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Wahoo P4 Stratagem System Review
Ian Bell writes "Buddhacon reviews the P4 stratagem system from Wahoo Computers. Could this be the most powerful home system on the market? With just about every option available including an overclocked Intel 2.9GHz CPU, Radeon 9700PRO, 1GB of memory and all the cooling features you can think of you would think a system like this would blow the competition away. Just goes to show that sometimes a fine tuned V6 can beat an over the top V8."
But how will it heat my house in the winter?
sorry, I'll stick with an AMD
Chicago2600.net more than a lifestyle, its a survival trait.
Does anyone else think this sounds like Latin crossed with web-dotcom-buzzwords?
Christ people, this is starting to sicken me. I've got an iMac 333 G3, a couple P2 333 and an old P1 90. Unless you're doing something like heavy graphics editing, what the hell would you ever need something this powerful for? And over over six grand?
People, stop trying to build the fastest box imaginable, and thing serious. Use what you need for the job. Save money. Reuse old machines. Don't spend six grand on something you'll never need (well, you will, but probably when it costs more like a thousand bucks). If you can justify having this much power, okay, but otherwise, stop wasting time and money, and killing perfectly usable old boxen.
--
http://nemilar.net - Not your grandmother's soup kitchen
Amazing. That's just about the same specs that Maximum PC put in their Dream Machine 2002.
Of course, that was dead tree form, and 2 months ago, so Slashdot is amazed by this computer because it's advertised online.
All these componants are available, and have been for a while. If you want to make one of these, go for it. Grab a ThermalTake case or a VapoChill, an Intel board and 1GB of PC1066 with a 2.8/2.whatever, and go to town. Overclock your 9700 pro.
It's not special. It's just special to slashdot.
Or, if you prefer:
Old and busted... New hotness.
sig?
Well, in my case, it ends up being for games.
I can get an average of 40fps at 1024x768 in ut2k3 with everything turned on, and that makes me happy, and I'm running a fairly old system.
MSI k7tTurbo2 (kt133a Chipset)
512MB SDRAM (pc133)
Geforce3 ti200
01101001 01100001 01101101 01101110 01101111 01110100 01100001 01101100 01100001 01110111 01111001 01100101 01110010
I'd like the alienware Area51 laptop more
up to 3 GHz p4, even if it IS a desktop P4 and not a laptop one... that's what AC adaptors are for
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
but then I have to calculate the cost of savings by going with AMD, vs a P4 and divide that into the supposed heat savings, and I'll probably end up not giving a damn by the end of the calculations....
Chicago2600.net more than a lifestyle, its a survival trait.
Who, in their right mind, would buy one of these for $6536? You could easily build a faster system for 1/3 the price. It seems like a company that just doesn't know how to build computers. It comes with water cooling, but could only be overclock to 2.9GHz before it started becoming unstable. What? Why does it have a Zip drive if it comes with a CD and DVD burner? Why RAID-0 WD1200JB hard drives, and not a Cheetah 15k.3 for a boot drive? And most importantly, they don't seem to know how to ship a computer:
"Due to inadequate mounting procedures, the Radeon 9700's core was ripped from the card during shipping."
Equivalent watercooling System: $300
Enermax 550W Quiet Power Supply: $180
Case Fans: $20 (They're using panaflo L1A's for everything, an excellent choice for a watercooled system, but yes they really are this cheap)
Babybus: $40
Pentium4 3.0ghz
2x HDD Cooler: $25
Top of the line Granite Bay Motherboard: $200 (includes intel 10/100/1000 ethernet)
2x Sticks of 512mb Insane DDR of a brand of your choice : $400
Radeon 9700 pro : $270
Sound Blaster Live! Audigy Platnium : $200 (To anyone considering this -- DO NOT BUY IT -- go with terratek if you truly care about sound!)
2x WD1200JB Hard Drives: $280
Plextor CD-RW + HP DVD+RW Drives : $450
Zip Disk + Floppy: $35
Hardware Modem: $50
WinXP Pro: $170
Total: $3662
That is a FREEGING HUGE PRICE DIFFERENCE. Your paying about $3000 for the case plus them putting it together. I mean, I know that there are people willing to pay quite a premium for a well built system they don't have the time to research -- but jesus chrirst $3000 is nuts. This article is just more free advertising for some random company.
Ok, was it just me, or did the "forum links" on the side bar read like a troll's wetdream?
Orgasms from around the world by dang
- International Music by dang
- From Russia, with lots of tongue by twitch
- Whoa, girls come here!? by twitch
- Kung Fu Stick fighting, episode 3! by Kernobi
- Man To Get 3 Years in Prison for Pretending to be Will Smith by Kernobi
- Eew! Urine skincare products by Kernobi
- What is a girls favorite sexual position? by Kernobi
- Girlfriends and video games do they mix? by Kernobi
- OMG look at these boobs by Kernobi
01101001 01100001 01101101 01101110 01101111 01110100 01100001 01101100 01100001 01110111 01111001 01100101 01110010
I disagree with your viewpoint. I'm one of those people that upgrades (or rather buy new) their machines as soon as something faster comes round. Why do I do it, as my old machine is obviously fast enough for any normal purpose? Well, a couple of reasons: 1) Games! I play a lot of graphics intensive games that can really use all the oomph you can wring out of the hardware. Call me shallow, and I shall ignore you! ;-)
2) I recycle my old machine to neighbours, friends and charity. Two weeks ago, I gave away my XP2400+/512Mb/180Gb/GnuLinux system to a local organisation that works with handicapped children.
3) I like to build machines from parts I get from all over the place. I usually lead the local stores in performance by at least half a year. Again, I know this is a weird thing but I enjoy that.
Anyway, while I don't *need* to upgrade, I frequently do: about every three months.
Ciao!
!ERR: Signature not found.
And in the 1970's, they thought that digital watches were the coolest thing. Sure, this machine almost fast enough to divx my library of DVDs before I die, but that's not real computing. What I'm waiting for is a machine powerful enough to calculate the DNA sequences for artificial life. Now that's hard work. Another 20 years or so of Moore's law, and we'll be there. Then I can just scan and clone myself, with a few improvements.
Sig for sale or rent. One previous user. Inquire within.
Before people say that this is different because it's a desktop (unmodified), do I need to point out that the average user won't need this much power? The people that buy this will be rich techies, or businesses. Alot of techies prefer dual CPU stuff for the value, so this has no real market. Too new, too expensive.
What makes a man want to be a mouse? (Python's Flying Circus)
"Most powerful home system"? 3.06GHz P4s are available, I don't understand why this system has a 2.8 overclocked to 2.9?
-Berj
I think it's absolutely STUPID to say that a P2 333 is 'fast enough' for home use. Granted, 3GHz might be overkill at the moment *only* because of how expensive it is, but there are definitely reasons to have a fast machine.
Hell, even if you disregard every single cool application that either runs better or needs a fast machine to run, it's worth getting a fast machine simply for how responsive it is.
-Berj
Sheesh, i overclocked my 1.8 p4 to that without watercooling even. antek server case, and thermaltake dragon cpu fan. While I understand the built in tempreture sensors in a P4 chip that prevent overheating, what is there to stop you from frying your nice radeon 9700 and haveing a first class door stop? correct me if i'm wrong but isn't the latest ddr fastaer anyways? throw in the fact that this thing is useing a PCI card for a raid controller (i don't care if the motherboard has gigabit, get one with a raid controller, like the nice ABIT) the only articles i'd want to see would either be on what the heck these "duel bios" motherboard are all about, and why the heck hasn't their been more fanfair over abits "legacy free" motherboards (screw ps2 and serial and the endless irq conflicts)
come comment on the madness at http://slashdot.org/~phreak03/journal/
I pretty agree with you but, where do you find old boxes ? The whole computer market is overclocked overheated and overmoneyed ! I got my AMD 550MHz since three years now, and wouldn't give it away, but even that is too much for the use I have : wife's reading and sending mail, sister surfing on the Internet, myself got not enough time to really appreciat the power. But now there are 2GHz and more, cool yeah, but does it really enhance working speed ?? It allows you to faster kill in Quake3 (or alike), but that's pretty all it does !
n-e
Really, I swear!
Chicago2600.net more than a lifestyle, its a survival trait.
the reason I would buy the thing is because my penis is small. That machine will make others believe otherwise. Plus it has an AWESOME DVD burner, in blue no less!
Paint.NET, a Free Image Editor, with Source Code Available!
Why are people remotely excited about this?
I figured that some poster had managed to sucker the editors into putting an ad up, but apparently people are really into this.
Can anyone tell me why people *care* about this? There's nothing particularly significant about this computer. It's not on the level of people introducing case windows for the first time, nor is it a never-before-done hardware hack. Some guy tossed a bunch of stuff that's already been done into a case, and is selling it for a *lot* of money. Big whoop.
This doesn't have unparalleled performance, since Sun sells systems that can smoke this thing.
It doesn't let home users do anything they couldn't do before, since no software requires this, and in two years it's going to be a middling system.
It's just another currently high-end x86 system. You can get things like this from a *ton* of vendors, with overclocking even.
May we never see th
Most people don't need a Porsche either, but I sure as hell enjoy mine.
Consider this a "luxery PC" and the market for these items is generally small, but profitable.
Stanley Feinbaum, professional journalist and master debater! God bless the USA!
I think it's absolutely STUPID to say that a P2 333 is 'fast enough' for home use.
All depends on what you're using, doesn't it?
XP is pretty awful on something like that, but Linux is more than happy on a system of that caliber.
May we never see th
That's the problem with old boxes : a lot of noise.
I gotta disagree. Fans tend to get noisier over time, but as long as you're PIII/K6 era or before, you have far less heat generated than an Athlon or a P4. Which means you can run quieter fans.
I know someone with a 486 and no fans.
May we never see th
...jeez, I'm in the wrong line of work.
I go to college in a small town, and thus I pay my college bills by working for Best Buy. We carry Alienware systems (well, carry is the wrong word, since they're ordered through our store but there are no pre-built systems kicking around). As I walk by our demo unit, I often ponder the market for systems like Alienware, Falcon Northwest, and these Wahoo Fellas. These guys are all using standard component parts, (in the case of Alienware, readily available cases from Chieftec and standard off-the-shelf boards components). In the case of companies like Wahoo and Falcon Northwest, they even tell you the actual Mobo, RAM, Hard disk, etc. manufacturers. So honestly, where is their market?
Retail Boxed PCs have the ignorant consumer who knows the brand name. Screwdriver shops have the slightly more informed consumer looking to save a buck or get more standardized parts (or the geek who doesn't feel like spending his day off building a PC). But these companies seem to charge an extreme premium for their products, given that most screwdriver shops would sell you the exact same parts and assemble them in the same manner (maybe not this watercooling business, but I know of a couple shops that would probably do that). The best I can figure is heavily spoiled 14 year-old boys who know that the Radeon 9700 is good because they saw it on PlanetQuake, but you can't build a computer company on the whims of 14 year-old boys (can you?!?). So seriously, I'd like some input here. Does anyone own, for example, an Alienware or similar system? Do you know someone who owns one? What was the motivation for the purchase? Since it's the only item I can really quantify that they might offer beyond the local shop, do these "premium" PC companies have tech support that's really that much better (or honestly, necessary) than the screwdriver shop that'll sell you the same PC, built with the same parts, for $500 less?
I've been building a new server on a 150Mhz 486 p54C Overdrive with 64mB RAM, it chugs along quite nicely compiling Apache et al.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
why do we always get this idiotic V6, V8 and turbo crap? A V6 of x displacement will be broadly equivalent in power and torque output to a V8 of the same displacement - the car engine/CPU analogy NEVER FUCKING WORKS.
So stop it.
That was classic intercourse!
...it might just be me, but I swear the first page says it has a 2.8 P4 overclocked to 2.9, but the last pages says a 2.53 and no mention of overclocking.
I would hate to pay $6500 and be slighted 370 mhz of performance...
Note to self: No more arguing with the faithful.
They're both friends of my younger brother. Other than the fact that they're 18, you're right - they're boys whose parents have too much money. They go for the PC's like Alienware because they heard that Alienware makes the best computers for gaming, but they really don't know jack/shit about what makes a computer good for gaming.
Coincidentally, most of the kids in this same crowd also have Honda Civics and the like with just about every sort of "racing mod" (their word) imaginable except the ones that would improve a car's performance or handling very much - $400 performance clutches w/ aluminum flywheels on a car that still has the original 1.2L engine and the like.
my 2 word rebute...
doom 3
It doesn't matter if this computer is a good deal or a bad one, if the components are well chosen or not, if the construction quality is amazing or if the whole thing just looks cheesy, the real question is this: how is this news?
Someone throws standard retail components into a custom-designed case, sells it for way more than it's worth, and somehow we care?
Computers are not cars, there is no art to tweaking them at the hardware level. Put prefabricated components together in the right way, and you have a computer. There are many hardware sites dedicated to this; let this kind of article be posted there.
This whole case-modding culture is a joke if you think about it. It's the computer equivalent of bored rich kids paying someone to put the world's largest spoiler on a civic.
Nix absolutably seriousness.
V6 engines normally outperform a V8 with the same size - the V6 has less rotary momentum to worry about, and so has a faster rev increase. V8s have a higher rotary momentum (more pistons), and so will be slower to rev.
Just a little side-piece...
Hey, I have a great idea. How about you not telling us what we should spend our money on.
I'm not trying to be harsh, but every time an article is posted about a faster chip, bigger hard drive, or overclocking, you mofos come out of the woodwork and tell us we are stupid. It just gets really old.
I personally have a K6-500 that I use as a file server. I have used it to surf the internet, but with new software (Mozilla, KDE, WinXP, etc...) it really bogs. I could probably use an older version of Windows or KDE and swap out Mozilla for lynx, but I don't want to. I want to use the latest, bug ridden software. And I want to have a fast computer.
Stop telling us that our hobbies sicken you. Stop telling us where our money is best spent. Let us have our fun.
I'd rather you do it wrong, than for me to have to do it at all.
cd linux*
make xconfig
make dep
make bzImage
Try doing that on one of them pokey computers and then realizing you forgot to include the module for your sound card after you reboot the new kernel. Back to the drawing board. Of course, a $200 microtel pc from Walmart would probably do the trick, but if these kids wanna inflate the economy, I ain't stopping them.
Karma: Not Particularly Funny.
I find spending a couple of hours with PhotoShop provides much clearer proof for the doubters.
Oh great.
Striped array with no parity is exactly what I want to use on consumer grade IDE HDs. </sarcasm>
For that price, I'd expect RAID5.
If J.K.R wrote Windows: Puteulanus fenestra mortalis!
my 2 word rebute...
doom 3
when Doom3 finally goes Gold, this System will be outperformed by $999 boxes from Walmart...
I can get an average of about 50fps at 1024x768 32-bit colour with everything up full on my PC with 256mb (ECC DDR) and a GeForce 2mx on Linux. Looking at the difference in memory speed there, it goes to show that your quicker graphics card makes a huge difference. When my PC starts to feel slow though, I'll spend about £120 and throw in another AMD 1600+ MP chip. Who needs overclocking (or central heating) ;-)
Follow me
heavy graphics editing doesnt even need this... Hell, non linear video editing doesnt need this.
I edit on a Dual P-III 866 and a 10 minute short with lots of work in it take less than 20 minutes to render (Dv video source Dv video out or mpeg2) The AVID's at work use Pentium-II 550's single processor and they are the top of the line PROFESSIONAL video editing stations not toys.
The only thing I can think of that explains why people are building ultra-fast machines is that they are preparing for either the next Windows release or the next Gnome or KDE release.
(Yes, I am bitter that Gnome and KDE are as slow as the Microsoft operating systems on their own. time to stop or remove "features" and start making it faster.)
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
what the hell would you ever need something this powerful for?
"I'll take trolls that got modded up for $100, Alex."
<sarcasm>
Oh, I don't know... I swear, these people buying these new-fangled computer things are out of their mindes. They've obviously never seen the kick ass integer benchmarks of my abacus.
</sarcasm>
---
DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
my p233 ran with 2 fans at 5v, silently, for quite a while. now they're back at 12v, but just because it's stuffed into a motherboard (i.e. cardboard) box, and space is tight, so i figure i shouldnt skimp on cooling :P
:)
anyways, while a 233 surely is not sufficient for a modern desktop, an athlon 1600 or so sure is, and they're about $60. not sure why people need the biggest baddest stuff, well ok maybe i am sure. ego boost
makes you wonder whether people that buy this stuff are just rich and dont give a crap, or they actually have save up for a while to afford it. if the latter, then man...poor fools....
No, this is a long way from the best system I have ever seen. I'm going to be harsh and say why...
What's with the shitty toggle switch "baybus" fan controllers? The site reports that the fans don't even start on the lowest speed. That isn't good engineering, and they shouldn't really ship a product like that. I would expect all the fans to be intelligently controlled by a microprocessor independant of the motherboard. This would include fan failure detection, CPU throttling etc.
They've put a live drive behind a door... erm, isn't that a little stupid? Now you're going to have to leave the door open all the time, or hack a hole in it, or not use the live drive.. oh well/
Raid 0 with no proper backup? I don't think so. I've seen far too many people lose data on raid 0 now to ever use it. At this kind of price, it would be nice to see two very fast and small scsi drives raided for a boot drive. Then larger IDE drives for data. But still no raid 0.
There seems to be some confusion about SCSI and IDE. People suddenly thought that IDE drives were better, especially in RAIDs... and it's plain wrong. SCSI is more reliable (the drives are built far better), it is faster, the bus is quicker. When you are doing things like photo or video editing, then having a fast page file and scratch disk is very important. SCSI has lower access and seek times, and the difference notices a hell of a lot.
The paint job looks pretty shite as well.
I just don't believe they are charging that much for this system. It's not amazing or anything.
Something that beats it? Go to The Overclocking Store and take a look at their Advance Micronics systems. Refigerator based cooling, complete systems, which are better configured and specced. You get an LCD and bluetooth mouse and keyboard for less than the system in the slashdot story. But...
"Stupid" would be saying its not fast enough without giving a reason why.
Most people browse the web and check their email. Its only fairly recently that even our office computers have got faster than 333mhz. We still run one on a P133 and up to a few months ago another P133 was hosting a database and some software (running NT) and it was fast enough.
no sig.
Why did I buy alienware? Summer before last my computer began to break down - CD burner and monitor both died about a week apart, and the main hard drive started misbehaving - and since it was a 4 year old box I started looking at my replacement options...
I originally looked at purchasing parts and assembling a system piecemeal. I discovered that living where I did (middle of nowhere town in NEw Brunswick, Canada) I'd have to have everything shipped - most of it from the states. After I totaled up the cost of shipping and customs duties for the parts, and then factored in the time required for me to assemble it, I realized it would be about the same cost as buying what I wanted, pre=assembled and warrentied, from Alienware (w/free shipping). Free shipping really helped - as well as the fact that when my nice big Alienware box crossed the border the customs official informed me that as an international student residing temporarily in Canada I wasn't required to pay duty (something I wouldn't have discovered if I had made a bunch of small purchases not requiring me to speak on the phone with customs).
As for what they offer as added value, the support people that I talked to when I had problems with my box were first-rate. The ONLY help desk people I've ever spoken with who didn't treat me like a moron and actually listened to me.
In July O7, I got a mac pro. There's no punchline. Just endless joy and wonder.
With the growing capabilities of clustering even workstations no one really needs one single ultra powered workstation. The bragging value may be high but its not worth the money. No computer have ever got a nerd laid to my knowledge.
A friend of mine bought a high end state-of-the art system for about 5000$ and now its worth nothing, only two years later. The only thing worth anything is the monitor, the rest is now history.
when software comes that requires this kind of CPU power in a single workstation (Windows 2010?) the computers will jump up in spead rather fast. until then the people paying 6000$ for something they dont really need or have use for are as fooled as those who buys Porches.
PS. Atleast a Porche draws chicks, computers dont. DS
HTTP/1.1 400
I agree with many of the comments so far. This really isn't anything special. There are plenty of vendors out there that sell better systems for less money.
This box is nothing more than an overstuffed behmoth. If you want to see some really cool systems, look to the [H]ard|Forum and you'll be blown away at what a bunch of [H]ardcore [H]ardware geeks can do in their garages.
And if you really want someone else to build it for you, look around, there are much better deals out there.
Now, solitaire won't frame anymore and I can keep my beer cool right inside my cabinet so I don't have to make frequent trips to the fridge while playing!!
...
I can SEE 20 frames per second.. individually, that's below the point my eye needs to create the illusion of motion. (incidentally, I frequently notice shuddering on film)
I stop noticing fps improvements at ~70fps
Actually, the Thoroughbred core versions of the XP processors are *much* cooler than the Palomino. I have two 1700+ chips, one with each core, in identical (tiny) aluminum cases. The Palomino runs far hotter than the Tbred. Oddly, much hotter than seems to be accounted for by the 64 vs 49 watt power consumption they are respectively rated. The Palomino, btw, has now been upgraded with faster (and louder!) fans but the box still runs much hotter.
Bottom line, a Tbred is only useful for heating a small room. For a whole house, specify 'Palomino core'.
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Geeky modern art T-shirts
I can see the difference between 25 and 50 fps, but a game running at 25 fps (or even 15 fps) doesn't bother me much, as long as the framerate stays constant. What bothers me more is when a game runs at 100 fps most of the time, then slows down to 3 when there is lots of action on screen, then speeds up again.
Christ almighty, read that site banner:
Slashdot: News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters.
Joe average, the guy you are describing, has no idea where to find Slashdot. I certainly don't read this site so that I can see what passes for "good enough" in non-technical circles.
I want to know about:
- the latest and greatest
- cool uses for existing technology
- technology used in ways that it was never intended
- things that have never been done before
Stop acting as if this is a site dedicated to the least common denominator. It's not, and if it ever becomes so, as you suggest, I'll go somewhere else. If you're looking for the former, go read C|net.For those that would die defending it, Freedom
has a sweet taste that the protected will never know.
If you calculate the whole thing using an old Pentium 90 chip you can probably save yourself millions.
Hmmm, maybe they just forgot to upgrade the accountant PC's over at Enron and WorldCom...
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Case in point, if a 4 cylinder turbo is so much better than a V6, V8, V10, etc, then why don't you see Indy cars, Top Fuel dragsters, or exotic super cars running them?
;-) There are very few cars that can outperform a Lotus Elise.
hmm, someone has never seen the WRC. The WRC spec Subaru WRX has a 2.0L 4 cylinder engine. It has been tested to go 0-60 in 4.3 seconds... on loose gravel!
I guess Lotus isn't an exotic supercar manufacturer any more
How about a Hayabusa? Its nice little naturally aspirated four takes it to 200mph very easily, once you replace the factory chip.
There is no substitute for displacement.
Keep telling yourself that every time you fill up your tank.
THERE IS NO DATA. THERE IS O
2002 Lotus Elise - 0-60 in 5.7 seconds, top speed 125mph. Did you mean there are very few trucks that can outperform it? :) Not to mention it weighs 1600 lbs...
A Hayabusa? That's a Motorcycle, no? What's it weigh, 500lbs at most? Non-sequitor anyone? Are you familiar with the concept of power to weight ratios?
I'm afraid your three red herrings aren't that red, and don't refute his argument either.
I missed the part where you told me about the WRX, why'd you completely ignore it?
A stock elise goes 0-60 in 5.7, but any Elise can outhandle just about any car on the road. It only weighs 1600# because it has a 4cyl engine, not a big bulky 8cyl.
My point is that power-to-weight and handling are everything. Displacement has nothing to do with it.
His numbered points make sense, but the rest is BS.
THERE IS NO DATA. THERE IS O
Well, 6 grand *is* a bit of overkill considering you can build something that is about 90% as fast for right about $1000.
... but can it do that and run 4x FSAA at the same time?
But really, its all about image quality. Sure your 2 year old computer will run Unreal Tournament just fine at a framerate thats fast enough that you can't tell the difference if it were higher
It just cracks me up that this overpriced machine is already behind the technology curve. The motherboard they chose does not support the new 8x AGP standard, so for that reason they are not getting full use of their Radeon 9700 card. (It will sync to 4x AGP.)
And too bad they didn't choose the 3.06 Ghz P4 with Hyperthreading -- yet another new feature this machine of yesterday does not support.
And what about Serial ATA (SATA) hard drives? A year from now, when pretty much every drive sold is SATA, the owner of this dinosaur will be sorry they didn't have the foresight to include support for this technology.
Several other posters seem enamored with the DVD+RW drive that is included, but a better choice would be the new Sony drive that supports DVD+RW, DVD+R as well as DVD-RW and DVD-R. (Yes, those dashes and plus signs mean different things folks!)
I could build a more modern machine that supports all of the important technologies listed above for half the price, without all the punk-ass neon light shit.
Sorry Hoss, but you're not even close on this one.
The amount of _torque_ an engine puts out is (to grossly simplify) a function of its displacement.
The amount of _power_ produced is torque over time, so it is a function of displacement times engine RPM.
At no time does cylinder count enter into this. Two given engines, one a V12 and the other an I4, of the same displacement and turning the same RPM should, all else being equal, produce equal power levels.
Where the real world starts intruding is when you start increasing displacement. Ignoring forced induction for a second, you increase displacement by adding bore diameter, stroke length, or additional cylinders.
As you increase bore diameter and/or stroke length, you tend to increase the inertial loads on the con rods, and these loads increase as a function of a power of engine RPM. Given that there is a fixed strength amount for reasonable materials used in non-racing engines, increasing displacement by going to a bigger bore or a longer stroke means reducing maximum RPM potential.
For a big diesel where redline is often less than 3000 RPM, this isn't an issue, so you take advantage of the natural balance of the I6 and make the bores and strokes as big as you like.
But on passenger car engines, and especially in racing engines, adding displacment while retaining RPM capacity means adding cylinders.
Once you start doing that, the primary constraint becomes packaging - all else being equal, a 4 litre I8 will be twice as long as a 2 litre I4, but a 4 litre V8 is only slightly longer (but wider) than a 2 litre I4.
DG
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
This sure seems like an ad to me. It's definetly not "news for nerds" or even "stuff that matters".
Is Slashdot selling out quietly?
And how much do you drive your car on "loose gravel" anyways?
well i've been driving through inches of snow and ice for the past few weeks. i only drive on "loose gravel" about once a month.
The Sub produces pretty good HP, but at what RPM? Lets not even start talking about torque
no really, lets talk about it...
Power 223.7 kw / 300.0 bhp @ 5500 rpm
Torque 490 nm / 361.4 ft lbs
You're not going to see any Cobras or Z06's passing this one any time soon.
THERE IS NO DATA. THERE IS O
I agree that you wouldn't want an 1100hp 4cyl car as a reliable daily driver.
The Elise is $35k. Have you ever seen Elise's (or Miata's, or S2000's) at SCCA events? They clean house.
I can't argue price/performance, but its your definition of performance that I disagree with. You say performance is displacement, I say performance is power-to-weight and handling.
The original argument that I tried to make, and failed miserably (no I wasn't on the debate team), was that there are many factors that can make for a fast vehicle, and the number of cylinders (8 vs. 6 vs. 4 vs. etc...) doesn't always have a direct relationship with "performance".
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That has already been done.
The Ford Mustang has had the DOHC EFI V8 for some time now. The displacement went from 5.0 to 4.7 but the power stayed about the same. Hardly the "double the power output" that you claim.
4700cc making ~300 hp, at the crank, is no big deal. Especially in the 2 wheeled world where 599cc makes over 105hp, at the rear wheel (120ish at the crank).
As far as cubic inches versus hp, it is not a linear relationship. The higher the cubes, the less hp per cube. That is why a Chevy 454 makes not much more power than a 350. You would expect more, until you account for the fact that the 350 can rev faster, longer, and more reliably than the 454 can.
Obviously not played UT2K3 then? Or even JKII? My current games machine is a 1.2Ghz Athlon on an Asus m/b with 256Mb DDR ram, and a GeForce 256 DDR and UT2K3 is just about playable at 800x600, but with most of the prettiness turned off. Now obviously, I don't need half of the junk in that $6K box (the flashing lights for example - how many extra FPS do I get for blue glow in the dark lighting?) but I do need more rendering power - and more ram, and then of course, to feed my shiny new 9700pro, I need an 8x AGP port, and a faster CPU, so better get a new m/b too! This will all probably need more power, and generate more heat, so more fans, bigger or more PSU's...
:)
Serious gaming doesn't happen on a Playstation - they may have optimised architecture for video gaming, but this cripples them for everything else - and you need masses of storage, and a general purpose OS for serious multiplayer games.
iMacs are fine machines, but I would be unhappy about the lack of upgrade options.
Games aside, you make some very valid points though - I recently retired my Slackware 3.6 box that I've had on my network for 6 years (internet/mail/news gateway) - and then only as it had no PCI slots - and I needed one for my ISDN ta when I finally threw out the modem I was using for Internet access.. It gathered dust in the corner with no monitor or keyboard for those 6 years. My games machine on the other hand has had almost all parts upgraded at some point though - online gaming is incredibly competitive in certain circles, and players who can afford to avail themselves of the latest kit will always have an advantage. Besides - I'd hate to think I'd spent £40 on a game but my ancient video hardware makes it look like Quake in software mode
Not really. Server chipsets are optimized for I/O, processor and reliability, not graphics. Dell uses Serverworks and Intel E7500 chipsets. The AGP performance you need for gaming would lag behind the desktop chipsets.
Still, if you didn't need the AGP performance, a Poweredge 1600SC with dual 2.4Ghz Xeons, 1GB RAM and a 10K rpm SCSI drive runs you about $2000. Dual 2.8G Xeons is about $800 more.
The people who do not understand why this system is so expensive have not had experience selling to people with lots of money. That sounds a little strange so let me give you an example (a strange one but it works). A few years back I used to raise and show rabbits (pedigreed fancy rabbits, look up the American Netherland Dwarf Rabbit Club or American Rabbit Breeders Association for more info). We would occasionally sell stock at some of the shows. One of the places we sold lots of rabbits was the State Fair. While watching the crowd go buy and talking to people interested in buying, I ran across some horse people (there was a very large Quarter Horse show at this fair). I had some pet quality stock there that I would have sold at a flea market for $10 to $20. For the fair the price was slightly higher, say $20 to $30. The horse people remarked that my rabbits were a lot cheaper than the guy whom they had just spoken to. I explained that we do not try to make money off of stock just to cover feed costs, I also pointed out that the stock I had was from more prestigious blood lines. They bought the most expensive and lower quality animals. Their reason? They said they didn't want a cheap rabbit, they wanted and expensive one. The price tag is a prestige item more than what they are buying. That is why this company will make money. People with money don't really care $6k to someone willing to pay $6k for a computer is peanuts.
In addition, I'd like to throw out my two cents. I own an LT1 equipped Camaro, and love the feel of the car. It's not exactly nimble in the turns, but the out and out growl and torque are impressive for a sub 25000$ (new) car.
:) Gotta love that!
As I understand it, the block for the LT1 has remained fairly unchanged for a few decades... Now, what's in a block? A piece of steel, bored to X dimensions etc. The real fun at that point is introducing a new cam, new timings, different fuel map ratios, etc. The engines of today may have their roots in early 1900's design technology, but things such as aluminum heads (and aluminum block for the ls1, if I'm not mistaken) and better mapping of spark and fuel metering lead to improvements in the overall performance and efficiency from the engine.
And I do get 30mpg on the freeway.
Karnal
Yeah, but this isn't a Porsche - it's a tricked out '57 Chevy Coupe with fuzzy dice hanging from the rear-view mirror. If you really want to drive that kind of clown car, I got true symapthy for you.
I'd think of the Apple line as a Porsche.
That is all.
As proof, consider the V8 swaps that have been done into small cars such as the Fiero or even the Chevette. (My first car was an '80 Chevette...a bigger engine would've kicked ass. :-) )
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
1. Wrong! Hi revs is a matter of bore to stroke ratio. New bikes motors are over square, ie bore > stroke. On the order of 1.5 to 1.0. Similar to "stroking" a motor to get better torque, you "bore" it for higher rpm capabilities (with the right pistons/rings/con rods/valves/springs etc) for each idea of course.
;-)
2. Variable valve timing is to make up for inadeqaute port flow. Clean up the intake/exhaust ports and the need is very much reduced for this kinda thing.
3. Not realistic is it
4. Don't bring torque into this... 'there is no replacement for displacement' *cough* when you are talking torque. This is where reciprocating mass is important.
Anyways... hi tech is hydraulic valves, Ti components etc. What most, not all, but most, guys do to their Civics is what guys have been doing to their Chevy/Ford/Mopar for decades now. Cheap, effective mods.
Hah, my roommate is definitely one of those kids. He paid big bucks to get a top-of-the-line Alienware computer, but for the first six months of using it, somehow he managed to have his CPU underclocked - the bus was set to 100 mhz instead of the 133 his Athlon is meant to use, but the multiplier was unchanged, meaning his 1.4 ghz cpu was running at about 1 ghz. Ooops.
The first ever Ultimate Frisbee video game: here (now
Ok, if you're going to get technical...
Z06 = ~$45000 USD
WRX = ~$23000 USD
Now let's spend the $22K difference to make it even...
Well for <$5K we could take it up to 368HP with this stage 4 kit. Lets say it takes 15 hours for a professional installation at $100/hour then that takes us up another $1500 bringing us to a total of $29500.
Now let's smack on a Stage 3 short block for more reliability. That's another $6700 including labor. That takes us up to $36200.
Even though the AWD will easily make up the difference of HP vs. RWD (unless we're driving on a nice hot track) lets spend $2k more on a nitrous kit just to make sure we can embarass the Z06.
That only takes us up to $38200.
$4000 for a stage 3 suspension kit. Taking us to $42000.
Wheels: 4 17x7.5 Prodrive GC-06D $1,900
Tires: 4 225/45YR17 BFGoodrich g-Force T/A KD $780
That will take us up to ~$45000. For a machine that will embarass pretty much anything else in that price range. You could argue the reliability of the WRX, but when you're comparing it with an American car is that really relevant?
Personally I'd rather just spend $12K on a Hayabusa (yes it is a motorcycle, yes it ONLY has a 4cyl engine) and embarass them both.
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Journalists don't need to spell... that's what they have editors for.
Too bad it is in one of those f'g-boy glow in the dark geek cases...
And then the money you made on the last 30 systems you built, gets given to a charity... which is a wonderful idea, but 1x XP2400 with the specs you mentioned is the equivalent in cost to about 6x Celerons... now which do you think would be more useful to said charity?
Personally, unless you have a grand plan along the lines of giving that charity 5x more PCs or something, you're wasting money, despite whether you can technically 'afford it', I hate to think of all the handicapped children vying to use 1 PC...
-VolVE
I'm running galeon, pan, sawfish, and a buncha rxvts along with xmms right now. xmixer. gkrellm. sawfish's pager. Solid dragging in sawfish. And that's on a slower system (PII/266 instead of PII/333).
It runs fine, and there are gtk2 apps with antialiased text in there. Granted, I'm not using E's "reflection" plugin or anything like that, and it wasn't too long ago that mozilla ran too slowly on a system like this, but it's fine now.
May we never see th
yeah, because the Z06 handles great in the 12"+ of snow we have.
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1. You make too many assumptions when you are talking about bore versus rpm. My knowledge is in 2 different areas, old Chevy motors (350) and modern motorcycle engines.
;-)
With bikes, to get the high hp numbers there are 2 ways to do it: rpm or displacement.
Bike racing is based on displacement classes; ie 600cc 750cc 1000cc and then 2 cycle or 4 cycle (trying to mix those is a bitch and someone always complains of a disadvantage, ala Nascar). In the past 12 years that I have been a fan/enthusiast a lot of things have changed. EFI is here now. New "exotic" materials with specific properties for specific circumstances (iron block and aluminum heads... i wonder why they leak?). One side effect is coated cylinder liners that offer lower friction than regular uncoated liner.
Ever increasing bore sizes. To get down the straight faster means hp, seeming as how hp is a function of distance/mass/time. One thing a bigger bore gets you that is often ignored is better breathing. More valve edge distance; via bigger valves, or more of them (Yamaha/Honda uses 5 per cylinder in some motors instead of 4).
Oh yes, as I re-read your comment, piston goes up and down twice per combustion cycle (rpm) in 4 cycle engines.
Also, different materials have different densities. That is why pistons have different weights. And of course there are different designs for the pistons; skirt length, thickness, dome shape (hemi or not) etc.
And another thing, the rings are not at the tip of the piston. They are below the top/face of the piston. All they are is a floating seal to keep combustion mixture out of the crankcase. Floating I mean not permanently attached to piston or cyclinder wall. Ring mass is of little concern when one realizes that they weigh 1/1,000 (or less) of the piston that they are attached too.
Shear strength of wrist pins is no biggie, as the are hollow metal tubes. Change the material or the thickness per the application.
2. I am not suggesting that VVT is bad, just not needed for most applications. For most racing applications, it is excess mass (hindering acceleration) and something else to fail (bad). When you look at race engines, they operate in a very narrow power band. Torque on the bottom is not usually needed, as they don't operate at such lowly rpm's except in the pits...
Besides, it is far easier to have an adjustable valve exhaust that gets the same effect for you. And if it fails, it is still functional; which is nice for picking up points in a race vs retiring for the fact that you can't mix gas and air.
4. That is why cyclinders don't all fire at the same time.