Sorry, Ian, but this is not true. It IS possible to tie multiple computers
together and get increased performance. The computers do not need to be
matched. This would be similar to having many workers on a job. The task is
NOT limited by the weakest worker - all together provide more power than any
one alone. The trick here is to have a good supervisor that puts it all
together. Some task cannot be divided efficiently, while other can. I have
seen some references to software that would allow sharing of cpu power -
most notable is the screensaver used for SETI analysis. However, I don't
have a link to the source of such software at hand. In any case, it sounded
like Randy did not want to make an expensive project out of this. The
practical response is to delegate the low end computers to tasks like print
servers, or just retire them!

Peter
-----------------------------------------------
The NoSpin Group
[log in to unmask]

-----Original Message-----
It's an interesting thought.
But such a machine could be likened to a committee, bound by a charter to
always produce a yes-no decision.  The correctness of it's judgements would
be always be limited by the the intelligence of it's least sensible member.
So it would be with a computer cobbled together from parts (even if such a
thing were possible).
All would be hampered by the bottleneck of the weakest component.

Ian Porter

----- Original Message -----
From: "Randy Worstell" Subject: [PCBUILD] Old Euqipment
> With all the older equipment out there is it possible to combine 
> mother
boards and processors like we currently combine hard drives and other
drives, either in sires or parallel and form some sort of mega machine.  And
if such a thing is possible would it be practical?

               The NOSPIN Group Promotions is now offering
              Mandrake Linux or Red Hat Linux CD sets along
             with the OpenOffice CD...  at a great price!!!
             http://freepctech.com/goodies/promotions.shtml