Hi guys! A few days ago I received my new sweetheart  :-) (Dell Insp. 6400, 2 x 2 Ghz,  2  Gb  ram, 256 Mb ATI X1400 graphic card, 15' wsxga LCD ) and it's like a  good dream  coming  true; my new lover has TWO cool hearts (Double Core) and it NEVER overheats; you can't hear the fans even at max load!  (Bryce uses only one core; Vue 5i uses both) I want to cry with joy when I render; it's totally silent & coool; hopefully no more lost work due to boiling processor!

It took 2 years to spare (equivalent) 1800 Usd and went through hell during that time but now the knots are loosened  and I'm back to the RenderWorld. As a reminder though that nothing is perfect in this dimension I have some tiny problem with the OS (WinXP Media Ed, aliased icon appearances ) but I can live with that until the next reinstallation.

Blessings and Peace
Atte

Congrats!!!

(had that elation recently)...hehe...still got it.

LOL ICM - many thanks!

COOOL!

awesome

Thanks guys; it doesn't mean though that I'm going to be a genious Brycer or Vue user...lol.
It's so hard to believe the difference between the overheating Pentium 4 in laptops and the cool Centrino Proc. that came out lately...it's almost like StarTrek tecnology!  :-D
Today I  ground down an old Bryce pic that was impossible to render on my old laptop; it didn't go very fast on my new Dell but the proc. stayed cool and quiet and of course it's a dream to use it for (older) games.

I wish I could say the same..;) I found backups of my originals; Heretic, Descent 1 and 2, Shadow Warrior, etc., and they won't run on Windows 2000 (the originals ran off some specialized file entries in Autoexec and Config.sys..;)

Glad to hear the laptop is working out. Now you can render on the go..have fun with it..

Try rendering 2 instances of bryce, letting each instance render half ur image. It might use both cores that way if not u can force it to use both cores using the ctrl+alt+del menu. (in processes assign core 1 to one instance, and core 2 to the other instance)

Very sexy !

attileus,

Very cool!  Keep it outta the sunlight!

I guess it's time for me to start thinking about another compter. hal2 celebrated five years of faithful service this last February. Yes I remember the elation I felt when I first got hal2.... how time flys!

Pakled,

Try running your old dos games in windows: open the file your bat or exe run file is in, right-click(hold down) drag the bat or exe into your desktop and choose  to make a shortcut. try running the shortcut if it doesn't work go into the propertys of the shortcut  find the advanced tab clck it and change to run in dos - current settings, enter and exit the dialog

if neither of these work google  for either the DosBox or Scumm programs.  As far as I know the programs themselves are legal although they have been used by pirates to run illegitimate copies of games. That reminds me - when is talk like a pirate day again? Avast!

ShadowWarrior has always been tricky do that one wrong and on some systems you're looking at an os reinstall (Windows ME comes to mind)  I think Descent 2 will run in XP and probably 2000 using one of the shortcut methods listed above.

Don't know if the bootdisk method will work but you could try making a bootdisk (dont use it only edit it) find the advanced tab again and chek use these settings and transfer the information from the edit to the config and autoexec settings. I can't get into 2000 right now as I locked myself out by messing with the admin security settings and the only way I can get in is through a trick whick only gives me user access but I have to wait a half hour for it to worky . My problem will persist until I find the install disk which I suspect is locked up in storage.

Good luck with the new computer attileus. An excuse to show off a few Bryce renders if I ever heard one!
-TJ

 

 

Thanks for your comments guys!
Now I tried some heavy testrenders both in Vue and Bryce; I have to say that it doesn't feel fast at all; these monster progs eat up my Centrinos for breakfast lol...I don't know how many proc. you should have in order to "feel" the  shorter render speed but the stability of the software/hardware is excellent! (Beware of the  overheating P4  proc. in laptops - go ONLY for Centrino! )

 I haven't looked at laptops for a while but I imagine 2g is pretty fast for a laptop although  2g isn't that fast these days for a desktop ( hal2 is 1.6g).You might be abe to give Bryce a higher than normal priority setting, but if it were me I'd leave that alone.   If Bryce took advantage of the dual core you might get more performance but  it doesn't. 

I think the less tasks running on the systray the better.

Again  a very nice setup!

well, the amount of Ghz isn't really the most important speed factor anymore these days bikermouse, two cores can be an important speed boost (though bryce sadly doesn't take advantage of this unless you use multiple instances of bryce), and also the new and improved processing cores prove to be more efficient calculators at the same clockspeed as older models.

What is a "Centrino"?

It is a type of Central Processing Unit, CPU for short. The CPU is the main calculating chip. The "Centrino" is a CPU specifically designed for use in laptops. In practice this mostly comes down to the following things:

Because laptops have very little room for air flow, it is very difficult to efficiently get rid of the heat produced by the CPU, this is why the Centrino CPU is specifically designed to produce as little heat as possible.

Also because laptops are supposed to last as long as possible on their accu the Centrino is designed to use as little batterypower as possible.

I suspect these optimizations for laptop use will most likely have a negative impact on the CPU's performance to some degree, but I don't know exactly how much slower it is compared to desktop pc's.

"Centrino" is not a processor (CPU). It is an Intel 'standard' for laptops. To achieve the standard (and the marketing badge) a laptop must include an Intel Pentium M processor; an Intel 855 chipset; and certain Intel wireless networking hardware (options).

The Pentium M processor (something between a P3 and P4 with some saucy bits that make it very good and very efficient) is available outside of the Centrino standard - even for desktop PCs. There are plenty of good laptops that include a Pentium M but are not Centrinos.

The new Intel "Core" processor is a development of, and the successor to, the Pentium M.

There is a new Intel standard for laptops, the "Centrino Duo". It includes the Core Duo processor; the Intel 945 Express chipset and the Intel PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connection.

 

Hmmm, interesting, thanks.  Now of course I'm wondering what I've got in my laptop...

Maybe this will help - maybe not???

http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

 

Nice looking piece of kit, you may be able to get the second core working bryce images by using bryce lightning with the local IP of 127.0.0.1, so you're running bryce and lightning on the same machine but different cores.

http://www.tek-tips.com/

might be of help with that (try the wiring forum first.)

It sounds like getting that to work might be a bit of a headache but then I'm not familiar with lightning. I have enough trouble trying to keep ATT,NetBlk,FCS and APN  from hackinng into my computer lately. Since I inquired into getting ATT broadband they've been relentless but because of a couple of websites lisIed below  at least found out who these clowns are: the first one ytells you what your IP address is and the second one looks up their IPs listed by your firewall

 http://www.showmyip.com/

http://www.networksolutions.com/whois/index.jsp

 

If anyone gets Lightning to address multable cores I think it would well be worth a tutorial !!

• TJ

Thanks GogCa1...interesting idea...I should try it some day! Actually, I have to rerender some older Bryce files in a larger format so I'm going to test the BL. (IP 127.0.0.1...got it,thanks)