Hello All,

I am gearing up a dedicated machine for Mach3. It is an HP Netserver 800 I retired a few weeks ago. It has a pair of 866MHz P3s and 392 MB of RAM. I have done a fresh load on a clean drive of Windows Server 2003 standard. It has the APCI multiproc driver loaded, network adapter hard coded to 100FullDuplex, and no antivirus or other non-MS services running. It lopes along at 1-2% CPU utilization, 78 MB committed & 17 processes.

The driver appears to be loaded correctly in Hardware. When I run DriverTest.exe I get a 16,268-16,278 Pulse/sec rate in 25KHz mode, or right at 2/3 the expected 24,400-24,600 pulse rate--rather interesting... The CPU speed shows correctly at 866. APIC timing constant is 50.

Further, if I run the driver test a second time the machine hangs at "Taking Control in 1 sec". This is repeatable. Is that normal??

The question of importance here is:

Am I being foolish for screwing around with this old dual-proc machine for Mach service?
If I'm not being foolish, does anyone have any recommendations on how to solve the problem. Say the word and I'll build a new machine for Mach.

Thanks for your time and attention!!

David

Dave,

I see alot of folks worry around with an old PC and hardware and some wind up having a system that is marginal or not capable at all. Dell sells the dimension 2400 (2.4 Ghz celery-on) with XP OS installed for $299 delivered and it will run the heck out of Mach3 with a very smooth pulse train. It seems the dual processor boards and laptops are generally not very tolerant of having their timing taken over as Mach does.

Ron

P.S. Fryes sells an Athlon (I think) for $159 with no OS that is capable also.

Is there any way to lower the pulse rate? The reason I ask is because I have a 1.1G Dell 256K ram and it won't run my steppers. My 2.2 G Dell has no problem. 1G was recommended as a minimum.

I just set up a HP Netserver 2000r with 1 933 Piii and it runs Mach smooth as butter. 
I took the server software off and installed a copy of XP Pro. and thats it no fuss.

Best part about it was FREE!
Robert

Hmmm. I basically have the same setup, 1.1G Dell with 256K Ram and Window 2000 Professional NT and I can't get anywhere. All I'm trying to do right now is run the motors to check out the system and I'm having no luck at all. The diagnostics screen says I'm getting better than 25000 pulses. The nerve wracking part is that it runs on my 2.2G Dell. But that's my main computer.

Have you compared your BIOS setup(s) between the two Dell's?  I'd focus in on that to start with.  Make sure your parallel port is configured for bi directional and enabled.

I had a battle with a 1.8 emachine T series that I never could get it to run the driver test ($400.00 machine).  I stripped it down to bare minimum software and hardware, nothing... the only solution I could come up with in the end is that the onboard video was killing it.

Anyone want to buy a emachine!  Just kidding I gave it to the kids.

Robert

Hmmm. I basically have the same setup, 1.1G Dell with 256K Ram and Window 2000 Professional NT and I can't get anywhere. All I'm trying to do right now is run the motors to check out the system and I'm having no luck at all. The diagnostics screen says I'm getting better than 25000 pulses. The nerve wracking part is that it runs on my 2.2G Dell. But that's my main computer.

What exactly is happening? Have you run the driver test?