Is this a good Computer to use for EMC?

Thanks, Hopefully all goes well. have a nice day.

YES! Going to get the less powerful computer that has good latency, WOO!! One step closer to manufacturing my own stuff!

Okay, so i got my hands on my dad's old IBM Thinkpad laptop with a 25pin printer port.

it' has a 333MHz Intel Pentium II celeron processor with 4gb HDD and 250MB of RAM.

I ran the 2.3.X live cd since the new 2.4.4 wouldn't let me run the latency test (computer is very slow, might be the cd drive or just that it takes a long time to load, i'l stick with Ubuntu 8, and leave 10 alone).

I am wondering if the speed of the computer will effect using it for my cnc machine?

I get Latency test results:

.................................................Max Interval(ns)..............Max Jitter(ns)..............Last interval(ns)
Servo thread (1.0ms):......................1020831........................24549.............................9964XX <---XXX is numbers that are rapidly changing
Base thread (25.0us):..........................52991........................28686................................24XXX

So the latency is good. 25k, same as the old desktop i was going to use.

It takes quite along time to start up OpenOffice word processor.

Starting up EMC2 time was fast. The whole this is slow, but that is just when using the live cd. After i install it, it would go so much faster.

All i need to do now is make sure the power saving feature is turned off in the BIOS and things should run smooth.

BTW, i saw the file names for the old version (2.3.0) and it specifically says that it is the desktop version..... does that mean you guys have a laptop version? or is it just the desktop version of Ubuntu, and that if you want to have better performance on a latop, to install the laptop version of ubuntu and have to install EMC2 on your own?

It really does not take a lot of computer power to run EMC...

wiki.linuxcnc.org/emcinfo.pl?Hardware_Requirements

and it has been suggested even less will work depending on the set up.

Because of features such as power saving laptops tend to be considered less desirable for EMC.
If you are going to try the laptop be sure to run a long (several hours) latency test.

Rick G

Rick G wrote:

If you are going to try the laptop be sure to run a long (several hours) latency test.

Rick G

Sure thing. When ever I've done previous latency tests, I only test for maybe 5 - 10 min, I usually start the test, run some programs such as GIMP and the other ones that come with ubuntu. The test usually just go to a sertain amount and then stay like that until I stop the test. tomorrow I'll try the long test.

Been looking around in the BIOS for the IMB laptop

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Current Settings are:

~~~~~~~~~~~~Power Managment Options~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Will not enter standby even if the LID is closed"

---

[Disabled]
"Battery-low Warning Beep"

---

[Enabled]
"Sleep Upon Battery-low"

---

[Enabled]

~~~~~~~~~~~~Onboard Devices Configuation Options~~~~~~~~~~~~

Serial Port:
"Base Address"

---

[3F8h] Other options are: [2F8h], [3E8h],[2E8h]
"IRQ"

---

[4] Other option is [11]

Parallel Port:
"Base Address"

---

[3BCh] Other options are: [378h],[278h],[3BCh]
"IRQ"

---

[7] Other option is [5]
"Operation Mode"

---

[Bi-Directional] Other options are: [EEP],[ECP],[Standard]
"ECP DMA Channel"

---

[Depends on the operation mode]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So, unless the settings for the parallel port depends on the power used for the parallel port, i dont see many power saving options that i can disable. I sure hope that it isn't hardware related (other than the fact that it's a latop lol), and that it's just software based.

Any input will be greatly appreciate, thanks.

EDIT: By the way, this laptop is really old, it's from 1999, so i have a feeling that maybe it doesn't have any power saving, you can see it's specs on the other posts.
EDIT2: read around, people were mentioning that emc2 uses the port in EPP mode. Is that correct?If so, then i might have a problem