Sharing Processing Power

[Anna]

I don't know if this is possible. I have a home network consisting of 4
machines each with Windows XP Pro.

My laptop is the slowest of the machines. I have several video applications
loaded on this pc, but they are quite slow due to the processing power of
the machine. Is there a way that I can share processing power across the
network to author my videos on my laptop?

 

[Jim Macklin]

Set up one of your machines as a server, with all files and
programs and just use your other computers as client work
stations. This would probably require the purchase of new
software.
Or buy a better laptop, designed for such uses, a desktop
replacement with a fast CPU, a ton of RAM (1 GB) and a big
hard drive.

If you have not maximized the RAM on your present laptop,
add to the maximum it will support.


--
The people think the Constitution protects their rights;
But government sees it as an obstacle to be overcome.


|I don't know if this is possible. I have a home network
consisting of 4
| machines each with Windows XP Pro.
|
| My laptop is the slowest of the machines. I have several
video applications
| loaded on this pc, but they are quite slow due to the
processing power of
| the machine. Is there a way that I can share processing
power across the
| network to author my videos on my laptop?
|
|

 

[Anna]

Thanks, that's pretty much what I thought I would have to do.

 

[Joe]

Probably more than you're willing to take on but I suppose you could setup
your computers in a Beowulf Cluster. However, you would have to install
Linux and not use the computers for anything else. Perhaps later if you get
really big and super computing is worth your while you can look into setting
up a Beowulf Cluster. The Beowulf homepage is at http://www.beowulf.org/

Joe

 

[Don Taylor]

Thanks, that's pretty much what I thought I would have to do.

Just one idea you might consider before buying something new,
and all the grief that adding more software a problem often does:

Since all your machines are running XP Pro, you might peek at
Help and Support and search for "remote desktop."

Remote Desktop was probably thought of as a way for an admin
to reach into a user's machine and fix something, by giving you
a little window on one machine to control another. But if you
read the description "backwards" you might see whether it could
let you grab control of one machine to do serious crunching
while you do other work on your laptop. And when the video
crunching is done you could reach over and grab the results.

I hope this might help
Please let me know if it works, then I might try it.
Thanks

 

[Anna]

Thank you, that's a great idea!

Just one idea you might consider before buying something new,
and all the grief that adding more software a problem often does:

Since all your machines are running XP Pro, you might peek at
Help and Support and search for "remote desktop."

Remote Desktop was probably thought of as a way for an admin
to reach into a user's machine and fix something, by giving you
a little window on one machine to control another. But if you
read the description "backwards" you might see whether it could
let you grab control of one machine to do serious crunching
while you do other work on your laptop. And when the video
crunching is done you could reach over and grab the results.

I hope this might help
Please let me know if it works, then I might try it.
Thanks