OT - Video Card Question(s)

Okay, this thread isn't totally off-topic, as my questions are related
to making the piloting experience more real in the sim. It's time to
upgrade the Kiwi!

(See it he http://alexisparkinn.com/the_kiwi_is_born.htm ).

I want to add a second monitor (dedicated for the panel), and use the
104" projection screen for the "out-the-window-world-view" only. This
means that I need a video card with two video outputs. "Lesser" models
seem to have a single DVI output and a single VGA (AKA: D-Sub) output,
while "better" models have two DVI outputs.

Our flight sim PC is a Dell Optiplex GX260, Pentium 4, with a gig of
RAM -- but only an AGP slot for video card upgrade. The current card
is a Radeon 7000, with just 32 mb of on-board memory, and a single VGA
port. This Dell system "only" has a 250 watt power supply, which --
along with the AGP slot -- pretty much eliminates the "latest &
greatest" video cards, all of which need a bigger power supply and/or
require a PCI-Express expansion slot.

Compatibility with an older system like this is obviously a problem. I
tried installing an ATI X1600 today (from Worst Buy), with 512 MB
on-board, and the PC wouldn't even boot up with it installed! I
obviously had pushed my older computer past its limits.

So, I'm aiming a bit lower, and looking at the EVGA GEForce 6600LE. See
it he

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130262

It's reasonably priced, seems to have decent specs that are within the
limits of my PC, and is in-stock. Anyone have any experience with this
board? Anyone got a better idea?

I've spent five hours dinking around with this, between trips to Best
Buy and time researching on-line, and I'm starting to go cross-eyed!

Thanks,
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On 19 Nov 2006 05:38:12 -0800, Jay Honeck wrote:

So, I'm aiming a bit lower, and looking at the EVGA GEForce 6600LE. See
it he

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130262

according to the manufacturer:
http://www.evga.com/products/moreinf...0-TX&family=17
---snip
Requirements
Minimum of a 300 Watt power supply.
(Minimum recommended power supply with +12 Volt current rating of 18 Amp
Amps.)
---snap

and I'd look into a card with passive cooling - _if_ possible.

#m
--
Enemy Combatant http://itsnotallbad.com/

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130262

according to the manufacturer:
http://www.evga.com/products/moreinf...0-TX&family=17
---snip
Requirements
Minimum of a 300 Watt power supply.
(Minimum recommended power supply with +12 Volt current rating of 18 Amp
Amps.)
---snap

and I'd look into a card with passive cooling - _if_ possible.

Nuts. I was afraid of something like that.

Any suggestions?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Nuts. I was afraid of something like that.

Any suggestions?

Well, considering how far you've gone with this fruit, you might
consider getting a new machine (computers are practially disposable
nowadays) and dedicating it to the kiwi. Get one with four (or more!)
video outputs, and dedicate the other two to side windows. A few spare
monitors and you'd have a simulator that would even get Mx to visit you
from France.

Jose
--
"Never trust anything that can think for itself, if you can't see where
it keeps its brain." (chapter 10 of book 3 - Harry Potter).
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

"Jay Honeck"
Any suggestions?

New (larger) power supply for the MB & daughter cards.
Save the second one, install it "somewhere", buy a normally open relay, wire
it to the first power supply and you now have all the power you'll ever
need. Run the MB from the new larger supply and the HD's and other junk
from the second.

It works pretty good, this is the way I"ve got my old PC set up and I've
never had a power issue.

Jim

You must use compatible video cards, be sure to check the
specs to be sure that you can run two monitors with
completely different outputs. Often you just split the
desktop, you need two independent outputs.

You may want to look into one of the new computers with a
dual core CPU, PCIe video and plenty of power and cooling.


"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
ups.com...
| Okay, this thread isn't totally off-topic, as my questions
are related
| to making the piloting experience more real in the sim.
It's time to
| upgrade the Kiwi!
|
| (See it he
http://alexisparkinn.com/the_kiwi_is_born.htm ).
|
| I want to add a second monitor (dedicated for the panel),
and use the
| 104" projection screen for the "out-the-window-world-view"
only. This
| means that I need a video card with two video outputs.
"Lesser" models
| seem to have a single DVI output and a single VGA (AKA:
D-Sub) output,
| while "better" models have two DVI outputs.
|
| Our flight sim PC is a Dell Optiplex GX260, Pentium 4,
with a gig of
| RAM -- but only an AGP slot for video card upgrade. The
current card
| is a Radeon 7000, with just 32 mb of on-board memory, and
a single VGA
| port. This Dell system "only" has a 250 watt power
supply, which --
| along with the AGP slot -- pretty much eliminates the
"latest &
| greatest" video cards, all of which need a bigger power
supply and/or
| require a PCI-Express expansion slot.
|
| Compatibility with an older system like this is obviously
a problem. I
| tried installing an ATI X1600 today (from Worst Buy), with
512 MB
| on-board, and the PC wouldn't even boot up with it
installed! I
| obviously had pushed my older computer past its limits.
|
| So, I'm aiming a bit lower, and looking at the EVGA
GEForce 6600LE. See
| it he
|
|
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130262
|
| It's reasonably priced, seems to have decent specs that
are within the
| limits of my PC, and is in-stock. Anyone have any
experience with this
| board? Anyone got a better idea?
|
| I've spent five hours dinking around with this, between
trips to Best
| Buy and time researching on-line, and I'm starting to go
cross-eyed!
|
| Thanks,
| --
| Jay Honeck
| Iowa City, IA
| Pathfinder N56993
| www.AlexisParkInn.com
| "Your Aviation Destination"
|

On Sun, 19 Nov 2006 10:24:48 -0600, "Jim Macklin"
wrote:

You may want to look into one of the new computers with a
dual core CPU, PCIe video and plenty of power and cooling.

the good thing of those core 2 duo machines is that they didn't use this
much power anymore (350W PSU are OK, depending on graphics and other
accessories) and don't produce that much heat than the prescott modells
did. And they also produce less noise, too.

my suggestion:
- motherboard with either raid on board or a extra raid controller
(fasttrack has cheap and good ones)
- 2 S-ATA harddrives with raid 1 mirroring. If you lose one drive you can
still work (fly) and can get yourself a new drive, so you save yourself
setting up the machine again. samsung!
- intel core 2 duo cpu
- min. 1 gig ram, the faster the better (ddr2 667mhz, samsung ... *yammi*)
- graphic card with DVI out (you'll buy new monitors later and will have
DVI-IN), ~256mb ram.
- optical drive (samsung)
- floppy (yes, you'll need one for the raid controller, external usb will
not be recognised by windows during install)

IMHO, RAID will save you a lot of time and hassle, because you'll lose one
drive the monemt you will like it the least (according to Murphy's law).

#m
--
Enemy Combatant http://itsnotallbad.com/

In article ,
Martin Hotze wrote:

- 2 S-ATA harddrives with raid 1 mirroring. If you lose one drive you can
still work (fly) and can get yourself a new drive, so you save yourself
setting up the machine again. samsung!

Another way to increase speed... look at installing Western Digital
RAPTOR HD (spins at 10,000 rpm). Watch the specs to make certain the PS
can handle them.

my suggestion:
- motherboard with either raid on board or a extra raid controller
(fasttrack has cheap and good ones)

What is your opinion of this system set-up? Would a system like this
make FSX fly? If not, what would you change?

INTEL CORE DUO PROCESSORS E6600 CORE 2 DUO 2.40 GHZ 4M / 1066 FSB
$416.00
INTEL CORE DUO MOTHERBOARDS INTEL DQ965GF DDR2 MOTHERBOARD
$153.39
DDR2 MEMORY 2 GB DDR2 667 MEMORY $426.00
IDE HARD DRIVES MAXTOR 160GB 7200RPM 8MB SATA HARD DRIVE $78.63
CD-ROM DRIVES LITE-ON 16X DVD 52X32X52 CD-RW BLK COMBO $60.00
PCI-EXPRESS VIDEO CARDS EVGA 7800 GT 256MB PCI-E VIDEO CARD $348.00
SOUND CARD CREATIVE SOUND BLASTER PCI 128 $19.00
FLOPPY DRIVES SONY 1.44 FLOPPY DRIVE WHT $13.68
MID TOWER CASES EVERCASE WITH FRONT USB2/1394 400W $68.50
POWER SUPPLY INCLUDED (UNLESS DESCRIPTION SAYS NO PS) $0.00
CASE FANS TWO EXTRA YATE LOON CASE FANS $20.00
OPERATING SYSTEMS MICROSOFT WINDOWS XP HOME OEM SP2 $99.00
WARRANTY THREE YEARS PARTS & LABOR

SYSTEM PRICE $1702.20
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

MS is dropping support on XP Home before long, but will
continue support for XP Pro. You should be sure to get the
Vista upgrade coupon, too.

Be sure the game allows you to split out the portion of the
display you want, it sounds as though you want to have just
the panel on one display and the outside world on the other.

Be sure that the video cards are designed for independent
output and are compatible with each other and the software.


A DVD RW 16x dual layer drive also does CDs, being able to
record a 8.5 GB DVD might be useful.


I would be sure the sound card will run a 5.1 system if you
want the "best" sound effects.

PCIe video cards may not work in the standard PCIe slots,
they have PCIe 16x slots for video, be sure about what slot
the mobo has for the second video card.



"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
oups.com...
| my suggestion:
| - motherboard with either raid on board or a extra raid
controller
| (fasttrack has cheap and good ones)
|
| What is your opinion of this system set-up? Would a system
like this
| make FSX fly? If not, what would you change?
|
| INTEL CORE DUO PROCESSORS E6600 CORE 2 DUO 2.40 GHZ 4M /
1066 FSB
| $416.00
| INTEL CORE DUO MOTHERBOARDS INTEL DQ965GF DDR2
MOTHERBOARD
| $153.39
| DDR2 MEMORY 2 GB DDR2 667 MEMORY $426.00
| IDE HARD DRIVES MAXTOR 160GB 7200RPM 8MB SATA HARD DRIVE
$78.63
| CD-ROM DRIVES LITE-ON 16X DVD 52X32X52 CD-RW BLK COMBO
$60.00
| PCI-EXPRESS VIDEO CARDS EVGA 7800 GT 256MB PCI-E VIDEO
CARD $348.00
| SOUND CARD CREATIVE SOUND BLASTER PCI 128 $19.00
| FLOPPY DRIVES SONY 1.44 FLOPPY DRIVE WHT $13.68
| MID TOWER CASES EVERCASE WITH FRONT USB2/1394 400W $68.50
| POWER SUPPLY INCLUDED (UNLESS DESCRIPTION SAYS NO PS)
$0.00
| CASE FANS TWO EXTRA YATE LOON CASE FANS $20.00
| OPERATING SYSTEMS MICROSOFT WINDOWS XP HOME OEM SP2
$99.00
| WARRANTY THREE YEARS PARTS & LABOR
|
| SYSTEM PRICE $1702.20
| --
| Jay Honeck
| Iowa City, IA
| Pathfinder N56993
| www.AlexisParkInn.com
| "Your Aviation Destination"
|