Newbie- Need suggestions for EMC2 computer

[marzetti]

I've successfully installed EMC and have it running despite a severe latency problem (~900000). Surprisingly it does not seem to affect the results I get out of my gantry router but I would rather have things as they should be. I have installed EMC on 3 different computers and get similar results so now I am thinking of building a dedicated computer for the software. Can anyone suggest a motherboard and peripheral combination that will work reliably and hopefully be a low cost solution?

[samco]

I have used the intel atom boards with success.. Not stellar - but consistant.
With the livecd install - latencys are under 20us.

depends on what you need... only has 1 pci port.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-383-_-Product

sam

[samco]

otherwise.. (used is good also)

http://wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/emc...l?Latency-Test

sam

[posix]

any computer will do

[vlmarshall]

At first, I had a lot of trouble with latency spikes. After a lot of frustration and constant rebooting, while trying many combinations of BIOS setting, Video card, Network card, and even CD drive, I noticed that simply waiting 2 or 3 minutes after powerup takes care of the problem.

I've been using EMC trouble-free for a year now.

[bsdphk]

Originally Posted by vlmarshall At first, I had a lot of trouble with latency spikes.[...]

I have had very good experience using VIA EPIA-family boards for EMC2.

The VIA's are not as "advanced" as Intel and AMD cpus, which mean that their BIOS mucks about a lot less in system management mode, than the "smarter" competitors.

For real-time stuff like EMC2, that is a clear win for Via.

Poul-Henning
(..who writes Operating Systems for a living)

[lumberjack_jeff]

I had severe chronic latency when using the S3Virge driver, so I switched to the generic vesa driver and it's much better.

I then found that I had latency spikes due to max cpu utilization, so I run htop to monitor what processes are overtaxing my cpu. Specifically I found that on my machine the renderer on Axis consumes a great deal of computation capacity... so I use the DRO - much better results.