? on show computer

[lineman]

•AMD Phenom™ II Triple-Core Mobile Processor N850 (2.2GHz)
•4GB installed memory
•320GB hard drive
•DVD SuperMulti drive supporting 11 formats
•17.3" diagonal widescreen TruBrite® TFT display at 1600 x 900 native resolution (HD+)
•Standard Keyboard with 10-Keypad (black)
•Wi-Fi® Wireless networking (802.11b/g/n)
•Integrated Webcam and microphone
•6 cell/48Wh Lithium Ion battery pack;Up to 3 hours and 48 minutes of battery life
•Dimensions 16.2"W x 10.6"D x 1.10"/1.49"H (6.61lbs)
•Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64-bit
•1 year warranty
 Wife wants me off the house computer and this is what we bought will it work for a show computer the only thing that it will have on it will be all the firmwares for our gear and Vixen and Xlights and what ever files needed to do Blinky. I can return it if its not big enough any advice will be apprietiated I don't have alot of knowledge in computers still learning also the house computer is XP home edition and this is windows 7 does that matter

[rrowan]

Hi Jeff

I am sure it work just great

Cheers

Rick R.

[jem5136]

Thats more then enough to run a show. I have my puny little show running from my netbook and I have had no problems with it, so I would say that you should be good as gold.

Jesse

[wbuehler]

I run mine from an old Dell C series notebook, with a single USB 1.0 port.  But Next year I may need something a big bigger to handle all the channels of the smart strings.

[lineman]

Thanks DLAers what would I do with out YA , One day I promise I'll be able to pay it foward, Gaining little knowledge at a time SOON GRASSHOPPER LOL

[rrowan]

Hi Jeff,

paying forward is what me and the staff does.

When I started I didn't know a thing about DMX, Wiki or Lynx Hardware. RJ took the time to explain it to me. AussiePhil took the time to explain the wiki and now I am in charge of it.

Its all good and fun

Cheers

Rick R.

[CaptKirk]

Yah, as long as the AMD processor does not burst into flame- it should work fine for short periods of time...

[rm357]

I'm using my brother's old (like 6+ years) laptop running xlights:

Gateway 200ARC
1.4GH Pentium M (single core no hyper-threading or anything like that)
512MB of ram

I had to turn off the resident scanner in the antivirus software, but after I did that it has been humming along like a dream.

RM

[Jeffl]

After having headaches this year with a home built machine I think what matters most on these machines is how good the USB ports are.

[tbone321]

If it's the USB ports that you are worried about then make sure that you don't use the lowest quality or least expensive system board on the shelf and make sure that you have the correct and most updated drivers installed for it.  You also want to make sure that it is both current enough and has enough power and memory to properly support both the OS you are using and the peripherals attached to it.

[Jeffl]

I think it's lottery anymore.  I cracked open a  HP desktop while at Sam's today and it looked just as cheap or cheaper than the unit I built from scratch.  Everything in it was off the shelf standard parts.

[combustionmark]

This is my first year doing the lights, My old laptop 1.6G Pentium M with 512 meg ram is doing great. The first night I was a bit upset that my laptop rebooted and the show didn't go off. Found out that window did an update and rebooted.
Short story.
Turn off automatic update, virus scanners, and any other "automatic updating software."
If possible disconnect your show computer from the internet.
Turn power management to "Always On" system standby and system hibernate to never.
If using a laptop make sure closing the lid doesn't shut down the computer.

Also I find a laptop to be a little more convenient smaller, portable, built in battery backup.

Just my 2 cents

[Jeffl]

For the most part a laptop is nice.  The only problem I have found is sometimes they have sound issues.  The one I'm using now has a ground loop problem with the audio so I have to run a cheater plug for power.  Other than that it does work well except for the fan is a bit noisy.