Hi,
Obviously your #1 constituency isn't users of weird architectures. None of the following questions are directly related to Alpha systems per se.
Firstly, very few Alpha systems have AGP slots. The most common board with an AGP (the UP1500) has the 3.3V signalling notch, which limits the selection of cards to 9800 Pro and older, although its chipset supports AGP 4x.
Alternatively, we could get PCI Radeons, such as the X1550 or 2400 Pro. Would an X1550 or 2400 Pro on a PCI bus be faster than a 9800 Pro on an AGP bus? Application dependent maybe?
Since the 2400 Pro seems to have a 64-bit memory bus and the X1550 has 128-bit, I would assume the X1550 is faster. From a bit of research, the 2400 has 40 stream processors while the X1550 has 4. Which would actually be faster?
Certainly we can expect the X1550/2400 to receive more driver support and in turn better features in the coming months.
What about video acceleration? I've been following the XvMC thread, but I'm unsure which features are specific to R500/R600 cards and which to older generations. Are any of these cards really fast enough for significant video acceleration?
Should we expect to see any R700 (or newer) PCI cards?
Finally, we've been testing video card compatibility with this board. Our current theory is that cards with only the 3.3V notch work. That is, cards with both the 3.3V and 1.5V notches cause the system to hang on start up. We've found one exception thus far: the R200 series. Was the R200 series made using 3.3V signalling with 1.5V added on later? This would certainly explain this discrepancy. It may be the case that the 9800 Pro is just a fantasy and that actually the fastest AGP card is the 8500.
I understand these questions are not normal, so I (and other Alpha users) appreciate your response a lot.
Obviously your #1 constituency isn't users of weird architectures. None of the following questions are directly related to Alpha systems per se.
Firstly, very few Alpha systems have AGP slots. The most common board with an AGP (the UP1500) has the 3.3V signalling notch, which limits the selection of cards to 9800 Pro and older, although its chipset supports AGP 4x.
Alternatively, we could get PCI Radeons, such as the X1550 or 2400 Pro. Would an X1550 or 2400 Pro on a PCI bus be faster than a 9800 Pro on an AGP bus? Application dependent maybe?
Since the 2400 Pro seems to have a 64-bit memory bus and the X1550 has 128-bit, I would assume the X1550 is faster. From a bit of research, the 2400 has 40 stream processors while the X1550 has 4. Which would actually be faster?
Certainly we can expect the X1550/2400 to receive more driver support and in turn better features in the coming months.
What about video acceleration? I've been following the XvMC thread, but I'm unsure which features are specific to R500/R600 cards and which to older generations. Are any of these cards really fast enough for significant video acceleration?
Should we expect to see any R700 (or newer) PCI cards?
Finally, we've been testing video card compatibility with this board. Our current theory is that cards with only the 3.3V notch work. That is, cards with both the 3.3V and 1.5V notches cause the system to hang on start up. We've found one exception thus far: the R200 series. Was the R200 series made using 3.3V signalling with 1.5V added on later? This would certainly explain this discrepancy. It may be the case that the 9800 Pro is just a fantasy and that actually the fastest AGP card is the 8500.
I understand these questions are not normal, so I (and other Alpha users) appreciate your response a lot.
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