Alpha Software Mobile Development Tools:   Alpha Anywhere    |   Alpha TransForm subscribe to our YouTube Channel  Follow Us on LinkedIn  Follow Us on Twitter  Follow Us on Facebook

Announcement

Collapse

The Alpha Software Forum Participation Guidelines

The Alpha Software Forum is a free forum created for Alpha Software Developer Community to ask for help, exchange ideas, and share solutions. Alpha Software strives to create an environment where all members of the community can feel safe to participate. In order to ensure the Alpha Software Forum is a place where all feel welcome, forum participants are expected to behave as follows:
  • Be professional in your conduct
  • Be kind to others
  • Be constructive when giving feedback
  • Be open to new ideas and suggestions
  • Stay on topic


Be sure all comments and threads you post are respectful. Posts that contain any of the following content will be considered a violation of your agreement as a member of the Alpha Software Forum Community and will be moderated:
  • Spam.
  • Vulgar language.
  • Quotes from private conversations without permission, including pricing and other sales related discussions.
  • Personal attacks, insults, or subtle put-downs.
  • Harassment, bullying, threatening, mocking, shaming, or deriding anyone.
  • Sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, ableist, or otherwise discriminatory jokes and language.
  • Sexually explicit or violent material, links, or language.
  • Pirated, hacked, or copyright-infringing material.
  • Encouraging of others to engage in the above behaviors.


If a thread or post is found to contain any of the content outlined above, a moderator may choose to take one of the following actions:
  • Remove the Post or Thread - the content is removed from the forum.
  • Place the User in Moderation - all posts and new threads must be approved by a moderator before they are posted.
  • Temporarily Ban the User - user is banned from forum for a period of time.
  • Permanently Ban the User - user is permanently banned from the forum.


Moderators may also rename posts and threads if they are too generic or do not property reflect the content.

Moderators may move threads if they have been posted in the incorrect forum.

Threads/Posts questioning specific moderator decisions or actions (such as "why was a user banned?") are not allowed and will be removed.

The owners of Alpha Software Corporation (Forum Owner) reserve the right to remove, edit, move, or close any thread for any reason; or ban any forum member without notice, reason, or explanation.

Community members are encouraged to click the "Report Post" icon in the lower left of a given post if they feel the post is in violation of the rules. This will alert the Moderators to take a look.

Alpha Software Corporation may amend the guidelines from time to time and may also vary the procedures it sets out where appropriate in a particular case. Your agreement to comply with the guidelines will be deemed agreement to any changes to it.



Bonus TIPS for Successful Posting

Try a Search First
It is highly recommended that a Search be done on your topic before posting, as many questions have been answered in prior posts. As with any search engine, the shorter the search term, the more "hits" will be returned, but the more specific the search term is, the greater the relevance of those "hits". Searching for "table" might well return every message on the board while "tablesum" would greatly restrict the number of messages returned.

When you do post
First, make sure you are posting your question in the correct forum. For example, if you post an issue regarding Desktop applications on the Mobile & Browser Applications board , not only will your question not be seen by the appropriate audience, it may also be removed or relocated.

The more detail you provide about your problem or question, the more likely someone is to understand your request and be able to help. A sample database with a minimum of records (and its support files, zipped together) will make it much easier to diagnose issues with your application. Screen shots of error messages are especially helpful.

When explaining how to reproduce your problem, please be as detailed as possible. Describe every step, click-by-click and keypress-by-keypress. Otherwise when others try to duplicate your problem, they may do something slightly different and end up with different results.

A note about attachments
You may only attach one file to each message. Attachment file size is limited to 2MB. If you need to include several files, you may do so by zipping them into a single archive.

If you forgot to attach your files to your post, please do NOT create a new thread. Instead, reply to your original message and attach the file there.

When attaching screen shots, it is best to attach an image file (.BMP, .JPG, .GIF, .PNG, etc.) or a zip file of several images, as opposed to a Word document containing the screen shots. Because Word documents are prone to viruses, many message board users will not open your Word file, therefore limiting their ability to help you.

Similarly, if you are uploading a zipped archive, you should simply create a .ZIP file and not a self-extracting .EXE as many users will not run your EXE file.
See more
See less

Computer Specs

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

    Computer Specs

    I will be buying new 4 new computers for my Alpha Five database. In addition to doing invoices I will be pulling up some photos of my products when dealing with customers on the phone. Most of my work will be generating invoices for a mail order business. What specs (memory, etc) should I be looking for in buying new computers to get the maximum performance? I already have cable strung throughout my shop to network. Also, do you have any thoughts on what is the best medium for making backups? Do ZIP drives work?

    Allen Krause

    #2
    RE: Computer Specs

    Several people will probably jump in here with minimum specs, their opinions of hard drive speed vs. amount of RAM, etc. The fact is, anything you go out and buy today will be plenty to run what you describe. Yeah, faster chips and more RAM is better, but buy because the PC is a good fit for you, not because you are concerned about how well it will run these things -- they will do just fine.

    - Steve
    -Steve
    sigpic

    Comment


      #3
      RE: Computer Specs

      Allen,

      Like Steve said, pretty much any machine purchased today will meet the needs, but 512Megs fo RAM, 2.8Ghz CPU or faster, and a 7200 RPM drive would be the place to start.

      1 Gig of main memory and a faster memory bus (PC3200 memory or similar) would be better. Faster CPU can help, but pretty much nothing other than keeping data on a 2nd physical drive will help beyond that much.

      However, I'd say forget the ZIP drive today for backup. A CD-R/RW writer or a DVD+/-R/+/-RW Drive would probably be best for most people. A number of pen drives that can hold your important data is a real good alternative, or a USB or Firewire interfaced Hard Drive for some backups.

      Regards,

      Ira
      Regards,

      Ira J. Perlow
      Computer Systems Design


      CSDA A5 Products
      New - Free CSDA DiagInfo - v1.39, 30 Apr 2013
      CSDA Barcode Functions

      CSDA Code Utility
      CSDA Screen Capture


      Comment


        #4
        RE: Computer Specs

        Thanks for your help!


        Allen

        Comment


          #5
          RE: Computer Specs

          Ira,

          I'm running a 2.8 machine with 512mb ram. The system is capable of handling 2gb of ram. Would I see much improvment in speed if I upgraded to the full 2gb?

          Just wondering,
          Jerry Gray

          Comment


            #6
            RE: Computer Specs

            Yes, there would be some difference but not worth the money. If you were curnching huge bunches of records, hundreds of thousands or millions; or if you were multitasking several apps that were memory intensive,, might be worth it but for most apps, 512 is more than adequate.

            The problem comes... say you did up it to 2GB but you had a 80GB HD funning at 4200 rpm and a slow transfer rate, this will represent a bottle neck, only so much will go so fast. So if you want to part with you money, go all out, make sure you've got a fast HD as well. I think there are other issues as well, just can't recall them at the 'senior' moment.

            I agree with Steve and Ira.

            kenn
            TYVM :) kenn

            Knowing what you can achieve will not become reality until you imagine and explore.

            Comment


              #7
              RE: Computer Specs

              Jerry,

              If you are running just A5 without all the $#%^&* stuff that various install programs and web sites install in the background and run applications 1 at a time, then 512 Megs is fine for Win XP. You'll actually see a fair amount of speedup by putting Windows on 1 physical drive and data manipulation (as in Alpha) on another physical drive. Size is almost irrelavant, but fast RPM (7200 rpm or more) will make a lot of difference, and to some degree, a larger drive cache (8MB vs 2 MB).

              If you had a 3rd drive, put Windows swap file on that. That will be the best arrangement (although overkill for most)

              By the way, I'm starting to hate Maxtor current drive's. I've had 3 separate drive failures in as many weeks. Not sure if there is a quality issue, but looks like Western Digital might be more reliable for now.

              On the other hand, a server should be really fast all the way around and have lot's of memory if serving alot of requests.

              Regards,

              Ira
              Regards,

              Ira J. Perlow
              Computer Systems Design


              CSDA A5 Products
              New - Free CSDA DiagInfo - v1.39, 30 Apr 2013
              CSDA Barcode Functions

              CSDA Code Utility
              CSDA Screen Capture


              Comment


                #8
                RE: Computer Specs

                An alternative thought about zip drives - not dissenting, just alternative. (I use CDs for long term backups and an external hard drive for daily backups.) Don't just read these one at a time; put them all together to get the rational.

                - One nice thing about zip drives is that they are relatively cheap at just under $10 for a 100 meg disk which is more than enough to handle multiple copies of most any application data once it's compressed to a zip file. (OK, so that isn't so cheap when compared to $1 per gigabyte on an external drive. I guess my point is that it is not a prohibitive cost when compared with the cost of lost data.)

                Yes, a 250 or 750 meg disk is probably cheaper per meg but who cares - we aren't going to keep that much on one disk anyway if you follow the rest of the logic. By the time a disk becomes full, the oldest 10 or 12 backups on the disk will be virtually useless and can be deleted. (That's one advantage to zip disks; deletion is easier. Of course, at less than 50 cents per CD, I just throw out the old CDs.)

                - There are still a few people around (customers) who have never burned a CD and it does take slightly more effort than copying to a zip disk. (Not much if you use the built-in method with XP but a bit.)

                - For some reason it seems easier for some people to mark zip disks and keep them in order than CDs. Don't ask me why because I don't know but that has been my experience.

                Give somebody a few zip disks. (Well, maybe they should just buy them themselves.) Mark 4 of them Mons thru Thur. and mark 4 more Friday1 thru Friday4. Mark a few more to be monthly backups. (Use one for each month if you really want to - note that this would be a total of 20 or 2 packs of 10.)

                With this setup, it seems to be easy for users to create a system where they always have a daily backup and weekly backups for a month plus a few monthly backups. (It's amazing how often problems are not found until weeks after they occur. I always recommend keeping something for at least 3 months.)

                Yes, the same thing can be done on CD or an external drive but, for some reason, this method seems to "make sense" to some of my customers. I guess it seems simple and logical so it works for them. I think they are also more comfortable with the "known technology" of putting a disk in a slot and copying a file to it.

                The real point is, "I don't care what you use as long as you RUN A BACKUP and keep a bit of 'backup history' just in case."

                One last thought - DO NOT set up your backup CDs so they can be written to like a hard drive. I don't recall the generic name for this method but it can be a dangerous thing to do. Each manufacturer uses a different format for this and those discs cannot be read with a regular CD reader - it must be a CD R/W with a program that uses the same format as when it was created. I've dealt with more than one person who has done this and regretted it later because they discovered that when the computer that created the CD was out of commission, their other computer couldn't read the backup CD - oops, big problem!

                So, no matter what kind of backup you use, make sure you can recover the files on another system before it's too late.

                Cal Locklin
                www.aimsdc.net

                Comment


                  #9
                  RE: Computer Specs

                  Allen:
                  Am I the only one who "reads between the lines" ?? or am I way off or living in my own world ??
                  [b]>>I will be buying new 4 new computers for my Alpha Five database
                  >> I already have cable strung throughout my shop to network
                  Unless you have money to threw away, You need a server, not 4 computers.
                  I build my own computers and I wanted to add few more thoughts to what has been said, but that would be freviolous considering that you, unwittingly, allowed all responders to be "rail-roaded" into your presumptive solution (4 computers).
                  You should have asked:
                  I would like to set up a mail order business that will be run by alpha software, what is the best hardware assuming several operators from the same location?
                  The answer: A Server.
                  Now the question is completly different: what are the best specs for a server and how to set it up?

                  Cal:
                  The CD formating you refer to is called MR: for Mount Rainier: while it is a newer and better technology, the downside is if your CD-RW driver is not Mt. Rainier-compliant you are stuck !!
                  Gabe

                  Comment


                    #10
                    RE: Computer Specs

                    Gabe,

                    Today, almost any machine can operate as a server in a typical SOHO environment, and the needs are not that much different for the small office, but obviously increases as server load increases (like 1000 web requests every minute).

                    So the answer about the 4 computers is to the hardware spec, not their usage. I did have a a follow up that recommended more capability for the server, but it's not a definitive need in a SOHO.

                    But you are correct that a dedicated server is a preferred choice for one of the computers. This will be almost a requirement when the server version of A5 comes out.

                    Regards,

                    Ira
                    Regards,

                    Ira J. Perlow
                    Computer Systems Design


                    CSDA A5 Products
                    New - Free CSDA DiagInfo - v1.39, 30 Apr 2013
                    CSDA Barcode Functions

                    CSDA Code Utility
                    CSDA Screen Capture


                    Comment


                      #11
                      RE: Computer Specs

                      Agreed. Hence, he needs to have one good server and any dumb terminals will do.
                      Gabe
                      P.S. : if he gets a 1,000 hit/minute: he could afford to hire everybody at alpha to work for him !!

                      Comment


                        #12
                        RE: Computer Specs

                        Gabe
                        So do you have any recomendation about the server spec. information.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          RE: Computer Specs

                          Kenn & Ira,

                          I upgraded my memory from 512mb to 1.5gb. I didn't do any speed measurements, but the improvement was noticeable. I spent $133 on 2 512mb sticks including shipping from Crucial. Not much money for the noticeable improvement.

                          My HD is 7200rpm. I will be adding a second drive in the next few weeks. From past experience, my preference is Fujitsu with Western Digital a close second.

                          Thanks for the input. I may look at a server in the near future.

                          Jerry Gray

                          Comment


                            #14
                            RE: Computer Specs

                            Jerry,

                            I'm glad you expenditure made an improvement for you. Let me just clarify that when you get your 2nd drive, The locations of the Alpha program, and the shadow directory (if used) and the Private directory all will have some effect on speed. The idea is to balance your use of track seeks on all drives, The windows drive and data drive typically being the most. Alpha will probably be fastest if you put the program on the window's drive and your data on the 2nd drive. However, your mileage may vary.

                            If you get the chance, measure your change in speed with 512M versus 1.5 Megs (and anything else you can change it too). My experience typically says the moment you cross the threshold of not actively using the Windows Swap file, you will see a big jump, followed by almost no increase with additional memory.

                            Report back any numbers and comparisons you have, so that others may benefit.

                            Regards,

                            Ira
                            Regards,

                            Ira J. Perlow
                            Computer Systems Design


                            CSDA A5 Products
                            New - Free CSDA DiagInfo - v1.39, 30 Apr 2013
                            CSDA Barcode Functions

                            CSDA Code Utility
                            CSDA Screen Capture


                            Comment

                            Working...
                            X