Mesa 7I76E

Hi I just got the Mesa 7i76E cause it had everything I needed for my maschine build. now I read the card needs the preempt kernel which is not recommended for running maschines Oo.
First of all is it as bad as it sounds?
Are there alternatives for the preempt kernel like some workaround with the rtai kernel?
This card has been around for wuite some time will future versions of linux cnc support it right out of the box?
thanks

You need the Preemptive kernel and it is suitable for running production machines. To install it, you could follow the excellent Linux Mint Tutorial, but also (and this answers your second question), You could use the very recent ISO that installs the latest version of Debian and the preemptive kernel.

Hopefully, somebody will post a link but it is linked to on the forum here somewhere.

I am somewhat envious because neither of these methods existed when I went to use my 7i76e a few months ago so I had to do it the (very) hard way.