Will the RepRap host run on a 500 mHz computer running Debian Linux? What's the lowest performance people have gotten it running on?

EDIT: I got it running, so you can ignore the rest of this post. I am still interested in what low-performance computers people have been able to run on.

---- Original Post ----
I originally setup my reprap software on my laptop and I was able to get it running. After I realized this would monopolize the computer for a few hours I decided to setup a dedicated computer using an old desktop.

I installed Debian, Java, Eclipse, etc. I can run RepRap and I don't get any errors. Running the program is very slow. It takes about 10 minutes to start and another 10 minutes to bring up the Stepper Exerciser. When I attempt to use the Stepper Exerciser, nothing happens.

In preferences, I have Geometry set to "cartesian" and Port(name) set to "/dev/ttyS0". Is this right for an Arduino with a USB cable (direct USB, I don't have a USB to serial cable)?

Since I already setup the Arduino firmware from my laptop, I didn't bother setting up any of that software.
---- End Original Post ----
I had to change the Port(name) to "/dev/ttyUSB0" to get it working. I was able to get the stepper exerciser working on my 500 mHz P3 with 512 MB of memory. I tried printing a part, but I got an error. I'll work on that some other day.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/30/2008 09:19PM by mccoyn.

Ran it on a 300 Mhz computer with 256 kB of memory. Things was painfully slow but it ran. Used LiveCD 0.6

Demented

it's mb i guess

ran the live cde on a via epia 10000 recently (1ghz eden cpu, 512mb ram) well, was... slow but okay, the only downside: the live-cd ran in 800x600 display mode that was really painful!
But that is a problem with the live-cd and the onboard graphics chip, so it's okay if you install everything directly to the pc

'sid

Is the via epia 10000 one of hose mini-itx boards? That was going to be my backup if my existing computer didn't do it.

micro itx, yes 17x17 cm with everything but ram included.

'sid

hehe. Yes, Sid, you are correct that's a MB, not a kB. Oops!

Demented

I just had a look at pricewatch [www.pricewatch.com] and they have no-OS systems listed as low as $150 that might be suitable. I recently put together a Linux system for the kids using a no-OS system from ascendtech [www.ascendtech.us] for about $400.

It'd be interesting to see how cheap a system you could run this stuff on.

Well,
if we stay with that java s* (almost said a bad word, I'm sorry)
we have to make sure to use a System that meets the jre requirements.

But if we change to a much simpler Software (like let's say replicatorG) we can use a less powerfull system.
Ther was this guy claiming he'd controlled servos (or steppers? cannot remember) with some pda.
That would be the perfect system for us.
Small, powersaving, touchscreen controlled...

But we have to change the software to succeed.

'sid

PS epias start at $60 used, complete with ram/hdd and powersupply as for carpcs around $100

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PS epias start at $60 used, complete with ram/hdd and powersupply as for carpcs around $100

And for that much, you can get complete desktop machines that are more powerful than the epia and more easily upgradeable/maintainable. Unless you have a pressing need for a very compact or very low power consumption machine, then it isn't worth you paying a premium for something like the EPIA series.

As to the performance of the host software, you pay a serious price for running all that java3d stuff. Then you pay a second premium for running a window manager. Personally, I don't see why you couldn't just use a headless, low performance PC running some simple host software with a web interface. It isn't like you need serious interactivity after all.

Ru, what about for designing parts? Yes, printing a set of darwin parts should be pretty low processor impact but that isn't what most people want to do with the machine...or rather, isn't the only thing they want to do.

Demented

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Ru, what about for designing parts?

Designing and printing parts are totally different tasks. There's no reason why both kinds of software should be installed on the same machine. More importantly, the software being discussed here was the reprap host, not CAD tools.

If people want to run CAD tools, they can do so. They can find the minimum requirements for their software package of choice, obtain suitable hardware and go right ahead. If people want to run a reprap, they should not need anything like as capable and expensive a machine, which is what this topic is all about, no?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/06/2008 03:44AM by Ru.

not the cheapest, but I'm running the whole Gcode toolchain on an eeepc. Works fine, you just have to wait a bit longer for skeinforge to finish. I did upgrade to Ubuntu, simply because I needed Java 1.6 for repgcode. ReplicatorG is working for me now though, so maybe I don't need Java anymore.

I thought ReplicatorG was written in Java. In fact Zach asked me to contribute to it and I passed on that because it was written in Java.

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[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]

@Ru

The reprap is for making things...the minimum system to "print" something is much less than the minimum system to "make things." Yes it can replicate on much less than a system capable of CAD work but that isn't really it's whole purpose in life. Pretty much everyone who wants to build a reprap as far as I know wants to make their own stuff too and that means CAD work. Seems to be necessary to include the uses of the machine in the minimum system otherwise it isn't even really usable.

Demented

Demented Chihuahua Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> @Ru
>
> Pretty much everyone who wants to build a
> reprap as far as I know wants to make their own
> stuff too and that means CAD work. Seems to be
> necessary to include the uses of the machine in
> the minimum system otherwise it isn't even really
> usable.
>
Yep, and the amount of muscle you need in a PC to do 3D CAD work in less than geological time is pretty awesome.

I disagree,

It's some years ago that I had to run 3dsmax (4.2 it was afair) on that epia machine I was talking about earlier.
And it was pretty fast (for that tiny little apparatus) okay, full featured (multiple lights, reflection, refraction a.s.o) renderings were close to geological time, but who needs such renderings for a printout?

Although I'm pretty sure that you cannot run 3dsmax 8 on that machine, it all depends on what CAD software you choose.
Meshlab for example runs great, blender is okay, not great but not painful at least. (talking about running everything under windows XP sp1 with only 512MB RAM)
I didn't try aoi, because I really don't like that piece of software, but I guess it'll do pretty good on that epia as well.

(the repraphost with all that javastuff that's needed is MUCH slower than blender for example)

'sid

AoI, as I'm discovering, runs on geological times when you try to design gears. It's the boolean operations that are mostly the hangup, though conversion to STL format is pretty hairy, too.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/06/2008 12:52PM by Forrest Higgs.

Is Zach's software better in terms of performance than the RepRap Host? Cause, as Sid pointed out, we could use older versions of software for our CAD work.

Demented

... my first experiences with 'geological times' (e.g. >10hrs rendering for a 3D-scene with 800x600 resolution) were on a 12MHz-V20 with 1MB Ram and a PC-XT-Clone (with math. coprocessor and 4MB Ram) and Autocad 9 and/or POV-Ray2 ...

Now we're in the ranges of some giga-Hz and giga-Bytes, but 'actual' software consumes this resources in the same exponential rate - so your hardware is five or six decades faster, but the resolution, colour-depth and environment appendixes equals ...

Why not using 'old' software on modern 'small' computers?

I use 3DSMax6/7, Lightwave7 and some other programs which were new pre and around 2000 - maybe some even older CAD-packages would be sufficient for most tasks?

AFAIK many of the complexest mechanical and electronic architectures we've running around were designed with pre-ACAD14-packages

Viktor

Nophead, I checked and you are right, ReplicatorG is Java and requires Java 1.6, so it won't work on a standard Xandros Eeepc either. Which is too bad. I don't have anything against Java per se, but I could never get any of the recent RepRap Java host versions to compile, as I'm not a great programmer. I've been going the Gcode route simply because I can't get anything else to run.

As to the topic of this discussion, I think a small cheap PC like the Eeepc seems fine for doing the CAD for the simple type of objects were playing with. Although I haven't done much more than spin a few things around and resize them, Blender runs just great on it. I do use an old free monitor to get a little more screen real estate. Interestingly, the monitor uses twice as much power as the RepRap and Eeepc combined.

Wade

Well that's good to note, Wade! I was looking into getting an Eeepc and was wondering if I could run the necessary software on it for my RepRap. Since Blender will run on it, I have no problems! Killer.

Demented