia 7300 or something.
>>
>> Known glitches: USB ports are broken due to chipset issue; the
>> keyboard/mouse was malfunctioning when I bought it, had to be returned
>> where presumably the BIOS was re-flashed and then sent back to me. It
>> still generates spurious ctrl and alt keypresses, maybe every few
>> seconds. This only causes problems in konqueror where it will trigger
>> the display of the hotkey hints, annoying but not a real problem.
>>
>> In six years of daily, and recently continuous, operation, I've never
>> seen a memory issue or any kind of hardware failure in the core of the
>> system. The motherboard is built like a rock.
>>
>>     
>>> 4. Have you fully patched your motherboard BIOS?
>>>       
>> I haven't checked on that in years. I am not aware of any actual BIOS
>> issues on this machine that would actually affect performance under
>> linux because linux supersedes 99.999% of all BIOS functions. Basically
>> the only effect the BIOS has is getting it to the kernel loading, after
>> that the kernel takes over all hardware and ignores all BIOS settings.
>>
>>     
>>> 5. What kinds of drives are you using?
>>>       
>> I have a Seagate 80 gb drive that I bought in the summer of 1994. (It
>> previously had a Maxtor that died in the spring, it used to have an
>> almost completely failed SuSE installation at the time, took all of my
>> AI work with it. =\ It takes about 4.5 minutes to run
>>
>>     
>>>>> time ls -R /usr/portage > /dev/null
>>>>>           
>> A newer data drive failed on me, luckily I was able to pull all of my
>> data on it before it completely failed. I am now using a SATA drive via
>> an adapter as my data drive. I've only formatted 200gb of ~350gb.
>>
>>     
>>> 6. What brand of power supply are you using?
>>>       
>> Antec, 83% efficient. Best in the world. When the machine was first
>> built it had a very marginal bargain barrel supply, when I could afford
>> it, I upgraded to this one. The rails are *PERFECT*. I can even put an
>> oscilloscope on them if you don't believe me. Once again, THIS IS A
>> SOFTWARE PROBLEM, MY HARDWARE IS ***SUPERB***.
>>
>> That said, I've opened the money valves and have started acquiring parts
>> for my next computer which I hope to have fully assembled by the middle
>> of the afternoon on July 15 of next year. I expect the shake-down and
>> conditioning to last about three months at which point I'll begin using
>> it as my main machine.
>>
>> The key issue is that I don't want to be stuck in the slow lane memory
>> wise again, so if AMD can't get their shit together and produce a DDR3
>> Opteron, I'll have to buy intel. =(((
>>
>> --
>> DO NOT USE OBAMACARE.
>> DO NOT BUY OBAMACARE.
>> Powers are not rights.
>>
>>
>>     
>
>
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