Uncreative Labs

Posted: Fri Jul 29, 2005 7:20 am

The question I have put shortly is: Is there a program out there that will allow me to share a generic program's processing with another system over a LAN? Or even preempt it?

Let me fully explain. I have a modest system (Win 98, P233, 96 MB RAM) that I use with a Max IC 3600A video conferencing/capture card. It does a good job, but uses a proprietary codec that the more powerful Windows NT based systems I have cannot use. In order to allow the more powerful systems to do anything with the video, I have to convert it to a form they can use. I get the best performance with uncompressed video, about 10 - 15 fps. If I compress it, I get something around 2-3 fps.

I save the video over the LAN, but I don't think this is the bottle neck. It's all 100 mbs and my laptop converts the video at around 40 fps over the LAN.

I think the best solution to this problem is to use a program that will distribute the processing load over the LAN. My laptop and desktop both usually have CPU to spare (unless I'm using them) and could be very helpful in this. The clustering programs I looked at all required the software to be written to take advantage of this.

Without spending more money, I'm pretty well locked in to this. I don't have a more powerful system free for use with Windows 98, and if I get too much more powerful of system Windows 98 will start to have trouble with it. (That's also why I save the video over the LAN. Windows 98 can't handle the 120 gig hard drive--trust me, I've tried.)

Joined: 02 Oct 2004 Posts: 594 Location: Western NC

You mean something like a Beowulf System for *NIX?

Never seen anything like it for Windoze...

Guest

more memory is the best answer
and 120g , yeah win 98 cannot handle that.

I read a paper the other day that win 98 was designed to work with drives up to 64mb. where was that info last yeqr?

we arr having problems and errors wih our win98 system and a 120 gb drive.
let me explain a bit

the mb, an epox mvp3 supports up to amd-k5-2 500mhz
it supports up to 80? gb drives tho i don't have a 80gb drive to try.

we put in the 120gb and it was not seen at all.
maxtor suggested a "compatibility jumnper" not documented we had master,slave, and cd.== just add a jumper here!

we did and it was seen but not a full capacity.
we bought a promise ultra ata 133 tx2 controller.

3 year guarantee and sanme as maxtor card according to maxtor
initially, i fdisked formatted it to 2-59/60 gb partitions.

I did use the newer fdisk for win98se, they saY IT IS THE FDISK FROM me.
dated 00 not 99. the d: was 59g ok but c fdisked at 59 and formattred
to 25gb,
i was afraid when my wife exceeded 25 gb it would crash.

I backed it all up and re-fdisked it to 3-40gb partitions scandisk and defrag worked again and all seemed normal. we are getting gradual corruption do not know why?

I used the newer fdisk although the older one from 98se is SUPPOSEd to work up to 64mb.. i have seen that fdisk screw up on smaller drives.

btw use the newer defrag it is faster.

Posted: Sat Jul 30, 2005 3:57 am

It's because Windows 98 does not know how to handle the large drive. When I upgraded to Server 2003, my hard drive has given me no further trouble.

To solve your problem, you ought to see if you can pick up something like Windows 2000 cheaply. Either that, or use Linux with Samba as network attached storage.

I'm not looking to put more hardware into that machine. It's got all that I can give it. If I buy anything else, it's going to be a new video capture card compatible with Server 2003 or WinXP.

Guest

I have been tempted to install w2000
as i have never seen any bad reports on it
one problem, the scanner may not work
we are using hp deskscanII ver 2.9
a old hp scanner with a isa scsi card.

yesterday, I swapped out the pc- meaning all parts moved from a epox amd k6-2 via chipser system
to a p 3-500 intel based system, I moved cards memory and drives to this other system

after asking many usual questions it settled down and is working wirthout the frequent errors. yes I KNOW you are supposed to reformat and re-install windows.
but my wife does everything except bake or cook supper on this pc and it was a time-limited situation.
the other system was a left-over from an upgrade.

Joined: 02 Oct 2004 Posts: 377 Location: Stuttgart, Germany

I use a symbios logic oem isa card for my hp scanner and I even got it to work under windows 2003. btu it was sooo buggy that I replaced it with a pci adaptec card that I got off ebay for $5. as a matter of fact I'm using teh scanner rigth now on windows 2003 sp1 with that pci card in an athlon xp 2600+. what I'm trying to get at is that those hp oem cards are usually not very stabel adn that u should get a brand name one, such as adaptec. that one works well under windows 2003, xp, 2000, 9x and probabaly even 3.x. For widnows 2003, 2000, and xp u don't even need dricvers, they come with the os. I'm nto sure about 9x and nt. I guess they come with at least nt 4.0.

Guest

I used an adaptec 2940 pci card with the h\p scanner unbtil 3 of them dies -- not recognized by the card--
I went back to the symbios logic ard as the connector mateched the cable
and because we swapped mb because the old one had problems
the current mb has fewer pci slots.
so for those reasons i switched to the slowerr card -- wunning 98se.

Posted: Mon Aug 01, 2005 2:12 am

How important is use of the scanner on the current machine? Sometimes it's better to set up a dedicated machine to do a task rather than put up with the problems from an all-in-one unit.

A KVM at Wal-mart runs about $24, so that means you only have to have one keyboard, mouse, and monitor on the desk. Then hook up a cross over cable between two NICs in the machines and you're in business.

Joined: 04 Oct 2004 Posts: 114 Location: ~/

Unless your mouse does not work with the KVM switch, in which case you have to have two mice on your desk.

Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 7

T-R-A wrote:

You mean something like a Beowulf System for *NIX?

Never seen anything like it for Windoze...

Even more, I think the application needs to be specifically written to work for Beowulf System.

Posted: Sat Aug 06, 2005 3:04 am

Quote:

Even more, I think the application needs to be specifically written to work for Beowulf System.

That's my problem. The software I have (Virtualdub) may be open-source, but I don't have the necessary experience with programming to get it to do its rendering across a LAN.

Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 7

You can visit :
http://www.beowulf.org/overview/faq.html

-- This is a FAQ about beowulf.

I Don't think it's a good avenue for this kind of problem.

You will see that is mainly intended for programs that need a huge amount of computing power like scientific apps.

And, me too, I'm not a programmer.

Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 7

Puckdropper wrote:

In order to allow the more powerful systems to do anything with the video, I have to convert it to a form they can use. I get the best performance with uncompressed video, about 10 - 15 fps. If I compress it, I get something around 2-3 fps.

I save the video over the LAN, but I don't think this is the bottle neck. It's all 100 mbs and my laptop converts the video at around 40 fps over the LAN.

Is it the conversion factor that result in a loss of FPS? (10-15 FPS vs 40)

If you monitor your CPU during viewing, maybe you can verify if it's your CPU that is the bottleneck.

Posted: Sat Aug 06, 2005 10:22 am

I'm pretty sure it'll be the CPU that's the bottleneck. I could try overclocking, but I don't want to overclock and run a CPU at 100% for several hours. I will look in to seeing if I can put more RAM in the machine, but I doubt it.

I don't remember if I tried running Win98 in a virtual machine to get the codec I needed. That may ultimately be the solution.

I should be able to pull at least 70 fps over the LAN, recompressing the video. That's what I'm getting now.