Starting my ultra-portable PC project (PCp?) update Nov 26th

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tom61
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Post by tom61 »

8) Guess what I'm posting from.

Took me over 4 hours to get to this point, as the first re-install failed to complete, as I didn't format the drive on the first time (left the partitions from the previous install), but now the uPC's HD has a functional OS on it,

No pics right now, as I don't have a digi-cam currently (hopefully my B-Day will gain me a nice 5 megapixel camera). Just imagine all the parts I've shown so far strewn across brown carpet and hooked together, and you have a pretty good image of what it looks like right now.

This thing needs more RAM badly, it is sssllllooowww. 96MB is just not good enough for an OS + GUI IMO. The CPU being clocked to 600MHz isn't helping either. I can get it to 766MHz, but didn't want to cause any troubles with any mobo components during the install.

Still need to rig up the power circuit, make the audio cables, and build the VGA to PSOne cable, and then the electronics portion will be done. Software may cause some troubles, as I think Xorg is using the VESA drivers and not a hardware native one, which would cause a nice bottleneck for video(i.e. no divx till it's fixed).
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Post by soundwave »

Your progresses are extravagent and your final product will be great motivation to me and the rest of us, good job.
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Post by FDSMAN »

sure, price estiment in USD, lease
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teraflop122
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Post by teraflop122 »

This thing needs more RAM badly, it is sssllllooowww. 96MB is just not good enough for an OS + GUI IMO.
Strange. I remember (my family) having a PIII 450MHz with only 96MB ram, and it always ran just fine. Then again, I recently was working with a PIII 500 laptop with 64MB, and it was slow as heck... I wonder if there is another unforseen bottleneck in effect.

I finally got the money from my laptop sale, so I will be ordering parts and updating my own thread over the next few days. Once again, though, funds are gonna get real tight, real fast.

PS: The ultimate in low-energy, extremely small, and relatively modern motherboards:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... %3AIT&rd=1

The auction page, as you can see, tells you just about nothing. You can find the info by googling "PCM-9372", or just go to the advantech website.

EDIT: I'd so get that motherboard, but then I would need to work with voltage regulators, and they utterly failed me last time. If I wire the circuit in series, however, I would avoid my previous problem. -BUT, I would be sending +2 amps through the PSone screen. I'd appreciate suggestions, tom61 or anybody :?
tom61
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Post by tom61 »

FDSMAN wrote:sure, price estiment in USD, lease
I think I've spent around $500-600 so far. However, that is including things that didn't get integrated, so I'm not not sure how much is actually going in the box.
teraflop122 wrote:
This thing needs more RAM badly, it is sssllllooowww. 96MB is just not good enough for an OS + GUI IMO.
Strange. I remember (my family) having a PIII 450MHz with only 96MB ram, and it always ran just fine. Then again, I recently was working with a PIII 500 laptop with 64MB, and it was slow as heck... I wonder if there is another unforseen bottleneck in effect.
Depends on what you're used to. I remember playing around with Debian Linux on an old 486 with 8MB and 1MB video card, and it didn't feel that slow, compared to my main box at that time which was a Pentium 90 with 32MB EDO RAM. Now, even my speedy P90 is seen as slow as molasses, compared to the beasts of today.

There's a huge difference in performance between my 600MHz C3, 96MB SDRAM, 4200 RPM HD with 2MB cache, and 2.5MB video chip uPC system, compared to my Athlon XP 2600+ (333FSB), 512MB DDR RAM, 7200 RPM HD with 8MB cache, and 128MB video card. So, the uPC seems slow to me, even though it's faster than all the systems I've had up until my first Athlon XP system, combined. I went directly from a Pentium 200MHz to an Athlon XP 1500+, so that isn't saying much, though.
I finally got the money from my laptop sale, so I will be ordering parts and updating my own thread over the next few days. Once again, though, funds are gonna get real tight, real fast.
Good to here about you starting up the project again. Having a limited amount of funds is very difficult to work around.
PS: The ultimate in low-energy, extremely small, and relatively modern motherboards:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... %3AIT&rd=1

The auction page, as you can see, tells you just about nothing. You can find the info by googling "PCM-9372", or just go to the advantech website.
It's all good until I get to the part about the Savage 4, which AFAIK doesn't have DRI support under Linux (which means no video acceleration). Though, 400MHz would be even slower than my underclocked C3, the Via Eden isn't much faster than a C3.
EDIT: I'd so get that motherboard, but then I would need to work with voltage regulators, and they utterly failed me last time. If I wire the circuit in series, however, I would avoid my previous problem. -BUT, I would be sending +2 amps through the PSone screen. I'd appreciate suggestions, tom61 or anybody :?
Go with what the experts recommended me, a PWM. Also, you could get a 12V battery and uses a mini-ITX intended DC-DC converter instead.
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Post by xriverfalconx »

I'd would still like to do this, however I need to FINISH my other 3 projects still...these things are so time consuming =(

But I probably would get a touchscreen also but integrated into a micro case. =D

Can't wait to see the pictures...
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soundwave
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Post by soundwave »

Tom, how big is the final case thing? I remember seeing some pictures, but I didnt know actual sizes.
tom61
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Post by tom61 »

Nice large, 5 megapixel image of most of the parts:
http://tom61.arcadecontrols.com/pics/10 ... cparts.jpg

You can make out the brands of most of the chips, and read most of the labels on the motherboard. I probably could of gotten even the small text on the chips, if I had used a tripod.

Current status: Working on software right now. Ubuntu is on the uPC, but the video player crashes saying it could not start a GStreamer Play object. I think it's not detecting the audio chip, which is causing the trouble. I think I have the software needed to setup video for the PSOne screen, but I need to find out if Ubuntu is using accelerated drivers.

I've made a test cable for VGA to PSOne video. Only hardware I have not made test cables for is the audio, and power. Eventually I'll solder and heatshrink the test cables into permanent cables.
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Post by madc0w »

wow, thats pretty cool, does a live CD work?
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teraflop122
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Post by teraflop122 »

Heeyyyy, your Sabrent hdd looks just like my Sabrent hdd (except less generic)!
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Post by Darth Fett »

Good question,Madcow!Does a cd work on it? :?:
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tom61
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Post by tom61 »

I installed Ubuntu from CD, and I ran, err, crawled Knoppix on it(low RAM + live CD=ssssssssssslllllllllllloooooooooooowwwwwwww...).

I had to use two IDE 44 to 40 pin adapters to use a standard sized CDrom, and then later my DVD burner, to install Ubuntu. My old 40x CD reader was flaky, so I had to switch to something more reliable to install the second time.

After I grab more RAM I might try a live CD again.
tom61
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Post by tom61 »

For those curious about using regular sized IDE cdroms (note: 5MPixel image):
http://tom61.arcadecontrols.com/pics/ideadapters.jpg

Then the CDrom would plug into the wher the IDE cable is just dangling, and rest partially on top of the HD enclosure.

Current status:
Sitting in its box waiting for me to figure out how to drive the PSOne screen under Xorg. I was playing with modelines on my main box and hosed X11, so now I don't have a GUI (running from Knoppix right now). Could just be a coincidence, as the Ext2 partition on my main system got fairly corrupted not long ago (I'll be using Ext3 once I decide on a new distro).

Xorg doesn't need individual modelines for each resolution anymore it seems. I barely had anything at all in xorg.conf before I mucked it up. So, I'm not quite sure what exactly it needs.
tom61
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Post by tom61 »

I just have to bump this.

Not much to update, I've been busy with papers and studing for the finals that are coming up.

I hope to get it up and running during December break.
teraflop122
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Post by teraflop122 »

I hate to say this, but you could prolly fix all of your current problems by installing Windows 98. Really.
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