[Imc-tech] about our new computers.

[Paul Riismandel]

The A/V Mac will actually do a decent job for simple audio editing for 
broadcast.  We've used a few at my lab at the U of I for years for simple 
cut and paste audio NLE.  The audio I/O is a notch or two above most sound 
cards, especially because it uses RCA plugs rather than 1/8" phone jacks. I 
have software that'll make it a decent audio workstation.  I think it'll be 
useful for producing short radio/webcast pieces, especially since Brian's 
machine may be under fairly high demand for more complex tasks.  I might be 
able to scare up some extra memory for it, too.

The PC looks OK, too.  I have an overclocked 486 (with an AMD 5x86 running 
at around 166 Mhz) with 48 MB of memory, 1 GB HD & 33K modem sitting in a 
closet, but the power supply is kind of trashed (the fan doesn't work), so 
it may be more useful for parts in combo with the PC Jim donated.  It could 
make a nice linux server when/if we get cable/dsl/isdn.  Comments?

--Paul

At 04:53 PM 12/31/2000 -0600, Sascha Meinrath wrote:
>jim sent this to me and i thought i should forward it to our techies.
>
>--sascha
>
>To: Sascha Meinrath <meinrath at students.uiuc.edu>
>Subject: about the computers
>
>Sorry I didn't have time to stick around for the meeting. The space looks
>great. Here's a little more info about the computers I've donated to the
>IMC. As I mentioned, I knocked them together and dusted them off for use in
>the Greens office, and they've been taking up space since then, so I hope
>they'll be of service. They're basically ready to plug in and use.
>
>The Mac is a 6100AV with a 66 mhz processor, a 2x CD-ROM, a 2 gig internal
>scsi drive and an external scsi drive that I think is 700 mb or so. There's
>32 mb of RAM. I think it's running OS 8.6. There's also an external 33mbps
>Supra modem with it, and a 14-inch color Mac monitor. This is an old NuBus
>powerPC, without a PCI slot, so there's not much to be done for modernizing
>it. (they do make 'G3-equivalent' add-in boards for NuBus that run up to
>300 mhz, but those don't handle multimedia well). It can be networked with
>the addition of a $30 or so 'AAUI-to-Ethernet transceiver' dongle, which I
>don't have. The "AV" in the name refers to a NuBus card that's in it for
>very basic video digitizing (RCA and S-Video ports) - I don't think any
>software's installed for that (though maybe Mac's basic video player is),
>and in any event I don't think it'll even record audio, so that feature's
>kind of useless. As with any Mac of its vintage, it's got serial and scsi
>ports - no USB or firewire.
>
>The PC is a Pentium 133, also with 32 mb RAM (4 8-mb simms; all slots
>filled) and a 2x or 4x CD-ROM. The drive is about 1.2 gig. It's running
>Win98SE. MS Office 2000 is installed on it, along with Eudora and Netscape,
>so there's only about 700 mb free space. There are a couple free PCI and
>ISA slots; the video and audio cards are very basic ones, the $15 variety
>and kind of old. There's no modem or network card in it, but either could
>be added for just a few bucks. The 15-inch 'Zeos' SVGA monitor is a
>rebranded CTX, I think - again, real basic stuff. If you prefer, this ought
>to run just fine as a Linux machine too, assuming the audio and video cards
>are supported. It's got yer basic serial and parallel ports; it'd be
>possible to add USB or firewire with PCI cards.
>
>These would've been state of the art hardware 5 or 6 years ago - though
>they came to me much later than that via the local student newsgroups.
>They're probably worth about $125-$150 apiece. I think you'll find both of
>these pretty dependable for word processing, web access (either thru a
>modem or thru a high-bandwidth connection if you go for DSL or cable),
>basic databasing, fairly simple Photoshop work, etc. They wouldn't be much
>use as multimedia servers or AV digitizing machines, though, no matter what
>you added to them.
>
>The Epson inkjet printer works with both Macs and PCs; the bad news is that
>print quality is crappy both in black and color. I think both computers
>have drivers for the Epson installed (though the Mac may not, come to think
>of it - they're available on the web if not, or I may have a disk lying
>around). Also, the Mac printer cable should work fine but the PC cable may
>not be bi-directional, so it may not work. If not, I might have another
>better one lying around, as well as 1 or 2 off-brand replacement ink
>cartridges.
>
>Let me know if you have questions.
>
>Jim