And worse, Greg ..

 GG> You know...
 GG> .
 GG> It really is strange thinking of a 700 mhz computer as a classic. :) .
 GG> Doc Clu 800
 GG> On a 1.77 mhz Atari 800

I'm trying to make a decision on what MB to 'standardize' on for the next
couple of years for a major medical somewhat research project for a fair
size pile of boxes.  At least the initial work will have to go in under
OS/2 and what to specify as to hardware that will be supported for that
couple years is critical.

OK .. at least as of this point, the current development work for on-going
support for the next two years for official IBM work is focused on the
Intel CPU line.  A cooperative vendor whom I've worked with for many years
now isn't having good luck with AMD at all for heavy use with many large
clients, including Texas A&M sites with later AMD processors. So they
too are pushing me towards Intel.

The last major supported Intel MB in the 865 series is toast as to this
month now.  And the only next supported for some 3 years product line which
has conventional older PCI slot compatibility as well as what we will
eventually migrate to for on-board features from that PCI slot card set now
used is the new Intel 915GAV board.  Just out a few months back, the
originals were, so told me, called back for buglettes.  SNAP does the IBM
contract for mass video support both as part of Passport Advantage for
official IBM members, plus independent SNAP product sales to others who
want to buy their product line.  OK, a little more than a month ago SNAP
completed support for the on-board video chipset for the 915GAV and that
part of the puzzle is over.

I haven't found a current party who can tell me if the on-board NIC chip
for LAN use is supported .. but I think so.  That would clear the way to
yank the PCI NIC cards as well as the AGP video cards we now use.

An on-going fuzz is still present for support for the 850  - 97 audio
chipset for on-board chip support to take the place of the current PCI slot
based SBLive 5.1 cards now in use for audio.

We're down to only *ONE* actual RS-232 serial port on the 915GAV board. I
still haven't started to research where to substitute a PCI slot four port
serial card for the ISA based such cards we have to use for as many as
*FOUR* full hardware and hardware based line controllers for some of the
telecommunications system interfaces which all used assembly language based
hardware controllers for everything from antenna positioning to TNC and HF
radio station control..   Gloom ..

And in the scant some THREE months now since this whole research game in
the likely most realistic new motherboard to choose has started ..

   What was first a 2.2Ghz CPU went to a 2.8 Ghz CPU ..

     And the vendor tells me the only thing now available is 3.2Ghz!

 GG> On a 1.77 mhz Atari 800

Duhh ...  a 2.2GHz Intel CPU is now a classic!


--> Sleep well; OS/2's still awake! ;)

Mike {at} 1:117/3001

--- Maximus/2 3.01