Old Installation - 6.06 and 2.1.0

My first post.

I have acquired a turret mill that was working with an old install on an AMD box.
Simple set-up: parallel port break-out, Leadshine drivers, unmarked steppers, jog pendant, no limits, no spindle control, no install CD.

I switched it on with steppers unplugged, seemed good with a tkEMC display.
The normal graphical responses were normal and I was able to read the install details as noted in the subject.
At the next power-up, switching on at the wall tripped the workshop C/B and a burnt smell emanated from the box.

I can get a new power supply but, if I have other problems, the available similar release to make an install CD is 6.06.1 / 2.2.2.
Am I likely to experience problems ?
Should I just go all the way and install the latest releases anyway?

Thanks and greetings from Sydney,
John

Hi

All depends what the computer is and whether you are going to continue using it.

2.2.2 running on 6.0.6 is ancient now and only suited for the slowest of computers that simply won't run the Ubuntu 8.04 based distro.
I would guess that the AMD is similar or worse to an Intel P3, which I have used and is horribly slow when you are used to anything better.

I would treat the PSU burn out as an omen and 'upgrade' to an old corporate desktop P4 2.4 or 2.8GHz machine, it won't cost that much more than a new PSU
and will revolutionise your usability.

They are all over Ebay for not very much money and if you live in Sydney and not out in the boondocks, should be easy enough for you to get hold of.
1MB of RAM is adequate for a quite fast machine running the 8.04 based distro with the latest Linuxcnc (2.5.2) with all the horrible bug fixes between 2.2.2 and 2.5.2 done.

This list will give some ideas of what machines to look for, but it is far from complete.
wiki.linuxcnc.org/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?Latency-Test

Before you buy, ask if anyone else has one and if it is good.
Some Dells for instance, are heartily recommended by their users and some are absolute rubbish, all depends upon the exact model and the chipsets used etc.

Welcome to the Linuxcnc world forum

regards

Thanks,
John.