Tim wrote:
Robin Laing:
Depending on the hardware, running Linux on it can push cheap hardware
past it's limits.
Multitasking/mutithreading can load a system more than just the old
windows way of doing things. This causes the processors and power
supplies to work harder.
I've read this before, but I find it hard to believe. I regularly see
Windows systems where the CPU maxes out a lot, doing ordinary tasks.
I've seen many where the resources are used almost to the full almost
all of the time. But on the same hardware using Linux, instead, I've
usually found that it spends most of its time being idle. Sure, you can
have some heavy intensive tasks, but that doesn't tend be the normal way
that Linux runs.
FC5 won't be burning the computers out but it could be showing the
weaknesses of the hardware.
As could any strenuous task.
I have seen problems occur on machines around work here that were moved
to Linux due to load issues. On the Linux boxes we normally run BOINC
as part of our research. Of course we put the machines under higher load.
Of course, most of the statements about multitasking, etc are based on
older versions of Windows and slower processors.
I just remembered that there was a problem with some motherboards and
bad components a few years back. I think it was a bad batch of
capacitors. It was also across manufacturers. Check Google on this.
BTW, we use mainly Fedora on all our Linux machines. Most machines are
FC4, some are FC5. The odd FC3 machine still runs. A couple of RedHat
machines for some specialized commercial software.
--
Robin Laing
