OpenBIOS is working on an OpenFirmware-compliant firmware for PCs and other platforms that don't already have such firmware (Alpha, x86-64, and IA-64, according to their page).
Make it separate from the BIOS; but possibly on the same EEPROM chip...
It's been done. Some Tandy 1000-series PCs (like the 1000SL and the 1000RL) had DOS and DeskMate in ROM, and the BIOS would boot into that if it couldn't find a disk to boot from (or/also if the user pressed a particular key, IIRC). It appeared to DOS as an extra disk, usually D:. This extra disk, besides containing IBMBIO.COM, IBMDOS.COM, COMMAND.COM, and a few core DeskMate files, also contained basic DOS utilities like FDISK, FORMAT, and CHKDSK, in case the user needed them to fix up a borked disk.
Obviously, this guy doesn't live in Philadelphia. If he did, he'd know that SEPTA buses are never on time, and that any attempt to predict their arrival is utterly futile. Besides, nobody ever wants to be encouraged to get on a SEPTA bus on time in order to sit next to some hobo who doesn't know the meanings of "soap" and "nail clippers."
Funny:). What'd you suggest next, -1 Dumbass for duped stories?
More seriously, here are some of my ideas on how to cope with the dupes:
The Submit page should search for other posts in the submissions bin with identical/similar links as the one being posted, and ask the submitter whether it should continue posting or give up. The same should be applied to the backend, prompting the reviewer as to whether it should post the story in the presence of similar previous stories.
Similarly, when reviewing a submission, the admin backend should list other submissions with similar links along with the submission currently under review, and allow the reviewer to reject any number of those with a single action.
Given the extensive coverage given to this case on Slashdot, perhaps a better solution would have been to provide links to some of the many past articles on the subject. The user comments alone would be sufficient to bring anyone up to speed on the situation.
The mere fact that there's a 2MB L3 cache should make the processor a lot faster.
Yup, and said cache uses DDR SRAM, along with there being 2 MB for *each* processor.
I'm willing to bet that the bottleneck is *not* at the memory bus.
You'd win the bet, though this is academical. The real issue is the system bus (a.k.a. front-side bus), which is shared by both processors on a dual-G4 machine. In the case of a hit in the L3 cache, each processor can transfer the data at 4 GBps (and each processor has its own L3 cache bus), but on a cache miss the data goes from memory (at 2.7 GBps) through the system controller, then through the FSB (at 1.3 GBps) to the processor.
The new systems, while considerably faster, don't appear to be much different from the previous models that you point to. From their tech specs:
Up to 167MHz system bus supporting over 1.3GBps data throughput
256MB or 512MB of PC2100 (266MHz) or PC2700 (333MHz) DDR SDRAM main memory supporting up to 2.7GBps throughput
Hhmmm... 1.3 GBps vs. 2.7 GBps... sounds like the front-side bus on the new processors is running at single data rate, just like the previous iterations.
This is the same issue that the previous models had: the memory bus runs at double data rate, while the processors' FSBs run at single data rate, effectively half the speed of the memory bus. While this allows the remaining components (AGP, PCI, Ethernet, IDE, Firewire, etc.) to use DMA without stepping in the way of the processors, it also holds back the processors, specially when running Altivec-optimised code.
Don't blame Apple for this, BTW; this is Motorola's problem.
An anonymous reader writes "Slashdot has a story about Slashdot posters reading old news articles from Slashdot and elsewhere, and finding the same old news from last week all accessible on them. Comments? What's the strangest thing readers have found, or written, on a Slashdot comment?"
Yeah, I remember those. And, you know what happened to IBM's printer and typewriter division? That's right, it was spun off into (da da da dum)... Lexmark.
Please read before opening. Opening this package or using the patented cartridge inside confirms your acceptance of the following license/agreement. This all-new cartridge is sold at a special price subject to a restriction that it may be used only once. Following this initial use, you agree to return the empty cartridge only to Lexmark for remanufacturing and recycling. If you don't accept these terms, return the unopened package to your point of purchase. A regular price cartridge without these terms is available.
The same cartridge is used for both the E320 and E322 printers. Lexmark calls the one with the ToA listed above a "High Yield Prebate(TM) Print Cartridge", part no. 08A0478.
All it has for a video connector in the back is an ADC connector, so unless you want to buy an adapter, you're stuck with expensive (but nice) Apple monitors, like the 15" Flat-screen CRT that originally came with the Cube, which is what I'm using here.
What video card did your Cube come with? I too own a Cube, which came with an ATI Radeon -- a built-to-order unit -- and has both ADC and VGA video display ports. The nVidia-equipped Cubes were also supposed to have both ports. If yours only has one, well, that's a rare specimen. I haven't used the VGA connector, however; I have a 17" CRT Studio Display hooked into the ADC port.
As for the speakers, the only special requirement is that they must be connected to a port that can provide a full 500 mA of current; this is why Apple warns against plugging them into the USB ports on the keyboard. They're ordinary USB speakers, even if they sound like ass.
As for everything else, you're dead-on about the Cube. You either love it or hate it, there's no middle ground with it. I'm with the former.
My vote's on the Seagate too. I bought a 60 GB Barracuda IV about a month ago to replace a dead drive (40 GB IBM 75GXP... made in Hungary... gah!). The drive now resides inside a Power Mac G4 Cube, and is almost completely silent; head activity is barely noticeable, and most of the time the video card fan is actually louder. I just wish Apple had used these from the beginning, since, compared to this, the IBM drive put out a genuine racket. Kudea to Seagate for a fine product.
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It'll have taken them a pretty long time to get around to that. Why, they might even have to licence the technology from StupidaMouse.
OpenBIOS is working on an OpenFirmware-compliant firmware for PCs and other platforms that don't already have such firmware (Alpha, x86-64, and IA-64, according to their page).
Make it separate from the BIOS; but possibly on the same EEPROM chip...
It's been done. Some Tandy 1000-series PCs (like the 1000SL and the 1000RL) had DOS and DeskMate in ROM, and the BIOS would boot into that if it couldn't find a disk to boot from (or/also if the user pressed a particular key, IIRC). It appeared to DOS as an extra disk, usually D:. This extra disk, besides containing IBMBIO.COM, IBMDOS.COM, COMMAND.COM, and a few core DeskMate files, also contained basic DOS utilities like FDISK, FORMAT, and CHKDSK, in case the user needed them to fix up a borked disk.
Obviously, this guy doesn't live in Philadelphia. If he did, he'd know that SEPTA buses are never on time, and that any attempt to predict their arrival is utterly futile. Besides, nobody ever wants to be encouraged to get on a SEPTA bus on time in order to sit next to some hobo who doesn't know the meanings of "soap" and "nail clippers."
Funny :). What'd you suggest next, -1 Dumbass for duped stories?
More seriously, here are some of my ideas on how to cope with the dupes:
Should we call it Linux on the cloned iPod instead?
You guys are starting to f'ing suck (instead of just plainly suck). Get a grip!
Just wait for spam e-mails advertising "Xbox Enlargement Pills". It'll be here soon, seriously.
I head crashed a MicroDrive with a stern look.
The Magnum?
<roblimo>Whatever.<roblimo>
Given the extensive coverage given to this case on Slashdot, perhaps a better solution would have been to provide links to some of the many past articles on the subject. The user comments alone would be sufficient to bring anyone up to speed on the situation.
The same thing works for reversing strings:
The mere fact that there's a 2MB L3 cache should make the processor a lot faster.
Yup, and said cache uses DDR SRAM, along with there being 2 MB for *each* processor.
I'm willing to bet that the bottleneck is *not* at the memory bus.
You'd win the bet, though this is academical. The real issue is the system bus (a.k.a. front-side bus), which is shared by both processors on a dual-G4 machine. In the case of a hit in the L3 cache, each processor can transfer the data at 4 GBps (and each processor has its own L3 cache bus), but on a cache miss the data goes from memory (at 2.7 GBps) through the system controller, then through the FSB (at 1.3 GBps) to the processor.
Espero que los Romanos nos demanden por usar palabras latinas en la mayor parte de nuestro... Hey, waitaminute! No way!
The new systems, while considerably faster, don't appear to be much different from the previous models that you point to. From their tech specs:
Hhmmm... 1.3 GBps vs. 2.7 GBps... sounds like the front-side bus on the new processors is running at single data rate, just like the previous iterations.
This is the same issue that the previous models had: the memory bus runs at double data rate, while the processors' FSBs run at single data rate, effectively half the speed of the memory bus. While this allows the remaining components (AGP, PCI, Ethernet, IDE, Firewire, etc.) to use DMA without stepping in the way of the processors, it also holds back the processors, specially when running Altivec-optimised code.
Don't blame Apple for this, BTW; this is Motorola's problem.
It's from a Despair, Inc. Demotivator poster, "Cluelessness".
An anonymous reader writes "Slashdot has a story about Slashdot posters reading old news articles from Slashdot and elsewhere, and finding the same old news from last week all accessible on them. Comments? What's the strangest thing readers have found, or written, on a Slashdot comment?"
Slashdot: News for Sweaty Nerds, Stuff that doesn't wash.
*shudder*
who are the other 26?
Spares for the first four, just in case.
Remember IBM typewriter ribbons?
Yeah, I remember those. And, you know what happened to IBM's printer and typewriter division? That's right, it was spun off into (da da da dum)... Lexmark.
It's not surprising, really.
This is what the label on the box says:
The same cartridge is used for both the E320 and E322 printers. Lexmark calls the one with the ToA listed above a "High Yield Prebate(TM) Print Cartridge", part no. 08A0478.
Are there any Open Source luminaries that *don't* read Slashdot?
You mean, besides the Slashdot editors? ;)
All it has for a video connector in the back is an ADC connector, so unless you want to buy an adapter, you're stuck with expensive (but nice) Apple monitors, like the 15" Flat-screen CRT that originally came with the Cube, which is what I'm using here.
What video card did your Cube come with? I too own a Cube, which came with an ATI Radeon -- a built-to-order unit -- and has both ADC and VGA video display ports. The nVidia-equipped Cubes were also supposed to have both ports. If yours only has one, well, that's a rare specimen. I haven't used the VGA connector, however; I have a 17" CRT Studio Display hooked into the ADC port.
As for the speakers, the only special requirement is that they must be connected to a port that can provide a full 500 mA of current; this is why Apple warns against plugging them into the USB ports on the keyboard. They're ordinary USB speakers, even if they sound like ass.
As for everything else, you're dead-on about the Cube. You either love it or hate it, there's no middle ground with it. I'm with the former.
My vote's on the Seagate too. I bought a 60 GB Barracuda IV about a month ago to replace a dead drive (40 GB IBM 75GXP... made in Hungary... gah!). The drive now resides inside a Power Mac G4 Cube, and is almost completely silent; head activity is barely noticeable, and most of the time the video card fan is actually louder. I just wish Apple had used these from the beginning, since, compared to this, the IBM drive put out a genuine racket. Kudea to Seagate for a fine product.
Indeed, I think that the next April Fools' Day joke will be... No Dupes!
Everyone knows Linux machines never crash!
But you know that some smart-ass kernel hacker will put "eng1 on fire!" in the code somewhere.