Congratulations! I did the same thing with a similar single-core
machine a few months ago, and had almost exactly the same experience.
I think the key is to start with a fresh machine - i.e., newly loaded
O/S on blank disk. Then add just the stuff you need.
My machine typically runs 15-25%, even with HRD (v5 beta) running and
PSDR of course. Google Earth qso lookups add a bit too, but not
worrisome. The display can freeze for a second or two during QRZ.com
lookups. The only thing I've found so far that makes a noteworthy
difference in CPU usage is the MultiRx. If it's processing two SSB
signals at a time, CPU usage can get up to the 50% range. You can
reduce the frames-per-second setting on the display to save some
computer cycles at the cost of a slightly less smooth display.
Have fun!
Jack K3FIV
Point Arena, CA
On Fri, 2009-09-04 at 20:38 -0600, Michael Jones wrote:
> The $165 machine showed up this afternoon.
>
>
>
> Here's a link where you can see the gory details, the bottom line is it's a
> 3.2GHz P4, all the usual computer stuff, and includes an XP Pro license.
>
>
>
> http://www.surpluscomputers.com/348774/hp-dc7600-p4-3.2ghz-1gb.html
>
>
>
> They messed up and shipped me a 512M RAM unit instead of the 1GB that I
> ordered - more later on this.
>
>
>
> The bottom line - it worked first time, like a champ!
>
>
>
> I put in a low-profile TI-chip firewire card (the system has two free PCI
> slots and 1 PCIe-1 and 1 PCIe-8 slot - all low profile), applied the MS
> firewire hotfix, installed the Flex driver, installed .Net 3.5 - and brought
> up PowerSDR 1.19.1 svn 3345.
>
>
>
> And it worked.
>
>
>
> I'm running with smaller buffer sizes on both the driver and the audio
> settings, and I can run with higher DSP buffers than I could on my Atom 330
> box.
>
> The standare Flex driver settings worked FB right out of the box.
>
>
>
> I tried my worst-case test of settings of turning on NR, both NB's, ANF,
> everything, and there is no stuttering, just no problem at all.
>
>
>
> I also installed the other ham software that I want to use - Ham Radio
> Deluxe - the current beta version.
>
> Running that, the HRD logger (which seems to be a resource hog) and DM780
> using VAC - everything runs just fine.
>
> My CPU usage percentage seems to hover between 18% and 30%.
>
>
>
> I set the CPU affinity to let PSDR have any CPU it wants, and on this box
> I've set up all my other apps to only use CPU1. I don't know how necessary
> or effective that is but I figured it can't hurt. And none of the other apps
> locked down to the second CPU seem to care or be slow or laggy at all.
>
>
>
> Oh yeah, I also put in my USB VGA adapter so I can have two monitors. It is
> a bit of a resource sink but it runs just fine. It generates a bunch of hash
> on 17 meters but ferrites fixed that right up.
>
>
>
> What surprised me was that with only 512M of RAM and all the above running -
> plus Firefox with 5 or 6 tabs open - I still have 100M of RAM free and the
> system isn't paging! They're going to send me the missing 512M stick. I
> could probably get email up and running on it as well if I felt the urge.
>
>
>
> So I think that's pretty good.
>
> Cheap, easy - just what the doctor ordered.
>
>
>
> Best regards,
>
>
>
> Michael Jones W0STB
>
>
>
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>
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