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Building a "Mini-itx" Computer... some questions
SteveJ34:
--- Quote from: javeryh on September 13, 2004, 10:48:46 pm ---I was looking at the VIA EPIA Nehemiah M10000 - it runs at 1Ghz. Isn't this enough to run most current mame games? I am not sold on any one computer yet - I just want it to be small enough to fit inside my bartop cab... It's going to be roughly 16"W x 15"D x 18"H... I'm having trouble finding a suitable monitor too... I feel like that is going to be the driving force behind the dimensions of the cab...
--- End quote ---
I've been looking at the mini-itx form for jukebox and similar HTPC projects. Price points for these mb's and components is still a bit high from where I sit.
Agreed, your cab size is likely going to be driven by monitor size and for the cost, I would suggest looking at flex atx and micro atx formats as well.
With this approach you can pack a higher ghz CPU into similar size space constraints and likely get bigger bang for $ spent.
I've built several systems around Shuttle XPCs....these are nice small micro-atx form factor box.
My two cents....
Silver:
The mini-ITX boards are superb - you don't realise how quiet no fans are vs "super-quiet-silent-mode-AthlonXP-cooler-fan...." You have to see something on screen or check the power lights to see if the thing is actually turned on (I run one with a compact flash card - no HD)
They are also ridiculously small. check out http://www.mini-itx.com/ and look at projects to see people building functioning xp machines inside a NES or SNES or teddy bear etc..etc...
One thing to bear in mind - The speed of the processors DO NOT compare to equivalent speeds of a P4 or AthlonXP. i.e A 1gig Athlon XP would absolutely wipe the floor with the 1 gig Nehemiah or whatever. But then the Epia processors probably use around 1/20th of the power consumption. So I would take up the offer from Jakobud to run some MAME tests. There will be no problem I'm sure with any of the 'classics' but you may find performance is not too your liking. It depends what kind of games you want to play. 3d PC games are also a no-no....
Just my opinion all that though!
Lilwolf:
forget XP unless your required to for other reasons. You will loose a % of speed and need to increase the memory. 98SE or better yet, look for 98lite and you will be happy.
Next...
Forget the CD... Every Epia board I've seen has a network card on the board. If you only have one more computer by a "cross over cable" this is a network cable that doesn't require a hub. So then you can just plug your computers in together and move files around at 100mbps.
Next.. Silver is VERY right about the speed. You might want to look at a slightly older mame version. Every few versions they emulate the games better (closer) to the original and remove speed hacks to make them work with todays hardware. Look at mame versions at the point where a 1ghz machine was standard.
But you can add a few mame versions and try it. But you WILL get a few thousand games that will run great. But don't expect the latest ones...
Also other non-mame emulators might work better for you. NeoGeo and CPS2 might run better on non-mame emulators.
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