Re: [OT] New motherboard questions

[Jim Noble <yahoo-groups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Keith Doxey wrote

>A couple of multiport capture devices I am looking at have the
following
>system requirements
>http://www.grandtec.com/xguard.htm
>Intel Pentium II 500 or above, Pentium III 800 is recommended.
>Not 100% compatible with Celeron or non-Intel-based processors.
>http://www.grandtec.com/xguardUSB.htm
>Intel Pentium 4, 1.0 Ghz minimum
>Not 100% compatible with Celeron or non-Intel-based processors.
>
>

Those Grandtec cards are way overpriced for what you get. You could have
a quad BT878 card off ebay for what a single BT878 grandtec costs (and
thus >4x the frame capture rate)

>I am also confused by AGP slots. Are these backwards compatable ?
>eg could a new mobo with a AGP 8x take the existing AGP graphics card ?
>
>

Yes, and no. Older standards use higher voltages, so not all newer
motherboard can use old cards. There's also AGP Pro to complicate
matters further.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerated_Graphics_Port

You might want to consider buying motherboard with PCI Express though.
At least for the graphics card (a mixture of PCIe and PCI would be
useful for the frame grabbers of course!). New AGP gfx cards a getting
thin on the ground, although there's still plenty of old model stock.
Non-graphics PCIe cards are still less prevalent though.

Jim